Went to load oats on a farm today.
Normally they load with a Telescopic Loading shovel (JCB,Manitou,etc) or an augur.
Not this farm. They had a fork lift similar to the ones that lift containers, and oats loaded in boxes.
No problem so far.
Each box contained about 5 ish tonnes of oats (I loaded 6 boxes and had 28700kg on board)
But then the boxes had one side that was a door locked with two hooks secured with wooden pins.
The farmers son stood below the box to knock out the pins and then hit the hooks with a hammer from behind the box.He had to move sharpish when he hit the last pin .
When I asked him(the son) if he worried about being injured he said, " I do get worried when the pins pop open on their own"
It was a quick load but at what cost, rather him than me !
BTW I was stood on the gantry at the front of the trailer well out of the way
i once loaded wheat the same way…only problem was that the farmers son was not present. i had to do the hit and run! first box was the worst though…because you literally stood below it. all the others you could work at height.
Could well have been the same farm Happysack, farmer reckoned he was only one doing it this way in UK, although he knew a few in Ireland and Holland (where he got the idea from apparantly)
The problem is these days drivers are/have been so wrapped up in h/s bulls…t, hi vis vests, orange flashing, lights,and other general nanny state lental eating crap that a lot wont be able to help themselves should they need to!
drivers have limited input into loading/tipping thse days with all the rules rules rules,once a chimp can be trained to read a sat nav they will be needed no more!
Moose, I dont believe in a lot of the H&S crap as you put it, I think a lot of it is just to give some office numpty that cant do anything else something to do.
However even a trained chimp can see that standing beneath a 5t box while you hit the door with a hammer isnt the safest thing in the world to do.
I dont mind getting my hands dirty to get the job done, but I draw the line when it affects MY safety.
ive seen boxes like that before but the ones i saw had a cable fixed to the tipping point so as the rear of the box went up the pins were pulled automaticly.
you’re lucky to still have catwalks toowise , we had a driver break his pelvis & wrist from trying to roll back his sheet,& slipped & fell so now the kneejerk reaction is all catwalk platforms have to go . this is fine but how do they expect us to get inside the body when a partition has to be moved or unblock the rear discharger ? if thats the rules then i wont be climbing an unsecure ladder to get there
MolePower:
ive seen boxes like that before but the ones i saw had a cable fixed to the tipping point so as the rear of the box went up the pins were pulled automaticly.
you’re lucky to still have catwalks toowise , we had a driver break his pelvis & wrist from trying to roll back his sheet,& slipped & fell so now the kneejerk reaction is all catwalk platforms have to go . this is fine but how do they expect us to get inside the body when a partition has to be moved or unblock the rear discharger ? if thats the rules then i wont be climbing an unsecure ladder to get there
We’re having our ladders removed and replaced with aircraft style steps to get into the body. Fine when tipping in the quarry but that was no good when I was tipping compost at a site to then go to our sandpit for building sand where there’s no access ladder. This and similar occurences have been raised but they’re still obsessed with “climbing into bodies is dangerous…” despite nobody ever having an accident.
We do get wrapped up in cotton wool and every generation will be able to do less and less. I have mentioned on another thread about bulk containers and the IFF boxes, to load these things, the driver had to open the roof hatches. This was done by climbing up the doors using the hinges, bolts and rivets as steps, we improved things by fitting Heath Robinson ladders on the doors, some containers just had a couple of bits of round bar welded between the stiffeners as hand holds.
As H&S got more important, we were designing new ways and had to use an approved ladder bolted onto the doors. The standards got higher until we get to today with safety rails tank ladders or full width staircases with bannisters and treads.
Even that is not enough for the H&S and drivers are not allowed to access the tank without safety harnesses and catch netting. Even in many steel works the driver is not allowed on his trailer to strap or chain loads.
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