BULK HANDLING OF WHEAT

Press, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 26634, 21 January 1952, Page 6

BULK HANDLING OF WHEAT

MECHANICAL METHODS USED IN VICTORIA IMPRESSIONS OF MR J. B. CULLEN The handling of wheat in Australia by mechanical methods from the standing crop to the mill, thus effecting a saving In labour and sacks as well as eliminating any delay in discharging, impressed Mr J. B. Cullen, managing director of Mid-Canterbury Transport, Ltd, (Ashburton), who returned to New Zealand by air during the weekend after spending two weeks in Victoria. Mr Cullen considers that these methods of dealing with wheat in bulk could very well be adopted in Canterbury and would be of great advantage to the industry. With the Victoria State superintendent Of the Australian Wheat Board (Mr C. R. Beere), Mr Cullen travelled about 1000 miles visiting more than 30 bulk bins and silos and observing the modern methods of bulk handling. “When I arrived in Victoria the harvest was in full swing and the system of handling was simple and impressive,” said Mr Cullen in an interview with “The Press” at Ashburton Mr Cullen said hd saw about 600 acres of wheat being harvested on a farm at Cannum by methods very similar to those described in an article in “The press” on Saturday. In another method of handling, the grain was unloaded from the header in unsown bags and was stood up in heaps around the paddock. A motorlorry fitted with a bulk well-type container capable of handling six or seven tons Of grain, and with a mechanical loading attachment, moved around the paddock and lifted the bags from the ground and tipped them into the truck. The complete cartage job .from the field to the silo or bulk bin was carried out by the driver of the vehicle. In New Zealand at the present time the same job is done by three men. Where bulk storage was not available, said Mr Cutyen. the bags were sown and then carted by ordinary flat deck lorries fitted with various types of hoists for loading. In most cases the loading was done by manpower as in New Zealand. The bagged wheat was carted to rail sidings where it was stacked alongside the railway line and the stacks were surrounded by a mouse-proof fence about two feet high. Bulk Bln Storage At Dunolly, Mr Cullen said he saw a huge bulk bin with a storage capacity of io to 11,000,000 bushels. It was built for emergency storage during the war and is of corrugated iron and covered about 10 acres. He said wheat could be received from motor-lorries either in unsown bags, in bulk or by rail. The intake rate from the railway was about 240 tons an hour. Wheat was discharged from railway trucks through a grill into a pit below rail level from where it was raised by a bucket-type elevator belt to a tower. From there it was conveyed by belt into the interior of the bln.

For motor-lorries there were two receiving units of the belt-conveyor type which took the wheat to a thrower. The wheat was then thrown in an elevated stream similar to water from a fire hose, about 100 feet into the in< terior of the building. Delay in discharging was completely eliminated At one silo he saw a lorry emptied of Seven and a half tons Of Wheat ie four minutes. At a later stage wheal was taken m specially constructed railway wheat waggons from silos and the bulk blns to flourmills or to ports for export. Large concrete silos as well as bulk bins were erected at strategic points throughout the wheatgrowing area, Mr Cullen said. The bulk blns were of friuch cheaper construction than sllds and it would not be long before they replaced the bag stacks. Of 39 flourmills in Victoria, 21 handled wheat entirely in bulk and the remainder accepted the grain in bulk as well as in bags, “in recent years there has been a tremendous revolution in Victoria in handling wheat from Standing crops to flourmills,” said Mr Cullen.