derrickman
14 years ago
I'd suspect that most people looking for a given location will start by entering the name. I'd follow that by suggesting that most people will know the mine in question by its principal product, which in the great majority of cases will be its greatest product by tonnage over most if not all of its life.

Tonnage is the only meaningful way of defining a mine's capacity. Professionals talk about tonnages, in the same way that oil people talk about barrels, because they are a far more meaningful description of the scope and nature of operations than final value of finished product. Apart from anything else, any mine selling part-processed ore, or sending ore for smelting under contract, isn't getting the full sale price anyway

Secondary products are a confusing issue at best - is Boulby a "salt mine", because it certainly produces salt?

"Boulby Potash Mine" gets my vote as a logical and sufficient format



''the stopes soared beyond the range of our caplamps' - David Bick...... How times change .... oh, I don't know, I've still got a lamp like that.
Vanoord
14 years ago
Just for interest's sake, those minerals with 10 or fewer entries:

Alum Shale - 7
Anhydrite - 2
Bauxite - 0
Bitumen - 1
Calcite - 9
Chrome - 5
Cobalt - 2
Flint - 9
Ganister - 10
Graphite - 3
Jet - 6
Mica - 1
Nickel - 1
Ochre - 8
Oil Shale - 2
Potash - 1
Salt - 3
Silica - 5
Sulphur - 2
Talc - 1
Umber - 3
Witherite - 2
Wolframite - 5
Wulfenite - 0


And the two catch-alls:

Mixed - 2644 😮
Other Rock - 128

Looking at the number of 'mixed' mines, a system of being able to tag mines to more than one mineral looks sensible - ie you could find a mine by both Zinc and Tin if it produced both.
Hello again darkness, my old friend...

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