The Mechanical Handling and Storing of Material

COAL, COKE, AND ASH HANDLING PLANTS 649 Coal-handling Plant at the Brentwood Gasworks.—The Brentwood Gas- works have a small but completely automatic coal-handling installation. Figs. 915, 916, and 917 give two elevations and a plan. The coal arrives in ordinary trucks with hinged end doors; is then discharged by means of a hydraulic tip, and is deposited in a wrought- iron hopper, capable of holding the contents of the truck, about 10 tons. The coal, after being broken in the coal-breaker, is elevated to the top of the coal store, where it is conveyed by a Zimmer patent conveyor to the extreme end, or to any intermediate point of the store. Beneath the conveyor are fitted six tipping shoots, by means of which the coal can either be dropped to the bottom of the store or into the coal pockets, Fig. 913. Section through the Coal Stores at Nuremberg Gasworks. which are best seen in the cross section, Fig. 916. These pockets are quite an innova- tion, and are the design of Mr R. M. Couper, the then engineer of the gasworks. I hey terminate in such a position that the scoop for feeding the retorts can be filled from them without the use of a shovel. Whenever the pockets are empty, and no coal is being taken in, the supply can be drawn from the coal store by means of a second Zimmer conveyor fixed in a tunnel under the floor of the store, when it can be elevated and conveyed by the plant already described. The whole installation is driven by a steam engine of 10 H.P., which manipulates the coal-breaker, the two conveyors, the elevator, and also the pump which works the hydraulic tip. This installation was designed by the author.