McCloud River Railroad
Equipment Roster
Ballast Cars

A lot flat set up with temporary gondola sides for ballast service being loaded at the Porcupine pit. Heritage Junction Museum of McCloud, Inc.

The McCloud companies did not own any cars specifically set up for ballast service through the first several years of operation. The company instead either leased cars from connecting carriers or added temporary gondola sides to log flats (as seen above) when needed. The railroad did eventually purchase cars for this service.

1789- Dump car, 20-yard capacity, 36-feet long, wood body, arch bar trucks, purchased 8/1938. Cost $232.80 f.o.b. Mt. Shasta City, plus $31.97 conditioning. Converted to trash car in its later years. Retired 1954.

1791, 1793, 1795, 1797, 1799 - 22-foot, 20-yard steel ballast cars, purchased 9/1939 from Great Northern. Cost $165.33 each, plus $772.50 freight f.o.b. Hambone and $54.15 conditioning. Pressed Steel Car Company built 50 of these cars for the Great Northern and a subsidiary road in 1899, with an additional 450 added in 1900. These earlier cars featured pressed steel shapes; in 1902 Pressed Steel built another 500 or so cars for GN using structural steel shapes. As built, the cars had two knock holes cut into the sides that allowed long poles to be inserted to loosen iron ore loads, or steam pipes in the winter to thaw frozen loads. GN cut three additional knock holes to the cars as an aftermarket addition. A wooden walkway ran the length of the car on the right side only. 1791 ret. 1954; 1794 ret. 1954; 1795 ret. by 1963; 1799 ret. 12/31/1953.

1801:2, 1803:2, 1805:2, 1807:2, 1809:2- 22-foot, 20-yard steel ballast cars, purchased 7/1950 from Great Northern. Total purchase and conditioning cost of $3488.76. Same origin and description as #1791-#1799. #1805 ret. 1954.

1808- Five of the #1791-#1809 series ballast cars (#1797, #1801, #1803, #1807, and #1809) survived past the middle 1950s. At least four cars remained in 1977, when the railroad repainted and renumbered them #1805, #1806, #1807, and #1808; however, company records show #1801 and #1809 retired 9/1982, creating some numbering discrepancies not resolved in available surviving documents. All cars except #1808 retired by the late 1980s. #1808 built 1902 as GN #75203, later renumbered to GN #80002. Car continued to be used in ballast service at least through 1988. Sold 1992 to McCloud Railway and remains on property in 2020.

1852- 1852- Western 20-yard air actuated side dump hopper, formerly Bay Point & Clayton Railroad #100, built 1927. Purchased 1955 from A.D. Schader. Cost $864.01. Sold 1992 to McCloud Railway. Stored in McCloud pending disposition.

1859, 1860- 25-yard air actuated side dump hoppers, built 1924. Purchased 8/1956 from Bottsford. Cost $2,056.60. #1859 off property by late 1970s or early 1980s; #1860 sold 1992 to McCloud Railway Company, then re-sold by the fall of 2010 to Virginia & Truckee Railroad, Virginia City, Nevada, and renumberd V&T #20

1901, 1902, 1903, 1904- Bottom dump ballast hoppers, purchased circa 1987 from SP. All four received roller bearing trucks salvaged from Itel boxcars scrapped by the railroad circa 1990. Sold 1992 to McCloud Railway Company. Two of these cars moved 7/2013 to Mt. Shasta City; one of these sold to the Lake Railway, Lakeview, Oregon, who renumbered in LRY 702. That car moved to other Frontier Rail operations in late 2017. The other three cars remain in McCloud, one in Mt. Shasta City and the other two remain in McCloud.

1910/????- Difco air actuated side dump hoppers, purchased circa 1998 from the U.S. military. Sold Fall 2011 to another operation in California and removed from property by early 2012