How much time after a car was spotted did it take to unload it. I am interested in the 1960’s using the kind of mechanical unloading equipment available during that time period. Others might be interested in other eras.
I would think a box car and a reefer would require the same amount of time. But there might have been certain products that were either very easy to unload or more difficult. Any examples?
Thanks
the most recent demurrage table i have seen gives the customer 1 free day to load and 2 free days to unload a car. demurrage charges and free time begin at the first 7 am after the car is spotted. they are not commodity specific and exclude sundays and holidays. the first 3 days after expiration of free time show a charge of 35 dollars a day going up to 50 per day after that.
years ago, shippers and consignees were in no hurry since demurrage charges were often less that a dollar a day and the when the PRR raised them to 5 buck a day in 1916 it was big news.
grizlump
Bob,
Back in the 50/60’s, a shipper or consignee was given 72 hours to load/unload a freight car. Unloading a boxcar full of dimensional lumber to take some time on a hot summer day. reefers were usually unloaded faster(less cubic volume) and the cargo needed to stay cold. During the 60’s, this started to change for certain high value freight cars. IIRC, back in the 60’s, car rental was something like $6/day for a typical boxcar. This had been that way for many years and some railroads found it cheaper to pay car rental than build/buy their own freight cars. This resulted in car shortages, and car hire/rental costs started rising. Some ‘specialty’ cars were the first to have special charges added.
Current charges for ‘per diem’ and ‘dumurrage’ are a complicated set of charts now.
The charges were needed for excessive time unloading cars because some receivers would store inventory until needed. Perishable freight like meat and produce was unloaded immediately to ward off spoilage and save on icing a car in storage. Freight that needed special handling like live animals or heavy liquids had special handling and people that catered to the loads specifically. Some tank cars were fitted with heater coils to heat the liquids for faster unloading. Special vibrating and tipping tracks for hoppers. Vibrators were used to unstuck frozen loads. Some early box cars were fitted with grain doors and hauled grain that was blown in with air and unloaded with man and shovel.
Sometimes there were contracts between the railroad and receiver/shipper. Sometimes unloading or loading times were extended or demurrage charges were null. For example a lumber yard that also sold coal for winter heating. They would hold on to the hopper of coal and use it as inventory storage during the heating season so the customers will have coal when needed and not rely on the railroad to deliver in time. In order for that to happen the shipper/receiver would contract with the railroads. The paper industry have always used the railroads for short term storage. It was quite common to find box cars full of paper sitting on sidings for weeks at a time.
Pete
I need to rephrase. I know the railroad allowed a specific amount of time, 24 - 48 hours. My question is what was the actual unload time?
For example I worked as the receiving manager of a furniture company that did receive car at a local team track once in a while. We could unload a car in about 6 hours but that included traveling both ways about 3 or 4 times.
Would I be about right to estimate a well equiped and maned dock could unload a car in 2 hours?
I think I might have answered my own question. In this example the product, furniture, is nicely boxed and stacked in the car. Would there be any product that might be easier or harder to unload?
The example of unloading lumber in the summer is good. In the 60’s was lumber (veneer) unloaded by hand or were forklifts and/or pallet jacks used?
It probably depends heavily on the size of the receiving business.
In the mid-70’s, at my uncle’s rather small lumber company (Hatley Lumber Company), recalling as best I can from “tween-age” memory, it typically took up to 2-3 days to unload a boxcar of dimensional lumber (a REAL event, as you might imagine, for me to observe!) It would depend on a lot of variables:
How busy were the workers (demurrage was a concern, something I didn’t really understand the significance of, but he said he would rather have people making him money by making deliveries/loading customers purchases, than unloading the car.)
How jam-packed the car was; sometimes, if the load was “right”, they would actually lift the smallest forklift in through the open door. Other times, they would need to work entirely from the ground, lifting/pulling one end of a bundle to get it in front of the door so the big lifts could work it out.
Whether any bundles had broken; if they were, either that bundle would need to be removed piece-by-piece, or re-strapped (I learned a couple of interesting new words, watching the workers trying to get a new strap around the end of the bundle if it was not very acces
Having unloaded boxcars during summer vacation I will share my experiences…
1.If a boxcar was unloaded by hand then you are looking at 4-5 hours.It takes that long because you are basically unloading 2 1/2 truck trailers…Not to mention there are hundreds of boxes that needs to be re stacked onto pallets.
2.Unloading lumber is time consuming and will take about 1 1/2 days.Remember you are handling each board and re stacking and then banding each stack and you will take extra breaks because of the heat and dust inside the car…
3.Unloading by forklift takes about about 1-1 1/2 hours for most products.
As far as floor jacks…You would use these while unloading by hand…
The hardest thing to unload from a boxcar is lumber…
There was/is a pay incentive called (IIRC) timed pay by the board foot …If the unloading crew-usually 4 men-gets this rate the faster they unload the lumber the m
i once unloaded a bad order car load of pipe in about 5 seconds, if that counts. waved a big kick sign and then dropped my lantern and broke it so i couldn’t give a stop signal. amazing how far those big buggers will roll when the bands and stakes break.
seriously, it would be interesting to hear from some old heads who worked around freight houses back when the railroads still had lcl business. i came on the scene a little too late to observe that activity. i believe most of the gangs were on a tonnage rate so they probably hustled for an early quit or extra $$$. no doubt the boss would assign the cars with a few heavy items to his favorites. he got to see the waybills before they started unloading the inbound.
grizlump
The year: 1966. The month: August. The temperature: 90+. The humidity: about the same, no breeze. The car: 40’ boxcar. The product: bulk rock salt, full load. Mechanized equipment: 5 yard dump truck (load from car, haul 5 miles to plant, unload to salt bin). Other equipment: two scoop shovels, one wheelbarrow. Personnel: myself and one of the town drunks (sorry, no PC terminology in 1966). Incidental supplies: approximately 2 six-packs of PBR per person per day. Unload time: two LONG days (I think; it’s a bit hazy). Not an experience I’d care to repeat, and one not likely to be recalled in a fit of nostalgia. Gary
I have to agree with Brakie. Having unloaded hundreds of cars both floor load and palletized. A 2 man crew would unload 2 cars and load one back in a 8 hour shift. That included putting the pallet loads into stock locations in the warehouse.
Loading cars depended on the freight to load. case goods went fairly fast if palletized. drums and 5 gallon pails on pallets took longer as they had to be blocked in to prevent shifting when the car was humped in the yard.
Dunnage was plywood sheets and corrugated void fillers. A lot of cars has cross members to secure the load in place back in the 50s and 60s. The cross members could be difficult to take out and put in at times. Cross members sercured/latched into rails on the railcar sides. You had to watch your fingers when working with cross members.
Our company used insulated plug door cars as we has freezable goods. We also had a lot of leased cars that painted in our company colors. Needless to say our company cars were a joy to work with compared to a pool cars we would have to unload.
griz,When I was a kid I would go to NYC’s freight house in Columbus and watch the railroad action from that vantage point.I know those guys was in no big hurry unloading fully loaded boxcars-this boxcars was for several industries to include Hertz Printing…I suspect the LCL was long gone by 1955-yes,I was 7 years old when I started these highly unauthorized solo railfan trips in '55…The lure of steam locomotives,brand new shiny diesel locomotives was to much of a temptation for a young lad that would rather watch trains then play sand lot baseball or play cowboys with his friends…
The spur / branch line I grew up alongside served a couple of construction related businesses at the end of the line (a company that received various types of stone, crushed rock and concrete, and a couple of lumber yards) back in the early sixties when building of new houses was still booming. At that time the railroad (MN&S) generally ran two trains a day up the line, and I assume that in some cases they would drop off a couple of loaded cars at a business in the morning and pick up the empties in the afternoon…perhaps delivering another loaded car or two at the same time.
I do remember reading about someone working unloading lumber who was very happy to discover the 50’ boxcar the lumber was in was an automobile box with end doors (where the whole end opens up so cars can just be driven in the end). He noted that he and another man were able to unload the car in an hour or two and then take a long break, since their boss had expected it to take several times longer for them to unload the car.
Stix,A 50’ double door boxcar was easier to unload lumber from as well because you had more open door space then a 40 footer with a 10’ door.
All to sadly it seem every boxcar of lumber I unloaded was a 40 footer.