Abstract
THE Safety in Mines Research Board has just published Paper No. 84 dealing with stemming materials and written by Prof. J. A. S. Ritson and Mr. H. Stafford. This paper is practically a resume of a number of papers and observations which Prof. Ritson and his colleagues have been carrying out for a number of years. The first paper was published by them in the Transactions of the Institution of Mining Engineers of 1930, and they have continued their work practically up to the present. They find that sand between 1/10 in. and 1/100 in. is the most effective material, and that a mixture of sand and clay (three of the latter to one of the former) is practically as efficient as sand alone and is much more convenient for stemming horizontal shot holes. To enable the material to be stored without getting dry, the authors recommend 3-5 per cent of calcium chloride to be added, and they state that by the use of a sand and clay stemming, blown-out shots can be prevented, the amount of fumes can be reduced, and up to one third of the cost of the explosives can be saved. From the practical point of view this paper, published at 6d., is of very great value.
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Stemming Materials. Nature 134, 492–493 (1934). https://doi.org/10.1038/134492f0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/134492f0