Hi David,
I hope that my paper on the Grassington system was of some use. I assume it
was: Gill, M.C. "The Mechanisation of the Grassington Mines, Yorkshire"
British Mining, No.25 (1984), pp.45-50. Writing that paper got me enthused
and the result was a much longer and more detailed paper: Gill, M.C.
"Mechanisation at the Grassington Lead Mines" Industrial Archaeology Review,
Vol.11 No.1 (Autumn 1988), pp.37-50.
The system at Grassington is interesting because it has proved possible to
detect the movement of pump-rods from shaft to shaft and then a transition
to winding from pumping (as the adit was driven forward) with a similar
movement of ropes between shafts - all from one large wheel - over 50 years.
Sadly, little remains of the mechanics of the winding process. It has been
suggested that in some cases all shafts were wound at once. This was
impossible at Grassington because of the variety of distances involved. I
suspect that the winding drums were loose on a rotating shaft and were
clutched into use as required.
You are probably right about the frequency of winding in lead mines being
less than in a colliery. Neverthess, the shafts at Grassington were a
significant centralisation of effort and the kibbles were fairly small. The
shafts all had plats (storage hoppers) and so each may have been alloted
winding periods to clear accumulated ore or rock.
Returning to the siting of an engine house between two shafts. It may be
possible that, with one cage up and the other down, some degree of
counter-balancing was achieved. This would be important with earlier,
under-powered engines.
You comment that "The economics of building enginehouses and erecting
winding engines must have been a strong incentive to use what you already
had in situ". This is more so for a waterwheel, which is tied to an
infrasctructure of leats and reservoirs.
Regards,
Mike Gill
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