Unique shiploaders from Metso Minerals

(Web Magazine 2002)

Metso Minerals has recently delivered a unique dual orbiting slewing shiploader to the Coke and Sulphur Handling Facility for Sincor in Jose, Venezuela. The dual unit, the first of its kind in the world and capable of loading up to 2000tph, is arranged to operate on two circular runways, which are turned approximately 900 to the dock face.

This configuration permits the runway to be designed to support the shiploader without the extraneous loads typically experienced from berthing of the ship. Another advantage is that the runway length is determined by the beam and not the length of the ship, thereby shortening the runway and its inherent cost.

Both of the delivered shiploaders consists of an orbiting bridge, pivoted from a bearing near the centreline of the dock and supported on a runway through a set of travel bogies, an orbit bridge conveyor to transfer material from the feed tower to the machine, a loading boom conveyor which is supported on a rotating structuring and two luffing cylinders, and a telescoping chute with a rotating spoon for loading.



Each unit is capable of loading up to 2000tph of petroleum coke into ships ranging from 25,000 DWT to 65,000 DWT. The shiploaders have also been designed to load sulphur, the other by-product generated by the Jose oil up-grader facility.

The dual orbiting slewing shiploaders have been designed to work in tandem, with each unit loading half a vessel.

PLC controls have been designed to integrate the slewing and orbiting motions of the loading boom to position each spout to load the hatches of the ship in a linear method, both parallel and perpendicular to the dock.

With a slewing range and an orbiting range of 1280 and 50.50, respectively, the loading chutes will trace the perimeter of the hatches of a bulk carrier with a dead weight of 65,000tm.



Operation is controlled either from the operator’s cabs located underneath each loading boom or from the ship’s deck via remote radio transmitters.

The units have been designed to fill each hatch in a pre-designed sequence, with the advantage of continuous loading and no costly stoppages to the storage yard’s feed system.

Metso Minerals selected tubular structures to encapsulate both the boom and orbit bridge conveyors and walkways to eliminate the possibility of spillage and dusting of the products.

This design has also helped facilitate clean-up procedures within these galleries and back to land through a network of sluicing elements and a drainpipe system central to the rotating parts of the units.

For more information, contact Tim Sexton

Metso Minerals Ship and barge loaders