inbye
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5 years ago
I'd be interested in opinions on this forum photo, which at first glance shows a typical face scene. I initially thought it was showing the start of shearing through a small fault but there looks to be more going on.
The usual haulage chain appears to be a hawser, what shearer used this idea?
Presumably, the water bagging is wrapped round the cable, there's another which may be hydraulic, for pushing the panzer across, so what's the huge pipe for?
I never used a shearer (was a development worker) but am fairly sure the drums didn't have picks in the face of them, yet there are circular pick marks in the coal.
And then there's the coal itself, what's the idea of that step in the roof?


Photograph:

🔗40399[linkphoto]40399[/linkphoto][/link]
Regards, John...

Huddersfield, best value for money in the country, spend a day there & it'll feel like a week........
staffordshirechina
5 years ago
This looks quite an old set up.
Any idea of date?
All the supports are manual and appear to be of the friction type, not Dowty props.
Older coal cutters used a steel rope for haulage. I never saw one but was taught a 'cutter loop knot' by an old boy when I was first training. The knot worked on all sorts of cables, even electrical ones so you could make a quick, illegal snatch rope for haulage problems!
Not sure how the conveyor would be pushed over. Originally they used lifting jacks on their side.
Shearer drums had picks at all sorts of angles. Latterly there were 'sumping drum' shearers that could be pushed over whilst cutting so no stable hole was needed.

Les
inbye
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5 years ago
"staffordshirechina" wrote:

This looks quite an old set up.
Any idea of date?
All the supports are manual and appear to be of the friction type, not Dowty props.
Older coal cutters used a steel rope for haulage. I never saw one but was taught a 'cutter loop knot' by an old boy when I was first training. The knot worked on all sorts of cables, even electrical ones so you could make a quick, illegal snatch rope for haulage problems!
Not sure how the conveyor would be pushed over. Originally they used lifting jacks on their side.
Shearer drums had picks at all sorts of angles. Latterly there were 'sumping drum' shearers that could be pushed over whilst cutting so no stable hole was needed.

Les



Thanks Les, ah yes, I'd forgotten about those sumping shearers but never seen one that pulls itself with a hawser. There were some that had a toothed sprocket that ran on a rack on top of the panzer but this ones a mystery.
I also wondered about those supports, a training face I worked on had Dowty props and Groetchell bars (spelling) and those things look super heavy in comparison.
No, no idea of date, it's just a photo posted on the forum, if I had to guess I'd say 1960's, hard to think they'd be using those supports in the 70's.

Regards, John...

Huddersfield, best value for money in the country, spend a day there & it'll feel like a week........
Mr.C
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5 years ago
Best candidate I can find is the Anderton Shearer/Loader.
It used a haulage cable rather than a chain & ran on the panzer.
It looks like it's based on the AB15 but with the final drive/jib replaced with a drum assy. Needless to say, it was non ranging & small dia. drum, so that perhaps accounts for the roof step?
The other possibility is the Anderton Trepanner, also cable haulage. It has a roof shearing turret head which follows the trepanner head. I'd discounted it at first as it would have given a curved cut face. Then I noticed they also had a vertical cutter jib which followed the trepanner.
Other than that, maybe one of the Huwood turret/slicer/etc combinations? They were also cable hauled.
We inhabit an island made of coal, surrounded by a sea full of fish. How can we go wrong.......
inbye
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5 years ago
Thanks, really interesting info. I did wonder about a trepanner but only studied them in mining journals. The pit I was at seemed to favour BJD stuff.
Another thing about that photo is how tidy everything is, hardly any spillage, supports look like they're almost set to a string line and, of course, there must have been a reason for the photo in the first place.

Regards, John...

Huddersfield, best value for money in the country, spend a day there & it'll feel like a week........
staffordshirechina
5 years ago
Quite by chance I found this photo from a 2006 visit I made to the Centre historique minier de Lewarde in Northern France.
It shows clearly what I believe are the same roof support and link bar system as the Frickley photo. Also, it shows a floor ram for pushing over, very like the one visible in the photo. The conveyor would be where I am standing in the walkway.
The support system could well be of German origin. They made several systems like that.

Les

🔗120074[linkphoto]120074[/linkphoto][/link]
Boy Engineer
5 years ago
On related lines, have you seen the Dowty Mining archive that has been put online as part of a wider Dowty Group heritage project?
The mining stuff is here:
https://www.dowtyheritage.org.uk/content/category/dowty-group/mining 

Plenty of stuff on the site to sate appetites at times like these.
Mr.C
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5 years ago
"staffordshirechina" wrote:

Quite by chance I found this photo from a 2006 visit I made to the Centre historique minier de Lewarde in Northern France.
It shows clearly what I believe are the same roof support and link bar system as the Frickley photo. Also, it shows a floor ram for pushing over, very like the one visible in the photo. The conveyor would be where I am standing in the walkway.
The support system could well be of German origin. They made several systems like that.

Les


They are German Les. I thought I'd seen an old advert in a Colliery Guardian that looked like the ones in the Frickley photo & yours. I've just found it. The props are Becorits of Recklinghausen & the link bars are Groetschel. Pretty certain they are the same.
The ad is in Guide to Coalfields '56, placed by Becorit (GB) ltd.

Nigel
We inhabit an island made of coal, surrounded by a sea full of fish. How can we go wrong.......
wheldale
5 years ago
I uploaded a coal face photo years ago in the Monckton 3&4 album, same face supports, the photo was taken in 1951, don’t know if this helps you with a possible date?
staffordshirechina
5 years ago
Yes! Groetschel bars. That was the name I was trying to remember.
I have seen them somewhere else, years ago, it may have been Grassmoor Training Centre.
inbye
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5 years ago
That's really interesting and a good find. I used Groetschel bars on a training face, some 50 years ago, in conjunction with Dowty props. Vividly remember the pair of neat little hanging brackets that kept the unsupported bar in place, whilst resetting the props. The brackets also doubled as rollers to allow the loose bar to be moved to the face.
Regards, John...

Huddersfield, best value for money in the country, spend a day there & it'll feel like a week........
staffordshirechina
5 years ago
Again from memory, the ones I saw at the training centre were on Dowty props, not those mechanical ones in the photo.
The Dowty props had castellated heads to interlock with notches on the bars.
inbye
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5 years ago
"staffordshirechina" wrote:

Again from memory, the ones I saw at the training centre were on Dowty props, not those mechanical ones in the photo.
The Dowty props had castellated heads to interlock with notches on the bars.



There's some with tops like that on the Dowty website, posted above.
The prop tops at Park Mill were just those composite discs that were held on by rivets.




Regards, John...

Huddersfield, best value for money in the country, spend a day there & it'll feel like a week........
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