Hopper Scales
Accuweigh’s Brisbane branch recently commissioned large industrial hopper scales for weighing waste sewerage by-product on the Gold Coast. These custom engineered hopper scales are part of a multi-million dollar waste water project and are used to weigh the volume of treated sludge that is a by-product of the water treatment processes.
These heavy duty hopper scales are 10m long x 4m wide x 5m high with a holding capacity of 120 tonnes. The sludge is fed into the hopper scale by dual conveyors and an auger is then used to empty the hopper scale into waiting trucks for delivery to local market gardeners free of charge to help rejuvenate their soil.
The hopper scales play an important part in the treatment process by not only tracking the volumes of waste product but by also ensuring the trucks transporting the waste are not illegally overloaded.
This industrial hopper scale is mounted on 6 x 30 tonne Flintec load cells which are of full stainless steel construction and rated for IP69 applications. The digital weight indicator fitted to the hopper scale is an Accuweigh 5000 fitted inside a sealed stainless steel housing and with an analogue 4-20mA output to a PLC. This Merrimac site has a transponder unit that sends text messages to up to 5 truck drivers when the system is nearing capacity advising the drivers that the hopper scale needs to be emptied.
Accuweigh is Australia’s largest industrial weighing system with branches in all mainland states.