This looks very like an abandoned attempt at picking up a collaped level by spiling through the fallen back-fill


Photograph:

🔗Smallcleugh-Lead-Mine-User-Album-Image-329[linkphoto]Smallcleugh-Lead-Mine-User-Album-Image-329[/linkphoto][/link]

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Hi Mike, welcome to the forum.
Its a great picture and maybe a repair job but I dont think its actually spiling for several reasons.

You would never get wood like that to drive in as straight and neat as this and the ends would be all smashed up if you tried it.
Spiling generally goes in at a sharper upward angle than this and with more overlap (ie shorter distance between sets)
The bits of wooden support aren't nearly robust enough for spiling supports.
If you look at the largest size picture, what looks like a second row of boards at the front is actually just two rows of rocks supporting the slats at the front end while there is only one row at the back.

I think it is probably just the form used to construct the arching has been left in, maybe after a repair or just cos that's as far as they got with it.

The stones between the support and the slats can be knocked out when you're done with that section, unlocking the form so you can use it again elsewhere.

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Thanks for that, I see what you mean. About 25 years ago at Mount Lyell in Tasmania I spiled through clay which had broken through the lagging on a fully setted 80 year old drive. We used 8 foot long 6 x 2 straight grained timber sharpened at the leading end. The length was to reach the next set about 5 feet ahead. By using a protection block we did not mangle the boards but did split quite a lot of them, almost perfectly down the middle - this is what I thought I saw in the photo. After we had picked up three or four sets we met up with a problem we had not anticipated. We got a small breakthrough and tapped into a full drive of water behind the collapse. The clay surrounds were saturated and as the water ran out the whole adit collapsed through to daylight.

"and as the water ran out the whole adit collapsed through to daylight."

:oops: That would kind of spoil the job.

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yes and we never returned!

Hi Mike,

Sparty is right, the wood work is original, dating probably back to the London Lead Company period of the mine, 100+ years. When I was there the level actually looked like it was at the forehead.

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