The Mechanical Handling and Storing of Material

CHAPTER XXIV ROPEWAYS Modern industry has made the widest use of ropeways (which are probably the oldest form of conveyor, except the worm), as that method of handling material is termed, which consists of drawing buckets or skips on ropes, and by means of ropes such buckets being filled with the material to be handled, and being automatically or otherwise discharged. In this and the two following chapters is given a succinct description of all the principal systems of rope and cable haulage, with some account of the various purposes to which ropeways and aerial cableways are applied. Ropeways may be divided into three sections :— 1. Ropeways proper, for conveying purposes only. 2. Cableways, which convey and hoist the material at the same time (see Chapter XXV.). 3. Appliances for coaling at sea (see Chapter XXVI.). The origin of ropeways is, like that of many other flourishing institutions, lost in the mists of antiquity; but it seems quite possible that this means of transporting material was practised by the ancients, who had made more progress in engineering than they are often credited with. It may be objected that no traces remain of these ropeways, if ever they existed. It must be borne in mind, however,, that then, as now, ropeways were often essentially transitory works, erected for special purposes, and bound to disappear as soon as the needs that called them into existence had passed away. Moreover, ropes are not objects that are calculated to defy the effects of time, especially hemp ropes which must have been used. A curious old print (see Fig. 387) gives a graphic delineation of a ropeway that was erected by a Dutch engineer, Adam Wybe, of Harlingen, for the city of Dantzig in 1644. This ropeway connected the city ramparts with a hill outside the town known as the Bischoffsberg. A single endless rope was passed over pulleys suspended on high posts, two of which were embedded in the city moat. The rope carried a number of rather diminutive buckets, which were filled with earth on the hill, and were discharged at a certain point on the ramparts. Probably the earth was used for strengthening the forti- fications. The empty buckets were returned to the starting point on the same rope, which ran back on another line of posts. This was simply an endless rope running between two not very distant points. The modern ropeway may be said to date from the adoption of wire ropes. It is a remarkable fact that, although, as already stated, wire ropes were known to the Romans eighteen centuries ago, they were not, with a few exceptions, pressed into the service of modern engineering till the nineteenth century was well advanced. The practical use of twisted wire rope seems to be of no earlier date than the thirties; they are reported to have been used in England in 1832. The pioneer in this field is believed to have been a German engineer, Professor Albert, of Clausthal, who introduced these wire cables into his native land in 1834. 263