I have two hulett unloader models as part of my future ironworks section. The problem i am having is being able to get a propper location in relation to the blast furnace and other working areas of the mill. I cant seem to find any pictures (overhead or scematic drawings) showing where the unloaders would be located. Also in the video available on the product review I noticed a small rail vehicle running between the railcars under the unloader. The operator was in a standing position when the car was operated and it was running on a narrow rail between two load lines. What is the name and purpose of this vehicle?Any information on these questions would be a great help.
The Huletts do NOT need to be right beside, or even close to, the blast furnace. Since they are used to unload ships, they would be located on the dock; on most layouts this would be directly along the edge by the aisle. There would be hopper cars on tracks directly underneath the Hulett, these could take the ore to the blast furnace via the highline.
If you don’t already have it, you should probably pickup a copy of the Model Railroaders Guide to Steel Mills by Bernie Kempenski. He describes a lot of this stuff in detail.
About that “small rail vehicle”, that may have been an electric car pusher (I can’t remember what the ‘nickname’ of that machine is though [:I] ). Since I didn’t see the video myself, I can only hazard a guess…
There are many steel mills that have hulett unloaders on the same site. The hulett is capable of dumping its loads not only over the multiple rr tracks, but all the way to the back, past the tracks, where the ore was stored in large piles to be retrieved by bridge cranes and loaded into hoppers on the high line. Think of it this way, picture a football field. The ore boats, huletts, and hoppers on one side, big piles of materials stacked on the field with the bridge crane straddling it, and the steel mill on the opposing side. This would need lots of realestate to pull off.
The little engine you refer to is a shunting engine. It is used to advance the hoppers under the hullet. It uses a hinged arm which is lowered and pushes into the back of the cars. They were much more economical than having a switcher standing by on each track and could service multiple huletts at a time.
Hope this works. This should be a link to an overview of what I’m talking about. Of course the tracks are gone, the huletts are long gone, but the bridge crane still stands. There would be multiple piles of different materials as well. You can see the retaining walls that would be to the rear of the hulett, and track beds as well. The hulett would drop it’s loads either in a car for further transport or between the walls to be retrieved by the crane.
It’s obvious that the site is still in use, presumably served by the present-day breed of self-unloading lakers.
As a former maritime type, I would consider taking a laker in from the lake to that site to be cruel and unusual punishment!
If you follow the river to the lake, you’ll see a self-unloader moored at a lakefront unloading facility that still has rail service. Problem there is exposure to the weather - which, on Lake Erie, can be brutal.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with waterways navigable by kayakers with death wishes)
Barney?
Ed
It’s probably what was sometimes called a side arm pusher. A lot of them were built by The Atlas Car and Manufacturing Co. of Cleveland. A Google search of “atlas car and manufacturing co.” will show pictures of several types of pushers in the first two items. The picture in the Wikipedia article (first item) shows the arm partially lowered. The North East Rails website (second item) has pictures of some of the locomotives Atlas built.
That is the type of photo i was looking for thank you very much for the link. This will be a big help. To everyone who has given input, thank you very much. Every time I see a video or a piece of equipment that sparks interest it is nice to know that there are people willing to help and video games have not replaced the greatest american hobby.
,And not far away, a Hulett is still there, but in pieces.
Interesting - somebody could model that ore yard on a 4x8! [swg]
In Z scale, I presume. That laker is about 600 feet long.
Incidentally, that’s the laker I mentioned earlier. I didn’t notice the dismembered Hulett in the weeds.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Heck just the other day I was studying that salt mine across the street and never saw the Hullet or the laker
Never saw that. In my defense though, the last time I was in Cleveland that was assembled and working, along with several others.[:)]
Here is another steel mill that can give you some alternative for a layout. It still takes a lot of room, but it’s a BIG industry
If I recall correctly , there was a couple schematic drawings for a steel mill in Pennsylvania in the Library of Congress website. It gave the site layout with all the different buildings and several buildings had elevation sheets (open hearth, etc). It was the Pittsburgh Steel Company’s Monnesen Works. It may give you more options.
Check with the Great Lakes Historical Society. They had a great video on the Hulets in action.
Many Cleveland area Hulletts were still standing until about 4 yrs ago. The plan was to relocate them to various parts of the city and erect them as monuments. They hadn’t been operative for decades. AFIK none have been scrapped but none have been reassembled either.
I intend to model a 42"x12’ version of Whiskey Island on my future layout complete with 4 Hullets, just have to find some cheap kits!
Cheap kits? And 4 of them to boot? I can’t see that happening any time soon. The hulett kits will soon go the way of the bascule bridge. Thats too bad, since they both would go together well, as evident in the pictures. I also noticed behind that original steel mill , on the other side of the yard tracks, is a roundhouse and turntable in miserable shape. It appears that at least a couple bays are being used even if the opposite end is collapsing. There is so many things that can be modelled in this small area of the Cleveland. It really would have been something in it’s haydays. I’m not that old, but I do remember the huletts working in the 70’s.
Location of such a large structure is very important and it poses many concerns for the operation and general viewing patrons of your layout.
1st, if a static model is represented it should be a close to the point of real interest,ie, the blast furnace or the raw materials stock pile(s).Note that the steel Making industry is a macro not micro operation. Large Volumes of materials move almost constantly into and out of the Blast Furnaces.
2nd,if animated and a seperate operating POI then some distance is better ,calculated by the amount of
material (ore) you move.
I have seen those Jennys used in many locations, PRR Greenwich yard in South Phila. had several between the tracks to move cars along the underside of a huge loading facility. The Huletts would unload ships at the river dock onto a long belt conveyor that fed a collector tower.Multple curved tracks under the collector fed the storage yard(s).
In Sanduskey,OH. Same routine but the Huletts dumped the load to rail cars directly under the Huletts.
Hope this helps.
A bird’s eye view of that roundhouse (on Bing Maps) shows some old passenger cars, cabeese and even a steam loco tender outside the stall. Apparently it is being used by a rail museum.
My HO scale harbor and Ashland Iron & Steel complex are “compressed” into a 3’ x 5 ’ area. The four tracks under the Huletts must be spaced exactly between the double rail supports for the Hulett. The first photo shows how I used a cardboard template footprint, to locate all the tracks precisely. I use a very short switcher to move the 24 ore cars into position. I would suggest that you scratch-build the 3ft.ore boat with six hatches. (The $300 Walther’s ore boat , that is shown), is overpriced). I,also, scratch built a 3 ft.long 18 hatch ore boat being loaded on a river harbor, located in another part of my layout. The following set of pictures give you some idea of how the Iron & steel mill complex can be compressed, The Blast furnace must be close to the Blower engine house, and close to the Rolling mill, where molten iron is formed into ingots, and then processed into sheets, tubes, or wires. Steel, (from the iron ingots), is processed in an electric furnace, located elsewhere. The related coke and gas complex and limestone quarry can add to the industries shown on your layout. My 24’ x 24’ layout is fictional. Click on any photo to enlarge it. Then click on the photo series to the left, to view other parts of my layout. Bob Hahn 
The Huletts are hand animated, (with levers) in three directions. 
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Actually, Hulett unloaders as interesting as they are, are not necessary for a Steel Mill. There are many Steel Mills that do not have these. Bethlehem Steel is one example. Huletts are located by rivers or large bodies of water such as Lake Michigan or Lake Erie where Iron ore, lime stone or coal are unloaded from either barges or freighters{called “Lakers”} and then are transferred to hopper cars or ore jennies{small hopper cars}. These are made into “Unit Trains” and brought to the steel mill and the materials are dumped at a “car dumper” which takes these by conveyor or by the Ore Bridge to the Materials yard.
Having a blast furnace, prototypically does not mean a Steel Mill. It would be what is known as an “Iron Reduction Furnace” and produces only molten or solid iron known as “Pig Iron”. Sloss Furnace is such an example. To make a Steel Mill, you need the “conversion department” where scrap iron & Steel, dolomite/limestone and molten pig iron is put into either a Bessemer Converter, Open Hearth Furnace, or as is now the case a “Basic Oxygen Furnace”. Here the iron is reheated to about 3000F and the carbon, manganese, phosphorous & silica are burned off. Later Carbon is reintroduced to the iron{.5% to 4.5%} to make steel.
However a stand alone blast furnace can represent a steel mill as these are what the public normally sees.
Go to Youtube and see my HO Scale SPRING LAKE IRON & STEEL CHARLES WESLEY WORKS COMPLEX1 and see how these structures fit. SLI&S does have huletts, but these are off site.My modular layout is under construction.