MACHINE FOR RAISING. COALS Oft ORE. jH 



Account of an improved Machine for raising Coals, or other 

 Articles, from Mines: by Mr. Gilbert Gilpin, of Old 

 Park Iron Works, near Shifnal*. 



T 



SIR, 1 



HE improvement of the machines in use for raising coal Experiments i 



and ore from the mines has long been a desideratum of the °^P]^'^ m sfor 

 o raising coal re- 



Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and quired. j 



Commerce, and they have repeatedly offered a premium for i 



this pui'pose. ■ 



Those in general use (from the increased expense of horse Those in com - 

 labour), are worked by a steam engine, attached to a crank ™°" "^^' ! 



of twenty-one inches radius, wedged on a shaft along with ) 



a fly wheel, eleven or twelve feet in diameter, and pinion ! 



wheel, of eleven teeth, which latter works in another of ij 



sixty-four teeth, on the shaft of which is a plam cylindrical 1 



barrel, from four to six feet diameter, and nine or ten feet 5 



long. Some have barrels formed of frustums of cones, (the 

 perimeters of which are in the proportion of about five to 

 four), united at their bases, and of various diameters.. The 

 axes of both kinds are placed at right angles with the cen- 

 tre line of the pit, and at each end a rope of six inches in 

 circumference is made fast by a staple, which ropes work 

 (in contrary directions at the same time) over two pulleys, 

 placed in a frame parallel to each other, and at an equal 

 distance from the centre of the pit; to the ends of these 

 ropes the baskets of coal and ore to be raised are hooked. 



The simplicity of their general structure is such as, per- Defect in the 

 / . ^ ^ . , , , • • , form of the 



naps, not to admit ot any considerable improvement; but barrel. 



the forms of the barrels are very defective. 



On putting one of these machines in motion each rope 



forms a triangle, the lines thereof from the pulley to the 



first and last coil, and the surface of the barrel, forming its 



* Trans, of the Society of Arts, vol. XXV, p. 74. Twenty guin as 

 were voted to Mr. Gilpin as » premium by the Society. 



three 



