![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/Loftus-drill-testing-2-1.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
All through the life of the mines there was a constant battle to increase yield without increasing manpower.\u00a0 Ironstone was won by blasting a portion of the rock face out and then loading the stone into a tub (or sett) to be taken back to the heapstead.\u00a0 To place the shot the miner had to create a hole into which he could place his powder, detonator and fuse. This was the time-consuming part of the job initially carried out by hand; then by hand ratchet drill; then by either compressed air, petrol or electric drill.\u00a0 This obviously posed photograph is a record of the testing of just one such drill. This picture and the other one entitled similarly are two out of a group of four pictures taken about 1900 when Whitecliffe Mine was re-opened and this compressed-air drill was tried out underground. From the earliest times the hand \u2018jumper\u2019 drill was used, in 1875 the first compressed-air powered rotary drill was invented. Loftus Mines introduced such drills in 1891 but they were big and cumbersome so this one illustrated was tested but never adopted.<\/strong> All through the life of the mines there was a constant battle to increase yield without increasing manpower. Ironstone was won by blasting a portion of the rock face out and then loading the stone into a tub (or sett) to be taken back to the heapstead. To place the shot the miner had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-skinningrove-mines","odd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=56570"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56571,"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56570\/revisions\/56571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=56570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=56570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.image-archive.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=56570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nLater electric drills were used in Loftus but about 1895 hand-operated rotary drills were introduced (the so-called \u2018ratchet\u2019) and eventually superseded the powered drills. Loftus Mines, however, were never as mechanised as the Dorman Long mines in Cleveland. (words by Simon Chapman).<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n