Sep 30, 2011 Opal Mining Update - No 104 No Opal again and a small Breakdown

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Thur Sep 1st, Today we finished setting up the blower up top and then came down here to finish setting up, got all the lights back in action, have already sharpened the teeth and now making a hole in the roof so the cutting head can make a start, this is one of the problems in having a round tunnel machine, it leaves these bumps on the roof in-between the drives, I have already banged my head twice this morning, do not have this problem with a square one, but I have what I have so on with it.

A bloody big piece has fallen down and broken one of my floor cutter level sticks on the left side, second one I have broken on this claim, have not broken one for years so now on a roll looks like for doing more in, no point in moving the machine as I have to know just where the roof has to come out, do not to jack pick down more than I have to and also there is very little room at the back where the bottom elbow is right now, so here it stays.

Here it is finished, not a lot but enough, tomorrow will start cutting from here, the machine is already pointed in the right direction, so only have to come down and start straight away.

And here is how I will start being so close the elbow, again these are temp as the 2 back ones are made of soft cloth and will war through quickly if used for 2 long, this way they do the job and last for a long time I can patch them up so they last longer, as soon I as I can get the elbow round I remove one at time and when it is straight then I move to the telescopes as you will see tomorrow.

Fri 2nd, Finally started this new drive, got a bit of rubbish out of the way first including that bit of roof, now at the face so see how we go today.

You can see how I pull the bottom elbow around till I have it straight behind the machine, have already taken one flexible hose off, next it will be the 3 foot telescope and then the 6 footer and away we go, I am making the machine go down slowly to bring up the level, when I can see it, right now there is not much to see at all in the face.

Have had 4 blockages so far and this is the 5th and last I hope, the ground is soft and good cutting and as I have the machine in automatic tracking I had it set too fast and it was cutting more then the blower could suck, so have to take off the telescope and poke my long clearing rod up its backside and push it through to the front, sometimes I have to bring the machine back a couple of inches, so I can get the rod through it has to just make a small hole at the front and then the vacuum will start to sunk the dirt out. but this time I have got the pipes or pipe blocked above the elbow, I tried to get the elbow off but could not undo the clamp with all the weight inside it, so had to lie on the floor and dig it out by hand, it slowly came down as I was bringing it out, till the blower took over and we was back in action, just shoveled this lot back up the pipe and reconnect the telescope and start tunneling again, have not done this for years and do now want to do it again for a while.

This is where we are at the end of today's shift, 17 feet in and 28 feet in from the leading edge of the shaft, have got a level of some sort come in the face but noting as yet, did see a small thin bit of potch a few feet back, but did not turn into anything, personally I do not think we will find very much if anything on this level, but my partner who is paying the bills want to have a look, so have a look we will, but if we do not find anything we will be back at the pipes real soon, this drive should only take another 2 maybe 3 days at the most if nothing is in here, then I will bring the machine back and start the other drive to the left of this one.

Today I only did around 6 feet and quit this drive, I said to my partner that it was a waste of time and diesel going any further as nothing has come in and hard to see any level at all, so better to quit now and bring the machine back to start the other drive, this drive will be going down to the 62 foot level where we know there is material, maybe not in front of us but there is potch around the shaft that I was just driving too on the 62 foot level and color trace not far from it, so why mess around up here any longer, better to go down if we don't hit that concrete ground again, so here I have just brought the machine back, now I have to go back up top and move the piece of timber that I use as guide across the top of this shaft so I can see where to head too, also have to bring the drill down so I can put that bar in for anchoring the telescope in place.

Now the machine is in place and all ready set up to start tunneling, you can se again that I have the flexible hoses on the back that I use until I get far enough away from the elbow so I can put on the small telescope and take these off one by one, as the bottom elbow has not got the rubber put on it yet to seal it, as the machine goes forward it just pulls on the hoses and the elbow just turns with slowly around to face the machine, when it is nearly straight I remove all or just one at a time as you will see later.

I did not have a big job on the roof this time, so did not have to use the jackpick, as the drive is nearly in line with the old opening up drive, I just had to pick a bit of the roof down with the hand pick and that was it, here I am just starting at the face, so will do a few feet before I have to knock off, I brought the front end loader starter motor out this morning and put it on the loader before we came underground and after I had put it back in and tightened up the 3 bolts I found that the copper thread that holds the positive lead was partially stripped, so left it in until I finish down here today and will take it out again when I get up top and bring it back to the auto electrician and see what he can do.

Bit of dust in the air in the photo, but you can see how the flexible hose's are starting to straighten out, I notice that I have a leek in the black one nearest to the tunnel machine, I will patch it up before I go home with my gasket silicone, then it will be ready for the next time.

Drilled and put my anchor bar in to stop the bottom elbow moving forward with the machine, had to put it a bit further back than I wanted as the ground in front of this is the shaft hole and so is soft ground and no good, has to be solid ground.

And now have to elbow straight and the 3 foot telescope on, will go about 15 feet straight then start to take it down, the shaft in front is 115 feet away so far enough to take it easy going down, I will go down at 15 degrees for about 70 feet and then start to level the machine out slowly, should be just about right if I do not miss the shaft this time, but before I get there I have to find a drill that can come and clean the shaft out for me as there is roughly 19 feet of mud in there, about 13 feet above where the top of the drive will be, so need to get it taken out, so I may have to stop and wait when I get about 100 feet out, till this is done.

Tues 6th, just started the machine to go down, have got the back jacks out to full extension, going to be hard again not having the right degree of elbow to use so will have to rely on the bent pipes to get me out of trouble again like before.

Now down the drive about 13 feet and have got the 6 foot telescope on and it is way out of line right now, so had to put another flexible hose on to get out of trouble, as I said before it is not good to have these on for too long or too far, but this second one is stronger and thicker then the one I use all the time at the front so will only use it till I can get the next pipe on with a good bend in it, then I should be alright or so I hope.

Here you can see how far I am out right now, the first pipe is only six foot long and is only a temp pipe until I get out far enough, after I get to the full extent of the telescope I will then take this pipe off an put the 10 foot pipe on, this one stays in place while the drive is being done, the drive now is well on its way and going well so far.

Just to show you how sever the angle is, never had to do this before, again I did not judge where to start the machine going down, very hard to get the top of the drive in exactly the right place so that the bend a pipe is right on the apex of the drive, this time it was hanging over the top so did not pint down at the floor soon enough for me, but it is only for the next 10 feet and then I will be right again, for a while anyway.

Wed 7th, The ground is changing all the time and not much to take photos off, but have just come across these strips of orange, have never seen this orange before, wonder what's next.

Getting a bit of a dump up already, the loader is now fixed and ready to go, so wont be long before I will be moving some of this, have to make a pad for the blower on the shaft I am driving too right now and the other shaft as well to the right of photo where my partner cut colored trace, so lots to do in the coming days, but if I cannot find a drill soon we will not be tunneling after Friday at this rate, have to stop short of the shaft for when the drill cleans it out, so no drill, no tunneling, all or most of the drills wee up at this so called new filed, but have found out today from someone that was up there drill with a prospect drill that a lot of the drills have now left and come back to town, but not all do drilling for other miners, so have to keep trying to find one.

This is where I am at the end of today's shift, figure I am between 6 and 7 feet down so far counting the pipes so have a fair way to go yet.

Same shot as above only closer to the top of the drive, in the photo above you can see I have put a piece of timber on the floor and it is supposed to be pointing in the same direction as the one above, not easy pointing a piece of timber across the shaft at the top and trying to follow that line underground, but it looks like I have gone off course already by about 2.5 feet to the right, so the machine is being turned now at the bottom and hope I can bring it back on track, but again it is not easy going in straight line, the machine itself wants to try and go up, goes slowly to the right or left and that is my job to try and keep it on line, so have to come back to the pipes every time we put a 10 footer on and recheck, but you can only really notice it when the machine is a fair distance out from the shaft then it become more evident, here I am 50 feet out so I have 65 feet to go yet. I don't want to really miss the shaft, but it is going to be hard to hit the nail right on the head, but as long as I can get close like before, within 4 feet would be nice, but if I just let it go on the track it is on now I will be at least 10 feet out and hat is too far for my liking, as I would still have to find the shaft, better if it can be with a auger distance for me.

I have cut what I think is the 54/55 foot level, this level is not carrying anything, it will soon disappear in the roof as I still have to go down some 4 foot or so yet before I start leveling off, hope the level is as good as this one so I can see it, hard going down to another level and know when you are there when there is nothing to tell you, easy when you get to the shaft as you can put a  tape measure down, but then it is too late as you are already at the shaft if you have got it wrong, easy if you are too high, you can come back a ways and go down again, but if you are too low, cannot come back up, have to do that when you start tunnel again from that shaft, not what I want.

Fri 9th, Finally got a drill, saw one on another field a couple of days ago on the way home, about 1.5 kilometers off the main road, so called in on it the next morning on the way top work but no was there, it is not far from us, so called in again on the way home and somebody was working underground, so left a message on the window of a vehicle that was there and got a phone call late last night and here he is this morning, did not get here until around 12:30pm and is setting up right now to drill a new shaft, will do the clean out after.

Just starting off, down part of a bucket so far, but again the top soil is very powdery, so he will have a job making it stick in the bucket till he gets down a bit further.

Just starting the 2nd bucket, they take out around 1.5 feet when the bucket is full, so a long way to go yet, I want this one down to 75 feet.

A good look at the bucket starting off, hope  this is going to be a good shaft to drill.

Full shot of the working end, this is going down to 75 feet, I hope anyway as there is a level around 73 and another deeper but that is wet so not interested that far down again, worked this bottom level on the last claim here at 11 mile, no more.

Another couple of days and I will move some of this out of the way, will not be on this shaft long once we get to the next shaft and will not be long at that one either, I will have to move the ladders to this shaft when I move the blower, too far to run a electric lead for the winch after I move the blower/generator from this shaft.

These are shots of the surrounding area, here is looking at the old claims where I have the ladders right now and the big shaft for the tunnel machine, this is looking towards Alice Springs.

This way is looking back towards Coober Pedy 19 kilometers away.

This is left of the shot above, still lots of virgin ground around and probably lots of opal too, but unless someone drills it up or some colored trace it will stay hidden for ever.

And left again of the photo above and still lots of virgin ground, we are not far from the main highway, have lots of tourists stopping and taking photos while the blower is working and when it is not.

Now we have trouble, the driller has hit jasper rocks, was hoping that we would not have any here like the other shaft which was quite good ground around the top, but not here, so will have to see how this one plays out.

Here they are checking the teeth on the bucket, have already replaced 4 so far, they cost $18.00 each and we have to pay for them, the cost of this shaft will depend on the time and trouble spent in drill it, so not looking real good so far.

Rocks, Rocks, Rocks, not good for us so far, the offsider which turns out to the drillers brother had to down the shaft on a seat attached to a cable and bring these big ones up by hand I had to take them off him by lying on the ground so had no chance to take a photo, these big ones just roll around in the shaft and will not break up or go into the bucket, right now he has replaced 6 broken teeth and after trying from more than a hour has now quit, we have decided that he is going to blast in the morning, looks like he has hit a hard band, quite common he tells me I personally have not had this problem before but have heard about it. So my partner and I are going to head home right now and the driller said he will go into town and get some stuff he needed and come back, then he or his brother will go down the shaft and check it out and clean the bottom up so they will know what to bring out in the morning to get through this had band, cannot be too far from getting through they are down around 16 feet right now and that has taken him around 3 hours, not good the shaft would normally take about 1.5 to 2 hours to drill in normal  ground, this one is going to cost us, lets hope we drill something up for our troubles Also when I go back underground on Monday, I will have to take that new cutting plate I made down the drive with me as I hit that very hard ground again in the face, its on the right hand side, not as bad as that last lot, not so far anyway, but had one tooth knocked loose and that was tack welded in, so better I change the plate before it gets broken again and put the heavy duty cutting teeth back on.

Sat 11th, we or the driller asked me if I wanted to blast and said yes as the rocks were chewing teeth up, 6 so far, he said that he had now hit a hard band that would be best if he blasted, so they went back home yesterday afternoon to get some things that they would need and then would come back and clean out the bottom of the shaft to get ready for blasting, I have never had to have a shaft blasted before so this is a new thing for me as well as you out there. We got here first this morning and they had been back and cleaned out some rubble and one big rock from the bottom of the shaft, so this morning right now they are joining 8 old tires together, I asked for this was for and they said it was to put on top of the explosives to cushion the blast so it will not damage the bucket, as you see later on what I mean.

All tied together and now putting them in place near the drill ready for action.

All done, will be interesting to see how this is done, after all these years hard to believe I have been lucky enough to get away from drilling a shaft as bad as this one where they have had to blast.

Never seen this old drill be fore, it is traveling along side the main highway on a track is made for our mining vehicles, this is one on this side also right next to our claim, in fact it runs through out claim, this is a old prospect drill, as you can see it is a long auger and can only drill down to 30 feet by the look of it, cannot see it carrying any more augers on the side for it to go deeper, and also looks like it is heading up to the Donna's Rush opal filed, which is fizzling out I believe, some have found bits of opal, some have found trace and potch and color, but to date I have not heard of any big finds worth the effort to go that far out of town, but good luck to those that have gone up there to prospect, hope they do find plenty, me I have enough trouble right her for now.

Now the driller is putting the bucket in place ready for lowering it down the shaft on top of the tires.

Now the offsider Boris and the drillers brother, is about to go down and place the explosives on the hard band, the explosives are in that little white bucket near the driller.

Got the explosives in his hand and about to go down.

On his way down so will not be long now before he is back up top.

Had a look down the shaft and could not see anything due to it being dark, so just pointed the camera with it on forced flash and here is the result, quite good, if you look closely you can see that the bottom of the shaft is a gray like color and that there is a stepped ring in the middle where the teeth on the drill has been grinding away, so it is a hard band of solid jasper rock, no wonder the teeth were breaking, now he will place the Ammonium Nitrate in the center and put the Cordex in it with the fuse attached, then will cover it up as you see in the next couple of photos.

Here he is filling a bucket with plain dirt to lower down to cover the Ammonium Nitrate.

Just checking if Boris is ready for it, as you see he has to cover his eyes so he can see down the shaft, hard this way and can see only so far but 16 feet is alright for this, I can see the bottom of a 70 foot shaft like this if there is a light on at the bottom but if there is no light you cannot see anything, we use a old mirror off a vehicle to redirect the sunlight down the shaft so we can down it, the driller already did this to see if and when there was the big rocks down there stopping him from drilling and then this hard band.

Now lowering the bucket down, we put six of these buckets down to do the job, this is the last one.

Boris is done and up, he lit the fuse, so now to get out the way and put the tires down.

In a rush now, tires going down now, then the bucket.

Now the bucket is being lowered till it just sits on the tires, the tires also would stop some of the dirt getting thrown out of the shaft, then we moved our vehicles out of the way getting ready for the explosion.

Bang, got it, not bad, had to wait for the bang then hit the shutter button, so got a pretty good shot, used to do this in my younger days as a powder monkey in Western Australia in the pioneer days of building the railway lines and bridges, used to drill and fire the shot from a trucks battery with a camera (not as good a today's cameras) and as soon as I had touched the batter an set the blast off drop the leads and pick the camera up and take the photo, just like this, only difference here is that I did not know when the shot was going to be, so rely on reflexes which are getting old I must say, still quite a good photo.

A photo of me from the late about late 1967 operating a Gardner Denver Air Track Drill, in North West Australia near the town of Wickham, before the town was finished being built and people living in it, was drilling for Blue Metal for crushing and used for resting the sleepers on, then the railway lines, I drilled 5 hills before I was I found what they required, then some time later they set up a quarry and mined this Blue Metal long after I had left the scene, I then went on and drilled all of the bride footing on this railway line got another 5 drills sent to me and had to train men to use them and became leading hand then foreman for a firm called MKMO. Was also the Powder Monkey that did the blasting and train the new men as they came top the camp as well and then near the end of the job got sacked later on by a bloody Canadian, I was working under the yanks and good men until this idiot put his word in did not get on with him but that's a another story, of well that's life and full of stories, could write a book worth reading, was good job amongst many in the Pilbara's and I enjoyed it.

Now the driller is going to start drilling again, he says he going to try and grab the ties with the bucket teeth.

Got part of one.

This was it for this attempt, blew the hell out of them by the look of this one and another tourist going up to Alice Springs in the back ground by the look of it.

Looks like there is another rock down there, he used the mirror to have a look as the drill was going nowhere so it must be a big rock just rolling around under the bucket, will soon know.

Yep a couple of rocks, one big one, fell out of the side wall, now all is clear, but no more tires, the rest have been blown into small pieces and will come out in the bucket, I went and moved some dirt after this photo.

Another Semi going up north, maybe to Alice Springs, don't know but since I have been working up top there are lost of these going up and down every day, so is quite busy, bit bigger than the 16 wheeler rigs in the US, now the reason I took this photo was not to show the Semi, but the mound of dirt in front, I have to move this as there are 2 shafts here, old shafts and my partner wants one of then cleaned out, so I have chosen the one on the right, they are partly filled in with mud and was drilled with small diameter bucket, smaller then one meter in diameter so even if it was good shaft It would have only been good enough too put the pipes down, not to use for going up and down with the winch, to small for the likes of me.

You can see that the top is washed out at the top, my partner had some dirt put round the top but after the damage was done, so was too late, anyway this is the one that I will get cleaned out should we need it for later, if there is any opal around that is.

This is how far it is to where the blower is at the moment and where we are heading too which is the shaft that is marked for a clean out and from there across to the shaft that she cut colored trace around, so the area you see here in the photo from the blower to the bottom of the photo is the area that she thinks the opal is in, time will tell if I am around that long.

Another Semi going up North, this is about the fifth so far this morning.

This is what I have to remove now and make it ready for the drill to move in when the other shaft is finished, about 1/2 hours work I should think.

Looking back from the big shaft that I put the tunnel machine down, the last shaft to get cleaned out is behind the blower dump and the shaft where she cut colored trace is just to the right of the blower and in front of the drill.

Shaft finished, getting late in the afternoon now and they broke through the rocks at 26 feet, normally they finish around the 20 foot mark or above so this was unusual as far as I know, but what is new everything I have done here is not normal so far anyway, hard ground, rocks, shafts in the wrong place, having to tunnel more then I should have to get to the spot and still not sure that there is any opal here, but my little partner is sure, she has spent a lot on money on this claim to get to this far, so I hope she is right. Also forgot to mention that they hit that hard ground in this shaft but below the 62 foot level, I stopped short of the 75 feet that I wanted due to this hard ground, do not want to go near it that deep, 3 buckets came out which is around 4.5 feet so that was enough for me, but the shaft would be only a couple of feet shot of 75 feet deep, cut a nice level around 61 feet but was nothing in it, not that means anything as you know, but always nice to cut material or better yet Opal.

Just setting up the drill on that hole I said she wanted to clean out, just trying to make sure it is the center of the old shaft, not easy with the top being washed out like it is.

You can see that have made the ground as level as I can and that the hole at the top is quite large, will be alright for me to put pipes down later on if needed, and I hope we do need it, hard for the drill to get his hydraulic rams down at the back being so close to the edge, but I went home after this photo so did not get to see the rest of the set up, they told me that they would do about 1/2 more work and then knock off for the day.

Back at work, that so called level has now gone into the roof but still along way to go yet till I get to see the 62 foot level.

Hit hard ground again, looks like this is a hard band that covers a very wide area, so no getting away from it, so again the machine is starting to struggle in this stuff.

Brought the machine back this morning and changed the cutting outside cutting head to that new one I made with the Calweld Teeth on it, lost a tooth on the original plate, was going to change the plate anyway and only noticed that the tooth was missing when I went in front to change the plate, was on the floor so must have happened just before we knocked off for the day last time, too much jerking and banging with the old plate and did not want to damage it again like last time and his new one as you know is a lot stronger. Here I have developed a hydraulic oil leak, turns out it was only the top hose connection that had vibrated loose, so a quick turn with the spanner and was ready to go, also blew 2 lights on the machine today, replaced one and that blew about 10 minutes later, been a while since I had to replace on, with all this vibration I would have thought that I would have done more I by now, thankfully I haven't.

Top half not bad and looking good, but the bottom half is bad news, hard ground for sure and broken ground at that which makes it hard to cut, that is why the head is jerking and banging at times, cannot do a even cut even if it is hard, better cutting now I have changed the cutting plate, but slow going, I will get through it but I think that I should have gone down at 20 degrees instead of 15, looks like I will not bring the level up far enough by the time I get to the shaft that is when I find the level, no sign so far, and I have about 33 feet to go as of the end of today's shift.

Close up of the hard ground, you can see its jagged, not smooth like that cut in the middle and even that is hard but a bit different to this lot and I noticed near the end of today's shift about 15 minutes after this photo that the ground is changing at the bottom as I am still going down, I did there for about 10 minutes start to level the machine off, but then I noticed the change, so started it going back down again, this change is also hard as I am still having trouble with the floor cutters cutting properly that get stuck quite often when I change the angle of the machine. But this ground at the bottom is a different color, so the first hour tomorrow will tell me a bit more about it and I am about to make a new inside cutting plate, just been on the phone to a Engineering firm in Port Augusta about getting a new steel plate cut for me and then I will make a new inside cutting plate with the bullet teeth on it, but smaller ones than I put on the other plate, not sure right now if I will put 3 or 4 teeth on it as this plate is 18 inches in diameter and the other outside one is 14 inches.

This is the large shaft that has been cleaned out, was down to 53 feet so not a lot came out, the driller went into virgin ground before he finished, I told him to go down to 64/65 feet and finish he went to 66 feet and I would say that the last bucket he drilled he cut this hard ground again, so its down there well but under the level which is good depending on exactly where the level is, would be good if its under the machine when I get there, this is the shaft we are tunneling to right now, so as this shaft was drilled about 5 years ago I do not know if there is or was any hard ground above the level and I will not go down this shaft to find out, so will have to wait until I get here.

And this was the old shaft near the road, a lot more came out of this shaft was filled in more and was also a smaller hole anyway and the ground was still wet as you can see by the big lumps in the dump also I see that they went down and brought up a big rock, later I will have to clear all this away and put some new dirt around the shaft to protect it.

Wed 14th, only been working an hour this morning and I have decided that we have finished with this drive, the hard ground will not go away and is now 3/4 of the face and more in the floor by the look of it, I thought that the change of color at the bottom would change to softer ground but was wrong, it has now turned back to this dark color again and is rock hard, the machine is taking a beating in this ground although it is cutting it, slow as it might be,  but it is not an easy job for it, if it wasn't for that new cutting plate I would have no chance as this ground would have destroyed the old one for sure by now.

This is a shot of the right hand side, jagged and broken ground some of it and as hard as concrete, especially where the white bits are, (same on the other side) I pulled the machine back a few inches to check the cutting plates and all was OK, then I got the pick and checked the bottom / floor of the drive and is still the same material, so I had a talk with my partner and told here that I cannot continue with this drive into this ground as I am still some 33 feet from the shaft in front. She wanted me to level out and go up which is not the answer, pity she do's not know or understand a bit more of this mining and operating tunnel machine, especially mine, if this ground is like this all the way to the shaft then by me leveling off, which I would not be able to do for about another 10 feet or so, just cannot get the machine to level from 15 degrees like that it take distance to do it, so if I was to level off then I would be in this ground until I reached the shaft and then what, more of the same and going where? She thinks that if we can reach the shaft then we can go down to the level from that shaft and then level off before we get to her shaft, but that is not going to happen, as I am not deep enough yet or so I think will find out tomorrow, what I propose to do it we will bring the machine back to the top of the drive and start again from a bit closer to the down pipes and go down at 20 degrees this time and see if I cannot get under this hard band of concrete then level off, the level has to be under this lot if not then there is no level to speak off.

We have just finished pulling all the pipes up and stacking them at the top (again) this photo is taken from the back tunnel machine, tomorrow morning I will bring the machine back up to the top for another go at this drive.

This is how far down I am at the moment, the machine will be back up here in the morning, I am about 82.5 feet down to the face right now, I will have to bring a small level and a small laser to see if I can work out just how deep I have gone, I figured that I would have to go down some 13 feet at floor level and I do not think that I am that deep yet, it is deceiving when you are looking down and seems deeper when you look up the drive, if there is a good level then it tells you when you are there like that ironstone one earlier, but in this hard ground I do not know where I am or when the level is due, all I know is that there will be no level in this stuff it has to be under it when we can get a change of ground and that cannot come quick enough for me and her.

The machine will come right back near this elbow, I want to start the machine going down some 10 feet further back if not more, it started going down last time near the bottom of this photo, though I had plenty of time to get down to 62 and then level off, would have just made it if it had not been for this hard ground again, anyway I noticed that I have another tooth knocked off the floor cutter on the right hand side, so I have to take the welder down again tomorrow and do a repair again, will have to check the all the machine at the front before I will start again, and sharpen the inside cutting teeth before I start, so far been a waste of time working this claim, if I had only known about this hard ground I would never have come here, but this is my last attempt to get down to the 62 foot level here.

Today was just bring the machine back up and do repairs as needed, here I am grinding clean where the tooth was knocked off, so I can gat a clean weld on it, no rust etc.

Here I have to hold the tooth in place while I tack weld it then I will run the floor cutter slowly forward to see if I have got the angle right on the tooth sticking out sideways, no special angle just enough the give the end of the bar the teeth are weld on clearance from the side wall.

Now welding it on, good shot from my little partner, weld all 4 side and it should be good for a while or hope so anyway, the one that got knocked off was an original one and not welded by me, I have I hope done a bit better and stronger job with this one.

Have not shown you this before, the new plate on the machine, it really does do a good job on the hard round, speaking of which, not often I have eng on my face but right now I have a whole carton on it, I went too deep in this last drive and here was me earlier telling you about going too deep and not be able to go back up, well it has happened, I did not think I was deep enough and my partner was telling me that I should not be in that hard ground and I agreed but thought it was above the level, so was trying to get under it. It is a optical illusion between the brain and the eye, one looking down the drive and not thinking that you are deep enough and then looking back up the drive from the bottom and it looks further than looking down, so how to measure how far down the machine has gone, had a flash that I could use a laser that was given to me a few years ago from a friend in Phoenix, Arizona, figured that if I took my small hand level down and this little laser I could measure how deep the machine had gone.    Pity I did not think of this earlier, but better late than never, what I did was to put a piece of timber on the floor next and just in front of the elbow and set this level on it, turned out to be just about spot on, just had to tweak it a little to get it dead level, then placed the laser on it as they is a grove running along the middle of this level and push the button and a red spot appears down the drive on the roof, my partner pushed the button and I went down the drive and put a nail in the roof where the red spot was, which was at 53 feet, then with a piece of thin rope with a weight tied to one end, put it to the nail and lowered the rope until it hit the ground, the floor here was then 6 feet down in depth down the drive. Then got 3 small pieces of wood and did the level thing again till it was level and hit the laser beam again and marked it and did it all over again, this was then 12 feet down before 53 feet and did it once more and the beam came 4 foot up the drive face, so was 16 feet down below 53 feet, in fact it would have been deeper as the drive itself in more than 6 foot high, going to check just how high tomorrow, never checked that before, as the machine cuts 6 foot - 1 inch in diameter, but did not take into account how much the floor cutters take out, anyway I am way too deep, no wonder I was getting more and more into the hard ground, I thought something must be wrong. So I had somehow to measure just how deep I was, turns out that level I went under was the level but I though at the time it was too close, I think right now that the level is not at 62 where it should be up around the 60 feet, will not know until I can get to a shat and put a tape measure down and this what threw me it is not where it should be or so I believe, that's why I thought it was Squibby level or as it is known a false level, they do come in now and again and carry opal or material, but this level I have hit and gone under is hard and empty so far, have seen it twice now and still nothing. So here is what is now going to happen and not what I wanted, but I will have to start a drive going down to my partners shaft that is only about 77 feet away, closer than I like as I need to be on level ground at least 25 feet from the shaft so I can start opening up, so I will start as close the bottom elbow as I can and go down at 20 degrees and start to level off as soon as the level is a couple of feet off the floor and this time it should be good, been a hell of a time trying to get down to this level and hope there is no or not much hard ground under it. Today I noticed that I have a small problem with the inside cutter, it is the hydraulic motor which as developed a small oil leak and some play on the shaft, nothing I can do about it until it either gets real bad with the leak or the shaft breaks, then it will have to be taken off and sent down south to get fixed and that will take a couple of weeks and about $1000.00, the outside cutter has also got a small oil leak but that is alright I know what that is and there is no problem there at the moment it is with shaking and banging in that broken hard ground. But I have a ram that operates the floor cutters that is playing up, has been for a long while and has been getting slowly worse but today I noticed that is real bad, it is leaking oil back so the ram will not stay up in place, when I am operating the machine and this slowly drops it is cutting the ground as well and as this left side gets lower the right the machine slowly starts to turn right and I have to make it cut straight, so tonight I have sent an enquiry away about 2 new rams, better to put a new pair on and not to try and repair the very old one with new seals, so as soon as I can I will replace this rams, but in the mean time I will have to work with what I have.

This is the ram that is the problem with the creeping down, it is real bad, I did a check on it this morning and have decided that tomorrow, (Saturday) I will go back out to the claim and remove both rams and will buy 2 new ones, have found a site that sells these small rams, took some finding, will have to ring this company on Monday morning and see if they have any in stock and see if they can put 2 on the bus for me overnight, so I can replace them on Tuesday, would not take that long to put them back on if all the fittings are the same if not well it will take longer, I was going to send them both away and get them repaired, but new ones will be a lot quicker if I can get them, will be more than a week I have to get them repaired. So will have to tell my partner the good news tomorrow, she does not like me breaking down or going on holiday as she calls it, I also had to put new tires on the mining truck this morning, I noticed that the rear ones were getting very bald so replaced them at a cost of $400.00 and bought 20 liters of heavy duty diesel oil for the blower/generator cost $110.00, nothing is cheap anymore, we used to think it was dear when we paid $60 for it, now its almost double.

Here they are off and ready to put in the bag and bring home, did not take that long just under an hour to get them off, thought it may take longer with the old bolts but they just like they had been put on real easy to undo, now to get onto that company next week and see what I can do about them.

Last day of the month, about time too, had enough of this month for sure, another month and nothing happing except that I am getting older and broker again, so what else is new you might ask, well nothing that's for sure, about time I got a break on the good side, so let hope next month is it, I will either find some opal in this next drive at the bottom or around the shaft when I open up or I will not be here and that's for sure. Anyway the machine is ready for action again, the rams I sent down to Adelaide and got repaired, they put new seal kits in both of them and both were bad and needed new seals so just as well I sent both, was considerable cheaper then new ones so this was the way to go, bit longer to get done, but took a week from the time I sent them a way on Monday and they were back here on Saturday morning, although could not pick them up till Monday morning, which I did and came out here and put them on and did a couple of other repairs as well. Brought the welder back down with me again and welded 2 support straps on the end teeth on this right side of the floor cutter and welded another tooth on the left side for a bit extra side clearance, had to get out a broken grease nipple, but had to come back up top to get a small chisel from the tool box to help me, managed to get it out with a small easy-out and replace it with a new one, was going to make an new inside cutting plate like the outside one with the bullet teeth on it, but smaller ones, had a 16mm thick x 18 inch dia plate cut, machined and drilled that cost $774.00 to make and got it back at the same time as the hydraulic rams. But I checked the bullet teeth on that outside cutter and although its only been a week since I used the machine the teeth are rusted in, tried to get one out but only managed to get it half way so sprayed them all thoroughly with WD40 and left them, see if they work loose when I start tunneling again, pressure may do the trick but will wait for a while before I make this new plate, may turn out that I will have to remove them id not going to use the machine for while and spray the holders and teeth so thy do not rust up on me, remember that I do not nor can I use the same pressure that the drills put on them, so that may make a difference, so still work in progress right now.

So the machine is in place for me to start this next drive, repaired hydraulic rams on and everything is working, for now anyway, looks like I am going back into this short drive, but in fact I am going down again, for the 3rd time, the machine is up on the back jacks, now I have to jackpick the floor at the front so the cutting head can make a start and away we go, this time I will be going down at 20 degrees, steep and hard on the feet and ankles, when this drive is done I normally have to walk down this angle backwards so I do not upset the ankles too much, hate this angle. But as the drive in front of us is only 77 feet away, not a lot of feet to play with, already about 10/12 feet out from the elbow, that's to the front of the machine, so have to get down quick and level out ASAP, I need to have at least 18 feet from the shaft to come back and start opening up, so lets hope this time my partner is right and we find some color that she says is there. Also I forgot to tell you that on Wednesday I went out to the claim and moved the dump and spread it around the shaft that we are headed for, make a pad for the blower to move onto, that is if we move the blower again, hoping to be able to check out the area surrounding this shaft to see if there is anything worth checking further. Sorry that I have not found any opal for you to get a look at this month, have to say that I am pissed off here for sure, but I made a promise to this lady that I would reach this shaft and check it out, so I will, other wise I would have been gone a long time ago, she has laid out a lot of money thinking that there is some opal here, so lets hope she is right, every drum of diesel is costing her $320 and that only lasts me for about 12 hours of working time, plus petrol for the mining truck, so not a cheap hobby for sure and so far nothing to show for it and it is also costing me as well with the wear on the equipment, never know when something is going to pack it in or break and that is my worry and expense. So till next month, take it easy and have a good one, not long till holiday time so this keeps me and Pat going and she is looking forward to the fishing as so I am I, but would like to find some color this year, so we will see, for me next week and for all of you, end of next 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 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!

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