Historic: Dangerous machinery...

[NickWallingford]

I'll put this in the 'historical' section, as none of you would currently have any dangerous equipment, would you?

I only worked with Jasper Bray at Airborne Honey for a few months, maybe Jan to Jun? But there were two devices there at the time that scared the hell out of me...

There was a drum barrow. You'd push it up next to drum of honey, flip a sort of retaining bar over the drum, catch the rim of the drum with a small hook on the barrow - and lean back. Everyone else seemed to be able to do it. But for me, it would slip off the forks of the barrow and try to fall back on top of me. It once pinned me to a wall of cartons, making it even harder to get away.

And then there were the small trolleys for moving stacks of honey boxes around with. They were a neat design - two arms flip across the back, lifting the drip tray just barely off the ground. And then, on level ground, you could easily drag 4 or 5 full depth boxes of honey.

But those were the trolleys we used to unload the honey from the truck, before putting it into the old lift to take it upstairs. And the truck deck was somewhat higher than the factory floor level - so from the truck you had to bump/lift the trolley. And then it was going downhill, down the ramp to the honeyhouse. It wasn't finished yet. You had to do a quick lift just as it got to the bottom, so it didn't bottom out and drop all the honey boxes on you. Those trolleys were really useful - if the floor was flat...

 

[tristan]

the drum shifters. still have them tho not used much these days.
you have to get the bottom bits to stick under the drum. bump the drum to get them started, then pulling back pulls it on. its a fairly simple way that works well but it pays to put the drums on soft wood or cardboard.

i've never used the single stack trolleys, tho seen a few that do use them.
we have always been forklift and trolley jacks.

 

[tristan]

most dangerous machine, beetech spinfloat by a long way.
seen that lean over on a 30 degree angle, straight back up and keep going like nothing happened.
the honey guide just sat in place so a big shake would throw it across the room.
if it shook enough the cover would pop off (tho i welded latches on in more recent years).
its tall and heavy, up off the ground. the stand was weak as (we fixed that. i even put sand in it to help dampen the vibrations.)
that thing was a ******* nitemare. thank god its gone now.

 

[Dennis Crowley]

My most dangerous machine was a worker who I sent home because he been drinking all night once, the stoner one was all good to work.
That was years ago.

 

[James]

We took on a man a few years ago to nail up bee boxes. He was dynamite on an air gun, but failed the dope test and higher management , in their wisdom, let him go.
Most dangerous tool has to be the palfinger crane. If you press the wrong button when folding it up, it clonks you on the head !

 

[John B]

Eight frame extractors with no lids, one slip and it would have been curtains. Easy loaders which were great for moving singles but we mostly use them for pallets of hives and it was just too close to their weight limits. You had to get right underneath the hives sometimes to get them on the truck and both the ones we had eventually just folded with no warning. Fortunately nobody was underneath them at the time but I wouldn't have another one. Drum barrows were a huge improvement on physically pushing them over onto an old tire and then rolling them onto tractor forks. The worst accident I can recall was when I was still at school. I was cleaning comb honey sections on a wire brush and my father was unloading a truck a few meters on the other side of a wall. He slipped on the deck and caught his armpit on a hook use for hanging ropes. He was lifted off and then carted off in an ambulance with me none the wiser. He was off work for two weeks and it was probably one of the few decent holidays he had in his life..

 

[Alastair]

Gosh Nick you do not mention the half of it.

Funny thing, in an idle moment just a few days ago I was reminiscing about the dangerous equipment we had at Airborne, in my view, just about everything there would not pass the OSH test now a days. All the same, there were few accidents, people used their noggins. Couple accidents I can think of was 1. me, unloading a truckload of honey with those very trolleys you described, one of them got away on me sliding down the ramp and went over the side. Trying to stop it I got in the way and went down under it, so landed on the ground with 5 full boxes of honey landing on top of me. 2. Arthur Gossett who got conked on the head by the Kelly Boom when the bearing broke, after some weeks recovery he returned to work but was never the same.

Other thing, once a year an inspector from the then Department of Labour would come to check over the machinery. I overheard a huge row between him and Jasper, the inspectors main concern was the woodwork shed. But Jasper would not conceed an inch, flat refused to make any of the changes the guy recommended. Did not seem to be any penalties if you did not comply.

 

[John B]

When I was a school kid I used to help out shifting hives on a truck fitted with a Kelly loader. My job was tying the load down and opening and shutting gates . My one attempt at using the Kelly loader resulted in a hive spread all over the ground. They were pretty amazing things but not that easy to use and took a bit of practice. One night a couple of the guys were out unloading hives in a bit of a hollow. In the neighbouring house were some local yokels on the turps and all they could see were the lights on the Kelly boom swinging backwards and forwards , they decided that it was an UFO and promptly opened up with a 303. Fortunately no one was hurt.
You can't legislate for stupid.

 

[Alastair]

Yes the kelly boom loader was a nightmare of a thing to use, I found out why once I used a self levelling loader, which was a piece of cake. With the kelly boom you were mostly fighting gravity and needed almost super human strength to use it.

 

[Wknz]

I was looking for pictures of a Kelly boom loader but instead found this.

You would need to trust your hives were solid but for a small operator not bad.