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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 9, Issue 1 (April 2, 1934.)

Modern Coaling Methods

Modern Coaling Methods.

Coaling steam locomotives by electricity sounds something of a novelty, yet this is the accomplishment of the L. and N.E. Railway at their big locomotive sheds at Boston, Lincolnshire, and elsewhere. When the L. and N.E. Company was formed, in 1923, there were only two mechanical coaling plants on the system, practically all coaling being done by hand. To-day there are thirty-three electrical coaling plants in operation, and engines may now be coaled in three minutes instead of the thirty minutes required by the old method.

Ostende, Belgium's most popular sea-side resort.

Ostende, Belgium's most popular sea-side resort.

The electrical coaling plants are of three types—the small skip hoist, the large skip hoist, and the wagon hoist. In the first case, wagons of coal are emptied into half-ton skips which run on miniature rails alongside the standard track; the skips are then pushed on to a hoist which lifts them and tips the coal into the engine tender. With the large skip hoist type, wagons of coal are tipped bodily into a hopper at ground level and the coal is then raised in large skips and tipped into a bunker above the rails holding 100 or 150 tons; engines are then run beneath the bunker and the tenders filled. The third, and most used, method is to hoist entire wagon loads of coal to the top of a bunker holding up to 500 tons, and tip the coal in at the top; engines then run beneath and the driver releases the coal he requires. At each release the amount of coal taken is automatically weighed and registered.