Getting the Mine Ready to Blast: We're Already On Gold! Season 1, Part 2

We’re deep inside our gold mine, over 600 feet underground, and this episode is one of the biggest steps yet in getting this old hard rock mine ready for real production again. The main job is reopening access to the stope by timbering a steep 55° raise, building a safe ladderway, constructing a chute system, and getting everything ready so we can finally reach the working face and prepare for drilling and blasting. Before we can even start underground, we run into a major problem: we’ve used so much timber rehabbing the mine that we’re out of wood. So the job starts in the woods, cutting dead spruce from the property, skidding the logs out with the old John Deere 440A, and taking them to Fred’s sawmill to be turned into true mine timbers, 2x4s, 2x8s, lagging, and heavy 6x6 stalls. That spruce is going from a 129-year-old tree to holding up ground underground. Back in the mine, the real challenge begins. We’re hauling lumber, ladders, tools, and supplies more than 600 feet back through the workings and then up the raise. The raise becomes a full underground construction project: 4x4 stalls wedged across the ribs, a 52-step ladderway, a separated chute, lagging, lids, platforms, and a safe manway so we can move people, tools, ore bags, and materials between the haulage level and the stope. Once we reach the stope, we start rehabbing old workings that are roughly 125 years old. We build lids over dangerous openings, set new stalls next to old rotten timber, block off unsafe areas with orange netting, and establish a secondary escapeway all the way out to daylight. Outside the escapeway, we install anchors, cable, and a safety line along the cliff so the route is usable if we ever need it. Then the mine rewards us. While scaling near the hanging wall, we find exactly what we’re looking for: a thin gold-bearing quartz stringer with visible gold. The geology is incredible. The main vein is several feet wide in places, but the rich material is concentrated in a narrow late-stage band along the hanging wall, where mineralized fluids appear to have injected into a slick surface between the vein and the wall rock. We break down some of that quartz, find gold on the floor, and save the good pieces to take back to the rock shop for cutting. The crew also starts solving the problem of muck handling. We test sandbags, a sled with Teflon sliders, a cobbled-together chute system, rope-controlled drops down the raise, and wheelbarrow transport to get the first bags of ore moving out of the mine. It’s not pretty, but it works — and that first load of muck marks a huge milestone. By the end of the episode, the raise is timbered, the ladderway is finished, the chute is working, the stope is accessible, the escapeway is complete, the airline and water line are installed, the vent bag is in place, and the jackleg drill has been hauled all the way up to the working face. After about a month of underground rehab, we are finally set up to drill and blast in the new gold mine. Next time, we start drilling into the vein and preparing the first round. The mine is ready, the gold is showing, and the real hard rock mining is about to begin. S&J Forest Products Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@UCTdPTXTKNC0BzFK9n1SmbbQ Check out our Shopify and eBay stores for ore, specimens, cabochons, and more from our mines: Shopify: https://mbmmllc.myshopify.com/ eBay: https://www.ebay.com/usr/mtbakerminingandmetals FOR MORE INFO PLEASE EMAIL OR CALL Email: info@MBMMLLC.com Phone: 360-595-4445 Website: http://www.mbmmllc.com/ Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/MBMMLLC Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MBMMLLC Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mbmmllc/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/MBMMLLC AFFILIATE LINKS What's an affiliate link? If you use our link to buy something, MBMM gets a small percentage of the money you spend. This DOES NOT mean you will spend more money using our link, you will spend the SAME AMOUNT of money while also supporting a small business and channel. UNDERGROUND MINING EQUIPMENT Milwaukee Hammer drill bits: https://amzn.to/3MjLf8A Milwaukee Sawzall: https://amzn.to/3Qt6Yy Milwaukee Flood Light: https://amzn.to/3NmvYEc Milwaukee Driver: https://amzn.to/3OqKoDT Milwaukee Grinder: https://amzn.to/3Qwro9C Hard hat with light clip: https://amzn.to/3Iss7nL Head lamp for hard hat: https://amzn.to/433G5US Hammer drill: https://amzn.to/3ORKSVi Safety glasses: https://amzn.to/439w8Fo Gloves: https://amzn.to/45ceXoF Feather and wedge set: https://amzn.to/3Om1kNz Respirator: https://amzn.to/3IqbclD #goldmining #undergroundmining #abandonedmine #logging