1.
Mining
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Mining is extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth usually from an orebody, lode, vein, seam, reef or placer deposits. These deposits form a mineralized package that is of economic interest to the miner, ores recovered by mining include metals, coal, oil shale, gemstones, limestone, chalk, dimension stone, rock salt, potash, gravel, and clay. Mining is required to obtain any material that cannot be grown through agricultural processes, Mining in a wider sense includes extraction of any non-renewable resource such as petroleum, natural gas, or even water. Mining of stones and metal has been a human activity since pre-historic times, Mining operations usually create a negative environmental impact, both during the mining activity and after the mine has closed. Hence, most of the nations have passed regulations to decrease the impact. Work safety has long been a concern as well, and modern practices have significantly improved safety in mines, levels of metals recycling are generally low. Unless future end-of-life recycling rates are stepped up, some rare metals may become unavailable for use in a variety of consumer products, due to the low recycling rates, some landfills now contain higher concentrations of metal than mines themselves. Since the beginning of civilization, people have used stone, ceramics and, later and these were used to make early tools and weapons, for example, high quality flint found in northern France, southern England and Poland was used to create flint tools. Flint mines have been found in areas where seams of the stone were followed underground by shafts. The mines at Grimes Graves and Krzemionki are especially famous, other hard rocks mined or collected for axes included the greenstone of the Langdale axe industry based in the English Lake District. The oldest-known mine on archaeological record is the Lion Cave in Swaziland, at this site Paleolithic humans mined hematite to make the red pigment ochre. Mines of an age in Hungary are believed to be sites where Neanderthals may have mined flint for weapons. Ancient Egyptians mined malachite at Maadi, at first, Egyptians used the bright green malachite stones for ornamentations and pottery. Later, between 2613 and 2494 BC, large building projects required expeditions abroad to the area of Wadi Maghareh in order to secure minerals and other resources not available in Egypt itself. Quarries for turquoise and copper were found at Wadi Hammamat, Tura, Aswan and various other Nubian sites on the Sinai Peninsula. Mining in Egypt occurred in the earliest dynasties, the gold mines of Nubia were among the largest and most extensive of any in Ancient Egypt. These mines are described by the Greek author Diodorus Siculus, who mentions fire-setting as one used to break down the hard rock holding the gold. One of the complexes is shown in one of the earliest known maps, the miners crushed the ore and ground it to a fine powder before washing the powder for the gold dust
2.
Cornwall
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Cornwall is a ceremonial county and unitary authority area of England within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, Cornwall has a population of 551,700 and covers an area of 3,563 km2. Cornwall forms the westernmost part of the south-west peninsula of the island of Great Britain, and this area was first inhabited in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods. It continued to be occupied by Neolithic and then Bronze Age peoples, there is little evidence that Roman rule was effective west of Exeter and few Roman remains have been found. In the mid-19th century, however, the tin and copper mines entered a period of decline, subsequently, china clay extraction became more important and metal mining had virtually ended by the 1990s. Traditionally, fishing and agriculture were the important sectors of the economy. Railways led to a growth of tourism in the 20th century, however, the area is noted for its wild moorland landscapes, its long and varied coastline, its attractive villages, its many place-names derived from the Cornish language, and its very mild climate. Extensive stretches of Cornwalls coastline, and Bodmin Moor, are protected as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Cornwall is the homeland of the Cornish people and is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, retaining a distinct cultural identity that reflects its history. Some people question the present constitutional status of Cornwall, and a nationalist movement seeks greater autonomy within the United Kingdom in the form of a devolved legislative Cornish Assembly. On 24 April 2014 it was announced that Cornish people will be granted minority status under the European Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. The modern English name Cornwall derives from the concatenation of two ancient demonyms from different linguistic traditions, Corn- records the native Brythonic tribe, the Cornovii. The Celtic word kernou is cognate with the English word horn. -wall derives from the Old English exonym walh, the Ravenna Cosmography first mentions a city named Purocoronavis in the locality. This is thought to be a rendering of Duro-cornov-ium, meaning fort of the Cornovii. The exact location of Durocornovium is disputed, with Tintagel and Carn Brea suggested as possible sites, in later times, Cornwall was known to the Anglo-Saxons as West Wales to distinguish it from North Wales. The name appears in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in 891 as On Corn walum, in the Domesday Book it was referred to as Cornualia and in c.1198 as Cornwal. Other names for the county include a latinisation of the name as Cornubia, the present human history of Cornwall begins with the reoccupation of Britain after the last Ice Age. The area now known as Cornwall was first inhabited in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods and it continued to be occupied by Neolithic and then Bronze Age people. The Common Brittonic spoken at the time developed into several distinct tongues
3.
Samson Pit
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The Samson Pit or Samson Mine is an historic silver mine in Sankt Andreasberg in the Upper Harz region of central Germany. The pit has one of the oldest man engines in the still working. The man engine, installed in the Samson Pit in 1837, the start of this ditch is the Oderteich reservoir, which is part of the Upper Harz Water Regale. The large water wheel, which drove the man engine until 1922, is powered by water today for demonstration purposes. When it was a mine the Samson Pit was, for a long time. Mining in Sankt Andreasberg began before 1487, the first definite record of the pit is dated 1537. The oldest, mining office records referring to the Samson Pit come from the year 1661, Mining in Sankt Andreasberg experienced its first boom during the 1560s. But times of high yield were frequently accompanied by sharp drops in output, the routine problem of water shortages caused by low precipitation or frost was solved by the construction of the New Rehberg Ditch to feed water to the wheel. From 1700 to 1730, mining in the Sankt Andreasberg area went through a boom with silver outputs of 1. On 12 December 1777 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe entered the Samson Pit as part of his first Harz visit and later noted in his diary Entered Samson in the evening, was very dismal to me this time. At the beginning of the 19th century, silver production almost always exceeded 2,000 kg per year, the last shift of 80 miners left the pit on 31 March 1910. The mine had 42 galleries and a depth of about 840 m. The mine was famous in the 18th century for its finds of rare and exotic minerals, the very rare mineral samsonite was named after the pit. In 1950 the Samson Pit Mining Museum opened and, since 2001, in 1987 the American Society of Mechanical Engineers placed the Samson Pit on the list of internationally historic engineering monuments. In the shaft of the Samson Pit today there are several turbines belonging to firm of Harz Energie and they supply the bulk of the electrical power needed by the mining town. At a depth of 130 m is the Grüner Hirsch Power Station, the Sieberstollen Power Station lies at a depth of 190 m and is drained by the 3.1 km long Sieber Adit into the Sieber. An Historical Perspective on Silver Mining in Germany, Mineralogical Record,17, official website Information on the mining town of St. Andreasberg
4.
Dolcoath mine
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Dolcoath mine (Cornish, Bal Dorkoth} was a copper and tin mine in Camborne, Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. Its name derives from the Cornish for Old Ground, and it was affectionately known as The Queen of Cornish Mines. The site is north-west of Carn Brea, Dolcoath Road runs between the A3047 road and Chapel Hill. The site is south of this road, the mineral rights were owned by the Basset family of Tehidy who are recorded on a deed in 1588 as leasing the ground to a family called Crane. By 1720 the mine was being worked for copper, and it was almost 300 feet deep in 1746, in 1778 it was nearly 600 feet deep, according to William Price. The mine closed in 1787 because the amount of copper ore that was being cheaply mined from Parys Mountain on Anglesey had depressed the price. However the price of copper recovered and the mine reopened in 1799. Of around 470 copper-producing mines in Cornwall and Devon, Dolcoath became the fifth largest, but as depth increased the copper died out, and by 1832 the mine was in danger of closing. By 1882 the mine had reached a depth of 2,160 feet and had 12 miles of tunnels passable by men, in 1893 there was a major accident at the 412-fathom level. In 1895 it took men employed in the levels between 2–3 hours to go down and return to the surface, so they could not work more than 4–5 hours a day. Dolcoath became the largest and deepest mine in Cornwall, with its shaft, known as New Sump Shaft. The pumping engine that worked this shaft dated from 1815, a piece of the cast iron bob from this engine is preserved in the collection of the Trevithick Society. This engine originally had a 76-inch-diameter cylinder, but this had to be replaced with an 85-inch cylinder when it was not powerful enough to cope with the deepening shaft. The rebuilt engine was so large there was not enough room in the engine house for the stairs. In 1895 it was decided to reconstruct the company as a limited company, a new shaft, named the Williams Shaft after the first chairman of the new company, was started in October 1895, intended to be the first 3, 000-foot vertical shaft in Cornwall. It was completed in 1910 and came into use the next year, in 1920 when the mine had become virtually worked out and following the tin price collapse Dolcoath finally closed. The company was reconstructed in 1923 when fresh capital was raised, the New Dolcoath Mine was actually an amalgamation of several smaller mines including Stray Park and Roskear. In 1936 Dolcoaths sett was purchased by South Crofty, on 20 September 1893 a party of miners was strengthening a large stull at the 412 level
5.
Harz
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The Harz is a Mittelgebirge that has the highest elevations in Northern Germany and its rugged terrain extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia. The name Harz derives from the Middle High German word Hardt or Hart, the Brocken is the highest summit in the Harz with an elevation of 1,141.1 metres above sea level. The Wurmberg is the highest peak located entirely within the state of Lower Saxony, the Harz has a length of 110 kilometres, stretching from the town of Seesen in the northwest to Eisleben in the east, and a width of 35 kilometres. The following districts fall wholly or partly within the Harz, Goslar and Osterode am Harz in the west, Harz and Mansfeld-Südharz in the north and east, and Nordhausen in the south. The districts of the Upper Harz are Goslar and Osterode, whilst the Lower Harz is on the territory of Harz and Mansfeld-Südharz districts. The Upper Harz is generally higher and features fir forests, whilst the Lower Harz gradually descends into the area and has deciduous forests interspersed with meadows. The dividing line between Upper and Lower Harz follows approximately a line from Ilsenburg to Bad Lauterberg, which separates the catchment areas for the Weser. Only on the perimeter of the Upper Harz, which is also called the High Harz. Its highest peak is the Brocken, its peaks are the Heinrichshöhe to the southeast. Other prominent hills in the Harz are the Acker-Bruchberg ridge, the Achtermannshöhe, in the far east, the mountains merge into the East Harz foothills, which are dominated by the Selke Valley. Part of the south Harz lies in the Thuringian district of Nordhausen, the Harz National Park is located in the Harz, the protected area covers the Brocken and surrounding wilderness area. Approximately 600,000 people live in towns and villages of the Harz Mountains, because of the heavy rainfall in the region the rivers of the Harz Mountains were dammed from an early date. Examples of such dams are the two largest, the Oker Dam and the Rappbode Dam. The clear, cool water of the streams was also dammed by early mountain folk to form the various mountain ponds of the Upper Harz waterways. The 17 dams in the Harz block a total of twelve rivers, because the Harz is one of the regions of Germany that experiences the most rainfall, its water power was used from early times. Today the dams are used to generate electricity, to provide drinking water, to prevent flooding. Modern dam-building began in the Harz with the construction of the Söse Valley Dam, the dams of the Upper Harz lakes are some of the oldest dams in Germany that are still in operation. → See List of dams in the Harz The largest rivers in the Harz are the Innerste, the Oker and the Bode in the north, the Wipper in the east, the Innerste merges into the Leine and its tributaries are the Nette and the Grane
6.
Water wheel
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A water wheel is a machine for converting the energy of flowing or falling water into useful forms of power, often in a watermill. A water wheel consists of a wheel, with a number of blades or buckets arranged on the outside rim forming the driving surface. Most commonly, the wheel is mounted vertically on a horizontal axle, vertical wheels can transmit power either through the axle or via a ring gear and typically drive belts or gears, horizontal wheels usually directly drive their load. Water wheels were still in use well into the 20th century. Uses included milling flour in gristmills, grinding wood into pulp for papermaking, hammering wrought iron, machining, some water wheels are fed by water from a mill pond, which is formed when a flowing stream is dammed. A channel for the water flowing to or from a wheel is called a mill race. The race bringing water from the pond to the water wheel is a headrace. In the mid to late 18th century John Smeatons scientific investigation of the water led to significant increases in efficiency supplying much needed power for the Industrial Revolution. Water wheels began being displaced by the smaller, less expensive and more efficient turbine, developed by Benoît Fourneyron, turbines are capable of handling high heads, or elevations, that exceed the capability of practical-sized waterwheels. The main difficulty of water wheels is their dependence on flowing water, modern hydroelectric dams can be viewed as the descendants of the water wheel, as they too take advantage of the movement of water downhill. The two main functions of water wheels were historically water-lifting for irrigation purposes and as a power source, when used for water-lifting power can be supplied by either human or animal force or by the water current itself. Water wheels come in two designs, either a vertical or a horizontal axle. The latter type can be subdivided, depending on where the hits the wheel. Engineers of the Hellenistic era Mediterranean region are credited with the development of the water wheel, Mediterranean engineers of the Hellenistic and Roman periods were also the first to use it for both irrigation and as a power source. The technological breakthrough occurred in the advanced and scientifically minded Hellenistic period between the 3rd and 1st centuries BCE. This is seen as an evolution of the paddle-driven water-lifting wheels that had appeared in ancient Egypt by the 4th century BCE. According to John Peter Oleson, both the wheel and the hydraulic Noria appeared in Egypt by the 4th century BCE. This is supported by finds at Faiyum, where the oldest archeological evidence of a water-wheel has been found
7.
Pumpjack
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A pumpjack is the overground drive for a reciprocating piston pump in an oil well. It is used to mechanically lift liquid out of the if not enough bottom hole pressure exists for the liquid to flow all the way to the surface. The arrangement is used for onshore wells producing little oil. Pumpjacks are common in oil-rich areas, depending on the size of the pump, it generally produces 5 to 40 litres of liquid at each stroke. Often this is an emulsion of oil and water. Pump size is determined by the depth and weight of the oil to remove. A pumpjack converts the motion of the motor to a vertical reciprocating motion to drive the pump shaft. The engineering term for this type of mechanism is a walking beam and it was often employed in stationary and marine steam engine designs in the 18th and 19th centuries. In the early days, pumpjacks worked by rod lines running horizontally above the ground to a wheel on an eccentric in a mechanism known as a central power. The central power, which operate a dozen or more pumpjacks. Among the advantages of this scheme was only having one motor to power all the pumpjacks rather than individual motors for each, however, among the many difficulties was maintaining system balance as individual well loads changed. Modern pumpjacks are powered by a prime mover, common off-grid pumpjack engines run on natural gas, often casing gas produced from the well, but pumpjacks have been run on many types of fuel, such as propane and diesel fuel. In harsh climates, such motors and engines may be housed in a shack for protection from the elements, engines that power water pumpjacks often receive natural gas from the nearest available gas grid. The cranks raise and lower one end of an I-beam which is free to move on an A-frame, on the other end of the beam is a curved metal box called a horse head or donkey head, so named due to its appearance. A cable made of steel—occasionally, fibreglass—called a bridle, connects the head to the polished rod. The cranks themselves also produce counterbalance due to their weight, so on pumpjacks that do not carry heavy loads. Sometimes, however, crank-balanced units can become prohibitively heavy due to the need for counterweights, currently, Lufkin Industries offer air-balanced units, where counterbalance is provided by a pneumatic cylinder charged with air from a compressor, eliminating the need for counterweights. The polished rod has a fit to the stuffing box, letting it move in
8.
Clausthal-Zellerfeld
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Clausthal-Zellerfeld is a town in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is located in the part of the Harz mountains. Clausthal-Zellerfeld was the seat of the former Samtgemeinde Oberharz, altenau-Schulenberg im Oberharz Buntenbock Clausthal-Zellerfeld Wildemann Clausthal-Zellerfeld originally consisted of two towns which were merged in 1924 to form an administrative unit. Clausthal is well known for the old Clausthal University of Technology and its magnificent buildings, while Zellerfeld is a typical tourist resort for hikers, Clausthal-Zellerfeld is the largest town in the area that is situated in the mountains rather than on the edge. Mining in the began in the 16th century. The Innerste Valley Railway was inaugurated in 1877 and extended to Altenau in 1914, the large station building and 70 other buildings in the town were destroyed in an air raid on 7 October 1944. Mining activity halted in 1930 because the ore deposits were exhausted, today, there are large remains of mines in the surrounding Harz region, some of which are now museums. The railway line was closed in 1976, the former railway station, which was rebuilt from 1961-1963 after being destroyed in 1944, houses the tourist information and the municipal library today. The Clausthal University of Technology was established in 1775 for the education of mining engineers, today, it is a technical university for teaching engineering. Tower dating from 1637. de Clausthal-Zellerfeld at DMOZ Clausthal
9.
Wilhelm Albert (engineer)
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Wilhelm August Julius Albert was a German mining administrator, best remembered as the first person to record observations of metal fatigue. Albert was born in Hanover and showed talent as a musician before embarking on the study of law in Göttingen in 1803. Experience in the Harz mountains awakened an interest in mining and, in 1806, he was appointed to the Mining, by 1836 he was directing the entire mining industry of the Harz region. In 1829, he observed, studied and reported the failure of iron mine hoist chains arising from repeated small loadings and he built a machine which repeatedly loaded a chain. His finding was that fatigue was not associated with an overload, but was dependent on load. He invented a twisted steel cable, later known as an Albert Rope, which was first used in the Clausthal Caroline mine in 1834 and was the forerunner of the modern wire rope
10.
Adit
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Adits are also used to explore for mineral veins. Adits are driven into the side of a hill or mountain, in cases where the mineral vein outcrops at the surface, the adit may follow the lode or vein until it is worked out, in which case the adit is rarely straight. The use of adits for the extraction of ore is called drift mining. Adits can only be driven into a mine where the topography permits. There will be no opportunity to drive an adit to a mine situated on a flat plain. Also if the ground is weak, the cost of shoring up a long adit may outweigh its possible advantages, access to a mine by adit has many advantages over the vertical access shafts used in shaft mining. Less energy is required to transport miners and heavy equipment into and it is also much easier to bring ore or coal out of the mine. Horizontal travel by means of narrow gauge tramway or cable car is much safer and can move more people. Most adits are designed to slope slightly upwards from the entrance so that water will flow out of the mine. Mines that have adits can be at least partly drained of water by gravity alone or power-assisted gravity, the depth to which a mine can be drained by gravity alone is defined by the deepest open adit which is known as the drainage adit. Workings above this level will remain unflooded as long as the adit does not become blocked, all mine workings below both the drainage adit and the water table will flood unless mechanical means are used for drainage. Until the invention of the engine this was the main restriction on deep mining. Of course, adits are still useful for deeper mines because the water needs to be raised to the drainage adit rather than to the surface. A side benefit of driving such extensive adits is that previously unknown ore-bodies can be discovered, great County Adit, a system of over 65 kilometres of adits used for dewatering the over 100 mines in the Gwennap area of Cornwall in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Milwr tunnel, a ten-mile -long drainage adit in North Wales, started in 1897, it still discharges an average of 23 million US gallons of water per day from the disused Halkyn District United Mines. The Snowy Hydro scheme in the Australian Snowy Mountains created during its construction and these adits are very large and used to access the central point from which the hydro tunnels were constructed. Black Trout Adit in Tarnowskie Góry, Poland and it is part of a former silver mine, the adit was used for removing the water out of the mine. Blue Hawk Mine near Kelowna, BC, Canada, nORCATs Underground Mine Centre, used for underground training and mining technology development in Onaping, ON, Canada
