The Mechanical Handling and Storing of Material

SELF-EMPTYING RAILWAY WAGONS 5°7 and is conveyed in the Society’s boats to a transit silo on the banks of the river Aire. This installation may be considered a receiving station for the mills law material. Two bulk cars are continually passing between the mill and these transit silos, taking wheat away as fast as the boats are unloaded. These cars were built by the Society’s own workmen, and have a carrying capacity of 5 tons each. The method of loading and unloading is most simple. The roadway passes right under the silo bins, and as the bulk trucks are drawn in at one end of the building they can be rapidly loaded and passed out at the other end. By a simple lever arrangement a slide is opened in the hopper of the bin from which it is required to draw wheat, and in two minutes 5 tons of wheat have entered the car. Then the slide is promptly closed and the car passes on its journey to the mill. It is alleged that not more than three minutes are required for passing the empty car into the silo warehouse at one end and taking it out loaded at the other end. On arrival at the mill the cars can be unloaded with a minimum of labour by a simple tipping device, receiving hopper and elevator. I he lattei lifts the wheat to the top of the mill, where it is passed over two warehouse separators which deliver into the storage bins. Not more than two and a half minutes are, it is said, required for unloading each truck. There is no doubt that before the bulk handling of grain can come into general use in this country it will be necessary to devise a thoroughly practical form of truck. Ihe first cost of such rolling stock would soon be recouped by the undeniable economies incident to this system. So far as the author is aware, but one railway company, the Lancashire and Yorkshire, have provided trucks of their own design for this particular traffic. These trucks have a length over head stocks of 35 ft., and a width of 8 ft. 1 he inside height at the sides is 6 ft. 1 in., and at the centre 7 ft. 1 in., and the capacity is 1,563 cub. ft. The wheel base of the bogies is 5 ft. 6 in., with 25 ft. between bogie centres. They have a carrying capacity of about 30 tons of wheat, but have been criticised by millers on account of the large amount of trimming that is required before they can be entirely emptied. It is, by the way, alleged that this particular design was a sort of compromise between the purely bulk grain truck and a truck that might be used for other kinds of merchandise, such as cotton, which are carried on this paiticulai line. What is required is a truck of large capacity that can be securely fastened, so as to prevent tampering with the loose grain, and will automatically discharge at its destination without the necessity of hand trimming. Messrs Spencer & Co., Ltd., of Melksham, have built a truck for carrying loose grain which is provided with a hoppered bottom, but if it be desired to use this truck for sacked goods, a flat floor can be laid over the hoppers. A very good bulk truck is built by the Metropolitan Carriage, Wagon and Finance Co, Ltd. In adapting the bulk system to the conditions current in this country, it should always be borne in mind that the immense loads of grain which are carried over the main trunk lines of the United States would be out of place in Great Britain, where flour mills are on a much more modest scale than the giant merchant mills which are to be met with at certain points in the winter-wheat, and especially in the spring-wheat belt of the United States. Again, but few of the dock companies of the United Kingdom are prepared to handle bulk grain, that is to say, to load bulk cars. The Manchester Ship Canal Co. has, however, provided automatic scales and loading shoots, by means of which loose grain can be weighed and shot into trucks adapted for this traffic. The Manchester grain silo and elevator are well provided with railway sidings, being connected with every railway system running into Manchester, so that here are to be found all the elements foi a lapid extension of this system of grain handling on the railways of Lancashiie, Yorkshire, and of the