Concentrated Pallet Bodie
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c By Use o
The Second of Two Articles Dealing With B.R.S. Traffic Movements for the Motor Industry
By P. A. C. BROCKINGTON,
A.M.I.Mech.E.
THROUGHPUT of complete car-body 'shells at the Long Lane "pallet park' of British Road Services' Oxford Branch averages about 8,000 a week. Both the collection and delivery of shells are closely co-ordinated with the input and output of production lines in the Oxford, Birmingham and Coventry areas. A temporary supply failure, or hold-up of completed shells, at a factory would result in the closing down of the production line.
This traffic represents probably the most outstanding example in the country of the application of pallet bodies to increase the use of vehicles and the flexibility of the fleet. Moreover, it reduces the " buffer " storage space required and offers many other detailed advantages, as well as a substantial reduction in overall running costs per ton-mile.
, In terms of the number of prime movers needed for the carriage of a given number of body shells, vehicle utilization has increased more than twofold since 1956. The facility with which pallet bodies can be interchanged between vehicles of different types frequently enables a prime mover that is normally employed for specialized body-shell traffic to be used for transporting cased C.K.D. parts, body components, raw materials or general goods. About 52 prime movers are normally engaged on trunk runs with car bodies to and from the Midlands.
Because of the acute shortage of space in industrial areas, no provision can be made at the end of a production line to store car bodies. The speed of production is suc that it is not normally possible to provide space for prc duction covering a period of more than 20 minutes, s. that continuous clearance is essential. In effect, the cat riage of bodies between the supplier and the produce represents an all-important production process, and transport breakdown is as serious as failure of th assembly line.
Variations in body types and in the working hours of ifferent factories exacerbate the transport problem. Outrard traffic from the Oxford area and inward traffic from le Midlands are keyed to the manufacture of body shells y the Pressed Steel Co., Ltd., for the British Motor Cororation, Rootes. Jaguar, Standard, Daimler, Rover and ther vehicle makers, and the production.of body pressings y B.M.C. factories in the Midlands destined for assembly .1 the Corporation's Oxford works.
Production by the Pressed Steel Co. is concentrated in a day shift from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. and in a night shift from 8.30 p.m. to 7 a.m., whilst the assembly lines of the Midland car manufacturers are normally in operation throughout the 24 hours. This unbalance in working hours also applies to return traffic. B.M.C. body production is on a 24-hour basis, whereas work at the assembly line at Oxford continues between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. and from 8.30 p.m. to 7 a.m.
A few years ago these complex factors resulted in thr. immobilization of vehicles and trailers for many hours of the working day to provide buffer storage for the production lines. Body shells produced at the Pressed Steel works are now loaded on the pallet bodies of shunting vehicles. which are transferred to the pallet park for temporary storage after unloading by an S.D. Freightlifter fork-lift truck capable of handling a load of 71 tons. Unloading occupies about 1+ minutes, and a body pallet can be reloaded on a trunk vehicle in about 2;. minutes.
The latest type of body pallet is equipped with a superstructure having adjustable support bars, and the pallet can be employed for the carriage of any type of shell in current production. Complete with superstructure, the pallet weighs 1 ton 14 cwt. and has a rated payload capaoity of 6 tons. On average, a load of four shells weighs less than 2-1tons.
Since 1958 frequent changes in body styling have been accommodated without introducing new pallet structures, whilst labour disputes and large fluctuations in car production have caused the minimum dislocation of fleet operations. More than 300 body pallets are in regular use.
Pallets "Highly Favourable" Pallets were evolved by B.R.S. technicians, and their cost is " highly favourable to economy." This also applies to modifications to the chassis of a rigid vehicle or trailer to receive the pallet. Average cost of a semi-trailer equipped with the standard superstructure would be well in excess of f500, and the general use of semi-trailers in place of pallets would materially increase the bufferstorage space required.
Car-transporter pallet bodies have been built in prototype form, and box and flat-platform pallets have also been produced. Future plans include the development of body pallets suitable for road-rail traffic, which could be loaded and unloaded at rail termini by fork-lift truck, thus avoiding "piecemeal transhipment."
Two Freightlifters are on call at the pallet park throughout the 24 hours, and one machine of the same type is o25 available for handling pallets at the Midland site. Machines at both centres are equipped with a second cab to enable them to be used on the public highway, and in the event of a breakdown they can be driven to the scene to transfer the pallets to a replacement vehicle. Attachments for the Freightlifters include a jib arm and a spreader, the latter being used for cases.
Lorries with four-wheeled trailers leave the pallet park on round-the-clock trunk runs to the Midlands at 15-minute intervals, each of the vehicles carrying a pallet on which four car bodies are normally mounted. Pallets are unloaded by a Freightlifter trunk at the B.R.S. Birmingham site for delivery to the appropriate Midland factory, and the vehicles are then reloaded with full pallets for the return run to Oxford, carrying bodies, body components or cased parts. An outfit normally completes a round trip in 10 hours and two trips in 24 hours.
Shunting is performed by lorries and semi-trailer outfits, the use of semi-trailers being a matter of convenience rather than to facilitate the storage of loads. Loaded pallets received from the Midlands are transhipped to shunting vehicles at the pallet park and later delivered to a B.M.C. assembly line or depot, as dictated by production requirements. After reloading at the works of the Pressed Steel Company, the pallets return to the park.
A pallet body comprises a standard 22-ft. base having slots with a centre distance of 6 ft. 2 in. to receive the forks of the Freightlifter. In a typical case the base platform is extended at the front and rear to give an overall length of 25 ft., and corresponding extensions are made to the superstructure. Shells are carried at two levels on six adjustable bars. The lower bar-carrying channelsection longitudinals of the latest pallets are looped at both ends to enable the bars to be moved away from the platform area if the pallet is. required for the carriage of freight other than body shells. The bars of the tot carrier can be moved to the ends of the members t( avoid obstructing higher loads.
The pallet is supported by the flat chassis members o the vehicle and is located by two pyramid-section vertica projections, outrigged from the main longitudinals on till transverse centre line. Guiding the pallet on to the chassi is further facilitated by a trough member at the fron of the vehicle frame and a similar trough at the rear which are employed in conjunction \Kith pins on the palle base. The pallet is clamped to the chassis at the fron and rear by a locking mechanism operated by a ham wheel The pallet structure is mainly based on 4-in. b; 2-in. channel-section steel members and has an overal height of 5 ft. 6 in. Design of the pallets is covered b: B.R.S. patents.
In addition to the 52 lorry-and-trailer outfits employei for trunking, the fleet includes a large number of tractor and semi-trailers equipped for the carriage of body pallet. which are freely interchangeable' between all the vehicle in this section of the fleet: Trailer outfits are employe, for the transport of complete cars to the docks, whils a large fleet of lorries and articulated outfits is availabl for general haulage.
Leyland Beaver and Commer 99A prime movers ar mainly employed for the trunk runs, and the eight 10-toi articulated outfits in the fleet are hauled by B.M.C. o Cornmer tractors. The remaining semi-trailers are o 10-12-ton capacity, and are hauled by A.E.0 Mercury and Leyland Comet tractors.
General haulage vehicles include lout wheelers, eight-wheelers and articulated outfit5 of which the eight-wheelers are of Leyland o Bristol manufacture. Scammell semi-trailer with Scammell couplings are used throughoL for body-shell traffic, whilst the car-carryin trailers are of the special Carrimore type wit hydraulically controlled top deck. Most o the semi-trailers have fifth-wheel couplings.
The carriage of sheet steel from South Wale and the disposal of baled steel scrap is include. in the traffic of the general haulage fleet. Abot 75 per cent, of the total tonnage hauled by a sections of the fleet represents parts or materk for the motor industry. It includes hod' pressings for sub-assemblies and C.K.D. conponents for export, the panels being carrie on special semi-trailers with open sides and roof, designed for the easy loading of stillage by fork-lift truck.
ther features of the pallet park and depot include a raI lighting tower (the lights of which enable a news:r to be read 100 ft. from it) and a filling station with Dte control. A hangar is being built to give covered tge space for materials that are not due for immediate :ction. The filling station can be used for dispensing ueI, petrol, lubricant and water to four vehicles at the o time, the controls being located in a central office. outine maintenance and minor repair work are perled in the depot workshops, but the vehicles are overed at the B.R.S. Reading workshops. Defect sheets completed daily by the drivers and no vehicle is Ned on the toad if a mechanical fault, or suspected t, has been reported.
hard surface for the entire area of the park was rided in 1956 by the consolidation process of the type inally developed for desert operations during the war. cost of surfacing, compared with normal cementing, thus reduced by about 70 per cent. One top dressing been applied since 1956.
t the B.R.S. Swindon branch, the carriage of goods the motor industry has rapidly expanded in the past e years, and when production is started at a new ory of the Pressed Steel Co. in about 12 months' time, sport will be geared to an increasing output of corn body shells in a way that now applies to the Oxford ich. Deliveries of body pressings to the Pressed Steel assembly works in Oxford represent the bulk of the ting traffic, but regular runs are made to the Austin gbridge works with body panels. Parts for some 0 bodiesare carried dtrring an average week, in [Lion to about 800 finished shells.
rganization of the fleet to cater for the planned expanof body-shell traffic will be facilitated by the acquisiof a parking site in the factory area covering about icres.
he existing semi-trailer fleet of the Swindon branch prises mainly outfits with Scammell 24-25-ft. semiers, makes of prime mover including B.M.C., Bedford Commer. Rigid vehicles in the general haulage fleet
include Bristol, Guy and Leyland maximum-load eightwheelers, in addition to 12-tonners and small vans. Two S.D. Freightlifters owned by B.R.S. are employed at the steel works.
Although the application of pallet bodies has yet to be fully developed, pending changes in the type of traffic carried, 79 bodies of this type are in regular use in con junction with 59 trailers. The bodies include pallets equipped with a shell-carrying superstructure and the flatplatform type used for the carriage of cased goods. Platform and box trailers are employed, and other types include open-sided, low-loading and dropped-frame vehicles and a small number equipped with till bodies.
A special pallet structure Of particular interest .is designed to carry Sprite bodies, and accommodates 12 shells. It is a " tree-type" structure, the bodies being mounted on hinged arms.
Semi-trailers of the dropped-frame type are used to transport eight sub-assemblies for Hillman cars. The bodies are placed vertically in two rows, which enables double the number to be carried compared with horizontal loading.