Particulate material powered prime mover

Abstract

There is disclosed a prime motive means powered by the tailings of mines, the crushed material emanating from quarries and/or the earth removed in strip mining operations. The system takes advantage of the fact that in any mine-like operation a relatively large hole is produced which extends for a finite distance below the normal topography of the surface of the surrounding land. The system includes a driven wheel mounted in a horizontal axis having particulate matter receiving means at the outermost circumference thereof. The wheel is located near substantially the bottom of the quarry or pit. Guidance means are provided to discharge the aforementioned particulate material from the upper reaches of the quarry or pit onto the flights or buckets of the driven wheel. The wheel, as in the case of a water wheel, discharges the particulate material onto a slide. The particulate material then slides to an area of accumulation adapted and constructed to make the particulate material accessible to a vertically oriented endless conveyer system having buckets designed to carry the particulate material upwardly to a hopper from which the particulate material is then redistributed to the driven wheel. The endless conveyer is driven by suitable means such as an electric motor or internal combustion engine. The driven wheel may be suitably coupled through transmission means to an electric generator. The current produced by the generator may be used to supplement the requirements of the motive means employed to drive the endless conveyer system.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.