|
|
|
|
|
November 30, 2006
Opal Mining Update - No 67 No Opal Again, going up to the 62 foot Level |
|
Another month, another Dollar, but will I make one or two or spend a few, more like the later I think, my claim is drying up I think, in the immediate area anyway, so I will keep trying for a little while longer before I have to start thinking about moving elsewhere.
So here we are where we left off last month, still in this new drive heading for that pocket of potch I cut last year, the time has gone so fast I did not realize it was a year ago that I did the drive next door and run into the pocket, course I have not worked all that time, with the breakdowns and holidays, but still the time has gone, just flew past. Anyway here in this drive so far the ground is not good for any opal, Alinite, Soapstone and bits and pieces of Gypsum all over the place, not a exactly the right ingredients for opal at the moment, too much salt and not enough pepper, you can just see a level at the bottom of photo and this is what I have to keep my eye on, as the potch I am heading for is nearly on the floor.  |
Now we have this little level that came in starting to dive down, this is what happened from the other direction and then made potch at the bottom and like the other falling level in front of me somewhere it also is not carrying any material, so have to keep my eye an this as well.
 |
Here you can see where I am headed for, I will have to start taking the machine down a bit from here as I am a bit high, but as the ground is very wet not far under the floor I have to be careful that I don't go down to far, as the ground is already damp that I am tunneling in, at the end of the drive next door is where the ladders and the big shaft are, so this is the drive that I have to take the machine back down when I want to leave this claim.
 |
Just about there, roughly two feet more to go and then if I do not hit anything I will be finished in the drive, so far nothing at all and that falling level in the left hand wall did not go right to the floor as you can just see if you look it level out just after the photo above, so no excitement there either.
 |
So now I have finished in the d rive and I have pulled the machine and pipes back to the shaft, so now I am starting to drill under the level and potch with the 4.5 inch prospecting auger on a slight angle going down, this is in the drive next door to the one you just saw the machine in.
 |
Here is what is looks like at ground level and where the arrows are is the potch, now I will drill in about 18 inches, you can also see that the ironstone level here is quite thick and somewhat hard to drill, the surrounding sandstone is hard even though it is damp, but the ironstone is completely dry and hard.
 |
At the bottom of the hole I have broken through the ironstone and gone into the sandstone and now you can see just how wet it is under it, if I was to hit this with the machine I would not go far before all the elbows and telescopes would be blocked up, anything that is made of metal soon gets a layer of this wet ground on it, the plastic pipes are alright, no point in mining in this type of ground unless you are on opal all the way, then you can put up with it and the extra work involved, but not to prospect which is what I am doing.
 |
Now you can see the potch on top of the level and now I have drilled 3 holes and knocked the pillars out from between them I now have enough room to jackpick down what you can see here, I am always hopeful that it may turn in color further in and I will have a pay day.
 |
Well I have knocked down most of it, there is still a bit left right at the back and some thin material on the left, but I have struck a bit of thin colored trace on the right side so I have drilled a couple more holes in there so I can jackpick in to the right, but it lead to nothing, typical, we get thin colored trace a lot, but when it comes to the main pocket if there is one, it normally is potch or most of it would be potch, that is why it is hard to find, Mother Nature does not put opal everywhere.
 |
After I had finished above and had got home I put all of the material in the tumbler and cleaned it, there was a few pieces that had some trace of color in them, but not many and it all weighed in at 45 ounces, so I looked back to when I first hit this pocket and it was on the 15th of November 2005 and the photo below is of the potch that I got then, it weighed in at 58 ounces, so altogether it weight in at 103 ounces and I lost quite a lot up on the dump as I cut though it without realizing it, if it had been opal I would have gone back at night and Noodled the dump with a backlight, but as it was potch I only picked up the big pieces I could see on surface of the dump to make sure there was no color.
 |
Here I am starting another drive back towards a couple of drives leading from the big shaft, I found a good parcel of crystal and red grey opal in one of them so I am going to try and connect with them by cutting across the back of them and see if there is any more in there.
 |
There is a level started to come in towards the bottom of the face, you can just see the ironstone level here on the right hand side, the big shaft is just past the far light in the drive on the left, the ground is still very damp here so don't know how far I will get.
 |
Good looking level, but not carrying any material as yet, the good part of the level started to come in as the Alinite was finishing on the right side, right now I am only in the drive about 14 feet.
 |
And this is the end of the drive only got 18 foot in, ground is too wet for me, I have blocked elbows again and I have also mud build up in the telescopes so I am out of here and on to the next project, which is to go up to the level above, I am not going to mine any more on this wet level and will not be long before I am looking for a new spot to mine in, will stay here until next year after I have come back from holidays then I will look around for a new place.
 |
I have just pulled the pipes up and stacked them out of the way in an old drive and then back the machine out and now I am turning it around and will be bringing it towards the camera, doe's not take much room to turn this machine around in, so long as I have at least 10 feet of space it is easy, slow but easy, speed is not this machine best feature when it is being moved form one place to the next, it only does 10 feet in 3 minutes, but who is in a hurry, I had a week off after I had put the machine in place to work on the web site, yep I have other things to do, the web site pays for most of the mining expense that I have, so have to keep it up to date.
 |
|
Here I have started the new drive going up, could not take a photo yesterday as the camera would not work for some reason, I thought the batteries were flat, but when I got home and out them on charge they came up with the green light straight away, works fine today so must have had a day off yesterday, anyway we back in business.
I am struggling again here, the ground under the level is very damp, and the tracks are slipping on the loose dirt on the floor, because of the machine going up on a 20% angle I have more dirt thrown back along side of the tracks and underneath from the front when it is cutting, as the front of the machine itself is under the top edge of the drive, so when some of the finer dirt falls straight down it is missing the floor cutters which helps to remove the dirt from the front of the machine, this doe's not happen on flat ground. So this loose fine dirt being very damp cause the tracks to slip when I push the machine forward to dig in the face and take a cut, don't forget the machine has to pull itself up this angle and she weighs in at 2 Tons dead weight, plus force the cutters into the face, so she has a bit of work to do for me and when I get past this wet ground the dry fine dirt will not cause the same problem as much.  So right now she is struggling a bit and the cutting is slow, but I will have to put up with it until I get a bit higher and I also have to correct the machine now and again for the angle as sometimes it starts to climb a bit higher and I have to bring the machine back about 3 and half feet and re-adjust the cutting angle to get back on the right 20% angle, I have a spring loaded angle gauge on the machine right now so I know exactly what angle I am going up at, when it increases by 3% degrees I will make the adjustment to bring it back, do not want to go up at more then 20% as that is steep enough for the machine. This way for every 10 feet of drive I go up 2 feet, this makes it easy for me to calculate how far I have to go before I will hit the level above which is at 62 feet or there about's, so when I have tunneled 55 feet from where the drive started at the bottom the level which will not be an ironstone one should be just about in the middle of the drive, than I have to go a bit further and mess around a bit to level the machine off, then when I have hit the shaft (I hope, if I have the direction right) I will have to open up around it again so I can start tunneling. |
Well the ground has beat me again today I am still in wet ground and the elbows are blocked up again, the top is the worst one as the dirt is traveling faster when it hits it and therefore builds up quicker, right now I have had most of the vacuum cut off and got to the stage where I could not pull anymore dirt as you can see below, so I have to pull what pipe off the rear of this flexible hose which was only the 3 foot telescope, which I had to empty by hand, I will be able to get rid of this dirt when I have cleaned things up and have full vacuum again tomorrow morning.
 |
Here is the bottom elbow, this is half blocked, so I have to remove it from the 4 foot pipe that is attached to it so I can clean both ends, this is the time that I wish I had a partner as this is heavy to start off with, but I manage with some effort, I am hoping that this is the last one I will have to clean out, I will be above the wet ground soon for sure and then I will be happy, happy that I will be in dry ground but about what is in front of me, that I will have to find out along the way.
 |
This is the amount of dirt form leaning the elbow, quite a lot as you can see, now you know why I said that it was very heavy for one man, an old man at that, but as I said can be managed so long as I take it easy, you can see though that it is hard work when in this type of ground and very slow due to keep getting blocked up, the wet ground pulls a lot slower as well because it is heavy, so cost me more in fuel.
 |
Just as I was finishing cleaning the elbow, the chisel end that I have welded on the end of the jackpick here broke the weld and fell off, so I did not have a chance to clean the telescope, I brought it home and went to my friend Ross's and welding it back on, this time I did a bit better job, but it had been on for a few years so cannot complain.
 |
This is what the drive looks like as I had to stop for the blocked elbows, I have Alinite coming in at the top, which is a good thing as that is dry, the level that I was on is slowly disappearing towards the floor and then I will be away for the wet ground for good, have no idea how long it will take me to get up to the level above, which is some 10 or 11 feet up, I have to travel some 55 feet at this angle before I will get there and then I have to level the machine off, which takes a bit of messing around and time and then continue until I hit the shaft if I am right on the direction, if I miss the shaft it will not be by much and will find it when I have to open up around it, but that is some time away as I am having some days off while I am doing this drive.
 The hot weather is starting to come in now and I may have the odd day off due to the forecasted temp, you may think that because I work underground that it is cool down there, well you are right it is cool underground, so long as you do not do any physical work, then because thee is no air flow as such, you will sweat like a pig as the saying goes, even people who live in dugouts do not run AC's or Heaters have to run fans for air circulation or they will sweat if they try to work. Me I have the hot 40C degree heat up top and that gets pulled down underground by having the blower running, as it sucks the dirt and air up from the front of the tunnel machine the air is replaced by sucking air down the shafts from above, so if its 110F above that is what I am pulling down below, plus I am working on a machine up a blind drive that has 2 x 500W lights on it and 2 electric motors and hot Hydraulic oil. So it gets quite warm down there and if I have to have a pick in the face now and again I work up quite a sweet and then I have to wear a sleeveless jacket to keep my back warm, funny as it may seem, but because my back and shirt are wet with sweat, I can get a chill in the lower back if I do not keep it warm, same when I go under for the day, I have to put a jacket on because when I finish for the day and come up if I am wet with sweat and there is a wind blowing, which is most of the time here, the wind cools the sweat to quickly and again I can get a chill, worse in winter, so it is not all easy on the body and as you get older the more you have to protect yourself. |
Here you can see the difference in the ground that I am now in, the wet and damp ground on the bottom and the dry and more Alinite ground at the moment on top, this is what we expect to see when you change levels, it is called a change of ground and this is what can be seen here, quite clearly, a change of ground, it may change again in color when I get to the level above, will have to wait and see, the shaft I am heading for is in the direction of the arrow and around 93 feet away from the shaft that the blower is on right now.
 I am looking forward to reaching this shaft, then when I have opened up around it, I will move the blower onto this new shaft to start tunneling again looking for opal, but I will also have to move the steel ladders etc from the shaft that I use now for the truck and winch on for going up & down on and set them up on this shaft that the blower is on now. |
This day here the temperature was 43C (109F) and I finished working at 12:30 and packed up to go home and boy was it hot, the wind was blowing and it was hot as well, but it was a dry heat which is most of what we get here, in the photo is the face right now, the drive is now some 24 feet in, so still have a long way to go, I am roughly about 5 feet up from the floor behind me, you can now get a good look at the gauge I use to tell me what angle I am on, once I get to 4 degrees above the 20%, I will bring the machine back and readjust the machines cutting angle, does not take much for the machine to start climbing higher, just have to pus a little bit to much in the wall and that will cause it to lift at the front and that's it she's off cutting higher, slowly of course.
 The glare that you see here is off the Alinite and it does not look like that to me as I look at it, just the camera picked it up like that, the Alinite is falling down in the side wall and I am going up, but again I have to cut somewhat slower when going through this material and going up on this acute angle also slows down the cutting rate, but I am in no hurry, so long as I have a 20% angle and no more. It would be hard to keep cutting at a greater angle anyway, this is steep enough and is steeper than a lot of tunnel machine operators would go at anyway, remember that I have to walk up and down this when I am finished also carry or drag pipes and other equipment up and down every day. my electric jackpick comes and goes with me every day, I never leave that type of equipment underground as it could get stolen. |
The old level is nearly on the drive floor now and I have just spotted some material that has come into it, as you can see I have to have my eyes everywhere as we never know when and where opal will come in the face, so now to get up front and check it out, who knows they could be color in there, well pays to have a sense of humor anyway.
 |
Here is the potch, I don't get to see how good the photo are until I get home and process them, but for a zoom up shot from some 7 foot away it is pretty good, turns out that this was it, just potch and what you see if what I got no sooner there then it was gone, that the way this stuff is, very illusive, but I don't want to really find any opal on the level thank you, want to get way from it, but if I was to come across any I would have to dig it out and hope it did not running the wall as I cannot change the angle of the machine now or I will never be able to get to the shaft in front of me.
 |
|
Again it has not been a good month for me as in finding opal, the only bit of color that I found is that small parcel of Beginners Opal, RO-124 and that I managed to salvage from the big pocket of potch I dug out above, it has been sold now, yesterday in fact just after I put it on the net.
It will take me a few days to get the machine up to the level above as it is slow going pushing a 2 Ton Machine up a 20% angle and forcing it in the face so it can cut, pretty hard on the machine and me as I have to stand on the angle for the 3 or 4 hours that I am working, although I do move around while working, it is still hard on the ankles and as I have this spur on the right ankle bone at the rear it does affect my foot and I limp like hell some of the time, gets worse when I am at home until I take some pain killers. But when I have the day off or a few days off, it is not that bad if I don't do a lot of walking around, I have had a few days off this month due to one thing and another, I have this web site to run, plus run around getting jewelry if I have sold it or to get new items if the shop has sold some an then I have to take the photos and process them etc, etc, plus the weather also comes into it, like the last 2 days where the temperature is very high for running the diesel engines on the field, yesterday was 46C here at my house in the shade that is 114.8F. Today (30-11-06) was supposed to be the same but last night around 8pm the wind came up strong and was a bit of a dust storm, it has continued all night and although I got up early this morning at 6:30 to go to work, the wind was too bad so I went back to bed, now I see that the forecast is for 39C today and maybe some rain, so will just have to wait and see about that, but it is still bowing a gale right now at 9am, so I may as well finished this newsletter for sending out. As the weather is now getting very hot here I will still try very hard to get out on the field, I do want to get up to this next level and have a go and would like to finish getting up there and opening up this month, the last time I went up from the big shaft I did find some potch but I must admit I did not do a lot of drives up there, my main intention at that time was to get into 2 old claims to the left of me and have a look which I did, but was not long after, that I decided I would be better off on the bottom level where the main material was, well now I have changed my mind I will go back up to the 62 foot level as it is called and stay thee until next year, if I do not find anything before I go on holidays at the end of January, I will be looking for a new claim elsewhere when I get back at the beginning of April. Again I 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, but only time will tell, 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! |
Top
|