Love watching your videos! There are a ton of tensioning systems available that you could use to help make that set up easier. You can get a dyneema rope launcher and take it to the top and fire it to the bottom to get the line set easily. I have used them for water rescue and they are pretty light weight. You can also use a roto hammer with expanding bolds to set up anchors in the rock. You can then use a come along or a mechanical advantage system with some amsteel which has almost no flex in the rope for a lighter weight zipline. You can also set up a pulley system with an ascender and a drill to help with returning the bucket to the top. Good luck out there!
Hey mine operator! Thank you for the entertaining mining videos! Whether the days plan succeeds or not I enjoy the challenges you dudes try to overcome! Keep going and the odds are you will hit the mother load eventually! Greetings from Vancouver British Columbia Canada! Ride ride ride!
Awesome video!!! I’ve been thinking of doing the same thing at a mine here in Idaho. A lot more rocky and steep but fun to watch someone go at it before I did this summer.
That is so cool guys! Love the go pro ride. Just imagine what it was like on the old trams back in the day. Miners use to ride the trams up to the McCarthy mines in Alaska.
Hey Guys! Great video. A turn-buckle (heavy duty - of coarse) at each end might help take the sag out of the cable. Thumbs up! Safety first! Jim in Phoenix..
@mineoperator I would have 2 pulleys on the load separated about 3 inches apart. That keeps the load from hanging up. I would raise up the top by 3 feet or more using a 4x4 inserted into the ground if possible. If you are dumping to a trailer. I would put a pole on the far side or the trailer and attach the zip-line to it 2 -3 feet above the trailer sides. That allows for sag. You could put a pulley at the top to put your return line through. Too make it easier to pull back the bucket. You want your zip line as tight as possible to prevent to much sag. I made a Zip-line as a kid for myself between two trees with things laying around my dads garage. I learned quickly that you need more than one pulley on the load side. If you don't want to stop half way down.
A tower at the mine to get your cable higher, set it down hill from the mine so you could walk out a walkway to hook your bucket up and send it down. You would need to anchor your tower back into the MTN to stabilize it. A dump bucket would work best once it was at the bottom, the person at the bottom pull the rope to release it to dump.
As a hard rock miner with a mine of his own, but not a mind of his own I've pondered a zip line op but I think you inadvertantly found your own solution: get a goat, load it up, use the zip line as a tether to guide it, reel it in to depot and dump load. Repeat.
Make an A-frame with a roller at the top, for the uphill side, this will do two things 1) give you more clearance at the top and 2) tension the cable more. you stand up and drop the A-frame as needed , the cable should keep it in place
I have done my own zip line using 10,000 winch to tension using reg logging 3/8 braded rope and it sags terribly. My Brother in law set his up with telephone pole guide wire so stiffer and it worked tension with only a com-along.
...Or, (version 2) find a garden windmill, remove blades, Mount pulley within, run 1/4 steel cable depot to depot. Use attached crank for tension. Run bucket down mountain with guide line looped over capstan so you don't lose fingers and to control speed of descent
Use of a come along on one end might help with keeping the tension. Also maybe a small tower at the top to clear the mountain could help with tha drag. Heavy duty of course. Keep on mining that AU.
A comealong to tension the line and then turnbuckles to set the tension and do fine adjustments. Also towers, but that's an awful lot of infrastructure to just get a pile of ore off the hill. I guess the assay will tell them what kind of investment they should put in
I once did this across a river to get a 6" dredge/camping gear across. Never again will i do that it tore my gut muscles so bad that I was laid up for several days.
Definitely need a comealong or 3 - one cable, pully on the bucket. Second rope for hand control. Tension your one cable over a pole jammed into the rock to get some height at either end.
Might wanna invest in a string of pack burros. I’ll spare us all the jackass jokes. A real aerial tram will take a bit of infrastructure. Definitely worth it if yer gonna be pulling sizable quantities of ore down from there. I’m sure that’s occurred to ya while you were up there struggling with it. You guys are the best and we all wish you the greatest success!
When jason visited cerro gordo he found a man made trench that ran up the mountain from a mine/test hole mine,(a good 1,00feet or 10 minute walk) they him(jason)/dan and the mine owner were confused for the reasons but the mine owner threw a rock down and it land/rolled all the way down to where they think was a stamp building for the ore. the rocks they threw down werent even that big to 5-10pounds my guess but the ore shot/trench worked well. Jason said the closest thing he can thinks of when viewing it was /he knew of a mine where they did something silimiar but with snow and they'ed tie the ore into bags and slide it down the mine during winter. they store/pack it up and wait for winter then theyed push/slide the ore down... my suggestion for painting the ore if you tried the slide/throw down method incase it rolled a bad way with it spray painted a neon/bright color youd be able to see it well for any that rolled badly off.
First thing that come to mind for me, your hard point at the bottom, attach to a truck with winch, then you can adjust your cable tension as needed as the load descends..
The way you deal with that sudden rise at the top is to put a trench in the waste rock shelf and let the 'tram cars' [the bucket] hang lower at the top, where you can put in a chute/funnel and drop the ore into it. [shovel, mucker or even a wheelbarrow]
Also, double shiv-wheels on a cross frame will keep your lines from whipping and tangling. Put the lines at least 4 feet apart [more based on factors such as length, cable tension, cable mass, expected wind force and number of separator shiv beams], at the same height [on both ends] so one car is pulling down, while the other is going up. It will run 'forever' only powered by the weight of the falling ore.
Good thing a certain site is offering good prices on very long 316 5/32 and similar ss cable right now. If they were paying me I would say who they are. However have you thought of using rope made of Dyneema? You would need a pully. That ss cable is heavy.
@@scotts.2624 Light aramid fibers are great, if you can afford them. Otherwise, economics still favor using more common galvanized wire rope. Also, weight is not a super big issue when selecting a tram line. As long as it can hold the loads it is being asked to hold, cheaper is always better. Especially when one is just freshly prospecting for minerals and don't even have any recovery to cover the cost of tooling.
I am looking at the setup and would like to simplify the process. Just clear a straight "slide" down to the truck. Put the ore on a "toboggan style sled" and slide it down the hill side using the sheaves and cable you have to guide it down and control the speed of decent. Yes, you would have to move some rocks, but I think it would be a lot simpler and no problems with buckets hanging up. You already have everything but the plywood and maybe a pipe frame for the "toboggan". Let gravity do the work.
Some way to telescope the line up at the dump when ore is being lowered. I think if you had option to tension and raise line up 5 foot higher like one of those light plants on construction sites working at night.
I’ve seen stunt guys rig a cargo zipline for the lighting department on a music video. Moved a couple thousand pounds of lights up to the top of a cliff face. Saved a quarter mile on a gator and another quarter mile hike many times over. I’m not an expert on this sort of rig, but I think you could more easily take the sag out of a static cable. Have the bucket hang from a roller, with another line or that cable loop to let it down and haul back the empty bucket. No pulley bearings that have to take the many multiples of the bucket weight. If that’s a hundred yards, you need about 10x the bucket weight in line tension to keep your midpoint sag to seven feet or so. So half a ton for 50lb load.
The point of your loading ore you could set up a three post cable lift. Rollers or pullies used to lift the cable once you have your load ready.2 would be side stabilizers while the third would be the lifter. the Simplest way and by having it above the loading spot you do not have to fight with the bucket passing it.
You guys just need a cheap come along. Its a handeld ratcheting winch essentially. They sell them at tractor supply oriellys harbor freight. If you put a loop or somethibg you can hook into on to your tram line you can put the come along on a boulder or your bumper whatever amd ratchet it super tight. Then easily untension it to take your gear with you. You can use the come along to move boulders and other stuff so its not a one use tool. They make electric ones too.
I'm a big big friend of your channel. I love the things you guys do and hw interest your content is. More people need to find your channel, cause it is very interesting.
Gravity games are challenging for sure . That slope you are lowering the ore over , looks like much smaller rock and a more consistent slope than the surrounding hillsides . Maybe a low slung cart with big wheels and a low COG could work . A big pulley at the top anchor point , one end of the cable attached to the cart , the other to a truck or big winch . That way you can lower the ore down and pull the empty cart back up , and less fussing with multiple lines . Looks a bit far to make a wooden chute worthwhile given the limited stockpile , but would be a solution if you found some decent pay in enough tonnage , inside .
Once you have a head frame at each end of the tram, it will be a world easier. (~_^)-b And while you may still want to take your cables back with you, odds are, folks won't mess with the wooden parts. If the pulleys look like something they may take, just use those cheap steel bolt-through 4" wheel hubs because usually those things are seen as worthless, especially when there are no tires mounted to them. Folks throw away old wheel barrows and stuff with those on them that, when really ugly can still work just fine, but look completely unattractive to most thieves.
can you try a bag cable slide, straight to your trailor. I use to lay underground electric cables, it was a fun job, when i was Buff in Studly, just saying,
Something seems wrong or I'm not imagining your setup -- right ? Pulleys at both ends -- 2 buckets -- move the top anchor point higher up the hill side so the buckets hang the same distance at the bottom and top. The filled top bucket will pull up the empty bottom bucket. Slack might become a problem --- Use a heavy counter weight at the bottom to automatically help control the tension. Or just import 13 Filipino boys with the pack mule modification
When I first watched this I kept thinking it was oversized waste rock.... I kept saying, "just throw it over the edge..." now I realize it's oversized ore
nice job my brother ....a gravity tram would work perfect ...easy to build .....keep'em coming
Love watching your videos! There are a ton of tensioning systems available that you could use to help make that set up easier. You can get a dyneema rope launcher and take it to the top and fire it to the bottom to get the line set easily. I have used them for water rescue and they are pretty light weight. You can also use a roto hammer with expanding bolds to set up anchors in the rock. You can then use a come along or a mechanical advantage system with some amsteel which has almost no flex in the rope for a lighter weight zipline. You can also set up a pulley system with an ascender and a drill to help with returning the bucket to the top. Good luck out there!
Hey mine operator! Thank you for the entertaining mining videos! Whether the days plan succeeds or not I enjoy the challenges you dudes try to overcome! Keep going and the odds are you will hit the mother load eventually! Greetings from Vancouver British Columbia Canada! Ride ride ride!
Awesome video!!! I’ve been thinking of doing the same thing at a mine here in Idaho. A lot more rocky and steep but fun to watch someone go at it before I did this summer.
The angle of the dangle is always important well done guys great vid.
That is so cool guys! Love the go pro ride. Just imagine what it was like on the old trams back in the day. Miners use to ride the trams up to the McCarthy mines in Alaska.
Hey Guys! Great video. A turn-buckle (heavy duty - of coarse) at each end might help take the sag out of the cable. Thumbs up! Safety first! Jim in Phoenix..
@mineoperator I would have 2 pulleys on the load separated about 3 inches apart. That keeps the load from hanging up. I would raise up the top by 3 feet or more using a 4x4 inserted into the ground if possible. If you are dumping to a trailer. I would put a pole on the far side or the trailer and attach the zip-line to it 2 -3 feet above the trailer sides. That allows for sag. You could put a pulley at the top to put your return line through. Too make it easier to pull back the bucket.
You want your zip line as tight as possible to prevent to much sag. I made a Zip-line as a kid for myself between two trees with things laying around my dads garage. I learned quickly that you need more than one pulley on the load side. If you don't want to stop half way down.
A tower at the mine to get your cable higher, set it down hill from the mine so you could walk out a walkway to hook your bucket up and send it down. You would need to anchor your tower back into the MTN to stabilize it. A dump bucket would work best once it was at the bottom, the person at the bottom pull the rope to release it to dump.
As a hard rock miner with a mine of his own, but not a mind of his own I've pondered a zip line op but I think you inadvertantly found your own solution: get a goat, load it up, use the zip line as a tether to guide it, reel it in to depot and dump load. Repeat.
Make an A-frame with a roller at the top, for the uphill side, this will do two things 1) give you more clearance at the top and 2) tension the cable more. you stand up and drop the A-frame as needed , the cable should keep it in place
I have done my own zip line using 10,000 winch to tension using reg logging 3/8 braded rope and it sags terribly.
My Brother in law set his up with telephone pole guide wire so stiffer and it worked tension with only a com-along.
...Or, (version 2) find a garden windmill, remove blades, Mount pulley within, run 1/4 steel cable depot to depot. Use attached crank for tension. Run bucket down mountain with guide line looped over capstan so you don't lose fingers and to control speed of descent
Use of a come along on one end might help with keeping the tension. Also maybe a small tower at the top to clear the mountain could help with tha drag. Heavy duty of course. Keep on mining that AU.
A comealong to tension the line and then turnbuckles to set the tension and do fine adjustments. Also towers, but that's an awful lot of infrastructure to just get a pile of ore off the hill. I guess the assay will tell them what kind of investment they should put in
A 6 foot diameter rubber ball filled with ore bags and tethered descent to roll down the hill?
I once did this across a river to get a 6" dredge/camping gear across.
Never again will i do that it tore my gut muscles so bad that I was laid up for several days.
When using a mule path, perhaps you should use mules.
I luv bucket rides with the go pro
Put a 4x4 at the top directly under the line so you can wedge the line higher so you don’t keep scraping your bucket
Definitely need a comealong or 3 - one cable, pully on the bucket. Second rope for hand control. Tension your one cable over a pole jammed into the rock to get some height at either end.
Dude It looks so much fun the crazy skills that are needed.. If you are a miner you are an engineer.. Love this progress so much..
Might wanna invest in a string of pack burros. I’ll spare us all the jackass jokes. A real aerial tram will take a bit of infrastructure. Definitely worth it if yer gonna be pulling sizable quantities of ore down from there. I’m sure that’s occurred to ya while you were up there struggling with it. You guys are the best and we all wish you the greatest success!
When jason visited cerro gordo he found a man made trench that ran up the mountain from a mine/test hole mine,(a good 1,00feet or 10 minute walk) they him(jason)/dan and the mine owner were confused for the reasons but the mine owner threw a rock down and it land/rolled all the way down to where they think was a stamp building for the ore. the rocks they threw down werent even that big to 5-10pounds my guess but the ore shot/trench worked well. Jason said the closest thing he can thinks of when viewing it was /he knew of a mine where they did something silimiar but with snow and they'ed tie the ore into bags and slide it down the mine during winter. they store/pack it up and wait for winter then theyed push/slide the ore down...
my suggestion for painting the ore if you tried the slide/throw down method incase it rolled a bad way with it spray painted a neon/bright color youd be able to see it well for any that rolled badly off.
First thing that come to mind for me, your hard point at the bottom, attach to a truck with winch, then you can adjust your cable tension as needed as the load descends..
If you had like car rims.. and strong rope with knots in it.. poles and the rims on top.. you could make it like ski carts..
Lot of work hope that rock has value thanks for the video
The way you deal with that sudden rise at the top is to put a trench in the waste rock shelf and let the 'tram cars' [the bucket] hang lower at the top, where you can put in a chute/funnel and drop the ore into it. [shovel, mucker or even a wheelbarrow]
Also, double shiv-wheels on a cross frame will keep your lines from whipping and tangling.
Put the lines at least 4 feet apart [more based on factors such as length, cable tension, cable mass, expected wind force and number of separator shiv beams], at the same height [on both ends] so one car is pulling down, while the other is going up.
It will run 'forever' only powered by the weight of the falling ore.
Good thing a certain site is offering good prices on very long 316 5/32 and similar ss cable right now. If they were paying me I would say who they are. However have you thought of using rope made of Dyneema? You would need a pully. That ss cable is heavy.
@@scotts.2624 Light aramid fibers are great, if you can afford them.
Otherwise, economics still favor using more common galvanized wire rope.
Also, weight is not a super big issue when selecting a tram line.
As long as it can hold the loads it is being asked to hold, cheaper is always better.
Especially when one is just freshly prospecting for minerals and don't even have any recovery to cover the cost of tooling.
Hard work pulling that bucket back up even though it's empty. Looking forward to your special guest. Maybe it's Wonderussy !!
Have you thought of using rope made of Dyneema? You would need a pully. That ss cable is heavy.
If the mine dump has a large quantity, then it may be worth to construct a simple wooden pole supported cable system
Use a comealong to tighten your cable
Great idea.
Innovation guys, that's what keeps the world progressing and if it don't succeed the first time, keep trying till ya get the flaws out....⚒️⛏️⚖️💪🤠
Could you just use some D rings to attach the bags too and let them all slide down without a bucket?
Sky hooks, ya, sky hooks.
Use one single cable and run it to the hitch on the truck and use the truck to tension the cable saves a lot of time and headache
I am looking at the setup and would like to simplify the process. Just clear a straight "slide" down to the truck. Put the ore on a "toboggan style sled" and slide it down the hill side using the sheaves and cable you have to guide it down and control the speed of decent. Yes, you would have to move some rocks, but I think it would be a lot simpler and no problems with buckets hanging up. You already have everything but the plywood and maybe a pipe frame for the "toboggan". Let gravity do the work.
Extendable tube chutes that clip on to each other. Add the pieces at the bottom and which it up as you go
Like the ol' timers use an ol' jalopy with the rear wheel tire removed to power your tram.
Get a couple of mules. That's the old timer way.
Some way to telescope the line up at the dump when ore is being lowered. I think if you had option to tension and raise line up 5 foot higher like one of those light plants on construction sites working at night.
I’ve seen stunt guys rig a cargo zipline for the lighting department on a music video. Moved a couple thousand pounds of lights up to the top of a cliff face. Saved a quarter mile on a gator and another quarter mile hike many times over. I’m not an expert on this sort of rig, but I think you could more easily take the sag out of a static cable. Have the bucket hang from a roller, with another line or that cable loop to let it down and haul back the empty bucket. No pulley bearings that have to take the many multiples of the bucket weight. If that’s a hundred yards, you need about 10x the bucket weight in line tension to keep your midpoint sag to seven feet or so. So half a ton for 50lb load.
Beautiful sight...nice video...
(If we were smart we wouldn't be doing this). I have told myself this more times than I could shake a stick at lmao.
Add a removable stay at the top at the load point to lift the carry wire that little bit extra when loaded. Might need just a single length of timber.
The point of your loading ore you could set up a three post cable lift. Rollers or pullies used to lift the cable once you have your load ready.2 would be side stabilizers while the third would be the lifter. the Simplest way and by having it above the loading spot you do not have to fight with the bucket passing it.
You guys just need a cheap come along. Its a handeld ratcheting winch essentially. They sell them at tractor supply oriellys harbor freight. If you put a loop or somethibg you can hook into on to your tram line you can put the come along on a boulder or your bumper whatever amd ratchet it super tight. Then easily untension it to take your gear with you. You can use the come along to move boulders and other stuff so its not a one use tool. They make electric ones too.
I'm a big big friend of your channel. I love the things you guys do and hw interest your content is. More people need to find your channel, cause it is very interesting.
Thank you Terry!
A Rokon motorcycle on the goat track backpacking the ore would be my choice, unless BLM won’t let you use them
Gravity games are challenging for sure .
That slope you are lowering the ore over , looks like much smaller rock and a more consistent slope than the surrounding hillsides .
Maybe a low slung cart with big wheels and a low COG could work .
A big pulley at the top anchor point , one end of the cable attached to the cart , the other to a truck or big winch .
That way you can lower the ore down and pull the empty cart back up , and less fussing with multiple lines .
Looks a bit far to make a wooden chute worthwhile given the limited stockpile , but would be a solution if you found some decent pay in enough tonnage , inside .
The greatest teacher… trial and error!
Once you have a head frame at each end of the tram, it will be a world easier. (~_^)-b
And while you may still want to take your cables back with you, odds are, folks won't mess with the wooden parts.
If the pulleys look like something they may take, just use those cheap steel bolt-through 4" wheel hubs because usually those things are seen as worthless, especially when there are no tires mounted to them.
Folks throw away old wheel barrows and stuff with those on them that, when really ugly can still work just fine, but look completely unattractive to most thieves.
Tie it to the truck and pull the cable tite with the vehicle. Done right ud be able to land it straight on the flat bed
"" If it doesn't work ""
The professional youtuber would blame the Audience hahahaha
YAAAYYY TRAM LINE TRANSPORTATION AND DRAG LINE FOR THA WIN! (~_^)-b
think helicopter
can you try a bag cable slide, straight to your trailor. I use to lay underground electric cables, it was a fun job, when i was Buff in Studly, just saying,
Keeping it interesting 👍😎👍
Would you guys "ride the line " yourselves? YAHOO!
How about a 2x4 say 8 ft with a notch at one end to stand up and lift the line up then lower the bucket.
That zip line sucks guys....😂 but your doing it I'm sitting hear watching it so I'm the real idiot...😂😂😂
Something seems wrong or I'm not imagining your setup -- right ?
Pulleys at both ends -- 2 buckets -- move the top anchor point higher up the hill side so the buckets hang the same distance at the bottom and top.
The filled top bucket will pull up the empty bottom bucket.
Slack might become a problem --- Use a heavy counter weight at the bottom to automatically help control the tension.
Or just import 13 Filipino boys with the pack mule modification
When I first watched this I kept thinking it was oversized waste rock.... I kept saying, "just throw it over the edge..." now I realize it's oversized ore
The goal is not to carry it, my artillery round was 80Pound,
Simular to a ski lift
You need extra towers for support
A motorized tramway😂
If those rocks pay, at least put a tower or 2 where necessary, and make a jig back tram.
Have you tried a mule and horse?
👍
Oh, I commented on the short asking if you had more views of this.... I guess so
That's so steep, if the cable doesn't work, try a slide. OR A HILICOPTER ...
was this filmed on the 1st of April... ? cannot watch to the end..
Little different than the tram at Cero Gordo....
👍