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 Post subject: Ashdown Moly Pictures discussion
PostPosted: Mon Jan 12, 2009 8:15 am 
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Joined: Mon May 08, 2006 2:16 pm
Posts: 1500
Location: Central Ohio
Those are some real hard rock mining pictures 8) 8)

Now that is some professional timbering . . . .I am impressed.

I bet it is more fun to rehab a section then it is to drive a new one. There is a completely different challenge involved.

You can see the photos at:

http://www.ironminers.com/mineforum/viewtopic.php?t=20054

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 12, 2009 4:43 pm 
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Joined: Sat Jul 28, 2007 3:48 am
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Location: Stockton, Ca
It is definately a different challenge to rehab a section than it is to drive a new heading. Rehab is a lot of work, some of it very dangerous even by mining standards. Timbering through caving fault zones comes to mind... When we rehabd that fault zone which was pictured before and after, we timbered up 2 faults and had to run spilling through most of that section, so above the timber you see there is a lot of railroad rails wedged between the caps. Where the faults caved that was the safest way to support the back without climbing up in to the timber and fault to timber up the fault. Sometimes we'd even have to blast to make the tunnel width comply with the mining plan. Either way both rehab and mining have their high and low points and it's all fun to me.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2009 12:30 pm 
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Joined: Mon Jun 20, 2005 11:33 pm
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Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
Yes, those are some great shots. Rehabilitating a mine is always interesting, getting back into where you were no longer able to get into before, however the dangers can never be under estimated. Is this mine still in operation? Thanks for sharing!

Miner Greg


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sun Jan 18, 2009 10:17 pm 
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Location: Stockton, Ca
It was until November 21. The price of molybenum oxide dropped by about $30 to under $10 per pound so the management decided to put the mine on care and maintanence until the price comes back up, so the mine is in limbo I guess you'd call it, until the price of moly goes back up.

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2009 12:26 pm 
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Location: St. Louis, MO
Enjoyed the photos. Thanks. Too bad to hear about the shutdown. Unfortunately it seems that this tends to be the boom and bust nature of mining.


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2009 4:58 pm 
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Location: Above the Sterling Hill Mine
Yes, that certainly is correct. Fluctuations in ore prices is always the maker and the killer to mining.

Did the mine ever use rail haulage? Or was it entirely wheeled machinery?

Miner Greg


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PostPosted: Mon Jan 19, 2009 10:51 pm 
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The original plan was to use rail haulage but, the drift we wanted to use for that purpose was tagged by the BLM as a historic resource and the original mine super put steel sets in the first 15 feet without BLM's approval to use the adit so they put the end to that idea real quick, after that it was all tuck and LHD haulage.

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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 11:06 pm 
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So they created a new, non-historic entrance and thus didn't need to use rail haulage anymore? I guess they destroyed the original entrance?

Miner Greg


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Sat Jan 24, 2009 2:14 pm 
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Not exactly, back in the late 70's early 80's ANCO drove a decline to the orebody, near the original adit. When they closed down because moly price dropped, the mine flooded. When we wnt in pumped out all the water and almost completely bypassed half or the original decline due to bad rock conditions, it was cheeper to drive new drift that rehab the old. SO we did that and intersected the old decline and rehabed it until we ran into more bad ground and then we just tunnelled by that until we reintersected the ore vein.

The original adit is still there, we just aren't allowed to use it.

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