Volume Eleven - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - some more aspects - Handbook to Penarth Dock & Ely Tidal Harbour - 1904 . . .

Each tip is fitted with two anti-breakage cranes and patent " Dispatch " anti-breakage boxes, which are not in use anywhere else. No bolts or other attachments are required for the working of these boxes. They are automatic in action and will empty at any height required, and are therefore the most expeditious boxes used. One crane is capable of working a 40-cwt. box, that is to say, a box carrying 40 cwt. of coal ; and the other, an anti-breakage box, carrying five tons ;  each tip is capable of " boxing " (as it is termed) as rapidly as the coal can be delivered into the shoot. The smaller anti-breakage crane is also fitted with jibbing and swinging appliances for swinging the small coal screenings ashore.

The appliances for working the cradle are fitted with automatic stops, so that, the height at which the tip shoot is required to work having once been fixed, the cradle when brought up to the necessary tipping point is automatically stopped at exactly the height required, and the top man has only to start the cradle for lifting, when he is free to handle the lever for tipping without further attention to the lifting of the cradle. Again, in lowering, as soon as the wagon has been tipped, the cradle descends, and is automatically stopped when reaching the bottom.

The tip shoots are 24 feet long, and there are arrangements by which they can be lengthened up to 30 feet. In order that the coal may slide gently out of the shoots to avoid breakage, they can be rapidly adjusted to any height or angle. They are also sufficiently large to hold more than a full 10-ton wagon of coal, the largest in use in this District. The shoots are also fitted with double wings for assisting in the trimming of the coal and also in the " boxing " ; and they are further made to radiate five feet in either direction from the centre line of the tip, so as to enable them to assist and minimise trimming.

Each tip is furnished with a traversing turntable platform, which is fitted with two turntables, one for the empty and the other for the full load. These platforms are also fitted with with hydraulic capstans of a capacity of of two-tons pull, and are capable of being moved to suit the position of the tips.

The whole of the water power required is brought to these tips by means of two mains, each 8 in. diameter, and so arranged that in case of failure of either one or the other,