Hulett

[citation needed] The Hulett machine revolutionised iron ore shipment on the Great Lakes.

Previous methods of unloading lake freighters, involving hoists and buckets and much hand labor, cost approximately 18¢/ton.

Lake boat designs changed to accommodate the Hulett unloader, and became much larger,[1] doubling in length and quadrupling in capacity.

The additional unloading capacity they brought helped permit a greater than doubling of the ore traffic in the 1900–1912 period.

[citation needed] In spite of the Cleveland machines being on the National Register of Historic Places and designated as a Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmark, they were demolished in 2000 by the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority to enable development of the underlying land.

Steel towers, riding on wheeled trucks, supported girders that spanned the railroad tracks.

The scoop bucket was lowered into the ship's hold, closed to capture a quantity (10 tons approx.)

[5] To reduce the required motion of the carriage, a moving receiving hopper ran between the main girders.

Huletts at the Pennsylvania Railroad ore docks at Cleveland . The nearest Hulett is discharging into the hopper, while the next is lowering its bucket into the hold.
A Hulett's bucket in the foreground, while another scoops ore from the hold. The operator's cab is in the leg, behind the aperture above the bucket and below the circular sprocket.
Discharging the travelling hopper's load into a waiting hopper car .
HAER diagram of a Hulett Unloader in Cleveland, Ohio