Recent hot weather has slowed down our work programme, but we have achieved some objectives. Here is a summary from 27th June to 18th July.

Conserving the EIMCO loader and a mine wagon:  both items have been coated with rust preventing chemicals and the loader has been partly undercoated. Audrey has been responsible for most of this work.

Rewiring the Barracks: the upstairs ring main and the boiler main have been installed and are working. Thanks to Colin for this task.

Lighting the Display Cabinets: Andy and Anne have built custom led lights for most of the display cabinets, and have almost completed this task.

Repairing the Dowgang footpath fence: ChrisB, Alec, Graham, Martyn and Rosemary have rehung the gate and started on fixing the fence across the burn. Erica, who lives nearby, has donated a length of mesh for the fence repair.

Arch repairs in Carrs Mine: The floor level arch for the old lower adit has been walled by Jim.

Stagg Wheelpit: Sheila has logged the vegetation within the safety fence, and has done a first draft of the SMC application for conservation work on the timbers.

Building signs and Noticeboards:  Repainted in a new shade of green, by Rachel, Nicola, Sheila and Joyce.

Stray fridge; that had been dumped in Dowgang Hush recovered and recycled by ChrisB and Graham.

Thompson’s Level: old shaft top fence repaired, level entrance cleared of vegetation, rails covered with ply, and the dump bund rebuilt. Leif, Allan, Greg, ChrisC, Nick, Rosemary and Joyce were all involved. ChrisC repaired the gate by welding.

Archive: a start made with the Coldberry pay sheets by Margaret.

Carrs Shop and Barracks Windows: have had some white paint recoated by Pete and Graham.

We have also had visits from the Nenthead Chapel team, and the pupils from Nenthead School.

Another great day with plenty achieved. Sheila Barker continued the sort of the Eric Richardson collection documents and Audrey Battersby put more paint on the Assay House windows – both of them were snug and warm. Meanwhile…..Anne and Andy Hopkirk completed the sort of the Mineral Specimen collection drawers aided by the gas heater loaned by Chris Chilton. We took the thermometer out of The Barracks so that they would not know how cold it was. Joyce Jackson cleared the mud from the showers and then went to work in the mine.

Alec, Graham and Chris

Down the mine, it was more warm than The Barracks. Colin Agnew, Rosemary Vidler, Graham Brooks, Alec Langley Chris Buckingham, and Chris Battersby removed rotten roof timbers and installed new sections. Joyce Jackson and Martyn Langley came to help later.

Pete Jackson gave a conducted tour of the mine to PCSO Tony Labram and had a useful discussion about recent burglaries on our site. Colin Wilkinson installed a replacement outside light at The Barracks.

Graham and Alec

Colin A, Rosemary, Martyn and Joyce

Old and new timber and Wagon No 1

New timbers

8th and 15th November Wednesday Work days.

Most of the year we can ignore our location high on the Pennine hills, until we are reminded in November when the temperature falls and the snow starts. The snow fell on the 8th and melted, but the outside temperature fell to 2C by the 15th.  On the 15th, we worked in a balmy 7C in Carrs mine, checking timber, surveying and doing a little exploring. Jim, Graham, Chris and Pete were in the mine today.

We are going to replace a fair amount of the entrance crosscut timbering over the winter and clean off some of the loose rock.

Meanwhile Audrey was very carefully painting windows inside the Assay House.The windows look better than they have for years – a very neat job completed.

Andy, Anne and Pete sorted through mineral specimens to remove the poorer quality specimens from our collection. Standing still in a cold Barracks building makes one think a lot faster and harder – it was colder inside than out in the yard!

The archive and computer team have sorted, checked and verified. We now have two back-up discs, one of which is taken off site after every Wednesday. Sheila, Anne and Joyce have been systematically checking through our systems.

Colin and Chris have also installed a new extraction system for the Assay House showers and Audrey has primed the woodwork.

ART GROUP VISIT 12th November  –  East Durham Artists Network

We hosted a visit from the EDAN team who wanted to visit a mine. Some of the members are former miners and some are new to underground. They have a good Facebook page and you can read more about their visit.

Thanks to Chris, Will, Frank and Charley who hosted this group.

Wednesday 1st November work day was a quiet affair.  Anne, Andy and Pete viewed sections of the mineral collection with a view to reducing the number of examples that we hold.  Martyn repaired Middlecleugh Mine shop door which had been damaged by an attempted break-in. Sheila and Joyce sorted through our stocks of books in The Barracks.  Graham and Colin constructed air extraction ducting for the Assay House showers. Martyn cut up paper to produce scale drawings of the kitchen with different layouts.

Thanks to all our team for the volunteer work today.