January 31, 2009 Opal Mining Update - No 91 Most repairs done, now on Holidays Fishing

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Well here we are at the start of a New Year, what is it going to bring or produce for Pat and I, Patricia has treated me to a present, a Inverter Welder 200 amps, so now I do not have to go and borrow Boro's anymore he can now have a lend of mine should the need arise as this is bigger then his, also a bit bigger is size and weight which is 7 kilos, but can handle 5mm rods if necessary, but the biggest I would use is 3.2mm, also it has very heavy duty leads so can carry the amps better with a heavy workload and not get to hot while working. I was going to have to borrow Boro's again for these pipe sleeves but would need it for 2 or three days, as the metal is 1.6mm thick I could not use the big old welders of Ross's as it would have been too hard to set them at the low current I will need to weld that thickness and not burn though the material, so Pat gave me the money for this welder, cannot try it out as yet as my welding mask is at Ross's workshop and cannot get it until he returns from his holiday in about 10 days time, but looking forward to having a go with it, will come in very handy in the years ahead I am sure.

I finally got the blower home as you can see, I have also run the cable back into the yard so I can use the tunnel machine when needed, I have just finished Teck screwing down some corrugated iron on the roof at the rear of the blower but on the other side that had worked itself loose in the high wind we have been having and last night and this morning again the wind was high and this tin was banging around so had to fix it or loose it, still have to grease the bearing as yet, but plenty of time for that before the blower will be used.

After I had taken the photo above and was about to go back into the yard, my friend Lizzie the Lizard was parked in the gateway, so I got up close and took some photos of him/her, has a nice orange chin on it and very watchful of me.

As I got about four foot from it, I was surprised that it did not move, only its head to watch me, but stayed very still, not bad for a wild animal, it lives in a wood pile next door in Warrens place so he tells me, but we have seen it moving from his yard to mine when we were talking over the fence a couple of days ago, right now there was swarm of moths around a week ago and now there are some caterpillars around, so looks like it is getting quite well fed.

As you can see it is in good condition, got lots of spikes on it and again very watchful of me as I am still about four feet away from it and it still has not moved, I took about 10 photos of it to make sure I got some good ones, then I came in and left it to go on its way, I suppose that I will see it again.

Today is Jan the 8th and we now have these Cockatoos waking us up early in the morning, it is now close to the breeding season for them and as I was about to do some work outside (at last) this lot and more was flying around outside the gate and some perched on the power lines just outside the front gate and run over the top of the blower, so thought I would take a photo or two for you.

This shot of the Cockatoo on the left reminds me of an Bald Eagle, to my mind looks the same at the wing tips when it is gliding around, lucky to get this shot of them in flight, just have to press the button at the right time.

Again another good shot, had to take a few photos so I would get a couple of good ones, lucky they stayed around for a few minutes, I took one more photo after this one and then they moved on up the street, playing around as they do, in fact these birds just love to play, where I was mining out at 11 mile there was a bulldozer cut next to me and a pair of these nested in hole in the side wall every year to raise there young.

So today I have decide to do a bit of work as I have been inside the last 5 days watching a game of cricket, I have got seven of these sleeves to finished cutting down to size as you can see I have a bit to come off, this is one of the four that I bought from Ross, but all that I bough second hand were the same diameter as they were all made for the 9 inch pipes not the 8 inch, as there are so much longer the guy had trouble in rolling them to the smaller diameter because of the extra width interfering with the rollers, so now I have got them all cut down I may go back again and see if he can roll them again a bit small in diameter as they are still a bit big in diameter for the 8 inch pipe, but I have to wait until Ross gets back as half of them are in his workshop.

As I mark one as above, I go here and cut it off with my small four and half inch grinder with a thin cutting blade in it and then I use the other 4 inch grinder with a sanding disk in it to clean up the sharp edges and take the sharp corners off it, then it is finished here anyway until I can get all the other parts ready for welding on them, as I said I would like to get them rolled a bit smaller in diameter, but can pull them in to fit if not.

Ross is back at last, did not open the workshop until Monday the 19th, (yesterday) so that only gives me five morning to finish what I can and I mean mornings he shut the door on this day at 12 noon, so I only have three hours or less as he does not open the back door until 9am as he always does, puts a bit of pressure on me for sure, yesterday I finished cutting these screw clamps off the old settings and I had to take the sleeves back to the guy who did the re-rolling as they would not pull in good enough so he has to re-roll them again and I pick them up in the morning, right now I have got the second length of 1x1x1/8 angle iron and have cut it up into lengths ( they are at the back) now I have to clean the sharp edges off them and mark out where the holes are going to be drilled and then drill them. Also working on the clamps as well and right now (front left) making sue the screw hooks can screw out all the way, taking some out and cleaning them on a wire brush on the electric bench grinder, straighten what is out of alignment or crooked, then I have to grind clean the short legs that will be weld back onto the sleeves again, also have to make and cut up the bases for there legs and stops for the clamp handles, the hook eyes are ready ( bottom right) so in all there is a lot of work and many hours in making these sleeve clamps.

Here I have finished drilling the holes in the second lot of angle iron and have also finished checking and fixing the screw clamps, now all I have to do to the screw clamps is to grind the bottom of the swivel posts where I cut them of the old settings ready for welding on the new bases, still a lot of work to do yet.

Here I have clamped one of the sleeves up tight around a short pipe with a special chain clamp of Ross's, now I will mark it with a pen so I will know where to weld on one of the angle irons which is the next job, there is going to be a 5/8ths gap between the two angle irons so they can the tensioned up tight with a bolt at one end and the screw clamp at the other end and I have to do this all fifteen of the sleeves, then it is on to the next stage.

Here I have already welded one piece of angle iron on to the end of the sleeve and you can see where the next one is going, I have clamped it on but is not quite in position in this photo as yet, I had to go out and buy some 2mm welding rods as the 2.5mm that I had was welding a bit to hot and was burning through the 1.6mm metal, I did a test run first on a scrap piece that I cut off these sleeves, did not want to ruin any of these, still not used to welding with such small rods as yet, but will get better before I am finished and I needed this new welder as I am only using 50 amps and could not have gone down to those amps with Ross's big old welders.

Here it is welding finished, but when I bolted it together on the pipe with some difficulty I might add the gap was wrong, it was supposed to be 5/8 ths of an inch but was lot more and the bolts I had bought are 2 inch long plenty long enough or should have been, seems that I forgot the welding a straight bar onto a round cylinder it throws out the top of the angle iron by a lot, still I did get it bolted together with the 2 inch bolt, but can use one a bit longer for this sleeve and I can still  use this sleeve but will change the mark I made on the next one by a 1/4 inch and tack weld it to see how it goes, the over lap on the inside is perfect.

Here Ross is rolling the six inch wide sheet metal that he has cut off a large sheet, in fact I rolled these sheets but got Ross to pose for me so I could take this photo to show you how it is done on his small rollers, they an only roll metal that is 11inches wide, this is why I could not re-roll the sleeves myself down to the 8 inch pipes as they are 14 inches wide.

Here is a total of  5 x 6 inch sheet metal strips, the two on the right are for the big six foot top elbow that also has a couple of wear holes in it, so that has to be repaired also, one strip is for putting in the elbow now and the other is a spare for me to take home for when it is needed at a later time, the other three are for two other elbows that I am modifying with this wear strip, there is only one other miner that uses this wear strip in his elbows that I know off and that is my friend Boro and when I came up with this idea about eighteen months to two years ago, I never knew that Boro had been using this for a long time, funny how great minds think alike.

These are the wear holes in the top six foot elbow, I had put a couple of Rubber Band-Aids on with the help of tape to hold the rubber in place till I had a new smaller top elbow made (normal size), then I scraped this one until now, at the time I had scrapped this elbow I had not come up with the idea of the 6 inch wear strip, the reason that these elbows, or called corners by some wear like this is because it is not smooth on the inside for the dirt to slide around, it has sharp and abrupt corners where the sections are welded together and as the dirt it these welded section in the middle it just wears a hole in there with 2 days on the big one anyway, takes longer on the smaller ones, but the effect ends up just the same so miners put patches on them and continue to use them and patch them until they cannot be used any more and have to have a new one built, but now Ross is quitting I have to repair all that I have to last me for a few more years.

Here are the patches, big they are and heavy, they were cut before Ross went on holidays and he rolled them this morning now to weld them in place and the job will be done as far as the patches go anyway.

Ross is just tack welding them in place for the moment.

Now the middle ends which are sticking leaving a gap up has to be heated up with the oxy torch so they can be beaten down level so it can be welded together, then welded completely all the way round and finished.

Job finished, now to put the six inch wear strip inside and weld it in.

Here Ross is putting the wear strip inside, it will be  bit longer which will be cut off when the time comes.

Although this wear strip is a good idea and works very well, you can see that it does not just fit in, it is a flat six inch wide plate going into eight inch round hole so it has to be made to blend in at the start of the elbow, the rest of the wear strip is just flat all the way through with this gap but does not affect the flow of air or suction when being used and as this now makes the inside the elbow flat and smooth following the fifty eight degree's contour of the elbow, not the dirt can slide al the way round without catching on anything, it will still wear through eventually but as it tends to wear thin towards one end I should have a chance to turn it around and use  it a bit longer before I will have to replace the wear strip.

Now Ross has to use some heavy clamps to pull the strip down as much as he can this way, before moving on to the next stage.

Now Oxy has to used to soften up the metal so it can be stretched and hammered into the shape required.

Ross is now hammering the metal into shape with a leading taper to it, perfect job as usual.

As you can see here, it now fits perfectly to the shape of the inside of the elbow, now onto the other side.

There are a couple of inches that need to be cut off from this end, we have to cut the metal a bit longer then we measure on the inside as we cannot measure it dead accurate, due to one being round and the other being flat, so this is what we do, then Ross will do exactly to this end as he did to the other and then weld them in place.

And here is the job finished, this should last for quite a few feet depending on the type of ground I will be working in when I get mining again.

This is the second sleeve I have put together, I did not put big welds on this time so I can take them off easily if I had too, but it is a good job this time, I altered the line I had marked by moving it in one half inch and now it is perfect, so when I get back from holidays I will do the rest like this, then work on the clamps as I have a bit more work to do on tem before they can be welded onto the angle iron.

I have brought all my things home and will leave them on the truck until I get back  from holidays, the elbow at the front is the bottom ninety degree which had nothing wrong with it as I had repaired this not long ago by patching and putting a six inch wear strip in it and it has worked beautifully so I took it in to get it measured for a spare wear strip which is on top f it, this I will make with a pen so I know what it is for and put it away until it is needed, I cannot fit these wear strips myself as I do not have the tools that you saw above nor do I have a Oxy Set so cannot heat up the metal etc, but I can grind and cut the welds out on the old one when the time comes and get another person to put them in for me. I will be leaving for Coffin Bay and Holidays at 6am in the morning, so all of this has got be finished when I get back, bit disappointed I did not get everything done before I went, but

Well here we are in Coffin Bay, was here three years ago in a house just across the street from this one, but this one is better, bigger and cheaper, we have unpacked and sort of settled in but still have a lot to do before we are ready to go fishing.

It has a very nice drive way, covered with a nice gravel so no more mess with mud when and if it rains or when Pat washes the boat down, the only drawback is that I have to reverse back through a narrow gateway would have been better if it was a couple more feet wider, but I can manage with Pats help.

Pat is cleaning the boat of the Coober Pedy dust now it has been emptied, I do not take any of the fishing gear out of the boat when I get back home, so the only time it can be properly cleaned after 10 months of sitting in one spot under the car port is when we go fishing again and now I have put now I have put the sun cover on it also can be cleaned of the dust, poor old Pat cannot get away from work, we have to go back into Port Lincoln again tomorrow to buy some supplies and as it is a long weekend the boat engine cannot be services until Wednesday so looks like Thursday being the earliest we can put the boat in the water for the first time and give it a test run and see if we can also catch some fish.

The property next to us and to the left of the boat above is an empty block full of gum trees and shrub and it is full of bird life right now, they are up well before the sunrise, surprising how happy they are, here we have three Pink Gala's on the ground feeding on seeds, there are more around and in the hundreds around the area as we are on the edge of a nation park here, so they are undisturbed.

A close up of one, found out later after this photo that one pair is nesting in a tree here and they have young, as the young make a lot of squawking noise when they want feeding and don't stop until they are full, so there is no mistaking where the nest is if you go looking and they nest in a hollow in the tree where a branch has fallen off, they do not build nests like other birds.

And here we have a pair of Port Lincoln Parrots, pretty quite these are, don't make a lot of noise at all and have plenty of colors in them, hard to get a good photo as I had to use the zoom on the camera to get this, they were high in the tree and the tree was about sixty feet away, so as they amongst the branches I think I did pretty good.

So most of the repairs have been done and the modifications that I wanted to do, now just finishing the repairs to the elbows, this I am doing because of Ross retiring and I will not be able to go and get them done when needed, so as I have a couple spare for up top I may as well get them fixed now and I have one that is made of rubber for wet ground that I am putting a wear plate in and having a spare wear plate for it. I have instructed Ross to make me a new top elbow with a wear plate in it and spare one to go with it, so I will have three top elbows and the old one that I can still use for a while and I will have two bottom ones, the top one wears out quicker than the bottom due to the dirt traveling faster when it hits the top elbow therefore causing more friction and wear. The pipe clamp sleeves are taking me time that I thought they would, I did not realize or think that there was so much involved in making these and as I was trying to save money which I had too it has taken more time, with having to cut the old ones that I bought apart and then having to clean them up an also get them re-rolled twice, all time. It would have been a lot easier for me to make these with all new parts but would have cost me a fortune to make fifteen of them, they are now worth around $190.00 each that is if Ross was to make any now, he has not made any for while, in fact a few years, he told me that the last time he made them some six years ago he charged $85.00 each, the normal clamps that are used with the pipes today cost at that $35.00 and at the time of Ross closing was $85.00 which are quite easy to make compared to these, just to get a tin sleeve made and rolled costs $40.00 each and you have done nothing or started to make them really, so fifteen of them is worth around $2850.00. Now if you are wondering why I am making these and what was wrong with the way I have been clamping the pipes before, well for many years I have been working in wet ground at 11 mile and I never clamped the pipes together only the first pipe that connects to the bottom elbow, the rest I made so that they fitted Male to Female which worked great for me working by myself, just fit one pipe inside another and pull the pulled over the end to seal it and away I went. This system work well for me in the damp ground as the damp ground built up in the corners and around the edges of the female connections of the pipe and therefore stopped a lot of wear and damage to the pipes themselves, but now I am working dry ground I have found that I am getting a lot of damage to the ends of the pipes, so I have to stop this and real quick as the pipes are not made anymore, unless you can put a large order in to the company and by large I mean a thousand feet or more, the pipes come in twenty foot lengths. With this sleeve system the pipes are clamped together in a straight line or as straight as the pipes will allow as most have a bend in them anyway, but as two pipes are clamped together with edge up against edge there is little wear to the edges of the pipes, there is till some but minimum and my friend Boro tells me that his need to be trimmed about once a year, which will do me, by the time my pipes wear out I hope that I will be finished mining. The old body is getting worse, the left knee is real bad was killing me at Ross's, must admit it has been good so far here in Coffin Bay its the walking around on it for three or four hours that it doe's not like, I have to see about getting knee replacement when I get back home, but it is not that bad when working with the tunnel machine as I do not do a lot of walking until I am pulling the machine out of the finished drive than it has to do some work for a little while but I can live with that. So I still have to finish off the sleeve clamps when I get back, the elbows should be finished I hope as although Ross has retired and the business is supposed to be closed, he is working with the back door open as he has to finish off jobs that was already booked in the workshop, mine included, but he has indicated to me that he may still be doing a bit in the workshop when I get back, if so I can finish the sleeves there if not I can do them at home as I have got them to the stage before I left where I can do that. Ross is going to sell me an old steel bench that he has sitting outside the workshop, I have been after this for at least the last four years but he would never sell, now he has closed the doors he will, so I have bought a vice for it already down here and still have to buy a electric bench grinder a small pedestal drill and I will be able to do a lot of my own work at home, not having these was the reason that I worked down at Ross's and used his, anyway that is all for this month. 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 Fish and lots of them, 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!

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