Greenside Lead Mine (Pic Heavy)

We were staying in the Youth Hostel on the slopes of Helvellyn, so took the opportunity (while the rain stopped) to have a mooch round.

The mine was still operational until the early sixties, and was state of the art in terms of the technology it used. Electricity was generated from hydro-electric plants, and in turn used to power electric engines used to bring the lead to the surface.

Most of the plant was razed to the ground in the sixties. The exceptions are The Youth Hostel which was a former worker's barracks, and the offices now used as an Outward Bound Centre.

Even though the buildings have been destroyed, there are still some impressive remains, including two huge spoilheaps, one up the mountain, and the other which looms threateningly over the Youth Hostel. The undergound workings are apparently massive.

According to a leaflet I picked up, the mine was used by the M.O.D in the Cold War to try and work out whether it was possible to detect a nuclear explosion being carried out underground. The Russians were suspected of having broken a nuclear treaty by doing this.

Stanchion for an aerail ropeway. Probably



Track of railway leading to spoil heap



They used anything they had left to build this wall



Blocked up level



Access point to workings



General shot of site



River was in spate



Looking up to spoil heaps higher up the mountain



and down ro Ullswater



more pics here

http://s201.photobucket.com/albums/aa101/borntobemild/greenside/

Its an impressive site all those old spoil heaps and the various artefacts, and some nice pictures there mate. Did you get into the underground bit at all?

BigLoada said:

Its an impressive site all those old spoil heaps and the various artefacts, and some nice pictures there mate. Did you get into the underground bit at all?

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No - tbh i didn't even know it was there until we arrived. The YH had a mini museum devoted to the place. There were pictures of visits to the underground workings, which apparently go down below the level of Ullswater (500ft + ?).
What amazed me was the technology used. I had this image of the ore being hewn by men with picks, but it was state of the art, using latest mining techniques.

Greenside Mine is unique because it was the first mine in Britain to use electrical winding and underground haulage, generating its own electricity by means of water turbines. Water was brought from dams built at Red Tarn and Keppel Cove Tarn, two miles distant from the mine. Extensive remains can still be seen of the system of dams and leats which gathered every available drop of water from the mountainsides. Twice there were serious floods caused by breaching of the dams. The water was discharged into a 15 inch pipe, giving a fall of 420 feet to a Y piece which directed the water through a vortex turbine and a pelton wheel powering two 100 hp dynamos. The plant operated until 1936 when the National Grid was brought in.

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There's quite alot of pics on aditnow

http://www.aditnow.co.uk/mines/Greenside-Lead-Mine/

Yeah I saw those pics on Aditnow a while ago. Not sure what the conditions for access are now though. Those mines certainly go deep. The craziest has to be Coniston copper mine. The mountains over there must be nearly hollow, I'm surprised there aint geological problems because of the extent to which they mined back then.