I'm still involved in surveying and illustrating an old copper mine in South Devon - the more I do the more there seems to be learned. Today's pressing question is this -

Assuming that a full kibble ( weighing up to a ton?) was hoisted to the surface via a cable running over the wheel on the headstock, how was it then unloaded onto the lip of the shaft? There would have to be some horizontal movement of the kibble to bring it in over the lip; since it was virtually a pendulum this would cause it to rise and would require considerable sideways force. Could this be done by manpower alone or would horse power be needed?

Would the contents of the kibble be tipped onto the ground or could they be decanted straight into a tub to be taken off on rails?

The kibbles I've seen appear to be suspended from near the rim so, when full, they would seem to need to be almost upended before they would empty - again a lot of effort when full of rock or ore. Some have a ring attached to the base, could this be used as a purchase point for tipping or dragging?

Taking all of this into account I've developed a theory which is this. The full kibble would be brought to the top of the shaft ( I'm assuming a vertical lift here ). It would be halted with the ring on the bottom at about head height of a man on the lip of the shaft. He would reach over and attach a strop to the ring. Either man or horsepower would heave sideways. At the same time the lifting cable would be allowed slack so that the kibble could both move horizontally from over the shaft and drop to the ground. This, I think, would get it onto the surface but the mouth would be pointing back towards the shaft and poor timing would result in everything in there being poured back whence it came! Maybe the horizontal pull was applied to the rim of the kibble but, however it was done, I'm still brought back to think that it was most likely emptied onto the ground in one co-ordinated movement of swing and drop. Could it be emptied directly into a tub? Was it held by some mechanism before being emptied?

Can anybody enlighten me or, in the absence of definitive knowledge, what other theories could work?

Best wishes,

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I cannot find a pic but there is reference to a "Lazy Chain" if you Google 'kibble tipping'.

Edit: This modern set up seems to indicate a chute is lowered under the kibble (across shaft).

http://www.amre.org.za/downloads/seminars/ShaftSafetySeminar2008/Signalling,%20Interlocking%20and%20Indication%20Devices%20for%20Sinking%20Shafts.pdf 

JohnnearCfon, linky thing worked. 🙂

"On arrival of the kibble at the surface, the lander seizes an eye or ring at the bottom by a pair of tongs suspended by a chain, and then gives the signal for the rope to be lowered slightly. The kibble turns over because it is suspended from the bottom, and its contents are shot out into a tram-waggon placed ready to receive them. During the operation of discharging the kibble, the mouth of the shaft should be covered by a hingeed door, so as to prevent stones from falling down and injuring the filler in the plat."

[C.Le Neve Foster "A Treatise on Ore and Stone Mining", London: Griffin, 6th ed, 1905, p.431]

The above account assumes a conventional kibble, suspended from a pair of eyes at or near its rim. However there were "tipping kibbles" or "bowks" where the point of suspension was slightly below their mid point. With this variety, the knocking up of a catch on the rim resulted in them tipping over without needing inching of the winding apparatus (hand windlass / horse gin / winding engine powered by water wheel, steam etc). [see E.H.Davies "Machinery for Metalliferous Mines: a practical treatise for mining engineers, metallurgists and managers of mines" London: Crosby Lockwood, 2nd ed, 1902, p95]

Tipping Kibbles, judging from their form, appear to have required vertical shafts. Conventional egg-shaped kibbles were designed to cope with inclined shafts, which were so commonplace in non-ferrous mines.

The above accounts all focus on kibbles employed in main shafts. The small kibbles employed in winzes frequently contained loads light enough to enable a man to tip them without the tongs arrangement.

I have once seen tongs in an underground shaft at the landing where the main haulage level intersected the shaft. A large shaft kibble was still gripped by the ring on its base and hung upside-down in its 'tipped' orientation. Unfortunately the hinged cover or chute arrnagement had all gone to the bottom of the shaft. The tongs resembled a large version of a conventional blacksmith's tongs, and had a sliding ring to lock the 'handles' together. One of the 'handles' terminated in an eye that connected to a chain that was secured to an iron eye bolt in the shaft wall.

I've seen ( once ) the 'lazy chain' arrangement described, on a baling skip used for emptying a shaft sump. The skip would be lowered to the water level and its loose bottom would be pushed up on contact. The skip would fill with water and slurry, be hoisted up, and overturned as described. This was a historic arrangement, left in place because it worked sufficiently well for its occasional use.

the overturning type skips described will be familiar to anyone involved in mining and tunnelling up to the mid-90s, being widely used in conjunction with traditional jigger-and-shovel or drill-and-fire hand sinking techniques. This isn't much done now because of HAVS constraints

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Some pictures that may be helpful:

Frongoch, kibble in deep adit with long hook used for landing.

🔗Frongoch-Mixed-Mine-User-Album-Image-003[linkphoto]Frongoch-Mixed-Mine-User-Album-Image-003[/linkphoto][/link]

Bwlch Glas, kibble in deep adit. Could well be a converted barrel. Mine was operated by Edward Evans of Talybont, if he could save money somehow, he would.

🔗Bwlchglas-Lead-Mine-User-Album-Image-45468[linkphoto]Bwlchglas-Lead-Mine-User-Album-Image-45468[/linkphoto][/link]

🔗Bwlchglas-Lead-Mine-User-Album-Image-45467[linkphoto]Bwlchglas-Lead-Mine-User-Album-Image-45467[/linkphoto][/link]

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Interestingly, there is documentary evidence that a woman called Gracey Briney of East End Redruth worked as a kibble lander at the local mines in the mid-C19th. She was a regular with the miners at the Pick and Gad pub on payday where she smoked a pipe, drank and socialised with the men! She wore male apparel inlcuding a 'Parstack' hat and apparently had a moustache!! The work as kibble lander was described as very strenuous and Gracey was the only 'woman' known to have performed this job at the mines!

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After describing the tongs and kibble in last night's posting, I fell to musing how effectively the lander would have communicated with the winding engine driver.

The tongs and kibble are in situ where the haulage adit intersects the shaft, 140 feet below shaft collar. The portal of the haulage adit was adjacent to the winding and pumping water wheel: the adit was 510 feet long from shaft landing to portal, and set about 100 feet from the pumping and winding water wheel. The winding rope went up the hillside from the water wheel to the shaft collar (about 615 feet measured up the slope of the hillside) then down ther shaft (140 feet to the landing at the haulage adit) - a total of about 750 feet.

The winding machine driver and the lander couldd, I imagine, have communicated by a pull-wire arrangement along the haulage adit - though that would have required to pull over 600 feet of wire. Regrettably i did not speciifcally look for brackets that may have carried a wire along the haulage adit, but had they been in situ I am sure I would have noticed them. However, they may have been removed, leaving only drill holes that I may not have noticed. The shaft is now filled and the haulage adit has been blocked by a fall at rock head for decades so I cannot check.

Alternatively, the winding machine driver may, after raising the kibble to the level of the landing, simply have given the lander a minute to hook onto the kibble before lowering the rope slightly to tip the kibble, then a minute for the kibble to be emptied, before raising the kibble to its original position, giving the lander a minute to disengage the tongs and open the hinged cover / chute, and then lowering the kibble back down the shaft. The winding machine driver would have had an indicator or marks on the winding rope to enable him to judge the vertical position of the kibble in the shaft.

Whichever arrangement was used, it must have functioned adequately from the driving of the haulage adit in 1859 until closure of the mine in 1892, during which time over 6,000 tons of concentrates were marketed, the ore being drawn from both the haulage adit and another shaft at which the kibbles were would all the way to surface (though the winding water wheel and winding machine were a similar distance from the shaft collar to the shaft described above).

These sorts of 'long-distance' winding and landing arrangments were common in C19 at water-powered mines where topography dictated locations for waterwheels and winding machines remote from shafts. The only wonder is that more accidents did not occur through poor communication between winding machine drivers and landers - I cannot recall specific comment by Mines Inspectors on this particular hazard.

A tensioned pull wire & bell would probably work at 600 feet.

Sorry Robert, which mine are you refering to please.
Sounds interesting!

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The only wonder is that more accidents did not occur through poor communication between winding machine drivers and landers - I cannot recall specific comment by Mines Inspectors on this particular hazard.

A rope/wire to a clapper works very well. Clean sharp tugs of the required number for each task are quicker/cleaner to relay to the winchman than by telephone/radio. It also makes him jump if there has been a longish period of inactivity :lol:

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Sorry Robert, which mine are you refering to please.
Sounds interesting!

Will pm you Roy.

Morlock - I had doubted whether a pull wire might be viable at 600 feet. After your post I remembered having seen definite evidence at another mine of a pull wire of very similar length, so you are correct - a pull wire along the haulage adit is the likely arrangement.

The mine I saw the evidence in is the Glog Fawr Engine Shaft. This is about 590 to 600 feet from collar to the lowest landing. The shaft is vertical to about 260 feet, and sunk on the lode (about 70 degrees) below that point. At the point where the shaft changed from vertical to inclined was a sort of quadrant arm, made of wrought iron and resembling a very minature angle bob, pierced on each arm for the pull-wire. Clearly a pull wire had run the full depth of the shaft - though there were no obvious traces of it at any of the landings right the way to shaft bottom.

A 'bell' activated by a pull wire can be seen adjacent to the underground steel headgear in Bwlchglas Mine (not the wooden structure that Roy posted images of on this thread). It comprises a sledgehammer head activated from down the flooded shaft, the hammer striking some small steel plates. This shaft was 210 feet deep.

Was just watching something on DVD that reminded me of this thread. So I cut this clip out.

[youtube]xrR-Qz8BHxg[/youtube]

My thanks to Morlock, Graigfawr, derrickman, royfellows, Cornish Pixie, Manicminer and christwig - these are great leads to follow. As I said, I'm researching an old copper mine on a friend's land and, having some training in graphics/art I'm trying to produce drawings of what the mine might have looked like when it was in production. I think that one of the mistakes I made was to assume that the mouth of the shaft was an empty hole disappearing into the depths. It seems that most shafts were pretty well crowded what with the pump rods, pumps, ladders, platforms and perhaps even a kibble-landing platform built across it. More research is needed ( which I find I increasingly enjoy ) but it's really great to know that there are so many knowledgeable and supportive people on this forum. Thanks again, and have a good Christmas.

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Whether the pumps would discharge to the shaft collar or to a drainage adit that intersected the shaft at whatever depth will need to be checked. If the latter then the rising main would not extend to surface, only to the adit. Even if the pumps did discharge at the shaft collar, the usual arrangement would be to route the water via a culvert a few feet below the mine yard - thus the top of the rising main would only be visible from very specific high angles of view or if the drawing is partly a cutaway.

I've found and old (1856 or thereabouts) section of the mine and there is no sign of a below-surface drainage adit. Also a holding reservoir was constructed and I'm assuming that drainage from the shaft was run in a maunder to the reservoir and thence through another maunder down to a waterwheel that operated the stamps. I've actually got a photo of the latter taken about 1913 just before it fell/was taken down.

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I hope this explains things a little better.



🔗Personal-Album-1228-Image-48057[linkphoto]Personal-Album-1228-Image-48057[/linkphoto][/flink

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Veeeery smart... whats the title of the book?

Regards ICLOK

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Spitfire - many thanks for that; I'm going to have to redraw some of my work. Thinking about it I had reasoned that the waggons would have to run on a platform set over the shaft so that they would be as close as possible to the kibble as it rose up the centre of the shaft and therefore convenient for off-loading. I was still unsure by what means the means kibble could be tipped given that its C of G would seem to be well below the axis of swing ( that well-known Cornish jazz band). Consequently I left that bit undrawn. Thanks to your kind response I now have the answer so it's back to the drawing board, or computer screen, to put it all right. I, too, would love to now your scource.
Best wishes, Ian H.

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