Car Dumper

a device for the mechanical unloading of bulk cargo from railroad freight cars by dumping or tilting them in a transverse or longitudinal direction. Lateral, end, and combination car dumpers are distinguished according to the unloading method. Lateral car dumpers are either tower or rotary dumpers. Tower car dumpers turn the car around an axis lying outside the car; rotary dumpers, on the other hand, turn the car around an axis that almost coincides with the geometric longitudinal axis of the open car. An end dumper facilitates the longitudinal incline of the car and is used for unloading rolling stock with opening end walls. Combination car dumpers tilt the car in the transverse and longitudinal directions. A car dumper is the most effective means of mechanization of unloading, with an unloading rate of 20-30 cars per hour.

In Russia car dumpers were in use as early as the end of the 19th century, when at the port of Mariupol’ (the present-day port of Zhdanov) two end car dumpers were set up; at that time they were a great achievement in hoisting-transport technology. In the USSR more than 90 percent of the car dumpers are rotary stationary models. They facilitate unloading from four-axle and six-axle open cars by tilting them 170° to 175°. In comparison with other car dumpers, the rotary kind use several times less electric drive power and have the highest productivity (30 cycles per hour); however, they require intake receiver bunkers recessed deeply into the ground with a corresponding system of conveyor lines. Mobile car dumpers (rotary and tower) are used for unloading open cars of cargo into deep and shallow intake trench structures. The advantage of mobile car dumpers is their ability to unload cars at various parts of the depot, ore stockyard, or other site.

Car dumpers are used effectively in coke-chemical and metallurgical factories, steam electric stations, large building-industry plants, and heavy machinery factories, as well as at points of transshipment of cargo (sea and river ports) during the annual unloading of about 1 million tons of homogeneous cargoes. Projects were carried out (1971) for the creation of car dumpers for unloading large eight-axle cars and car dumpers with vibration devices for the mechanized removal of cargo remains and also the creation of systems for automating the unloading of open cars on rotary car dumpers (pushing, placing, pulling out, and so on). Inertial-unloading machines are used for unloading bulk cargo from boxcars.