Bulk material handling is an
engineering
Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more speciali ...
field that is centered on the design of equipment used for the handling of dry materials. Bulk materials are those dry materials which are powdery, granular or lumpy in nature, and are stored in heaps.
[http://practicalmaintenance.net/wp-content/uploads/Maintenance-of-Ash-Handling-Plants-and-Pneumatic-Conveying-Systems.pdf ] Examples of bulk materials are
minerals
In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed ...
,
ore
Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically containing metals, that can be mined, treated and sold at a profit.Encyclopædia Britannica. "Ore". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 7 Apr ...
s,
coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen.
Coal is formed when ...
,
cereals,
woodchips,
sand
Sand is a granular material composed of finely divided mineral particles. Sand has various compositions but is defined by its grain size. Sand grains are smaller than gravel and coarser than silt. Sand can also refer to a textural class o ...
,
gravel,
clay
Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4).
Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...
,
cement
A cement is a binder, a chemical substance used for construction that sets, hardens, and adheres to other materials to bind them together. Cement is seldom used on its own, but rather to bind sand and gravel ( aggregate) together. Cement mi ...
,
ash
Ash or ashes are the solid remnants of fires. Specifically, ''ash'' refers to all non-aqueous, non- gaseous residues that remain after something burns. In analytical chemistry, to analyse the mineral and metal content of chemical samples, ash ...
,
salt
Salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in the form of a natural crystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quant ...
,
chemicals
A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., wit ...
,
grain,
sugar,
flour and
stone
In geology, rock (or stone) is any naturally occurring solid mass or aggregate of minerals or mineraloid matter. It is categorized by the minerals included, its Chemical compound, chemical composition, and the way in which it is formed. Rocks ...
in loose bulk form. It can also relate to the handling of mixed
waste
Waste (or wastes) are unwanted or unusable materials. Waste is any substance discarded after primary use, or is worthless, defective and of no use. A by-product, by contrast is a joint product of relatively minor economic value. A waste prod ...
s. Bulk material handling is an essential part of all industries that process bulk ingredients, including: food, beverage, confectionery, pet food, animal feed, tobacco, chemical, agricultural, polymer, plastic, rubber, ceramic, electronics, metals, minerals, paint, paper, textiles and more.
Major characteristics of bulk materials, so far as their handling is concerned, are: lump size,
bulk weight (density),
moisture content, flowability (particle mobility),
angle of repose,
abrasiveness and
corrosivity
Corrosion is a natural process that converts a refined metal into a more chemically stable oxide. It is the gradual deterioration of materials (usually a metal) by chemical or electrochemical reaction with their environment. Corrosion engin ...
, among others.
Bulk material handling systems are typically composed of stationary machinery such as
conveyor belts,
screw conveyor
A screw conveyor or auger conveyor is a mechanism that uses a rotating helical screw blade, called a "''flighting''", usually within a tube, to move liquid or granular materials. They are used in many bulk handling industries. Screw conveyor ...
s, tubular drag conveyors,
moving floor
A moving floor is a hydraulically-driven moving-floor conveyance system for moving bulk material or palletized products, which can be used in a warehouse, loading dock or semi-trailer. It automates and facilitates loading and unloading of palle ...
s, toploaders,
stackers,
reclaimer
A reclaimer is a large machine used in bulk material handling applications. A reclaimer's function is to recover bulk material such as ores and cereals from a stockpile. A stacker is used to stack the material.
Reclaimers are volumetric mach ...
s,
bucket elevator
A bucket elevator, also called a grain leg, is a mechanism for hauling flowable bulk materials (most often grain or fertilizer) vertically.
It consists of:
# Buckets to contain the material;
# A belt to carry the buckets and transmit the pull;
...
s, truck dumpers,
railcar dumpers or wagon tipplers,
shiploader
A shiploader is a large machine used for continuously loading bulk solid materials such as iron ore, coal, fertilizers, grains and/or material in bags onto ships or barges. These machines are located in ports and jetties to facilitate bulk mate ...
s,
hoppers
Hopper or hoppers may refer to:
Places
*Hopper, Illinois
* Hopper, West Virginia
* Hopper, a mountain and valley in the Hunza–Nagar District of Pakistan
* Hopper (crater), a crater on Mercury
People with the name
* Hopper (surname)
* Grace H ...
and diverters and various mobile equipment such as
loaders, mobile hopper loaders / unloaders, various shuttles, combined with storage facilities such as
stockyards,
storage silo
A silo (from the Greek σιρός – ''siros'', "pit for holding grain") is a structure for storing bulk materials. Silos are used in agriculture to store fermented feed known as silage, not to be confused with a grain bin, which is used ...
s or
stockpiles. Advanced bulk material handling systems feature integrated bulk storage (silos), conveying (mechanical or pneumatic
), and discharge.
The purpose of a bulk material handling facility may be to transport material from one of several locations (i.e. a source) to an ultimate destination or to process material such as ore in concentrating and
smelting
Smelting is a process of applying heat to ore, to extract a base metal. It is a form of extractive metallurgy. It is used to extract many metals from their ores, including silver, iron, copper, and other base metals. Smelting uses heat and a ...
or handling materials for manufacturing such as logs, wood chips and sawdust at sawmills and paper mills. Other industries using bulk materials handling include flour mills and coal-fired utility boilers.
Providing storage and inventory control and possibly material blending is usually part of a bulk material handling system.
In ports handling large quantities of bulk materials
continuous ship unloaders are replacing
gantry crane
A gantry crane is a crane built atop a gantry, which is a structure used to straddle an object or workspace. They can range from enormous "full" gantry cranes, capable of lifting some of the heaviest loads in the world, to small shop cranes, us ...
s.
Other materials handling classifications (non-bulk)
Non-bulk materials handling classifications include
palletization and
containerization
Containerization is a system of intermodal freight transport using intermodal containers (also called shipping containers and ISO containers). Containerization is also referred as "Container Stuffing" or "Container Loading", which is the p ...
.
See also
*
Bulk cargo
Bulk cargo is commodity cargo that is transported unpackaged in large quantities.
Description
Bulk cargo refers to material in either liquid or granular, particulate form, as a mass of relatively small solids, such as petroleum/ crude o ...
*
Bulk carrier
A bulk carrier or bulker is a merchant ship specially designed to transport unpackaged bulk cargo — such as grains, coal, ore, steel coils, and cement — in its cargo holds. Since the first specialized bulk carrier was built in 1852, eco ...
*
Caking
Caking is a powder's tendency to form lumps or masses. The formation of lumps interferes with packaging, transport, flowability, and consumption. Usually caking is undesirable, but it is useful when pressing powdered substances into pills or briq ...
*
Double dump valve {{unreferenced, date=April 2011
Double dump valves, also known as double flap valves or double flap gates, are a type of airlock valve commonly used in industrial applications as a component in bulk material handling applications. Double dump valves ...
*
Rotary car dumper
A rotary car dumper or wagon tippler (UK) is a mechanism used for unloading certain railroad cars such as hopper cars, gondolas or mine cars (tipplers, UK). It holds the rail car to a section of track and then rotates the track and car together ...
*
Self-discharger
References
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