10 Questions You Should to Know about Sand Storage Hopper manufacturer

What is a Sand Hopper? A sand hopper is a self dumping hopper used for the disposal, transportation, and storage of sand. However, as dump hoppers by nature are very versatile they can also be designed for use with other materials and items.

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While it’s a relatively simple design, hoppers can also be outfitted with a variety of mechanical release systems, as well as other accessories. This includes covers to keep the contents of the hopper well contained, as well as bases for enhanced stability. 

Hoppers are available in a wide range of sizes to meet as many customer needs as possible. Capacity can range from 2,000 pounds all the way up to 10,000 pounds, which is highly beneficial for heavy-duty jobs. 

These devices are used in many diverse industries and businesses. This includes construction companies, manufacturing plants, warehouses, restaurants, grocery stores, offices, academic institutions, hospitals, clinics, waste management facilities, and many other businesses, all of whom will benefit from an advanced storage and transportation solution. 

Best Dumping Hoppers Used?

Large amounts of sand can be incredibly heavy, which makes storage and transportation more complex. Fortunately, a rugged dump hopper for sand can accommodate the massive weight.

This design has a capacity that ranges from 4,000 to 8,000 pounds, as well as numerous features for efficient and effective operation. The 7-gauge carbon steel construction ensures maximum resilience, while the 100% continuous weld makes for greater durability. 

The body of the hopper is also designed with optimum reinforcement in mind thanks to the design of the side and back angles, as well as the two bottom support channels. Along with sand, rugged hoppers can be used with sawdust (see dust hopper for reference), construction materials, glass, coal, metal scraps, and other items. 

What Are the Rugged Dump Hopper Specs?

Specifications vary depending on what type of rugged hopper you select for your application. In addition to weight capacity, they’re also available in a wide range of volume capacities.

Dimensions also vary according to your needs. For larger applications, hoppers are available in dimensions like 71″ x 97-1/2″ x 58-1/2″, while smaller applications can be accommodated by 36″ x 39″x 17-1/2″.  

If you’re not sure what application works best for your needs, be sure to ask your sales representative. By describing your workplace and the purpose for your hopper, an experienced sales rep will be able to point you in the right direction when it comes to making a purchase for your business. 

How Should You Choose a Sand Hopper?

Selecting a self-dumping hopper can be challenging since there are so many models to choose from. Needs vary from application to application, as well as from industry to industry. Once you understand your specific needs, you’ll be in a better position to choose the best hopper to suit the intended application. 

In addition to the rugged models, there are also durable hoppers. While still incredibly dependable, these models have slightly lower load and volume capacities. Choose a durable hopper if your job can be accommodated by a 2,000 to 4,000 load capacity, and a volume capacity of 1/8-5 cubic yards. 

Ultimate hoppers are able to accommodate even greater capacities, ranging from 8,000 to 10,000 pounds when it comes to weight. Sometimes referred to as a concrete hopper they also have a cubic yard capacity measuring 1/3-5. Behemoth hoppers have the same weight capacity as ultimate models, but with a 6-10 cubic yard capacity. 

What Are Forklift Dump Hoppers?

Efficiency is crucial at work, and being efficient entails having the right equipment. If you routinely use forklifts at your business, you’ll be pleased to know that sand hoppers are compatible with this essential equipment. 

Forklift slots in the base of the hopper allow your crew to easily lift and transport them around your facility. Hoppers can be moved on their own, but once full of material it could require multiple staff members just to move the hopper a few feet. When they’re forklift compatible, it only takes one staff member with knowledge of forklift operation and a forklift dumpster to tackle the job. 

Even better, forklift dump hoppers also come equipped with a mechanical release system. This system allows you to discard the contents of the hopper easily and efficiently.

These hoppers also have a wide range of applications and uses. Material handling of heavy-duty items, manufacturing, removal of metal scraps, construction clean-up, and water and sewage treatment are just a few of the possible applications.  

Custom Sand Hoppers

Your workplace is not one size fits all, so you need equipment that can accommodate your specific needs. Customizing your sand hopper is easy, as you can choose from the following options:

Bases

Bases can be made in a boxed tube or open channel design. Bases also vary according to the type of forklift forks used to transport the hopper from one location to another. 

Casters

If your business does not use a forklift, casters allow hoppers to be pushed around. There are a variety of caster options to choose from, including polyolefin, iron, polyurethane phenolic, and more. Select from a variety of sizes to best suit your specific application. 

Colors

Hoppers are usually available in green, but they can also be painted with any color of your choosing. In fact, a combination of colors can be used to ensure the device exemplifies your business and brand. Hoppers can also be outfitted with a logo representing your business. 

Covers

Covers are crucial when hoppers are used outdoors, as they prevent water and debris from getting inside and causing a huge mess. Covers can be made from lightweight plastic or more durable steel. Tarps are also available, including vinyl and mesh, for more specific applications. 

Band Cutters

Band cutters can be attached directly onto the hopper for greater efficiency when cutting steel. Steel is then deposited directly into the hopper for easy disposal. In addition to making for a more efficient operation, mounted band cutters also prevent workers from needing to handle sharp pieces of metal. 

Release Systems

Release systems ensure safety and efficiency at your place of work. All release systems auto latch, which means they can be dumped by a forklift operator from inside the vehicle. This reduces the constant back and forth required to empty hoppers with a release system built-in. 

There are plenty of other accessories to choose from. When designing your custom hopper, you can specify springs, chains, floor locks, wheel brakes, handles, runnion pins, and more. 

Why Is Workplace Safety So Important?

No matter what type of business you run, ensuring the safety of your staff and workplace is a full-time job. Being smart about safety not only prevents major mishaps and injuries, it also ensures your staff is more productive. And at the end of the day, it’s just the right thing to do as a business owner. 

If you’re not sure what actions to take, or if your workplace currently falls short on safety, there are plenty of video resources available to assist you. These training videos show how to use hopper features safely and efficiently, so there’s never any confusion when the time comes to use these convenient devices. 

Proper training not only prevents acute injuries, but it can also spare your staff from experiencing repetitive use injuries that can result in time lost at work. Proper training also keeps your workplace neat and orderly, since you won’t need to worry about spills and messes as items are being transported around your facility. 

Friends, a few weeks ago I was asked by several people whether I had heard about the latest ‘sand battery’? I had never heard of any such thing.

Most people asking me had come across this article on the BBC which gushingly described a heat storage device – not a battery – that had been built in Finland.

I quickly checked that I correctly understood the meaning of the word ‘battery’:

And I then concluded that this was a deliberate ruse to make a thermal storage system sound more interesting. No need – I love thermal storage systems!

Genuine Thermal Storage ‘Batteries’ do exist and Rosemary Barnes visited one on her Engineering with Rosie Channel a year or so ago.

In the Stiesdal company’s system that Rosie visited, excess electrical energy is stored as heat in an insulated container – similar to the sand battery. But instead of just using this stored thermal energy to directly heat homes (as the ‘Sand Battery’ does) the heat is used to drive a generator and make electricity. So it functionally, it operates like a conventional chemical battery – storing and releasing electrical energy.

In the video, Stiesdal claim overall efficiency is expected to be ~60% but the discharge function produces ‘waste heat’ that could be used for district heating, bringing overall storage efficiency to ~90%. In other words it can do what the sand battery does AND generate electricity.

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But as will become clear, I suspect that efficiency is only for short term storage – a day or two – rather than genuinely seasonal storage. Anyway: back to the sand ‘battery’.

Sand Battery Details: How long can it store energy for?

The BBC report that:

Sand is a very effective medium for storing heat and loses little over time. The developers say that their device could keep sand at 500 °C for several months.[my emphasis]

Colloquially this sounds plausible: we are familiar with ceramic materials retaining heat for a long time. But I am sceptical.

Why? Because there are no perfect thermal insulators, and the rate of heat loss from an object is proportional to the difference between the object and its environment. So for an object at 500 °C, heat loss will likely be a serious problem.

I wondered if there might be a better way to do this, for example by choosing a material with a larger heat capacity. Then the same thermal energy could be stored in a medium at lower temperatures – and hence have lower heat losses. The storage material would also need to be cheap so I wondered about something really cheap: water.

Water? Yes. A given volume of water stores three times as much heat as sand heated to the same temperature. However (without pressurisation) water is limited to being heated to 100 °C.

Alternatively, one could say that sand is so poor at storing energy that it HAS to be heated to high temperatures to make it even half-way useful. But at high temperature it will lose heat faster. And storage times of months seem unlikely to me.

Calculation

Friends, I made a calculation!

I calculated the storage time of two storage vessels both storing 8 MWh of thermal energy (like the Finnish design), one storing sand at 500 °C and the other storing water at 100 °C.

To understand the scale of this system:

• A typical domestic hot water cylinder at 60 °C stores around 7 kWh of thermal energy so we are envisaging systems roughly 1,000 times larger than a domestic ‘thermal storage’ system.
• My house requires approximately 4,500 kWh (4.5 MWh) of heating over a winter, so 8 MWh of thermal storage could store enough energy to heat perhaps two homes over winter.
• Yes, I said two (2).

I fixed the height of the vessels at 7 m (as in the Finnish design) and varied the diameter of the vessels to store enough substance to store 8 MWh (as in the Finnish design). The water vessel was 3.8 m in diameter and the sand vessel was 2.8 m in diameter.

I assumed both vessels were covered with 300 mm of mineral wool insulation with a thermal conductivity of 0.03 W/m/°C, and then calculated the time constant over which the vessels would lose 50% of their stored heat.

• The sand vessel

  would lose 50% of its heat in 2.1 months after which the water would still have retained 84% of its stored energy.

• The water vessel

  would lose 50% of its stored energy after 8.4 months after which time the sand would have lost 94% of its stored energy.

Conclusion

Friends, I hate this kind of news story. 

This ‘sand battery’ can store enough heating over winter for 2 houses – neglecting losses – or more likely one house accounting for losses.

Community Thermal Storage – may well make sense in some contexts. Indeed I have seen other implementations of similar ideas (can’t find the links at the moment) that don’t require very high temperatures and hence high heat losses.

But this story reads like a BBC correspondent swallowed a PR story from Finland and then regurgitated it all over the BBC web site.

Inter-seasonal storage of renewable energy is an important technology that will be required if we want to build a system capable of supplying year-round energy from sustainable, but intermittent, sources.

But there are many alternatives. The Stiesdal implementation returns energy as electricity rather than heat, which is much more useful. The electricity could then be used to run heat pumps which would boost the overall efficiency of the system.

Alternatively energy could be stored as green hydrogen, or as pressurised gas. It is still not clear to me which technology will prove optimal: in the end it will come down to cost.

So it’s a complex situation, but facile stories like this do not help anyone.

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This entry was posted on July 21, 2022 at 9:16 am and is filed under Climate Change. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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