chute suggestions for a dump box?

There's topic here: http://nepacrossroads.com/post25878.html#p25878

I'd suggest aluminum, basically all you need is flat piece and fold the ends up so you have a very wide c-channel. Get some heavier strips of aluminum for down the sides. I got achute out back I'll get a picture up. You're jaw is going to drop when you go to price them though.

Wish I could have gotten beter picture but these are buried behind the summer stuff so I couldn't get to them. Note there's two chutes here, each chute is 8 feet long. Note the reinforcements for the edges. The reinforcements are about 1 to 3/4 inch wide and 1/4 thick. Forget the gauge for the aluminum but is not all really thick. they will last for years if you don't abuse them. You can't get dings or anything else in them and if you do you have to puound them out, even then it doesn't take long to get hole. Keep the customers away from them, nothing pissed me off more than some customer throwing my $500 chutes around or banging on them with a shovel or worse yet with hoe. That's what those cost... 15 years ago if I remember correctly. Not sure what they would cost now but I think I was quoted a price of $1400 for 2 sets not too long ago. You need really good aluminum, you don't want cheap stuff. It's just like the shovels, we purchased 2 hardened aluminum ones 15 years ago and just recently retired them. the ones you can get at Ace for example you're lucky if they last season.

If you're reading this and you're a consumer ... keep your dam hands off the coalman's chutes.

Coal Jockey wrote:Without some sort of physical support from the ground like a pole, they chute sections would have to be very heavily built to support a chute full of coal.

As you can see they telescope, generally I just left the two together, I had others on the truck if I needed the addtional length. You can hook up to 4 of them together without an issues of them breaking but you need to leave at least a foot and half of each one inside the preceding one. The only time you might have an issue on a really long shot is if the coal gets clogged at the window and you don't get it urned off immediately because it will stack up on the chute and you can literally have 1/4 ton sitting on them in the seconds.

The second chute is the exact width of a cinder block so you can put it right through such holes, actually a little wider. you had to put it in at angle then wedge it down. Typically the two 8 foot chutes together will handle about 70% of most places. I also have stainless steel chute that fits into terra cotta pipes, a very short chute with a bail on it that that funnels to about 8 inches, a chute like the ones in the picture except half the length where the window was very high and you could get very close, and of course the regular extensions. Those were all on my smaller truck as that was the one that was used most often for new customers or harder places, the larger one was relegated to easy large loads and just had few extensions and short chute with bail.

Here's a quick tip, if you suggest ways to the customers on how to make it easier most will generally do it. I've even flat out told people that I wasn't bringing it next year unless they changed the configuration, might not be very helpful for someone starting out but some will take advantage of you and do things to make life easier for themselves that can make things a whole lot harder for you. My general rule when getting a new customer was I'd tell them on the phone if I can't get it from the truck to where you want it it has to go somehwere and I wasn't going to kill myself to do it either, no buckets, no wheelbarrows etc. I'd also mentione that I am the very best coalman in the world and if I can't get it there no one can.

stokerscot wrote: The drivers loved it because they didn't have to take out a couple extra pieces to get to those far spots. Some of that would work great for a coal chute.

Too heavy...lol, you got to remember if you're doing a lot of coal deliveries locally you might be going to 10-12 houses in day. Beside you don't need it, these all telescope, the two main chutes are already to together. On a regular coal truck it already in position, just pull it out and extend it to where you need it.