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I have just a quick question as to which rolling stock piece i should get as a by-product carrier from my industry.
Which piece of rolling stock should i use for hauling saw dust, defected pieces of 2x4s and various other pieces?
should i use a regular wood-chip car, a covered hopper, or even a hopper car with maybe a tarp on it or something? my layout it set in the '70s so there shouldnt be a problem with rolling stock not up to date or anything. i also will probably have a tractor loading it on or i'll get a chip loading tower from Walthers.
You can use all of the above. Sawdust would usually be hauled in open hoppers covered with a tarp to keep the sawdust inside. Depending on the amount, a wood chip hopper would be used. Some specialty types of sawdust, used to make hardwood laminates, are kiln dried and hauled in covered hoppers to keep the sawdust dry.
Things like defective lumber and end pieces are almost never hauled by rail. They are turned back into wood chips and then hauled by truck to either local industries or landscaping wholesalers. The value of the load is too low to justify much movement by rail.
I'm not sure what industry you're modeling so it's hard to give more suggestions. Generally, wood chip cars are used to haul the material from the field to paper and cardboard plants. Most of the chipping is done as a byproduct of lumbering and the wood chips are hauled by trucks to a loading bin for rail shipment if there are no nearby mills.
oh, my industry is a barrel factory. the Clyde and Dale barrel factory from woodland scienics. Is there and easy way to make a tarp? or do modellers sell them?
You can also use blue painters tape to make a passable looking tarp.
A barrel factory would get no wood chip cars in and really not produce much waste. You'd be looking for lumber cars like bulkhead flat cars to haul in finished lumber to the plant. Boxcar loads of strap steel or copper staves might also be part of the mix, depending on the type of barrel. You'd be shipping out barrels in boxcars after they were loaded and strapped down to pallets at the factory. Any scrap wood left over would usually be sold on the local firewood market or used to fire the plant boiler, since a lot of steam is required to produce barrels. Sawdust would be sold for use in the local landscape market. It would take a huge barrel factory to require any rail service to ship waste product out.
Looking at the size of that industry, I would bet that they either burned the sawdust or shipped via truck. There just wouldn't be that much dust created, probably not much different than a cabinet shop. The scraps would be hardwood and again, not that much because of the expensive cost of the wood. I hate to give that to you, but you still should be able to generate plenty of traffic shipping the barrels, receiving the rough cut wood staves, banding materials, etc.
If you still are intent on having this, you could get the Walthers Bulk Transfer conveyor #933-3519 and have it come out of the basement into an open hopper, chipper would be assumed in the basement. When I worked for Hammermill, all our chips were shipped via open hoppers; sawdust by covered trailer truck (until we burned it in our kilns furnace.).
Sawdust would usually be hauled in open hoppers covered with a tarp to keep the sawdust inside. Depending on the amount, a wood chip hopper would be used. Some specialty types of sawdust, used to make hardwood laminates, are kiln dried and hauled in covered hoppers to keep the sawdust dry. 
