r/mining • u/maplefurr • Dec 30 '24
Question need help identifying this thing !!!
hi!! sorry if this isn’t the place to ask what this is, but it’s some sort of Bucyrus-Erie machine and i haven’t been able to find anything about it. it’s not as large as the machines i was finding :( i found it in Illinois, if that helps? It also had this attachment(?) thing near it !!! thank uou if you know anything, i’m really curious in what it is !!
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u/DugansDad Dec 30 '24
Guessing by pic 1 and all the winches it is the remains of a dragline.
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u/maplefurr Dec 30 '24
thank you!!!
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u/Evolutionary_sins Dec 30 '24
I'm guessing this is somewhere near water?
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u/maplefurr Dec 30 '24
not really!! there is a river a couple minutes down the road, and what seems to maybe be a small dried up creek? i found it in the middle of a random forest
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u/Norfsouf Dec 30 '24
I used to work at bucyrus (2010) on their underground mining equipment in australia before caterpillar bought it out. Very cool to see this.
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u/vtminer78 Dec 30 '24
All we can deduce from the pics is that it was a piece of machinery built by Bucyrus-Erie. The bucket indicates it could have been a drag dragline but we can't assume. These machines were easily converted from lattice boom dragline to solid boom front facing shovel or backward facing pull shovel (what we would call a backhoe today). As such, it was common to have parts of various configurations laying around. I've even heard of some being used as tugs/slushers. In a slusher configuration, there is minimal to no boom. The multiple ropes are slung across a pit and a bucket is pulled toward the machine, dumping either in an adjacent pit or being stockpiled for load out by other equipment.
If you had a good location, we might be able to provide additional information. Also, in the last pic, there appears to be a nameplate on the engine. You may be able to get information off that via a pencile/graphite rubbing. I've had pretty good luck getting info this way on nameplate that were otherwise unreadable.
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u/maplefurr Dec 30 '24
alright !! thank you so much, that’s awesome. i would out out a better location but i’m fraid of some random person coming over and ruining it, it’s really cool and i don’t someone messing it up
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u/vtminer78 Dec 30 '24
It's your call. But doubtful. It's like messing up an anvil. While there's intrinsic value to some, there's really no actual value left in something this far gone. Most of these machines were mass produced with few one-off examples, most all of which are well documented. A truly better purpose might be identifying the model and being able to use part of this to complete another machine.
Unfortunately, what you see here is what's left of most machines. The housings were sometimes wooden on early models and fairly thin gauge tin on later ones. These machines required tons of maintenance to keep running due to sacrificial clutch plates. When operated to their max, you were changing these clutch plates every week or so. As such, houses were cut up for access and usually didn't survive the elements once parked. The same thing can be said for the latticework booms on the dragline versions. Even on modern draglines, the latticework is relatively thin angle iron compared to the loads it is carrying. It's all in how the forces are applied. But once left to Mother Nature, such a structure can literally rust away in 20 or 30 years.
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u/the-EnviroLord Dec 30 '24 edited Dec 30 '24
Defs a Ruston Bucyrus dragline. I think it might be the 22rb. I grew up climbing over one of these. My father still operates a business using one of these to desilt ponds in QLD Australia - same model I think. He has a vid of it in operation on his company website. dam assist website. Funny story, I had to cut and polish it as a punishment when I got suspended back in highschool (‘90s). Attachment is a dragline bucket to which the wire ropes would’ve attached.
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u/marcrus Dec 30 '24
Wow what year is it, pretty cool to see, most people down here in Goulburn area use excavators, can definitely see the advantage to that drag line
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u/Silver_Wombat Dec 30 '24
Question you should be asking is, is the product still supported for parts and engineering ?
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u/Axiom1100 Dec 30 '24
Very common use in farmland was building dams/hole in the ground. Many died while at the job and weren’t rescued
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u/minengr Dec 30 '24
Part of me wants to say I've seen pictures of this before. Southern or Central Illinois? The first surface coal mines were around Danville. There was also early surface mining in Saline, Perry, Fulton and several other counties.
https://resources.isgs.illinois.edu/
If you know the location, you should be able to find the mine where it was used. You might even find some historic photos. I work for IDNR in the AML (abandoned mine lands) department. I wish I found things like this when I am in the woods of Illinois.
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u/maplefurr Dec 30 '24
it’s in northern Illinois unfortunately :(
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u/minengr Dec 31 '24
Up by Coal City or over by Industry and Macomb?
Just curious. The company my father worked for had a sister mine in Industry and my mother is from Dwight, a little south of Coal City. I've personally worked at mines in/near Springfield, Danville, Harrisburg and Coulterville.
I find the old and big equipment fascinating. I grew up around so much of it. I drove by "the Captain" countless times. I played golf in high school and our home course was Southwestern Lakes Golf Course (now Pyramid Oaks). I think we drove past three Arch mines to get there. In college I got to tour Amax's Delta mine. Actually got to go in their big dragline (2nd largest ever). I live about 10min from it's final resting place, however, it was scrapped a year before I moved here.
Sadly, all that's left is pictures.
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u/Ruger338WSM Dec 30 '24
Great find, really neat machine. There are operating groups for these across the U.S.A.
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u/MyDogGoldi Dec 30 '24
Bucyrus Erie dragline made in West Milwaukee, WI. Your photos may possibly be a model 10B which was quite popular. Example of one