April-30, 2004 Opal Mining Update - No 34 Getting back into Mining, slowly

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I went back on the field to start work a week after I got back from holidays and found that some poor unfortunate people who I should feel sorry for but would like to drop them down a shaft and fill it in, had stolen my top elbow and BRAND NEW spacer pipe you can see in the back ground below, along with 3 clamps and the replacement cost will be around $550.00, so I will have to get a new elbow built before I can go out and resume work.

Here is the new elbow, as you can see it is a lot longer that the old one, it is still the angle of 58 degrees but does look different as you see it here, I have been advised that as I am going to putting a tunnel machine down (when ready) having a long sloping elbow like this increase the flow of dirt and vacuum and I will in due time have to have the 90 degree one for underground built like this, as it also helps to stop the building up of damp dirt and causing blockages, will not stop it all together but it will take longer for this to happen, better for me as I will be moving a lot more dirt a lot quicker that I ever have.

The only problem I can see with this elbow is that I may not be able to put it on by myself, but will not know for sure until I go on the field and try it which may be next week or the week after as I have started doing alterations and repairs to the tunnel machine and trailer right now and it will take a while until they will be finished, but will want a change from this on the odd day so will go on the field then. The clamps you see in the photo is the last of my spare clamps as this now makes 5 clamps I have stolen in the past 5 years, new clamps now cost $65.00 each and as I do not use clamps underground on the pipes I have not had to buy any, I only use clamps on the down pipes and at the top of the bottom elbow, but this will change when I get the tunnel machine down, I know that I will have to use 2 clamps for sure but not sure as yet if this is all I will need, soon find out what I can get away with when I start. Here my friend Boro who has already taken the machine off the trailer last week, has come back to lift it again for me but this time I only need the front lifted so I can get an old claim peg put under the front of the tracks so I can get start work on the floor cutters.

Now I can put the peg under and the cutters will be off the floor, as I have no generator to give me power as yet this is the only way I can lift the cutters off the floor to remove them from the machine and make repairs to them.

Here I have already done some modification to the trailer, I have added a 2 inch wide strip down ether side of the base as the trailer is wider than the machine tracks and when the machine was on (crooked) one side of the tracks were only on by an inch and this is not good for the rollers that the tracks run on especially when you are towing it over rough ground and the machine is bouncing up and down on the tracks.

This could lead to damage I don't need now the tracks will sit even, I also put the jockey wheel on the front as it was hard to get the trailer off the back of the 4x4 as the front was to low to the ground and we had to get a very small and low jack to lift up the front and take off, now should be alright, I also have to get some ramps, I have a friend who has a pair he wants to sell and I will negotiate with him next week.

Here I have put a stand under the cutters and am now ready to get to work, I will in the next week remove 4 cutters for the left hand cutting wheel, right now there is 8 cutters on it and I only want 4, 3 would be better because as it is it will cut the dirt too fine and this makes it harder to get sucked up the pipes with the vacuum, remember the bigger the pieces of dirt or rock the easier it is to suck up.

I have already cut the chain off and removed the damaged sprocket from the hydraulic drive pump, this was the easy part, now to remove 6 bolts and remove the bottom floor cutters and take them in the workshop, I will also have to straighten the Hydraulic drive pump you see here, as whoever built it did not mount it straight and this will lead to premature wear on the chain and sprocket, which I don't need.

I must apologize that there are some really good photos missing of Ross cutting and taking off the end cutters, he had to weld a chain on the end and use a hydraulic puller to get them off and as I did not finished processing the photos at the end of the day I forgot in the morning and when I put the card in the camera I erased the lot to start afresh, I am upset as they were well worth looking at and I wanted to keep them for my own reference. Here Ross is cutting through the old bearing on this side, the one on the other side just fell off as there was no ball bearing left in it at all, the reason that we are cutting these items off the shaft is that they are rusted on and this is the only way to get them off.

We believe this is the first time they have been off since the machine was built over 25 years ago, so I hope we can put them back and just weld the cuts with no problems, I have also found out a bit about the machine and who it used to belong to, as it has had 4 owners that I know off, the guy I bought it from did no work with it as he is in partnership with his farther-in-law who I paid the money to and know quite well.

This young guy who I bought it from never worked with it, but lent it out twice to friends who also did nothing with it as it would not work properly, no wonder with the floor cutters not working, if these don't turn and cut the machine cannot go forward, so he has had it for about 18 months to 2 years and I have found out that it belonged to a friend of mine but did not know that he had a round tunnel machine, I thought it was a square one. This guy used to operate a Vacuum prospect drill for the most part and was always fixing it, but the equipment belonged to a guy who lived down in Adelaide who had plenty of money or so I was told and used this a tax deduction, so Dave, the guy who operated this equipment also had the tunnel machine along with the drill, Dave has now left Coober Pedy some 18 months to 2 years, this is when Steve the guy I bought it from must have bought it, now I have known Big Dave as he was known since I have been here and even been on the field with him when he was drilling, but that was a long time ago. I have never known him to work a tunnel machine underground as he did not like working underground at all and he worked along with a partner who I also know, they worked on a percentage of what they found as they got to use the equipment for nothing as long as the fixed it when it broke down and the guy would pay for the parts, Dave worked like this for a few years and only remember him opening up or I should say his partner Kiwi did the underground work and they took the dirt out with the drill as it was suction drill, until Kiwi got sick of it after a couple of years and quit. Then Big Dave worked the drill by himself and never struck anything worth mentioning as far as I know, His wife got a job in Ceduna south of here as she was a school teacher so I know that this machine has done hardly no work at all for the last 13 years, nice to know a little bit about it, now I have to get it up to my standard and this may time some time, as I can only fix and modify what I can see now where it is, there my be more for me to do when I get it underground and start working it. Took a tourist out to the field today that I meet at Ross's he has been doing repairs to a big car trailer for the last 3 days and I said I was going out on the field to try and put this new elbow on, so as he was finished he asked if he could come out with me to have a look and he would give me a hand if I needed it, so out we went but I did not get the elbow put on, as I had to lift the pipes up the shaft. And when I went down below to take off the bottom elbow so I could lift the pipes at the top I noticed that the telescope was out as far as it would go, so I would have to put a small section of pipe on up top which I did not have with me, so I went and put the batteries in the box no point in bringing them back home and when I looked for the lock which I left there on the blower, it had gone, why would these idiots take a lock that had no key I have no idea, but that is the nature of some of the morons we have living here. Lucky I had some spare locks with me that are on chains that I will be putting on the clamps when I get the new elbow on, but this type of lock is a heavy duty one and cost around the $40.00 mark so again they have cost me some dollars, but we will get there. Anyway as I had not been down for a while (3 months) I had forgot that I had blown the roof down and then gone home the last time I was here, so I was going to have a pick in the wall where I have a bit of trace for the guy so he could get the feel of what we do and the roof when it got blown down had uncovered some trace in the level so we picked there for about 3 hours and I managed to show him a bit of color and he was happy with the day out and that is all that matters.

This is what we had to do to remove 3 of the 4 cutters from the shaft, the 4 cutter did not have to be removed and was left in place, the bearing on the right hand side of the cutters had disintegrated and the bearing on the left was seizing up, both had to cut off with the oxy torch, the last photo you saw with all of the sparkles was the left bearing being cut off, these will be welded up when I have replaced them on the shaft.

Here is the shaft with the 4th cutter still in place and I have removed all of the rust that I can, it is now ready for me to start putting some things back on.

Here are the new sprockets against the old ones and the old and wrong chain with the new and right one, the new big sprocket has to be machined out to fit the shaft and the old small one has to machined down because we want the boss or the part that fits on the shaft as it is a tapered shaft, then we will machine the new small sprocket to fit on this boss and when I have made sure that it is in the center when I am ready to fit it back on the machine I will weld the sprocket on the boss.

The two arms you see above the sprockets, the holes have been knocked out of round and need to welded up and then ground back out so that there is not to much clearance on the shaft, so to keep the dirt out from the bearing on that side as much as possible. Here is the outside cutting head, I have cut 4 teeth from it, now I find out that I may have done the wrong thing, as the friend I have been going out with (later down the letter) had 4 teeth on his cutter and then he went to 6, so I will have to wait and see if I have to put them back, if so I will put 8 new teeth back on, this is no big deal as I will be able to just unbolt the cutter and bring it in and fix it.

This is where the cutting head that cuts the inside circle sits, I have removed the cutter, to make sure that the bolts are free and easy so I can remove them with no problems underground should the need arise, but when I removed the cutter I found that there was a small Hydraulic Oil leak from a front seal, so I removed the motor and took it inside for repairs

And here the motor, when I pulled it apart the front seal had worn through on one side, so on further inspection I found that the shaft just inside that brown boss has some wear on it that cannot be repaired here and so it has been sent down to Adelaide for repairs, they might have to replace the shaft or perhaps they can grind it down and chrome it and regrind it don't know until I get a phone call sometime this next week but it will not be back for at least 2 weeks I should think, I want it right but the cheapest way so if I have to wait a little longer I will as I have other things to do.

Here the shaft is starting to be put back together, but I cannot go any further until I weld and fix the bearing housings as they have to go on next and after I have put the 2 end cutters on, I will weld up the gaps we made by cutting then off, then it has to be set up on the bench so we can check where the cutters are cutting and add more as necessary as I know there are a few missing (have not been put in) in the middle you can see here, will show you this when it happens.

Again I got my finger in the way of a grinder, this has nearly healed right now as I write this (May 2) but was and still is sore as it is not a cut but a burn, I had to use a small grinder without a guard on it and not being used to it this is what happens.

Now I have gone back on the field with a friend to my Blower to replace the new elbow I had stolen, first I had to put this small pipe on as I needed a bit extra to come out of the hole, the hole you can see with the wood across it is the one that I will have opened up bigger the put the tunnel machine down when ready.

Here is the new elbow, bit one isn't it, did not know if I could handle by myself as it is a lot heaver but I can lift it no problem, just a matter of balancing it while I put the rubber and clamp on it while it is sat on the black pipe, of course the pipe would be further down the hole that it is in the photo, but I come up with a easy way of putting it on by myself next time, here we are just checking how it will sit on the pipe to the hopper, before I take it off and put it on the black plastic pipe after I have lowered it down a bit.

Its on at last, next time I will just lift the black pipe up about 2 feet and hang the elbow over the hand winch facing the other way, this way it will balance while I put the rubber and clamp on, leaving the clamp loose I will be able to turn the elbow round to face the way it is now then put a bit of rope around it so it stands up so I can drive the blower forward until the pipes come together, this might take a few minutes as I don't get it right straight away and may take a few attempts to get the pipe and elbow to line up just right so I can get the rubber and clamp on.

This time I went to move the truck it took a while as it was stuck in reverse gear and as the back of the truck was slight angle downwards it would not come our so I had to rock the truck in gear to get it loose, then when I had got the gear leaver loose I could not get 1st or 2nd gear, 1st gear I always have had trouble with but 2nd has always been good. I don't know if I have told you before but this old Mercedes Truck is as old as me, was made in 1942 and has the original diesel engine in it which runs like Swiss Watch but as the truck has not been started since I put it on this claim which is November 2002 and the oil has run away from the top of the gear box and made the gates dry, but we managed to get it and 1st gear for a change, then I could move the truck forward, it will get moved again when the tunnel machine gets put down onto the hole that it goes down which is only about another 7 feet, so the old truck does not get moved that much, poor old girl. This is my friend blower, has a bigger engine for the blower than mine and has a better hopper as he has only just had this new one built last year.

This is how he has his winch set up, it is a permanent fixture in the back of an old van which towed to the spot, works very well like this.

This is what that 3rd shaft of mine will look like when George has been and opened it up to take the tunnel machine, its quite a big hole I can tell you.

Well here we are at last, I am now in a class room, back at school so to speak, here I will learn a few things on how to operate a round tunnel machine, although my machine is built different to this the principle is exactly the same and they do the same job in the same way, just the controls on this machine are at the back and mine are not, but may have to change them after watching Bruno operate this machine, here he is changing a electrical switch on the machine, Day 1, Hour 1.

This is a shot back down the drive to the shaft that has the winch on it and the electrical cable hanging down it, notice how neat the drive is compared to my drives which are all messy because I use explosives, this way is a lot safer and quicker and cheaper, the only problem with this type of drive for me is that they cut a 6 foot round tunnel and as you can see the machine leaves some dirt on the bottom to make a flat floor.

This make the Diameter some 6 or 7 inches smaller and the taller you are the more you have to bend over as you walk up and down the drives, this is a problem for me with my back and bad knee, so I could not have a machine like this, the machine I have as you have seen has the floor cutters and it may the only one like it in Coober Pedy I am not sure abut that, but have not heard of another one, the difference with mine is that I can extend the cutting arm and as it is it cuts a 6 foot one inch Diameter but because it cuts a flat floor I get the full Diameter which means I can stand upright, better for me, the reason this machine did not sell here was because of the floor cutters and the reason I bought it was because it had them, so everybody is different, right! Now you can see why I am trying to do a real good job on the floor cutters above and make sure they do there job properly which the guy who built the machine did not, there are a few modifications I will have to do to make it right for me and I will show as I go along and I will probably find more as I start to use it underground as it is hard to think of everything until you start to use something and then you find out what works for you and what don't, as I have no experience on these machines as yet, but will when I have finished here with my friend. Here is a drive that Bruno has left for the time being, you can see that brown line in the bottom right hand corner, this is a slide as we call then or a fault, these are what we chase as they may lead to pockets of opal on the other side as this one is facing away from the photo, Bruno is working to the right of this photo, but it also shows you how 2 drives are next to each other, not parallel but leading away from each other.

Here he is just starting a what turned out to be a short drive to have a look at the ground in this direction, he is just slowly cutting away the roof that is hanging down until he gets to the face.

Here Bruno is clearing some big pieces that have fell down from the roof, there are some old working to the left and right of the photo, the ground is very hard here as this is the Olympic Filed and is know for its good opal and hard ground, I have never worked here, you can also see that the dirt gets sucked up through a pipe on the side of the machine, where mine like most of the tunnel machines here gets sucked up through the middle of the machine, but I do like this idea but this machine is built for it and mine is not, Bruno built this machine himself and did a very good job, works real good, hope mine does as well.

Here you can that some rubber flexible concertina type of pipe is used to make up for uneven ground and to go round small corners or when you start to another drive to your right or left and cannot put a straight pipe of elbow on right then, I will have to buy some of this, there are a couple of kinds and all are expensive so I have been told.

Here he is just starting the drive as he has now reached the wall or face as we call it, the thing you see in the middle of the machine on top is called a roof jack, it is a small hydraulic ram that is used to anchor the machine as it goes forward to stop the machine from being forced backwards as the cutters are working, my machine is a bit heavier than  this one and does not have one of these, bit that does not mean that it does not need one, wont know until I get it working underground, but then again my cutting head is a different design and it may not need this.

This is the cutting head on this machine, all on one side and what we call mechanical driven, in other words the electric motor drives a reduction box which drives one cutter (the one on the left) and the rest are driven via a chain and sprockets, mine has the cutters on each side and is driven Hydraulically.

Here Bruno is now into the wall and now it is a called drive, he did not go much further than this about 12 feet in all, but when you consider what he has done this morning is not a lot, but for me to do even this small job for a tunnel machine would have taken me 2 weeks and this has only taken about 2 hours in total.

Bruno has finished that short drive and has backed out of that which was downhill and now turning the machine around to start working next to the telescope on the left of the photo.

Here you can see the machine is really lifting at the back due to the machine being front heavy so Bruno tells me and as the ground in front is slanted does not help also there is a small ridge under the tracks where the 2 tunnels have separated, Bruno picked some of this out of the way, but the ground is still uneven, make a great action photo, where else would you see something like this, live underground as it happens, except from me

This is one way of trying to keep the tracks from rusting up while they are underground, he is poring some old engine oil over so it seeps into the chain and joins to keep them lubricated and working without a squeak as it had before he did this, was gone after.

Starting to clean up a corner here so he start a drive next to this but at a different angle, sure beats hell of a pick and shovel, but having said that we still have to use a pick and shovel even with a tunnel machine but not like we do when hand mining, here they are more cosmetic for cleaning up a bit and leveling out the ground for the tracks sometimes and the pick, well you always need that for taking the opal out of the wall should you be lucky enough to find some.

He is well on his way with this new drive, this is day 2 of my lessons, the part he cleaned up with the machine is where the spotlight is hanging on the wall to the left, this was enough to allow him to come in at this angle, now he is driving to connect up with another shaft in front of him now about 30 to 40 feet away, he also cutting a fault here and again it is facing a way from him, not much chance of finding opal here, but he will drive from this shaft in front of him to another that has some potch trace in it.

This is the last Photo for this Update, this shot is from where Bruno was doing that very short drive just to look at the ground and before he moved and turned the machine around, hope you have enjoyed what I have shown you this week, I have enjoyed it myself and I may go down with Bruno for a couple more days yet.

This again gives you another insight in to what we do as miners to try and find opal, if I could get underground with different miners here you would see a large verity of ways the miners work with different types of machinery, there is hardy 2 machines that are built the same, but it would take a long time and really that's not what this Update is about, its about what I get up to and where I go the camera goes as well so long as they give me permission to take photos I will, I will be back on my claim sometime next week to finish opening up for my tunnel machine to start working. But now I see that I do not have to do that other shot or 2 that I was going to do to finish opening up, now I have been with Bruno I have learn a few things all I have to do now is to put then in practice, when I can, but for the time being I will keep mining by hand when I am not getting my machine ready, I hope to have the machine underground within the next 2 months or sooner, there is a lot of work still to be done and as I have to bring the blower into town to put the generator on it when it gets here and only when I have finished opening up for the machine as it will not be going back on the hole until the machine in underground, because I have to move the blower for the drill to get in and open the shaft up for it, etc. Hope you have enjoyed this issue and look forward to the next one, hopefully I will have some more good photos to show you in the next issue and maybe some of Good Looking Opal and lots of it, I am still hoping that this will be a good year for us in mining, so stay with us over the next few months and find out what goes on in our part of the world as far as Opal Mining goes. Stay Tuned for the next Issue, who knows what I will have to report. Until the next issue......... and wish me lots of LUCK. Cya Later, Stuart Bird. To return back to the Archived Page for more Updates click, Here!

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