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Post by Wheldale on Jan 12, 2012 17:21:37 GMT -5
How difficult would it be to unfill a mine shaft? Say for example Hatfield decided to use the now filled Thorne mine shafts. Would it be cheaper to dig them out than sink new shafts? How would such an operation be carried out? Has such an operation been done before?
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Post by John on Jan 12, 2012 18:23:47 GMT -5
How difficult would it be to unfill a mine shaft? Say for example Hatfield decided to use the now filled Thorne mine shafts. Would it be cheaper to dig them out than sink new shafts? How would such an operation be carried out? Has such an operation been done before? Interesting question, one question would be, is the shaft lining damaged??? Would we have to reline the shaft?? If so, by what thickness?? Would it be economical to remove the infill, repair damage to shaft and reinstall the steelwork, or would it be cheaper to sink a new shaft?? One thought, many of the old shafts were smaller diameter to modern shafts. Modern shafts are designed for hoisting 20 plus tonnes in one lift, the more one can hoist in one lift, the more profitable the mine will be. I personally don't think clearing the infill from a shaft and rehabilitating the shaft would be economically feasible. |
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Post by dickthecoal on Jan 12, 2012 18:24:06 GMT -5
Wheldale - I can't imagine it could be more expensive to recover a filled shaft rather than sink a new one. However there would be little point in recovering the Thorne shafts. The main reason that Thorne never took off was because shortly after they were sunk the shafts developed a bloody great bulge in the shaft wall half way down the shafts. The risks assosiated with tarvelling skips through the shaft while guiding them past the bulges was too high. When they were developing the pit bottom insets I went throught the shaft in a kibble and the bulge was plain to see. That doesn't mean that with the right level of intent the shaft couldn't be repaired and the bulges taken out?  |
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Post by Wheldale on Jan 14, 2012 18:24:00 GMT -5
I used Thorne as a example but just wondered if say for example if coal took of again if some closed mines could be salvaged. Mind you cant think of any other than thorne or frances. Selby was all worked out? The only way is east and i cant see there being any investment in the industry.
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Post by John on Jan 14, 2012 18:32:06 GMT -5
I doubt you could economically salvage a colliery that's been closed 20 plus years. The cost of pumping out all the water would be enormous, plus roads would have closed up and strata waterlogged.
As you say go east young man!!
BUT, even that could pose problems now, water from the collieries that have been closed could well flow eastward through the strata, then as you're probably aware, seams dip to the east and by the time you get to the coast top hard would probably be over 2000 yards deep!!
Imagine the heat and humidity at that depth!!
Maggie and her cohorts virtually put the lid on UK deep coal mining for good with her short sightedness.
There's some good papers on water from flooded collieries causing problems to the natural water table.
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Post by John on Jan 14, 2012 18:34:47 GMT -5
I used Thorne as a example but just wondered if say for example if coal took of again if some closed mines could be salvaged. Mind you cant think of any other than thorne or frances. Selby was all worked out? The only way is east and i cant see there being any investment in the industry. I think Selby had severe geological problems, Dick could clear that up, he managed a colliery in that complex I believe, he'll be the Selby expert on the site. |
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Post by Wheldale on Jan 15, 2012 5:41:55 GMT -5
I used Thorne as a example but just wondered if say for example if coal took of again if some closed mines could be salvaged. Mind you cant think of any other than thorne or frances. Selby was all worked out? The only way is east and i cant see there being any investment in the industry. I think Selby had severe geological problems, Dick could clear that up, he managed a colliery in that complex I believe, he'll be the Selby expert on the site. I remember the unions saying there was still alot of coal down there. But like you say John there was alot of geological problems, water in the west, small faults etc. I once read that according to a expert at the time the whole Selby complex should have been developed 90 degrees to the right i think and comprise of 3 mines. From memory Riccall worked a small part of the Stanley seam. I dont know how this seam compared to the Barnsley seam. They applied applied for planning permission to drive a heading further in the Stanley seam but got knocked back by the council. |
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Post by John on Jan 15, 2012 8:36:53 GMT -5
You will find a lot of collieries with good reserves were closed, profitable pits too??
Cotgrave in south Notts had millions of tons of "virgin" reserves and many years left in it. None of the top workable seams were touched. Seams worked were Deep Soft, problems with that seam at that colliery was floor heave and weighting, five faces were worked when the pits started and abandoned, all in the north area.
Deep hard, the main seam for many years.
They tried the Piper, bad geological conditions, then went into the Blackshale.
Tupton, (Low Main) was never touched, then in the upper seams none was ever worked, Top Hard should have been workable, had a good seam section and was noted as a good steam raising coal.
Probably now, the corrosive action of the acidic water from the gypsum strata has eaten away at the concrete in the shafts, as happened during the late 50's early 60's.
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Post by dazbt on Jan 15, 2012 9:01:04 GMT -5
"From memory Riccall worked a small part of the Stanley seam. I dont know how this seam compared to the Barnsley seam. They applied applied for planning permission to drive a heading further in the Stanley seam"
The Stanley Seam was known as Beamshaw around Barnsley, brilliant house coal. I think in some places it varied and split into two workable seams but around here it was generally around 36".
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Post by dickthecoal on Jan 16, 2012 13:29:01 GMT -5
Chaps - The Stanley Seam as it is being refered to is of course the Stanley Main. This seam was not worked in the Selby complex mines (or at least I'm pretty sure it wasn't). It was worked well though in Prince of Wales mine at Pontefract where I was manager from 1991 to end of 1993. It was a good quality coal of around 4/5ft section. The area was faulted but with very little interaction from the faulting so once you were in a decent area between faults winning coal was fairly easy. It was a great seam for using the Dosco dintheader miner. This machine is a relatively lightweight machine but due to the nature of the seam with it's good roof and floor the machine was well suited to that environment.
The Selby area was heavily faulted with a great deal of interaction from the faulting. With outputs of in excess of 10million tonne per year it seemed to the outsider like shelling peas but it was anything like. Water ingress at Wistow, extreme floor heavy at North Selby, heavy faulting at Ricall, Stillingfleet and particularly Whitemoor where you wouldn't want to mine within 100 metres of any fault. There is very little workable coal left other than at Ricall possibly where the future plans for a new area of take were thwarted by poor management desisions on the design of the working plan. They tried to take the nearest faces first rather than drive to the end of the take and work back. The trunk roadways collapsed and the reserves were lost. This all happened after I had departed for the rail industry and I was fairly livid as it was potentially lucrative. In saying that the complex needed at least three pits producing so as to fund the operations at Gasgoinne Wood. Whitemoor and North Selby had all but folded by then
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Post by Wheldale on Jan 16, 2012 16:35:40 GMT -5
RJB applied for permission to work the Stanley main seam in 98 from Riccal. Ive read on a few sites (Welsh forum being one) that a small area was worked. Its a shame as when you look at all the coal east of the complex that has been steralized.
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Post by dickthecoal on Jan 16, 2012 18:19:06 GMT -5
Wheldale you are correct. On reflection the new area of take I refered to in my earlier slot was actually the Stanley Main. It had never been worked so I organised a series of 15 boreholes vertically up from the Barnsley seam that had always been worked. The seam showed in excess of 6ft of good quality coal over a massive area. We set the new developments away and just as we started the x measure drivages I left the industry. Richard Budge and me didn't get on too well
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Post by Wheldale on Jan 17, 2012 3:16:32 GMT -5
Wheldale you are correct. On reflection the new area of take I refered to in my earlier slot was actually the Stanley Main. It had never been worked so I organised a series of 15 boreholes vertically up from the Barnsley seam that had always been worked. The seam showed in excess of 6ft of good quality coal over a massive area. We set the new developments away and just as we started the x measure drivages I left the industry. Richard Budge and me didn't get on too well Hi Dickthecoal, was there any other workable seams at Selby? |
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Post by dickthecoal on Jan 17, 2012 5:06:46 GMT -5
The seam legend was quite large but to be honest I never really focused on other seams too much. When I was apponited to Selby it was to effect the merger of Ricall and Whitemoor. This was the first of the proposed pairing-up of the six mines so as to achieve three. As a result most of my focus was on reorganising staff, rationalising working faces and coping with the union kick-back from redundancies etc. In addition we had quite a battle with HMI as they were not at all happy with seperate mines several miles apart at surface level having one manager. (Truth be known neither was I). Wheras I started with one of everything at each mine, i.e. one deputy manager, one mech eng/elect eng, several dputy eng's I had to release loads of staff and that wasn't a pleasant experience. So I'm sure you can imagine that looking for new seams was off the radar. It was only when I had completed the merger and staff reductions that I had time to sit and review what else was there to go for. To be honest if someone had spent time doing that in the early days of the complex it could have lasted a further 20 years plus.
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merlin
Shotfirer.
prop and lid
Posts: 64 
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Post by merlin on May 13, 2015 12:33:33 GMT -5
some say maggie thatcher closed the pits for the future when the gas and oil has gone
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Post by John on May 13, 2015 13:36:18 GMT -5
some say maggie thatcher closed the pits for the future when the gas and oil has gone
Besides, even if it hadn't happened, my guess is the coal industry would have been on it's last legs now. Whats the price of a ton of coal on the open market now?? $US35 a ton?? I doubt any British pit, no matter how large could produce coal at that price, let alone ship it to the customer and make any profit on it.
Over here, many low profit large mines are on care and maintenance, only the big pits with big longwalls are profitable at the moment, the big 5 to 7 million tons a year pits.
Many big producing Australian collieries are in care and maintenance too due to market prices and poor markets.
I like many members on here worked for the old NCB, mainly on low faces, it's only when you work on real high production faces of 12 to 14 feet high do you realize how inefficient the NCB really was.
Lets compare a face at a UK colliery in the 60's and 70's with the one I worked on in the 80's in Oz.
Thickest seam section I worked on in the UK was 60 inches, I know there were thicker, but most were 30 inches to 42 inches.
Advancing faces, used stable holes, so had four men in the S/H, and four men on a rip, times two = 16 men.
Face team, one shearer driver, one cable man, one man chocking, one man pushing over, one spare man, one chargehand collier. 6 men.
I Deputy, one Overman, two shotfirers 4 men.
One Electrician, one Fitter, one chock maintenance man 3 men.
One man on the gate end switch.
Total manpower = 30 men.
There could also be a crew backripping in both gates, but we'll say the gates were perfect.
Australian face, we'll only use a longwall.
One Deputy, whose duties are statutory and carry the same ticket as a UK Deputy, he also supervises the face crew.
One Electrician, one Fitter.
Two shearer drivers, reason is double ended ranging arm shearer.
One man chocking, one man pushing over, one spare man, one man at the gate end.
Total manpower....Nine men.
Production, in excess of 48,000 tonnes per week.
I should mention, that's five days of production on three seven hour shifts that overlap, where the teams change at the face. Nightshift was a maintenance shift, belt retraction etc ready for the next days production.
There are now faces operating 24/7 and producing triple the production I gave, with the same manpower.
When I started at Angus Place, it was half way along with LW5 face, the pit was selling their coal to the local power station at $13 per tonne DELIVERED. And we still made a profit. The colliery produced the cheapest steam raising coal in the world in the early 1980's.
Mind, we were the only colliery in Australia at that time operating a longwall.
I've seen visitors jaws hang open when they saw how large a modern collieries equipment is. Even seasoned colliers can't grasp the scope of modern longwall mining.
I started in the age of the Anderson Boyes AB16 125 HP shearers, todays shearers dwarf those, some weighing as much as 100 tonnes.
There is one colliery in Australia using the longwall top caving method to extract a seam many feet thick in one cut. Years back we'd have taken it in slices, top, then middle, then bottom. Now it's done in one go.
Subsidence must be great on the surface!! |
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