The Mechanical Handling and Storing of Material

LOADING COAL INTO SHIPS OTHERWISE THAN BY TIPS 607 inclined conveyor is fitted with a Merrick Weightometer 1 for the purpose of accurately weighing the coal passing over the same. The travelling tripper on the quay conveyors delivers the coal to the receiving hopper of a telescopic conveyor carried on a travelling tower (see Figs. 850 and 851). As will be seen from the illustrations, the conveyor with its tower has a very wide range of operation. It is capable of discharging coal at any height up to a maximum of 50 ft. above the quay level or a total height of 60 ft. above the water line. It can also be adapted to deliver at a distance varying from 8 to 30 ft. from the edge of the quay wall so that any size boat calling at the port can be coaled by this installation. The great flexibility, which is a special feature of these loaders, is obtained by the very simple arrangement of making them both hinged and telescopic, so that by a combination of these two facilities the discharging terminal can be placed in any position required within the limits mentioned. A telescopic anti - breakage lowering device is also provided which can be used either during the preliminary part or during the whole of the loading operation. The shoot is lowered into the hold of the vessel until the lower end reaches the bottom; the coal is then led in at the top until the telescopic shoot is full, when it is gradually raised to allow the coal in the shoot to pass out at the same rate as it is fed in at the top by the conveyor. In this way the coal can be lowered into the ship without a drop, and breakage is thus obviated. 1 he plant has been so designed throughout as to handle the coal gently, with considerable success, and at no point of its transit has the coal a direct fall. The guaranteed capacity of the plant is 700 tons per hour, but the actual capacity is over 1,000 tons per hour. The installation was supplied by Fraser & Chalmers, Ltd. Coal-Shipping Plant at the Kidderpur Dock, for the Commissioners of the Port of Calcutta.—Two separate plants have here been installed, each as per Fig. 852. They consist of an underground hopper fitted with a hydraulic tip to unload the railway trucks. These hoppers feed the coal on to an inclined belt conveyor which in turn feeds a horizontal conveyor running parallel with the quay front, from which the coal is discharged by means of a tripper to a third or loading conveyor mounted upon a travelling tower. The plant is arranged to feed coal to the holds of two vessels lying at two berths without moving them, thus considerable time is saved from the beginning to the end of the loading operations. The capacity of the plant is 500 tons per hour, and it was built by Fraser & Chalmers, Ltd. Wall’s System of Coal Loading.2—Mr Samuel M. Robins, superintendent of the New Vancouver Coal Co., Nanaimo, B.C., when facing the difficulties incidental to an antiquated system of end-on wharves (relics of the Hudson’s Bay Co., the original owners of the mines'), from which he had to feed a fleet of steam colliers of 4,000 to 6,000 tons burden, engaged in carrying steam and household coal to San Francisco and the southern parts of California, was impelled to install a more modern system of coal handling. Mr Robins utilised the wharves by heightening and increasing the approaches, and erecting bunkers of great capacity close to the point of loading, thus pieparing the way for Mr Wall’s apparatus, which was commended by the Minister of Mines of British Columbia. The depth of the water at the docks is such that any vessel can lie safely alongside. 1 The Merrick Weightometer is described on page 720. 2 The Iron and Coal Trades’ Review, 24th November 1899.