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Chris Batstone, Jeff Price, Tony audsley.
Took bags of rock from Caine Hill and packed them round the top of the shaft to fill the voids there.
Chris Batstone, Jeff Price, Tony Audsley.
Moved the little digging hut towards the centre of the depression to make space for a new digging hut cum engine house. Started laying down a foundation of rock (from Caine Hill) for the new hut.
Jeff Price, Paul Brock, Tony Audsley.
Tried out silly idea No. 542, which was to blast a dry mix of 3:1 sand:cement using compressed air. The idea being to fill the gaps in the spoil with sand/cement, which would the absorb moisture and harden. ; This worked moderately well, but it also filled the shaft with an unbreathable cloud of cement dust. Lacking any form of respirator or dust filter, the attempt was abandoned in favour of sloshing in a wet mix.
No spoil removed.
Alice Audsley, Annie Galloway, Roger Galloway, Tony Audsley.
The depression was dry, although the new blue drain pipes were taking a very small amount of water. There was a small pool at the bottom of the shaft.
Tried drilling into the rock walls, with slightly mixed sucess. Got three good holes in but when trying to work to the left or the right of these found that solid rock was more that a drill length away. Hauled out two of the bags of fill put down there on 18th July; three more to go. Also hauled out one load of 'proper' spoil.
Ivan Sandford, Jeff Price, Tim Large, Tony Audsley
Some time ago, Tim had bought a 15 ft long, substantial section I beam from a lady in Blagdon. There may well be a fascinating story attached to this, but I know of no other details.
The removal team hauled it out and loaded it onto Ivan's trailer, drove in convoy to Home Close and deposited it with the rest of the ironwork at t'hole.
Then retired to Hunters' for tea and biscuits.
Jeff Price, Tim Large, Tony Audsley
Surface preparation work. Dug channels to the drainage sump and filled them with the Belfry gravel. Rain prevented further play, so we retired to Hunters' (Sensible decision).
Monday 10th August 2009:
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Took 12 bags of ½" stone from the Belfry car-park to t'hole (thank you to Henry Dawson for this). The depression drainage system seems to be working well and the ground around the yellow sump is drying out and beginning to crack. For those of you who feel tired, jaded and sad, here is an exciting photograph of mud ... drying ... slowly ... |
 10AUG09: Cracks in the drying mud. |
A quick visit to check if the drainage system was working after the torrential day of rain on Tuesday. The depression was draining well and a small amount of water was still running down the pipes. By contrast, the adjacent depression had a 16 inch (or 406mm if you insist) deep pool.
 05AUG09: The drained, but still soggy, depression. |
 05AUG09: The drainage sump (a yellow plastic bucket). |
05AUG09: For comparison, the undrained next depression with a 16 inch deep pool at the bottom. |
Alice Audsley, Annie Audsley, Roger Galloway, Tony Audsley.
Another day of surface preparation. The intention was to stop the water from the pool flowing down the outside of the shaft as this was washing away material from around the concrete rings. The theory was that if the water were piped to the shaft bottom the spoil round the bottom ring of the shaft would dry out a bit and be more amenable to being under-mined.
So, we started by digging a trench at the level of the bottom of the first ring from the shaft towards the centre of the depression. Roger then drilled a couple of 60mm holes through the ring and a couple of pipes were run from the bottom of the shaft through the holes and along the trench to a bucket which had been sunk in the slime in the centre of the depression. Much fun was had by all.
More importantly, the pipes seemed very effective at draining the depression. We'll see what happens next time it rains.
 Alice Audsley, Annie Audsley & Roger Galloway digging a trench for the drainage pipes |
 Roger Galloway trimming a hole he has just drilled |
 The drainage pipes fitted in the shaft |
Chris Batstone, Stuart Lindsey, Tony Audsley
Started off with the intention of filling the hole that Paul had dug out on Wednesday with some bags of spoil to prevent any risk of a run-in.
Unfortunately, the fill had beaten us to it and wiped out Paul's work very neatly. Four out of the five ree-bar supports had held, but mud had sludged between the bars and rocks had moved down from the right-hand (western), unsupported side of the excavation.
Hole 1, Diggers 0.
A reverse digging session then started. Five bags of spoil were lowered down the shaft and jammed in, round and under to prevent further collapse.
Back on the surface for pies and bread pudding, provided by Stuart. This was followed by a silly afternoon session, nominally with the purpose of draining the pond with the eventual intention of piping the water down the inside of the shaft. In reality, I guess that we just liked playing in the mud.
Digging total:- minus 5 bags of spoil removed from the dig.
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An afternoon of steady, heavy rain. Went over to t'hole, filled the watertanks in preparation for cementing at the weekend and generally fiddled about on the surface while they were filling.
The pond had overflowed the dam of spoil and a respectable stream of water was flowing down the shaft.
The site looks much too wet to attempt cementing at the weekend.
Henry Dawson, Jeff Price, John Noble, Paul Brock, Tony Audsley.
Digging down below the temporary roof of reebars in preparation for casting the first cement seating for the shaft. Paul did most of the digging and John did most of the hauling. Nine loads, one rock and one frog were hauled up the shaft. Strictly speaking, the frog travelled up the shaft inside John's oversuit; when he got to the surface, it took quite a while to get the frog out as it seemed to have formed a strong emotional attachment to John.
Later Henry and Tony went down to test the washing system. At first this insisted on producing only a pathetic dribble despite much pipe blowing and sucking by the surface and underground teams. Finally, the joint between the down-pipe and the tap was opened and the tap and the bottom 6 inches of pipe were found to be stuffed with small leaf fragments; a leafcutter bee had made a nest in the hose pipe.
Once this blockage was removed water sprayed everywhere.
Henry was OK, he was part way up the ladder.
Fixed up a header tank and connected it to the "water main" in the shaft. Away from the dig, made up a skip for lowering cement down the shaft.
Installed a water-pipe down the shaft with a tap at the bottom. The water supply will come from a header tank on the surface. This should be useful when the rock wall needs cleaning up before casting the cement plug against it.
Fitted a guide rope for the bucket to (hopefully) prevent it from jamming against the ladder, which it seems to like to do. After Hunters', dragged varied bits of scrap metal from the heap at the dairy unit over to t'hole. Got wet.
Alice Audsley, Tony Audsley.
Had previously made up three more "drilling jigs" and pointed up some lengths of ree-bar, so went down t'hole and fitted the jigs to the bottom of the pipes then hammered the pointed bars through the fill and into the wall behind. We hope that just hammering the bars into position will work rather than having to drill a hole for each bar ... time will tell.
When the bars were in position, excavated under them and tunnelled towards the wall. Got to touch the rock wall! As too much excitement is bad for the elderly, we packed up at this stage. Nine (smallish) loads of spoil removed.
Alice Audsley, Chris Batstone, Tim Large, Tony Audsley.
Found that the ladder anchors were firmly set, so bolted the ladder to the wall. This is a great improvement as the ladder no longer flails about at the bottom of the shaft. The surface party (AA, CB, TL) then made a wall of "sand" bags to prevent the heap of chippings from sliding into the pond. The remnant of the team went down the shaft and started drilling in the right direction to find the rock wall. Drilling into the mudstone was a bit problematical, as the relatively soft rock produced small chips which repeatedly jammed the drill in the guide.
By the end of the afternoon, a fine retaining wall had been built round the heap of chippings and two deep holes had been drilled into the rock wall - more to follow.
Jeff Price, Tony Audsley.
Jeff brought out his Hilti drill and a pukka Hilti resin kit and resined some anchors in position for the ladder.
Started to shovel and barrow the aggregate into the depression. A pathetically small amount was shifted in this way then Pete Page turned up with his shovel and he shifted the rest in less than 20 minutes.
Took delivery of 10 tons of aggregate and filled a 220 litre
container with water in preparation for cementing works at the
bottom of the shaft.
Most work involved
collecting "stuff" and fettling of winches and
generators for later use. At the dig, the old gate from
Fernhill cave was fitted to the top of the shaft.
Jeff Price, Tony Audsley.
Took generator and drill, cables etc over to the hole. We found that the resin used to fix the ladder bolts to the pipes had not hardened. Either it had not mixed properly, or more likely, too old. Jeff Will get some new resin. Tony used the drill jig and 1 metre drill bit to drill into the rock under what he thought was the north wall of the shaft; only to find that all four holes attempted went to full depth without hitting much that was solid. Much confusion as the rock wall of the rift was known to be less than two feet away.
After much scratching of head and looking at it from the top and the bottom of the shaft, it appears that he had been trying to drill ALONG the rift rather than into the wall, ie east instead of north, 90° out. Never mind, better luck next time.
Jeff Price, Tim Large, Tony Audsley.
Fitted small brackets to the bottom of the two ladder standoffs, then drilled 8mm holes (about 2 inches deep) in the concrete pipes, filled with resin and inserted stainless studding to anchor the ladder. This left to harden until next visit before bolting together.
Probed under the north wall to try to find the "solid" rock wall of the rift which is behind there somewhere. Either we didn't find it or it is not very solid; more work required. Then used Jeff's 36 volt Hilti to drill about 14 holes in a line across the boulder in the floor and used a gad (spike) in the holes to split the rock in two. Removed 1½ skip loads, mostly shattered rock.
Alice Audsley, Tony Audsley.
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Went over and took some photographs of the bottom of the shaft, detailing the jacks and strapping. |
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Duncan Butler, Jeff Price, Tim Large, Tony Audsley.
Tony fitted the now newly freed bottle-jack, then dug out 9 skip loads. Duncan then came down and dug out a further 6. There is a large(ish) boulder appearing at the bottom of the shaft which will have to be removed before too long.
Jeff Price, Tim Large, Tony Audsley.
Excavating at the bottom of the shaft for fitting the straps. Fitted the second strap and jack and fixed the third strap into position, but then found that the third jack was jammed solid, so couldn't fit it. Ten skip loads removed. Took the jammed jack away for fettling.
Jeff Price, Tim Large, Tony Audsley.
Excavated at the base of the shaft to try to fit the bottom straps and jacks. Managed to fit one. Ten skip loads removed.
Alice Audsley, Tony Audsley.
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A day largely of surface work; started at home, welding on strips to reinforce the bottom hooks. Then took all back to Wigmore and tried the jacks and lower straps in position in the shaft, measuring up for the bottom loops. Then to Nigel's workshop with the marked-up bottom straps and used some more of his gas (many thanks) to heat and form the loops for the bottom straps. |
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Continued working in Nigel's workshop. Reinforced the top hooks by welding on strips to form a channel section. Ground down the loops to fit the top of the jacks, then towed the top straps back to the dig and lowered them down the shaft and fitted roughly into position.
Towed the three 10 metre steel straps from the shaft to Nigel Perkin's workshop. Then used his gas set to heat and bend the straps to form hooks to fit over the ends of the shaft and loops to connect to the jacks.
- 2009 (012) Tue, 31st Mar: More work on the jacks - all day.
- 2009 (011) Sun, 29th Mar: All day working on freeing the screw jacks.
- 2009 (010) Sat, 28th Mar: Working in Nigel Perkins' workshop bending the ends of the short (bottom) straps to fit the shaft and the jacks.
- 2009 (008) Fri, 20th Mar: All day on the bottle jacks.
- 2009 (007) Thu, 19th Mar: All day working on the bottle jacks.
- 2009 (006) Sun, 15th Mar: Visited and found voids at the side of the shaft where the fill had been washed out. Backfilled these with the stone from Caine Hill. Took lengths of re-bar (which had been left at the Farm House by Avon Steel) over to the dig.
- 2009 (005) Sat, 7th Mar: Working at home, freeing rusted 5 ton bottle jacks obtained from the Belfry.
- 2009 (004) Mon, 23rd Feb: Took a few more Caine Hill bags of stone over to the shaft.
- 2009 (001) Sun, 25th Jan: Took a few bags of stone from Caine Hill over to the shaft.
 15MAR09:Collapse by the side of the shaft |
 31MAR09: Applying heat and leverage to the rusted jacks |
 02APR09: Heating and hammering the straps to hook the ends |
 08APR09: The completed assembly of jacks and bottom straps. |
2009 started still with no solution to the problem of holding the shaft rings together. Steel strapping (50 x 6 mm flat) had been at the dig since October, but no easy way of using this to tension the column had presented itself. Some 5 tonne screw-jacks had been noted half buried behind the Belfry, but they were rusted solid and as the threads were 3½ in diameter (38mm), I had discounted them thinking that they might be impossible to free.
However, there was nothing else available; so a combination of bloody-mindedness, a chain-wrench with a 6ft waterpipe extension on the handle, a LOT of heat and a tiny bit of oil meant that they gave way, a bit at a time. The most resistant took 12 hours, spread over two days, before both threads were free.
Created: 05-May-2010