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Timber planks are used to provide roof support in a corridor underground.
Wood in the good old
days of mining
The use of timber in mining dates back to the golden days with dis-
covery of gold, coal and other minerals. Timber was predominantly
used as pillars in underground mines to support mines from caving
in – Timber iQ unpacks its various uses in the mining industry.
By Dineo Phoshoko | Photos by Leon Louw
A
n article by MU Ozbay, JA Ryder and AJ Jager titled
‘The design of pillar systems as practised in shallow
hard-rock tabular mines in South Africa’, explains that
pillars have been used as stopes since the early days of
mining.
This article appeared in The Journal of The South African
Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (SAIMM), where the
authors give a technical overview where they explain that
the need to use pillars in a mine is determined by prevailing
considerations of rock mechanics at shallow depths. An
30 JUNE / JULY 2019 //
example of such mechanics are large tensile stresses in the
hanging wall and geological weaknesses in the hanging wall
rock mass.
In coal mining, timber is used as a support measure for an
open coal seam. This is according to Robert Knutron in his
article, ‘A look at the mine timber market in the Appalachian
Bituminous Coal Region’. ‘For this purpose, round, split, and
sawed timbers are used,’ the article reads.
Knutron distinguished between two types of timber and
their different functions, first there is the round and split
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