B.R.S. Modernize
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Traffic Handling
By C. Y. Hardie, Big Developments in Use of Pallets. Special Services Officer, and Fork Trucks for Parcels and Other British Road Serrice.s. Goods. Off-thefioOr Handling MECHANICAL handling has been developed by British Road Services with two main objectives: first, an improved service to the customer; secondly, the reduction of operating costs to the minimum compatible with efficiency. The development programme is as yet far from complete, but great progress has been made since the last Mechanical Handling Exhibition in 1956, when the first 8-ton fork truck to be purchased by B.R.S. was shown by the manufacturers.
Handling problems are, perhaps, more acute in parcels operations than in other forms of road transport, and it is not surprising that a great deal of attention has been given in the past few years to improving the handling of traffic in parcels depots. Nor is this in itself anything new. Even before the war the larger parcels companies, such as Carter Paterson, had introduced mechanical handling at depots large enough to justify the cost of conveyors, which were in those days virtually the only type of mechanical equipment .available for handling parcels traffic.
The spectacular rise of the fork truck and the unit-load technique has had as forceful an impact on the large-scale operations of B.R.S. (Parcels), Ltd., as it has in trade and industry. Five years ago, for example, the suggestion that parcels traffic could be stacked in pallets up to 16 ft. high, when it was necessary to hold it pending the availability of the outward vehicle for loading, might well have been greeted with incredulity, if not derision. But that is what is happening today in some depots of B.R.S. (Parcels), Ltd. ' A similar response might have been expected to the suggestion of working a depot without loading banks by means of fork trucks and pallets, a technique, which it can be fairly said, B.R.S. has invented.
Development of the pallet system as a domestic means for handling parcels traffic in a depot can be attributed to:— (1) The advantage of a system which is inherently flexible, as opposed to fixed conveyors. If fork trucks are employed to load vehicles, flexibility can be extended to the ultimate; even loading banks can be dispensed with. The parcels depot then becomes a large shed free from obstructions, enabling operations to be adjusted without difficulty to cope with an infinite variety of traffic and circumstances.
(2) The ability to stack pallets to heights of 16 ft. or even more makes it possible to sort and hold traffic in a depot on the minimum floor area. c16 (3) If pallets are adopted as a medium for handling in depots, the way is open to forward. traders' palleted traffic as and when this develops.
(4) A Rillet depot should show economies in the way of reduced 'handling costs with less likelihood of loss or damage to traffic.
As in most applications of the pallet technique in industry, the best results are obtained in new premises, preferably built around the unit load-handling scheme. This ideal situation has not yet arisen in B.R.S. (Parcels), Ltd. Until last January pallets had been introduced only into existing depots with loading banks and previously operated for the most part with two-wheeled sack trucks as the basic traffic handling tool.
It was impracticable to modernize such depots completely. Only selected operations were converted to the new medium. This was -either introduced on the loading bank alongside previous methods—as at Walter Street, Birmingham—or the pallet traffic was transferred to an improvised " annexe " where it could be handled at floor level—as at Burnley and Cardiff.
In neither type of working were spectacular financial results achieved. This was hardly surprising, as the unpalleted traffic necessarily controlled the overall rate of throughput in such depots. Nevertheless, these partial pallet schemes produced useful information of a general nature which could not have been obtained otherwise.
The experience gained of individual operations at various
depots —loading local, vehicles by fork truck at Burnley or Cardiff, palleted inter-depot transfers at London and Birmingham; mechanical unloading at London, Southampton and Burnley, palleted
buffering" ot outwards traffic awaiting loading at Birmingham—has enabled large depots of the future to be planned for completely palleted operations based on handling-speed norms which Rave been tested under operational conditions. These norms have, incidentally, been further checked with the work-study department of the Dutch carriers, Van Gend en Loos, who have been operating the system in road-rail transit sheds for several years.
For various reasons it will be a year or two before any such large new depots come into operation. It was, therefore, decided last year to convert a comparatively small parcels depot to complete off-the-floor palleting as a pilot scheme. The depot chosen was that at Dundee, which it was arranged to transfer from the existing conventional premises to a large hangar, with floor dimensions of200 ft. by 80 ft. This hangar had previously been used by the engineering department.
The new depot began its operations last January. Its working appearance is about as different from a normal parcels depot as it is possible to imagine. There are no Loading banks in the normal sense. The .floor area is unbroken by any permanent structure, and handling and
sorting are carried out at floor level by means of roller conveyor, pallets and fork trucks. Vehicles discharge at the north end of the shed and are loaded at the south end. The central portion of the shed is taken up with primary and secondary sorting operations, and pallet " buffers " in which traffic for reloading is, on occasions, held until the vehicle concerned is available.
Dundee is a small depot, as parcels depots go, and it is therefore sufficient to allow for six trunk and nine local vehicles to be stand-loaded simultaneously by the new methods, after taking into account the advantages of the new loading techniques. Similarly, two positions—only one of which is normally working at any one time—have been provided for unloading all types of vehicle.
. The aim has been to adopt the uniflow " principle of the modern factory, so far as possible, and to keep the various work teanis static, except, of course, the fork trucks. Vehicles arriving at the depot back up to the head of one of the two unloading conveyors. The traffic is then passed down the roller conveyors and sorted into B.R.S. standard box pallets which are placed on each side of the conveyor.
• Each pallet position has two labels. One is employed when inwards trunk traffic is being sorted into local deliveries; the other when local collected traffic is being unloaded for sorting into outwards trunks. According to the nature of the traffic flOw, the sort is either final or primary into a paUt and is later further broken down into routes by a secondary sort in a pallet concentration area.
The details of these sorts can be varied in the light of prevailing traffic conditions. Awkward traffic is dealt with on the small quay at the head of the conveyor by means of B.R.S. standard flat gondola pallets or directly on the truck forks.
Two 4,000-lb. oil-engined fork trucks are provided for the movement of full and empty pallets between the unloading positions, the pallet concentration and buffer areas and the loading positions. Hand pallet trucks are available for .short movements. As each pallet on each side of the conveyor is filled, it is taken away and replaced by an empty one. For busy routes, continuity of flow is ensured by duplicating the pallet positions.
The scheme has not yet been in operation long enough for final conclusions to be drawn. It has, however, already yielded valuable experience which will be incorporated in a second and larger Scheme of complete off-the-floor pallet c 1 loading at the new parcels shed at Low Fell, Gateshead, due to commence operations later this year. At this depot it is intended to employ five fork trucks.
• Both types of pallet used at Dundee (and in all future parcels pallet schemes) are constructed to domestic standards evolved from experience gained in the earlier experimental operations. These pallets are also employed to some extent at Dundee and elsewhere for collecting suitable traffic from customers. By these means handling operations at the depot are further reduced.
Transit warehousing does not, perhaps, involve as much handling of goods as parcels operations, but there is sufficient of it for the technique employed to have a marked influence on the costs of running the warehouse. For this reason, and to enable goods to be accepted for storage from traders in pallet form, all new B.R.S. warehouses are designed to permit the best use to be made of unit-load handling. The ruling clearance in ground-floor warehouses is 20 ft. and the interior is designed with the minimum number of obstructions in the form of stanchions and other structural features.
In the past year or so pallet warehousing has been intro duced by British Road Services, Ltd., and B.R.S. (Parcels), Ltd., at London, Maidstone, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Blackburn, Bradford, Doncaster, Newcastle, Birmingham, Leicester and Bristol, in addition to existing schemes at other places, such as Manchester and Cardiff.
There is a number of considerations affecting transit warehouses which do not apply to domestic warehousing. It is, for example, usually impossible to forecast for more than a few months ahead the types of goods which will pass through the warehouse. Again, the form—pallet or loose--in which goods will enter the warehouse is normally decided by the individual owner. Conditions at the premises of various consignees determine whether or not goods can be sent out from the warehouse on pallets.
Planning in its fullest sense is, therefore, extremely difficult—a severe disadvantage because the full economies in handling in a pallet warehouse are only achieved when the goods enter and leave the warehouse on the pallets on which they are. stored. In general, therefore, the only obviously consistent benefit to B.R.S. in their pallet warehouses is the value of the increased storage capacity arising from the greater height to which goods can normally be stacked on pallets.
Furthermore, in the absence of a standard packaging module in this country, different commodities, which arc otherwise ideally suitable for pallet storage, require several different sizes of pallet if they are to be warehoused with the greatest efficiency. It would not be economic to keep stocks in transit warehouses of even the six British standard sizes of pallet, assuming that these would cover a complete range of traffic, which is itself unlikely. With the fluctuating streams of traffic passing through, a large proportion of the pallets of different plan dimensions would almost certainly be idle at any time, or at best uneconomically employed.
To reduce to the minimum the number of pallet sizes required in transit warehouses, B.R.S. carried out, some time ago, a number of pallet loading tests with a crosssection of general warehouse traffic. The results indicated
that the majority of traffics loaded with reasonable economy on the pallet size 40 in by 48 in A-two-way-entry flush wooden pallet of this plan dimension was, .therefore, selected in 1957 as the standard B.R.S. warehouse. mOdel. These flat pallets can be used as post pallets by fitting a tubular convertor, set which. collapses into a small space when not required.
In some warehouses, small numbers of parcels box pallet are also employed for special traffic •-where there is a sufficiently large regular flow. In one or two older ware-houses, physically unsuitable for the standard 40-in. by 48-in pallet, four-way-entry 40-in. by 40-in, flat wooden pallets are used instead.
Electric fork trucks are generally preferred for warehouse operations, particularly if food products are involved. B.R.S. have in the past used a number of different types in their warehouses. A standard operational specification to cover the circumstances most often encountered has. now been decided upon fora truck with a 14-ft. lift and a capacity of 4,000 lb. at 20-in. centres. This capacity is also subject to a stability formula applicable to the truck with its mast vertical and fully tilted forward and to the rear. . .
A 'scheme for the storage of oceanliner passengers' baggage introduced at Chelsea early in 1057 is of interest.
because at this depot a special multi-prong fork truck is employed for part of the work in the warehouse. This particular work involves the storage of the luggage or individual passengers in such a way that each set is immediately accessible. Flat pallets are obviously unsuitable in view of the wide variety of pieces involved, and postor box-pallets of sufficient size or strength were considered too costly. The decision was, therefore, taken to store the traffic in large compartment racks.
To use flat pallets in these racks would have been prohibitively expensive, and they are fitted instead with slatted ' bearers—at 6-in, centres—which support the luggage direct. The fork truck employed on this work has, instead of normal forks, 11 prongs 40 in. long, also at 6-in. centres.
Handling Passengers' Luggage
When a consignment of baggage arrives at the warehouse, the luggage for any passenger is unloaded from the incoming vehicle on to a slatted frame of the same Plan dimensions as the compartment in the storage rack. The prongs of the fork truck are then slid between the slats of the frame and raised so that the load i& transferred to the fork Carriage.
The truck carries the baggage in this way to the selected rack compartment and deposits the load by lowering the prongs between the slats and the compartment on which the goods thus rest. In view-of the low tolerances applicable to this method of working, it is essential for the fork truck to be equipped with a side shift mechanism.
With the present trend towards smaller consignments in general .haulage, the economics of transhipment have become increasingly -important to concerns such as B.R.S., which operate a high'proportion of scheduled trunk services. Demands for lifting equipment to be supplied by the haulier at the start and end of the journey as part of the transport service are also on the increase.
For transhipment purposes, B.R.S. are developing the use of mobile, rather than static, equipment, in view of its greater flexibility. At the larger depots, the equipment generally takes the form of mobile. cranes or heavy-duty fork trucks, in both cases with nominal capacities of about 6 tons (the gross weight of a large container). In some instances the nature of the work makes the employment of a mobile crane essential, but there are often advantages in using a large fork truck instead for general transhipment. This type of machine can either work with forks (which is quicker for certain types of traffic) or be converted in a few moments to a non-slewing mobile crane by fitting a jib attachment.
Big Fork Trucks Recent examples. of the introduction of these large .machines at B.R.S. general haulage .depots include the employment of 6-8-ton fork.tt-ucks for transhipment work at .Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool, Warrington, Cardiff, Oxford and Swansea'. A 10-ton' mobile crane has also been
introduced at Sheffield for handling steel traffic. At 'Wellington a 7-tori fast-travelling mobile crane has been installed not only for local use but also as a general mobile reserve for the northern district of Western Division.
In medium-sized depots, at which the cost of a &ton machine could not bejustified, fork trucks or cranes with a 'nominal capacity of 21-3 tons are now coming into use. At the new Bedminster depot, Bristol, for example, a 6,000, lb.-capacity off-engined fork truck is employed in a dual capacity-,-in the yard as, a transhipment tool and in the
small warehouse attached to the depot; .• • In this instance the nature of the flow of traffic through the warehouse did not justify the provisiOn‘of a separate electric triick for the warehouse alone. The overall width
of the forks: of the Bedminster machine is adjustable hydraulically so that the driver can pass from one type of operation to another without dismounting from his cab. The B.R.S.. standard wooden 40-in. by 48-in, pallet, originally designed for warehousing, has been found a further use in the collection of suitable general haulage traffics which are to be transhipped before trunking. The alternative 40-in. by 40-in, warehouse pallet has also been used in this way with success. A large reversible pallet with a plan area 48 in. by 72 in. is sometimes employed for transhipment work, notably at the new Lister Street depot in Glasgow, which, like the Dundee Parcels depot, is without a conventional loading bank. . Approximately 6,000 pallets are, on average, carried on regular flows of traffic by B.R.S. each week. This is a tenfold increase on the situation six years ago. Nearly half these pallet movements are on 40-in. by 48-in. pallets, the size considered the most suitable for normal road vehicles.
A proportion of B.R.S.' vehicles based in agricultural districts has been equipped with tailboard loaders to assist and accelerate loading at farms and similar locations where it can be an arduous business if manual operations only are employed. Consideration has also been given to the use in similar circumstances of elevating conveyors capable of being towed behind any vehicle. In addition to the concrete developments which I have briefly reviewed, B.R.S. are continually studying the possibility of new techniques and their application to road transport. They are fortunate in having contacts not only with trade and industry in this country, but also with principal transport and other users of handling equipment on the Continent, with whom information on new developments is frequently exchanged. At least 25 further fork trucks with varying capacities up to 8 tons should be added during-1958 to the existing B.R.S. fleet of 62, as well as a number of mobile cranes, and other items of ancillary handling equipment. Advance planning work is already in hand for 1959.