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Wednesday, 28 June 2017

Shaft vs. Incline


Incline drivage is cheaper and quicker than pit sinking as it does not need skilled men, costly headgear and heavy capital cost. Men can travel by the incline to surface; not so in case of a breakdown of winding arrangements for a pit. If the mine is stopped for one or two shifts in a day, or for some short period, say a couple of weeks or months, and only pump drivers or other few essential men have to go underground for inspection or maintenance, the winding arrangement has to be kept in readiness for all the time and the banks man, the on setter and the winding engineman have to be on duty. In case of steam winders the boiler plant has also to be kept working. An incline in such case has obvious advantages.
Inclines are safer than shafts; .Maintenance and repairs of inclines are easy and cheap.
Mining regulations are stringent on inspection of shafts, the equipment used for winding and other winding gear. Winding equipment requires a number of safety devices some of which have to" be imported.
For increasing the production or for any other reason if it is necessary to increase the width or height of an incline, it is not a serious problem. But increasing the size of a shaft often dislocates raising arrangements over a long period.
An incline is ideal for trackless mining. By installation of conveyors from working face upto the surface, filling of mineral into tubs, mine care or skips can be avoided and degradation of mineral reduced.
In inclines it is possible to take locomotives from surface to underground working face in a nearly flat seam e.g. at West Bokaro Colliery.
An incline has the disadvantage of heavy make of water during rains due to large catchment area if the deposit is worked by quarry on the outcrop side.
The choice of site of an incline is limited to the outcrop region, while a shaft may be located at any convenient place in the property.
Under CMR 66 and MMR 68 every mine should have at least 2 shafts or inclines before any underground production work is undertaken.

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