The Classic Machinery Network

Jeremy Rowland wrote:Fred if memory serves me correctly Hymac got 580 from 580 cu in which was the bucket capacity of the machine.

Jeremy

HI Jeremy,
I don't think so.
There are 46,656 cu. in. in a cu. yd. you would have to fill the bucket over 80 times to move a cu. yd. at that rate.

It could be related to the 5/8 cu. yd. bucket size or even to 580 litres which is just short of 3/4 cu. yd.
Fred

Hello again,
Here are some more pics from the past. These TS24s belonging to Costain were working on the M4 circa 1971.


In the picture above there appears to be a 54RB dragline loading Foden dump trucks in the background and an NCK 304 looking very sorry for itself on the left of the pic.

The Key Plant machine in the pic below was on the same job and appears to be in a bit of trouble.

FOWLER MAN wrote:

Jeremy Rowland wrote:Fred if memory serves me correctly Hymac got 580 from 580 cu in which was the bucket capacity of the machine.

Jeremy

HI Jeremy,
I don't think so.
There are 46,656 cu. in. in a cu. yd. you would have to fill the bucket over 80 times to move a cu. yd. at that rate.

It could be related to the 5/8 cu. yd. bucket size or even to 580 litres which is just short of 3/4 cu. yd.
Fred

Yes Fred 5/8 cu. yd. that's what I meant; hadn't got my thinking head on!

Jeremy

I would say the navvie is a 38-RB Fred, A 54 had a different A frame arrangement, There is a jury mast on that Navvie coupled by 8 part reeving onto the sunken A frame which is not visible on a 38-RB.

Hello Graham,
Good to see you posting.
You are of course right as usual when it comes to Ruston's, it is a 38 RB in the pic. they had a similar A frame to the 30s.
I'll have to start wearing my glasses.
Fred

Hi All,
I haven't posted on this thread for a while but I came across this pic. which took me back to a past age.
Don't know if this is classic plant or vintage like me. But I remember watching this duo work circa 1957/8 at a local cement works quarry.
The shunting loco was then about five or six years old and built by John Fowler of Leeds. It was powered by the same Meadows 6DJ970 engine that Fowlers used in the Challenger 4 crawler.
Surprising to me, (having been brought up to believe that British Engineering was supreme and nothing else was any good), was the electric powered face shovel. It was made in Germany by Menck & Hambrock. It was apparently a pre-war machine dating back to the 1930s and had, at the time, already given over twenty years service.
Fred

Im pretty sure some of the small sugar cane locos are the same brand great photo I dont think we would see and train lines built in quarries any more

Hi All,
I find it difficult to believe but lots of the younger operators today don't even know what a Hymac looked like, so here are a few pics. as a reminder of the sort of British machines that I cut my teeth on. This was before hydraulics became popular. As time passed and Hydraulic machines appeared we plant fitters were on a steep learning curve.
The first pic is of a small open cast operation in Yorkshire circa 1960. The S Type Bedford could easily have been petrol powered in those days or it may have been powered by a Perkins R6, (Not Perkins finest effort), or Leyland 375. All British made.

The face shovel is British through and through, it's a Smith 5-20 that's the 3/4 yard model which preceded the Smith 21. it would probably have been fitted with a Fowler Sanders Diesel or I believe some had the Gardner like the later 21s.
The Lima 1201 dragline is American you say, but some of these to were British built too, built under licence by The North British Locomotive Co. who also had an interest in Crossley, so it's no surprise that some of the British built Lima machines were fitted with Crossley power units.

The picture below is of a rarely seen British built dragline. If you look at the counterweight you will see it says NCH Sheffield.
Newton Chambers built a new factory to build these in 1939. The advent of the war meant that production turned mainly to tanks and armaments and most of the excavators produced were also allocated to the military.
They were built to P&H designs under licence and powered by Caterpillar D4 engines, I knew of three NCH machines in South Wales in the late 1950s.

The licence to use the P&H designs ran out in 1947. Newton Chambers then got into bed with Koehring and started to build the NCK 304.

Great stuff Fred; yes you are correct many of the younger generation working today have no idea of the things that preceded them or really just how recent that technology has sky rocketed in most industries, unless there is an 'APP' for it or unless you can plug it into a computer many of them would not have a clue.
What makes me very sad is that as you have pointed out most of the stuff back then was made in this country and now we have nothing as a kid I can recall hearing Bedford TK trucks with the six cylinder petrol engine in them and for those who can recall the Bedford RL /OL similar to the one in Fred's photo that were used by the army as fire engines and used during one of the fireman's strikes of the 70's labelled as the 'green goddesses' I think they too were petrol powered.

Jeremy

NICE pics!