loading salt into large trucks

[John Allin]

Alan made reference, last night on a different thread, about using an auger arrangement to treat his salt piles with magic. I asked about such an arrangement to load trucks instead of using a skid steer and/or backhoe. We just purchased a township truck (international) with a large salt box. We had to get rid of our L9000 salt truck as it was at the end of its days. This new one is just slightly higher than the old one and our 853 Bobcat is fully extended to dump salt into the hopper. The other trucks are all lower and easy to load.

Question: Does anyone on the forum load salt trucks now with a conveyer type arrangement ?? If so, can you give me some help, or some pic's that will assist us and give us some direction in constructing (or purchasing) something to do this?? Any experience with loading times and efficiency??

[diggerman]

John never used a conveyor before but we have used those concrete road dividers to make a ramp.The truck pulls along the barrier then the skid can drive up the ramp to the side of the truck.Conveyors are nice but getting a truck loaded properly can be a trick and take a while.The one thing that I have thought about for salt is a grain auger because they are available and cheap,but I don,t think they will do sand and might not do the salt.

[iowastorm]

John; I believe that the new G series Bobcats will load a large dumptruck. My 1999 773 will anyway, assuming the truck's side rails haven't been built up too high.

[John Allin]

We CAN load it with the 853, but my guys were making comments about not being able to pile it up as high as before (in the hopper). The truck will most definitely handle any weight WE put on it and I don't want to see him leave here with a 'level' load.

I would think that a conveyer would be much slower than the skid steer - and I agree that loading with a conveyer might not be real exacting (as compared to using something with a front bucket). I'm hoping we will find someone who is doing it to know how they like it. If we can't find someone already doing it with a conveyer - then I presume THAT will be answer enough.

We did talk about a ramp arrangement, and we would do that before purchasing another loader just to load salt.

By the way, we are going to remove the front and wing plow as we have no use for it (we don't do roads). We're going to make the wing into a pusher and probably just scrap the one-way from the front.

[Chuck Smith]

John,

With as much property as you have, you should build a loading dock. It would make loading any material easier. Do you have salt, mulch, and top soil piles at your yard?

Imagine how much more mulch you could fit into a truck if you compact it with a loader as you fill the truck. I mean where the operator can actually "see" what he's doing. Just that alone could speed up the loading process.

I was thinking along the lines of a 3 sided "bay" a truck could back into, and be loaded. You could take a chunk out of an existing hillside, and level off the area around it, or build one from scratch on flat ground. The flat ground would require fill to build, but that's plentiful and cheap in most areas. I think a bay would be more versatile than a ramp. Make it large enough to fit your biggest truck in. It would only have to be 3 or 4' "deep" to really help loading. You could make it deeper if you need to.

Just a thought,


~Chuck

[John Allin]

And a good thought at that.

Gotta think about it. We have more than enough room to do it, and more than enough fill to make it happen. I would like to continue filling the salt truck inside and not outside - but we might be able to make it work inside too.

Let me work on that one for a few hours. I gotta think about this one...

Thanks.

[Chuck Smith]

After more thought, you could even load other things easier, that you couldn't load before. Things that require a "sling" or dangling on a chain. Where the loader couldn't go high enough to facilitate loading on flat ground, with the truck "in a hole" it could. Especially loading into taller trucks. It would also work in reverse, for unloading items. You could transfer equipment from one truck to another easier too, without the loader at full extension....

I also considered having such a loading area inside, but it's usefullness has to outweigh the valuable indoor storage space.

~Chuck

[John Allin]

We have outside loading docks now, on the landscape installation building - but the salt, salt trucks, and the skid steer to load the salt trucks, is stored in the landscape maintenance building in winter. We store screened topsoil in that same area in summer. I might be able to cut the concrete floor and make a depressed area (maybe just a few feet depressed) where the trucks drive through (we have overhead doors at both ends of the building) so that the salt trucks (and topsoil trucks) could be loaded out - but still use that depressed area (if it was made wide enough) to park truck/trailer combinations (the landscape maintenance truck/trailers stay loaded overnight) in summer too.

Hmmmm........

I think you might be onto something here.

[plowking35]

What we do is pretend the snow is salt, and let mother nature fill our hoppers. Both are white, and the customer doesnt know the difference. They pay us the spread the snow on their lots, and then recall us to plow the snow we just spread. Its a vicious circle that has doubled revenue the last 2 years running.
Anyone else tried this?
Dino

[diggerman]

See I knew it wasn't all SIMA that made you all that extra money.