ABSTRACT
Bord and pillar and rib and stall layouts are still found in many of the low seam pits of North West Durham where residual areas of coal have to be worked or where the seam is approaching the outcrop and the type of cover is unsuiTable for long faces. These layouts may be subsumed under the general heading of single place working. In this system of mining interlacing roadways are driven at right angles into the seam, leaving small square or rectangular pillars of coal, 30–50 yds in length, which are then wholly or partly extracted. A coal face 6–11 yds in length—called a ‘place’—is worked during any particular shift by one, or at the most two, miners who hew the coal with pneumatic picks. If the coal is hard, shotfiring may be used. The coal is then shovelled by hand into half-ton tubs which have been pushed up to the coal face on rails by another miner known as a ‘putter’. As the coal is extracted the roof is supported by timbering. If the seam is low, stone has to be removed from below the floor by digging or blasting, in order to make height for the tubway. The stone is then stowed into the space from which the coal has been removed, the roof settling on to the packs so made. Places are normally worked in blocks—called ‘flats’—consisting of 12 or 13 ‘bord’ places to one ‘winning’ place, which makes the heading.
