20-12-2013, 11:33 AM
Hi,
You haven't missed much Tony in never going down a mine; the only thing I miss is the genuine team spirit between everyone working in a pit which I never ever saw as I worked through industry outside the pit.
At the Caphouse Colliery (Mining Museum) I was apprentice mechanical engineer and was heavily involved in converting from "hand getting" over to machinery. If I had to visit the face it was a case of walking but to return to the pit bottom we infringed H&S by riding on the full speed coal belt. This posed two rather serious health risks; the first being that the unladen belt would crush anyone against the roof as it climbed uphill so to overcome this we always asked the guy on the hopper feeding coal onto the belt if it was safe to ride?
Now for the fun bit; as I say this belt really did move but jumping on in the well lit hopper area wasn't too much of a problem; the engineers would jump on and lay flat; the hopper guy would wait a minute then dump our tool bags on the belt and away we would go; getting off the belt though posed a real health risk because to judge it wrong we could have ended up being loaded into a tub; as we approached the pit bottom we could see the cap lamps of the team at the conveyor head and at this point we would rub a spanner across the bell wires; the belt would immediately start to lose speed and when judged slow enough we would jump off but the old wooden sleepers were always willing to trip us; if we landed OK then all was well but I've bounced from the wall a few times; back on our feet we would give another signal with the spanner then the belt speed would increase; the guys at the conveyor head though used to give us some stick as we waited for the tool bags to arrive; these tool bags were always very heavy filled with big spanners and wrecking bars etc.
I live to tell the tale and I had some good times at the pit; happy memories of the sixties.
Kind regards, Col.
You haven't missed much Tony in never going down a mine; the only thing I miss is the genuine team spirit between everyone working in a pit which I never ever saw as I worked through industry outside the pit.
At the Caphouse Colliery (Mining Museum) I was apprentice mechanical engineer and was heavily involved in converting from "hand getting" over to machinery. If I had to visit the face it was a case of walking but to return to the pit bottom we infringed H&S by riding on the full speed coal belt. This posed two rather serious health risks; the first being that the unladen belt would crush anyone against the roof as it climbed uphill so to overcome this we always asked the guy on the hopper feeding coal onto the belt if it was safe to ride?
Now for the fun bit; as I say this belt really did move but jumping on in the well lit hopper area wasn't too much of a problem; the engineers would jump on and lay flat; the hopper guy would wait a minute then dump our tool bags on the belt and away we would go; getting off the belt though posed a real health risk because to judge it wrong we could have ended up being loaded into a tub; as we approached the pit bottom we could see the cap lamps of the team at the conveyor head and at this point we would rub a spanner across the bell wires; the belt would immediately start to lose speed and when judged slow enough we would jump off but the old wooden sleepers were always willing to trip us; if we landed OK then all was well but I've bounced from the wall a few times; back on our feet we would give another signal with the spanner then the belt speed would increase; the guys at the conveyor head though used to give us some stick as we waited for the tool bags to arrive; these tool bags were always very heavy filled with big spanners and wrecking bars etc.
I live to tell the tale and I had some good times at the pit; happy memories of the sixties.
Kind regards, Col.
Happiness is a wreck of a cabinet to restore.
