Since the first railways were built in Australia, timber has been moved by train – a traffic that still exists today, but somewhat hidden thanks to the rise of containers.
In the old days
Timber tramways would transport freshly cut logs to sawmills deep in the forest.
Museums Victoria image MM 5821
With the sawn timber then being loaded onto main line trains for transport to the construction industry.
But by World War II the timber tramways were gone: replaced by road transport, and supplying a network of town based sawmills established following the 1939 Black Friday bushfires.
Enter woodchips
In the 1960s the timber industry switched from sawlogs to clearfell logging for export woodchips.
Initially this traffic was by road, but in 1999 newly privatised freight operator Freight Australia started to move this traffic to rail.
Logs were loaded onto flat wagons at Bairnsdale and Wodonga.
Hauled by train to Geelong.
Where they were unloaded at the Midway woodchip plant and sent through the chipper.
To be loaded by conveyor into ships.
Bound for Japanese paper mills.
These log trains continued running until 2009, when the Black Saturday bushfires burnt out the source of the logs.
And now containers
In the 2000s another way of moving timber by rail emerged – sawlogs stuffed inside standard ISO containers, ready to be exported by sea.
Logs are delivered to the rail terminal by truck and then stockpiled.
The loader grabs a claw full of logs, and loads them into a cradle.
Once the cradle is full, it is placed in front of an empty 40 foot container.
A specially fitted loader then pushes the logs into the container.
Them the forklift takes the empty log cradle away for reloading.
And so the process repeats.
Current containerised log rail services include:
- Bathurst to Port Botany, NSW: 175,000 tonnes/year by Pacific National
- Goulburn to Port Botany, NSW: 100,000 tonnes/year by Crawford Freightlines
- Werris Creek to Port Botany, NSW: 230,000 tonnes/year by Crawford Freightlines
- Bordertown and Flinders Adelaide Container Terminal, SA: Bowmans Rail
Footnote: log wagons
Moving logs by container on standard flat wagons is a lot more flexible than constructing dedicated log wagons, which Freight Australia discovered when trying to expand their fleet.
Freight Australia found a new emerging market in transporting plantation logs and to capitalise, the Sale to Bairnsdale line had to be reopened. For the log business to expand, wagons that could carry logs were in urgent demand.
In order to satisfy this demand, older disused container flats, open wagons and louvre vans were all identified as having the potential to be converted into log wagons by having their sides and canopies removed. Further checks were undertaken to determine the suitability of each wagon to support the load where the stanchion cradles were to be attached.
The container flats and the open wagons proved straight forward, however, the VLEX louvre van design had to be analysed as its canopy needed to be fully removed. The analysis revealed, as with many of the original PTC wagons, that the center sill on the vans actually took 95+ % of the load.
The cradle frames for the logs were then designed so that they could be huck bolted onto the various wagon classes, this allowed for easy replacement if damaged and the ability to convert these wagons back to container flats if the need arose.
Flexibility and the ability to convert wagons readily for any commodity was a bonus for these wagons however, unlike previous log wagons built, these wagons were not fitted with bulkheads. To fit bulkheads to these wagons would mean excessive extra costs, shorten their effective carrying load length and reduce their flexibility. To enable these wagons to be accredited for operation in Victoria, Freight Australia had to demonstrate the safe securing of the logs namely in the longitudinal direction without bulkheads being fitted.
The ROA Manual of Engineering Standards and Practices requires an overall load sustaining minimum capacity in the longitudinal direction equal to the gravity force of the load multiplied by 4. i.e. survive a 4G de-acceleration. Freight Australia demonstrated the safety of these wagons, loaded with logs and why bulkheads were not required by: –
• Carrying out impact trials of Log wagons to determine the load movements at speeds between 8kph to 15kph. These dramatic test could not replicate 4G as to do so would have meant destroying a wagon however, it did demonstrate the controlled way the load shifted. The mass of the logs tied down and jammed between the stanchions and the friction between the logs meant the log movements were contained within the outline diagram and none of the logs broke away from their total mass;
• Modelling the forces and the loads required to move the loaded logs between the stanchions and calculating the sufficiency of the log restraining systems;
• Reviewing other Log Transporters and their practices. This included the American Railroads, who are governed by the AAR guidelines, and more importantly our competitors in the road industry who follow the Department of Transport Guidelines. Both operations aren’t required to operate their vehicles with bulkheads.
Further reading
I wonder how the logs are unloaded from the containers at the other end. They look like they’re packed in fairly tightly in those photos.
When I was at FCL Transport we did a trial of shipping tree ferns in a refrigerated container on a tipper wagon for a nursery in Moorabbin. The ferns settled so much on the journey that they jammed in solid and wouldn’t tip out. Eventually the nursery’s forklift was brought over to unjam them but the tynes damaged several of the ferns and even so it took 45 minutes to unload them.
I guess timber isn’t as squashy as tree ferns so it’s probably not as big an issue.
I’m thinking they might use a container tipper:
https://www.google.com/search?q=container+tipper&tbm=isch
I’m guessing that while the logs themselves are packed tightly enough against each other, they are smooth enough that they’ll slide against the sides of the container on the way out.
Very interesting Marcus!
I’ve always been interested in the trains that ran to mount gambier and the Millicent Kimberly Clark (previously known as Apcel) mills from Victoria up until the mid 90s when the broad gauge was cut from the standard gauge. From memory coal briquettes were sent to the pulp mill boiler (from where?). and paper sent back in VR vans. From what I understand now all the pulp is imported. But into where, Melbourne / Portland / Geelong? Must be a massive task to haul the pulp in and paper out by road. What a shame rail can no longer serve this mill.
I’ve found some more details about rail traffic to the Kimberly-Clark factory at Millicent here:
https://www.railpage.com.au/f-p1546449.htm
https://www.railpage.com.au/f-p906325.htm
And here’s a 1977 photo of the Mt Gambier freight – plenty of box vans in the consist:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/gcargeeg/3732652091/
But plenty of other general freight as well:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/markcarter/15268237968
Paper was railed from South East SA to Melb, Sydney and Park Road (Brisbane). I may have some details filed somewhere from a survey that I did back in the 1980’s. The briquettes for mill boilers came from Latrobe Valley in Vic. Some cement traffic and empty wagons also passed between Vic (Fyansford) and Adelaide via Mt. Gambier, because (I think) it helped balance out train loads, with empty cement pots back from Adelaide to the Mount, then the empty wagons plus loaded paper and chipboard into Vic. Likewise loaded cement and briquettes and empty flats and vans for the paper and chipboard ex Vic to SA. Around 1 million tonnes of traffic on rail in and out of Mt.G at that time.
Total madness that funds were not provided as part of the One Nation conversion of western Vic to SG. From memory, at that time, it was about another $8-10 million to convert Heywood – Mt.Gambier. V/Line Freight did the sums and under the leadership of Marinus van Onselen, convinced the feds to fund converting Dimboola – Yaapeet and Murtoa – Hopetoun with a fairly simple calculation that showed that local, state and federal governments would be up for far greater expenditure to upgrade and maintain the roads to handle the traffic if they did not spend less to convert the rail lines, so the money came very quickly! Lined up the combined support of local councils, grain growers, etc, to lobby for the funding. Shows how it can be done!
Late 90’s, I was involved in a look at converting Mt. Gambier – Wolseley to sg, but governments, both labor and liberal in SA and their bureaucrats have no interest nor understanding of rail these days. Was an easy relatively cheap project and could then be run as a short line trundling up from MT.G to interchange loading in and out, east and west at the national Meld -Adl line.
Thanks for the extra info Michael – I knew that the western Victoria branch lines being a late addition to the gauge conversion project, but didn’t realise how cheap Mt. Gambier could have been.
I know this is a 2019 post and now 2024 but I’m interested in any information about log trains from Mt Gambier, interesting to read that there was substantial tonnage on the Heywood- Mt G Line, yet officially the tonnage was reported as low volume, yet a video of the last trains in the area show a different story. I’d to know more of Marius van Onselen.
I am preparing a case to reopen the Heywood – Mt Gambier line based on a P3 arrangement. All other attempts have failed because of the reliance of funding from the two States and Australian Governments including the submission put forward by the Limestone Coast RDA to Infrastructure Australia, to date nothing has been heard.
I am contacting a number of organisations, businesses and selected individuals to form a Consortium that would include Public participation ( some form of funding or support) and private funding and development.
The latest news is that the rail line can only go as far as Glenburnie due to the anti rail stance from the City of Mt Gambier but that will change whether they like it or not in the future.
One update since I wrote this is Qube Logistics taking over the operation of a weekly intermodal service from Bordertown to Melbourne since October 2023.
https://www.facebook.com/westernvicrailfan/posts/pfbid034PRwSY3jeHPCXrbfm1dyaEJYjZvpntR9K1aqXwUVg49STizWfefGmqUP5WZkBAbDl
This is good news as Qube previously sent export meat and wine from Naracoorte to Melbourne by road, another reason why the line should reopen as far as Naracoorte for the time being
Heywood – Mt. Gambier sg conversion cost in 1995 would be around somewhere, but I guess comparable per km to the Yaapeet and Hopetoun conversions. Those costs will also be around, but no time to dig them up. I have a vague idea of $40 million, but it may have been much less?
$40 million yet discarded by the then Premier Dean Brown as his interest only was Adelaide based ventures.
Latest cost is now $150 million