Each boat was diferent, R.J. Beaumont and J.V.Perrin were twin boats, Built and delivered together in 1958. Some time, I had to use the Perrin and the feeling on the wheel was totally different from the R.J. Beaumont. On the tug, the control of the winch while the propeller was working was also tricky, you don't want to break the wire. Have you ever seen what happen when it breaks.... it not nice and It can kill you if you get in it's way when it snaps.

In regard to the large timber at front of the boat, at about 30 foot long it was almost the length of the boat. This was used to push the logs toward the dam. It was lowered by releasing the winch break and stopped at the water level by applying the brake again; the pedal on the right if I remember. It was called the piece (liberal translation of "la pièce") and was raised using the winch. (SB notes in one Russel brochure the piece is referred to as "the pusher").

Look at the photos, in one of them the piece is down, and the logs are piling in front of the boat. Turning the boat will make the logs slide or stick to what we called the "bunch". The fun was to accumulate as many logs as possible without jamming the whole thing in front of the log chute. I would say it was a precision job requiring a lot of attention. In front of the chute, we were engaging the boat in reverse, pushing the throttle to the max in order to stop the boat being pulled down the chute. When every thing was safe, we raised the winch to lift the piece, lock the winch break and pushed the throttle to back on and turned the boat around for the next bunch.

Most guests I had on the boat were really scared.... and were most of the time running to the back of the boat while I was approching the log chute (also called the slide). We had to get very close because the logs were piled at least 4 feet high in front of the piece and without the tug pushing, would jam the entrance of the chute.

Notice also in the pictures, the chute entrance is equipped with strong water jets to help aligning the logs in the chute. We had to stay away from the jets in order to avoid damage to the side pipes. All the while fighting the lateral current when the dam turbines were working at full load during the peak electical demand hours.

All the boats of what was called the upper dirve on the St-Maurice river (Beaumont, La Trenche and Rapide Blanc) were equiped with 6 cylinder Cummins engines except the Rapide des Coeurs and the Coucoucache. The Amisk, for example, was equiped with a 250 turbo developping near 300 hp. All the boats remotorised by my father had Cummins 250 hp engines installed and had the side cooling tanks extended. The reason, pushing at the dams was tough because the boats were continuously jammed and surronded with logs.

As mentioned earlier, the STMRD was rafting the wood with the boats using the propeller, not the winch, another reason to get a stronger engine. Rafting is what we used to do when the wind was not helping to bring the logs near the dam to be pushed down the log chute! We were going up the river with a long boom then circle the logs to form a big "U" with the boom to trap the logs. One tug each end each of the boom each on our side of the river. we were generally able to catch 2000 to 3000 cords of wood on one raft.

Only on one occasion we had to use the winch to retreive a stuck boom after a storm. I could not believe the power of this thing, pulling the boat over the ground was an amazing event. The jam on that day was bigger than anyone had ever seen. When we started winching, only two things could happen, the boom was to come or we were to go to the boom.... with the pier! That was the only time in my life on the boat that I had to rev up the engine on the winch. Normally, winching was done at engine idle in order to avoid breaking the steel wire. Beleive me, with engines that could make 120 or 250 hp, it was easy to break it....and very dangerous.

- Yves Cloutier, Ing., February 2006.

Addendum (Aug. 2006) ...To understand what logging was in the 80's, one must know that the river was shared. Logging operations were conducted during the week and logs were confined in a "boom corridor' between St-Roch and Grand-Mère. Boats such as the McNeil St-Roch were used to tow barges loaded with logs and anchors. The boat was also used to open and close booms. The logs were enclosed in booms on weekends and released at the beginning of the week by opening the booms. Opening a boom meant releasing one end to let the logs free, closing meant blocking the path of the logs by installing a boom from one pillar to another or from one side of the river to the other. The company had to clean some parts of the river and the best way not to leave anything behind was to load stray logs in barges. The anchors anchored the booms because it was not always possible to tie them to the shore.

La Trenche Dam Log Chute...or slide. Aug. 2006.