Mining gear

Mining Gear

Everything else that went underground: blasting gear, survey instruments and the memorabilia of pit life.

Blasting

Representative recreation of a blasting machine. Recreation based on “Blasting machine CIL no 30” by Cantons-de-l’Est, CC BY-SA 4.0, and the Du Pont Pocket Blasting Machine, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. Shared under the same licence.

Exploders

Plunger, twist and dynamo-condenser shot-firing machines, plus detonator and cap tins, fuse and shot-firing tools.

Cap tins came in counts of 10, 25, 50 and 100
The printed labels are a collecting field of their own

Exploders in Market Watch →

Representative recreation of a crank exploder. Recreation based on “BGML Zündmaschinen” by Wolfgang Sauber, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Shared under the same licence.

Crank exploders

Hand-cranked magneto machines used for firing shots underground.

Look for a maker’s plate and the shot count

Blasting posts →

Safety first. Treat any tin with contents as live. Old detonators can still go off. Don’t open it; call 000 or the police. Read the collector safety check.

Instruments

Representative recreation of a gas-testing lamp. Recreation based on “Pieler safety lamp” by Julo, public domain, and “Davyho lampa” by Ikcur, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Shared under the same licence.

Gas testers

Lamps and instruments made to measure firedamp: the Pieler alcohol lamp, the Ashworth Hepplewhite-Gray (A-H-G) and later methanometers.

Officials’ tools, not for general lighting
Complete examples with keys are scarce

Gas testers in Market Watch →

Representative recreation of a miner’s dial. Recreation based on “Haengekompass1” by Markscheider, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Shared under the same licence.

Miners’ dials

Brass surveying compasses for underground work, often on a tripod or hung from a cord.

Look for the maker’s name on the dial face

Dials in Market Watch →

Representative recreation of a pocket clinometer. Recreation based on “Watkins Clinometer 1892” by Storye book, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Shared under the same licence.

Clinometers

Pocket instruments for measuring the dip of a seam or the slope of a roadway.

Lietz and Watkins are names to look for

A clinometer in Market Watch →

Representative recreation of a vane anemometer of the kind Biram invented. Recreation based on “Vane style anemometer” by Ka23 13, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Shared under the same licence.

Anemometers

Vane anemometers measured the airflow in the roadways. Biram’s design was standard in British pits.

Check the vanes are complete and the dials turn

Cutaway of a Friemann & Wolf FW300. Photo: Markscheider, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Inside a lamp

A cutaway of a Friemann & Wolf lamp shows the gauzes, glass, burner and lock that every instrument-maker’s lamp shares.

Useful when checking a lamp is complete

Radium dials. Some older instruments have luminous paint containing radium. Don’t open them or sand them, and store them away from living areas.

Memorabilia

Brass checks (tallies) swapped for a lamp at the lamp room told the banksman who was underground. Plates and checks tie a lamp to a pit. Bridles, brasses and non-sparking beryllium-copper shoes come from the ponies that hauled underground until 1994 in England. Enamel signs, mine telephones, changehouse baskets, union banners and badges belong here too.

Pit ponies · Mining telephones · The Lady Markham silver replica · All memorabilia