Taking a Look at the History of Conveyors
When we think of the modern conveyor belt, our minds are likely to think of those long, rapidly-moving, smooth conveyors which link up the supply lines of major high-term firms. But this is just one aspect of the history of conveyors – a tradition in manufacturing and production lines for over two centuries. In this article, we’ll take a look at how conveyors have changed over time to become the key assets to any production business that they are today – constituting thousands of miles of belts across the world.
Early Beginnings
The earliest recorded use of a conveyor belt was in the 18th century when they were used to transport goods onto sailing boats, which would then be taken across the world in what was beginning to be a globalized trade network.
Yes, conveyor belts have their part to play in the globalization of trade. These belts were made of leather running over smooth wooden rollers, which would be operated by a hand crank. With conveyors now electrically powered and smooth-running, it’s difficult to imagine how jolty these initial conveyors might have been.
New Power
After a few decades, steam power came along and revolutionized the world. In Britain, where steam power was first harnessed in the industrial revolution, the conveyor belt was finally able to be unmanned – running constantly on a simple motor, which was, at times, a little difficult to control. The first recorded use of a steam-powered conveyor was in the British Navy – apparently to help in the production of ship’s biscuits.
The innovation didn’t stop there, though. With new sources of power came new, stronger materials, and it wasn’t long before the rollers of the conveyor belts proliferating across the world were to be made of steel – and the belts of rubber – in what shaped the modern conveyor of today.
New Uses
There were hundreds of uses for this modernized conveyor belt, including its use in the mines, where the primary resource of the industrial revolution was to be found. Underground pits would often have some form of conveyor belt to ferry coal from one place to another – either into trains or into a large heap.
But the real innovation came with the arrival of Henry Ford, whose automobile production technique spurred new decades of production line development, and immortalized the humble conveyor in the world of manufacturing forever.
Modern Times
Nowadays, it’s likely that you come across conveyor belts without particularly realizing you’re using one. When you unload your cart in the store, you’re using a short conveyor belt. When you hop on a horizontal travellator in the airport, you’re using one. And, of course, most of the industries around you use conveyors, too.
In fact, conveyors are so common that it’s likely they now save millions of hours of labor per day, making them one of the most useful tools to have graced production lines in the twenty-first century.
There you have it: some key ways in which conveyors have developed and changed over their long history.
