Mining prospecting

“ There are the usual paraphernalia of the mining industry, which we have already described in other places. In every direction there are mining-shafts and reduction-works, and for miles and miles around the country is full of prospecting holes, where gold has been sought but not found, at least in paying quantities. ”

“ Many gold mines have been abandoned as unprofitable that could have been mined at a profit had their owners been wealthy and enterprising enough to do a great deal of expensive prospecting by diamond drill, cross cuts, drifts and rises. In one instance that came to the writer's knowledge a clever mining engineer cleared nearly $200,000 profit by leasing for a term of years a gold mine that was supposed to be exhausted. A drill hole sunk less than 50 feet below the old workings revealed a pocket of ore in the vein, and paying quartz was found for many hundred feet below. ”

“ These deposits are naturally the first to fail in productiveness, but the neighboring hills are formed of a gold-bearing quartz which is being crushed, night and day, by hundreds of powerful machines; and the works still pay ten thousand miners fair day-wages, besides giving the organized companies who employ them satisfactory dividends. Thus mining has been largely robbed of its adventurous character in this neighborhood, and perhaps also of most of its alluring charm, having become a sort of regular industry, like coal-mining, or even brick-making. ”

“ All engineers must wish to have the industry under them in high repute. The writer knows of several mines paying 20% on their stocks which yet stand lower in price on account of short ore-reserves than mines paying less annual returns. The speculator, who is an element not to be wholly disregarded, wishes a rise in his mining stock, and if development proceeds at a pace in advance of production, he will gain a legitimate rise through the increase in ore-reserves. ”

“ Large areas, although so popular in England, do not compensate for large bodies of payable ore; the most remunerative mine is generally one of comparatively small area, but containing a large lode formation of payable, but often low grade, ore.
It is worse still, of course, to buy a practically worked out mine, though this too is sometimes done. It must be remembered that mining, though often so profitable, is nevertheless a destructive industry, thus differing from agriculture, which is productive, and manufactures, which are constructive. ”

“ There is an amount of uncertainty about any mine or prospect that appeals to the speculative proclivities in humans and it is hard for most persons to resist the notion that greater or richer bodies of ore may, at any time, be discovered in their particular mining properties. ”

“ Due consideration must always be given to the selection of some method of opening up what might be supposed will never amount to a great mine, so that, should subsequent disclosures exceed expectations, enlargement of the scale of operations can be advantageously effected. Always bear in mind that legitimate mining is just as much a commercial enterprise as is any other kind of business. The utmost concern for financial showings must be constantly borne in mind. Select a scale of operations consistent with the known—not the hoped-for—bodies of coal or ore ”

“ All the world over, the operation of winning from the soil and rendering marketable the many valuable ores and mine products which abound is daily becoming more and more a scientific business which cannot be too carefully entered into or too skilfully conducted. The days of the dolly and windlass, of the puddler, cradle, and tin dish, are rapidly receding; and mining, either in lode or alluvial working, is being more generally recognised as one of the exact sciences. In the past, mining has been carried on in a very haphazard fashion, to which much of its non-success may be attributed. ”

“ After a mine is once opened and preparations have all been perfected to operate [106] upon a certain scale of output, it is quite essential that exploitation and production be maintained without material fluctuations, if the greatest economy is to be attained. Exploitation, i.e., development work, must be kept well in advance of actual mining operations to assure plenty of working space for the extraction of the normal output. ”

“ Given that the project has been determined upon, and that the enterprise has entered upon the second stage, that of determination of method of attack, the immediate commercial result limits the mining engineer's every plan and design to a greater degree than it does the other engineering specialists. The question of capital and profit dogs his every footstep, for all mines are ephemeral; the life of any given mine is short. Page 189 Metal mines have indeed the shortest lives of any. ”

“ Under ordinary working conditions, it should be considered just as essential for a mine to take an occasional inventory as it is for a mercantile establishment. In truth, there is far more need in mining operations of the knowledge thus derived than in any other business. In mining, as already suggested, the business is one of selling off the stock in trade without replenishing it. The opening of more reserves of ore is not bringing more goods into the stock, but it may be likened to simply unpacking more goods in the storehouse. ”

“ Such companies, with superior mechanical facilities to do much labor, in a short space, will be enabled to go over the whole mineral field, although already dug over by individuals, and reap yet a rich reward of their efforts. And when there will be no more gold washing to be done, then a new era in the mining of the country will commence—we mean a regular system of mining by sinking shafts into the very bowels of the rocks will be entered upon. ”

“ The ore as taken from the mine concentrates four tons into one, which has a gross value of one hundred dollars, and with the first concentrator, whose capacity was one hundred and twenty tons daily, returned three thousand dollars per day to the owners. The company employ one hundred and fifty men, and are well equipped for profitable mining. ”

“ It may be taken as a safe axiom that to make gold-mining in the mine as distinct from mining on the Stock Exchange really profitable the same system of economy, of practical supervision, and scientific knowledge which is now adopted in all other businesses must be applied to the raising and extraction of the metal. Then, and not till then, will genuine mining take the place to which it is entitled amongst our industries. ”

“ One means of providing against an extinction of a mining company's activity with the exhaustion of the ore bodies in the mines is to provide new mining territory to which operations may be transferred at the proper time. This plan has been very successfully carried out by a number of large mining companies. When a mining company has been maintaining its identity for a considerable period, it has reached a very desirable stage of economy in the make-up of its various lists of officials, superintendents and engineers. ”

“ It is true that much fraud has been prevented in the practice of taking up Government lands and it is also quite true that the Forest Service is endeavoring to uplift the mining industry in the western portions of the United States.
Mining is bound to become a still stronger factor in civilization as metallurgical processes multiply and there are discovered means of more economically extracting the valuable contents of ores. ”

“ In irregular and uncertain deposits this work of development should be kept at all times so far in advance of mining operations as to ensure a regular and uniform output. In some cases, where the barren areas are large, it may be necessary to have two or three years’ supply of ore thus blocked out in advance. A mine, however, may be over-developed, which results in loss of interest on the capital unnecessarily locked up for years by excessive development, and involves additional cost for the maintenance of such openings until they are needed for active mining operations. ”

“ Mining may be said to begin whenever there is produced an output upon which there is some profit. Exploitation may be in valuable ground. If so, we may say that mining is in progress during the exploitation. The driving of levels or drifts in an ore body—or of entries in a bed of coal—produces the valuable products of the mine, and we may, therefore, consider that mining is taking place.
The driving of a crosscut through barren rock to reach an ore body is dead work; but the driving of a drift or level in a vein is either exploitation or mining. Dead work produces no ore. ”

“ It is becoming more and more important for the active mining man to post himself upon the methods and economies of this latter-day mining practice. The development of this open or surface mining has introduced entirely new economic ideas. With no costs for timbering of mine passages, for ventilation, or for hoisting, and with a very material decrease in manual labor per ton mined, immense masses of rocks are now really ore, although a few years ago they were nothing but lean, country rock. ”

“ Such reports must embrace details of ore extraction, metal contents, treatment recoveries, construction of equipment, and the results of underground development. The value of mines is so much affected by the monthly or even daily result of exploration that reports of such work are needed very frequently,—weekly or even daily if critical work is in progress. ”

“ Further improvements in the processes of reduction will doubtless increase the mining area, by making it worth while to develop mines where the percentage of metal to rock is now too small to yield a dividend. Improvements, moreover, tend to accelerate the rate of production, and thereby to shorten the life of the mines; for the more profitable working becomes, the greater is the temptation to work as fast as possible and get out the maximum of ore. ”

“ A deep old mine which has been abandoned, is undertaken with a chance of less profit and a certainty of greater risk, than a new and promising discovery. In the first case encouragement is often held out, by fixing very moderate dues, while in the other, so much is too frequently demanded and given, as to prevent that share of profit accruing to the adventurers which is due to the great risk constantly attendant on all mining pursuits. ”

“ Looked at in a large way, the returns from the mineral industry are commensurate with the effort put into discovery and development of mineral resources, even though the returns to lucky individuals have been excessive. In respect to the importance of the human energy element, the mining of minerals is not unlike the cropping of soils. Some interesting economic studies have been made of mining districts to ascertain whether the total return has been equal to the total investments by both successful and unsuccessful participants. ”

“ I am told that in America all mining is done by individuals or private companies, and that four-fifths of all mining companies have no mines at all—merely samples of ores, blueprints, photographs and prospects. The genus promoter is a very modern production, and is a creation Humboldt never knew ”

“ They made haste too quickly, as the Americans say, and they were not expert economists. Then there is another favourable element in lead mining—it can be conducted with only a shaft and a winch—and as soon{299} as the lode is reached, the mine commences to pay. ”

“ Mines are very seldom priced at a sum so moderate as that represented by the profit to be won from the ore in sight, and what value should be assigned to this unknown portion of the deposit admits of no certainty. No engineer can approach the prospective value of a mine with optimism, yet the mining industry would be non-existent to-day were it approached with pessimism. ”

“ There is, therefore, plenty of time for intending prospectors and miners to inform themselves thoroughly regarding everything necessary to know about the mines, routes of travel, outfit, etc., and for investors, who are not going to the mines, to satisfy themselves regarding the reliability of the mining companies that are and will be advertising their alluring and seductive money-making schemes. ”

“ But let us ask, would any other business, even such as are less subject to unforeseen vicissitudes than mining, succeed under similar circumstances?
It is now very generally agreed that to the profitable development of mining new countries, at all events, must look mainly for prosperity, while other industries are growing. Therefore, we cannot too seriously consider how we may soonest make our mines successful. ”

“ Not so with silver and gold mines. They are most unreliable in both quality and quantity. Costly buildings and machinery are often erected to economize the mining of the ore, only to find no mine to operate by the time the buildings are completed and the machinery is working. ”

“ There are men still trying to succeed in the mining business while thinking it is essential in mining that a complete plant be the first thing given attention. Upon the showing in a ten-foot hole, such men will induce capital to take interests enough to provide the wherewithal for purchasing and installing an equipment capable of handling and treating the output of a big mine. ”

“ Access to the buried deposits is gained by vertical shafts. Actual mining is now done to a large extent by continuous miners, machines which bore or rip the potash ore from the face and load it into shuttle cars in one continuous operation. The shuttle cars then transport the ore to conveyor belts which move it to the shafts for hoisting. Working conditions and safety are excellent and have led to high productivity from these mines. ”