ODDS’N’SODS — LHDs a big improvement on hand-mucking of

It is a good thing that mechanization has arrived in mines, as I don’t know where we would find people to muck out by hand today. The comparison of the use of the load-haul-dump machine versus mucking by hand with a shovel is awesome.

The term “Bull-Dog” (No. 4 or No. 6) was not one to be taken too lightly. This was the trade name (and size) of shovels used in the mines. A new recruit in a mine spent many months digging ditches or just mucking spills below chutes with a Bull-Dog.

I can recall hand-mucking of the material at the face of a blasted drift round. A steel plate was placed at the end of the track against the face and the round, and then blasted so that the bulk of the broken material remained on the plate.

The practice of removing this same material was called “mucking off the plate.”

My partner and I arrived with our 1-ton mine car and our Bull-Dogs and shovelled continuously off the plate, working side-by-side in the glow of our carbide lamps, filling the car, pushing it to the waste-pass and dumping, returning to the face and repeating the procedure.

Not a word was spoken. We just saved our breath and kept mucking till some 20 cars had been accounted for, the plate was clean, and the face was washed, scaled and checked and ready for the next round to be drilled. Oh, for those good old days! No trouble working up an appetite for dinner — and the food would be consumed to keep up the pace. Sleep came as a blessing for weary and worn hands, arms, legs and back.

For the sake of variety, and to keep us in practice, we were occasionally assigned to “muck down” a prospect raise, or do some production mucking in the stopes.

These were not particularly happy undertakings. Indeed, it was back-breaking labor of the roughest order, usually with a Bull-Dog No. 6.

The amount of material to be moved and the length of the movement of the material seemed unlimited. We literally carried each pound of muck on that shovel. (It was great stimulation and motivation to seek an education!) On rare occasions, we were invited to replace a miner in a shaft crew, to assist in mucking a bench of blasted material in the shaft bottom. This was an especially grueling exercise.

Initially, the slope of the muck pile permitted “scooping” or raking of the broken material into the sinking bucket. However, gradually we had to attack the muck with a Bull-Dog No. 6.

The method involved pressing down on the shovel with our huge unwieldy shaft boots to lever the shovel into the resisting material and then heaving a full load on the shovel into the sinking bucket.

Two such buckets were in continuous service so that there was no respite between hoistings of the full bucket.

Finally, the crew had to “pick bottom” to remove any loose slabs in place and so to prepare for the drills.

Usually between 20 and 30 tons had to be mucked by hand for each half bench. Today, the “clam” and Riddell muckers make life much simpler in the sinking cycle.

The most merciless of the shovelling tasks involved the mucking and cleaning down of the fine orebins in the mill to accommodate inspection or repairs. This was indeed a prolonged and thankless task in dust-laden air. Pick, shovel and bar were required as the material appeared to be “frozen” in place. We picked, we shovelled, we barred — endlessly. Then, finally, the bottom of the huge bin was reached, so that work went more smoothly on the steel or wooden floors. Not many volunteered for this work.

And so, when we consider our mechanization today, we really can’t complain, or can we?

— S.J. Hunter, a retired mining engineer and regular contributor, resides in Vancouver, B.C.