Nice pics, right place and right time! Can you tell what they Weyco numbers using your higher resolution pictures on the stroker and the 3800C.
Apparently Weyco Longview doesn't lowboy their own equipment, they contract it out to C&C Logging. Thats what I suspected and now you confirmed it.
Weyco Longview did all thier own machinery moving until the mountain blew in 1980 and most of the lowbeds disppeared in the explosion and susequent flooding. As they cleaned up they recovered 7 or 8 lowbeds (all off-highway rigs) from the mudflows and rebuilt and used those. During the big blowdown salvage cleanup effort there were so many machines moving that Weyerhaeuser wasn't able to keep up, and they hired Heavy Hauling Company (based out of Kelso) and Groat Brothers (out of Woodland) to assist with the lowbedding from 1980 until around 1986 when all the off-road company lowbeds were sold off. After 1986, it went out for bid and Groat Brothers/Heavy Hauling did most of the moving until the early 1990's. In 1994, Bighorn Logging of (Vernonia, Oregon) bought 3 brand-new lowbeds and took over the lowbedding for several years at WTC Longview. When Bighorn decided to slow down and sold off thier truck fleet (he did keep a couple log trucks, dump trucks, and one lowbed) in the later 1990's, C&C took over based on price and has been doing most of it since then. With Weyerhaeuser it's all price and if someone cut C&C's rates, they'd be tossed and the new dirt cheap would get hired. Rates today are so low I doubt anyone is interested in working for any less than C&C is doing it for.....
Back in the day each Longview Camp (Coweeman, Kalama, 12-Road, 19-Mile, Baker, and Headquarters) all had thier own lowbed fleet (usually 4 trailers) and usually 2 line trucks as well. Often a whole side would move at one time, 3 and 4 loaded lowbeds and a line truck all moving together in a 'convoy' type setup. It was something to see-. Some of the trailers were so large that 2 Cat D8's were moved on one trailer.
in 1990 when the Columbia River was being dredged at Astoria, one of the big lowbeds from Camp Baker was found in the silt below the Astoria Bridge. I wonder how much of that Weyerhaeuser machinery made it clear out to the ocean?? Something to think about. There's alot of gear they have never found.
The tires at Baker were all branded, and the trailer was traced back to Camp Baker using the still-legible brands stamped in the tires on that trailer, 10 years later and after being buried in the river 100 miles downstream from Camp.
