Land and sea transport system for particulate materials
AssigneeThe Heil Co.
InventorsBryan Yielding, Joe Calonge
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A multi-modal system for transport of particulate material includes a plurality of ship based hoppers mounted within the hold of a ship. Each such hopper includes a container for particulate material, a container inlet by which particulate material can be loaded into the container by entrainment, and a container outlet through which particulate material can be unloaded from the container by entrainment. The system also includes a product loading internal manifold located within the hold of the ship and connected to a container inlet for a plurality of ship based hoppers, and a product unloading internal manifold located within the hold of the ship and connected to a container outlet for a plurality of ship based hoppers.
Claims11
A system for transport of particulate material comprising:
- (a) a plurality of ship based hoppers mounted within the hold of a ship, each of which hoppers comprises:
- (i) a container for particulate material;
- (ii) a container inlet for loading of particulate material into the container by entrainment;
- (iii) a container outlet for particulate material;
- wherein each ship based hopper includes only one container inlet and only one container outlet;
- (b) a product loading internal manifold located within the hold of the ship and connected to the container inlet for at least some of the plurality of ship based hoppers;
- (c) a product unloading internal manifold located within the hold of the ship and connected to the container outlet for at least some of the plurality of ship based hoppers, said product unloading internal manifold being adapted to transport material received from said ship based hoppers by entrainment.
A system for transport of particulate material comprising:
- (a) a plurality of support structures that are provided within the hold of a ship;
- (b) a plurality of ship based hoppers mounted within the hold of the ship, each of which hoppers comprises:
- (i) a container for particulate material, said container including a generally cylindrical body section, a dome-shaped top section located above the body section, and a conical hopper section located beneath the cylindrical section;
- (ii) a container inlet for loading of particulate material into the container by entrainment;
- (iii) a container outlet for unloading of particulate material from the container by entrainment;
- (iv) a plurality of attachment members, each of which is adapted for attachment to a support structure;
- (b) a product loading internal manifold located within the hold of the ship and connected to the container inlet for each ship based hopper;
- (c) a product unloading internal manifold located within the hold of the ship and connected to the container outlet for each ship based hopper.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.