As described in my student report on Cadley Hill colliery in 1950,
now lodged with the Derbyshire Country Record Office in Matlock,
one of the steam winders then in operation had at one time
served three shafts, and had a drum in which three different portions
had three different diameters. The shafts were strung out along the
same centre line, and had pit bottoms in three different seams.
In the main, or No 1 , shaft, there were two cages (by 1950 these were
operated by a second, newer, winding engine). Shafts Nos 2 and 3
each had one cage, the cage in one reaching pit bottom when the
cage in the other reached surface.
IBy 1950 the No 1 shaft had been sunk to a deeper level, hence the
need for the newer engine, and that was the source of all production.
The older shafts served the usual other functions such as ventilation
(No 2 was upcast) pumping, and as emergency escape routes.
As a student, accompanying the under-manager on one of his
inspections, I did one day travel down one shaft and up the other
served by this engine. Each shaft had its own characteristic manually-
operated, bell-pull system, and indicators in the engine house showed
the engine-man where each cage was.
I understand that when this engine was removed ( the Cadley Hill site
was subsequently worked as an open-cast ) it went to the Chatterley
Whitfield museum, but I guess it was never erected there.
In short, a winding engine was still operating in 1950 which had, for some
years, served three shafts at the same time.
Tony Brewis
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