Abstract
THE Fuel Research Board has just issued Paper No. 21 of the Physical and Chemical Survey of the National Coal Resources, being a report on the Yard Seam of Northumberland. The report is a very full one, and appears to be very carefully done. There is only one point to which attention may be directed. In places there is a narrow band of dirty coal at the top of the seam known locally as‘op brat’, which the report states is “sometimes known as ‘roof coal’ or ‘ramble’” From the wording of the report the reader might suppose that the term ‘ramble’ is confined to this particular coal, but as a matter of fact it is a generic term for any thin bed of shaly matter that comes down when the underlying coal is worked. Thus in the “Glossary of Terms used in the Coal Trade of Northumberland and Durham”, by G. C. Greenwell, the first edition, published in 1849, defines ramble as “A thin stratum of shale, often found lying immediately above the seam of coal. It falls down, and, getting mixed with the coals, causes some trouble to the hewer, in getting it separated and cast back.” Seeing that this brat, although described as dirty coal, is stated to have contained in one place as much as 69 per cent of ash, whereas one of the bands of shale contains only 46 per cent, it is obvious that this band might fairly come within Greenwell's definition. Perhaps the most interesting statement in the report is that the authors find “the coking properties of the seam to be weak, but not nonexistent”; seeing that Northumbrian coals are generally supposed to be non-coking, this statement is a very important one, and leads to the inference that the Yard Seam smalls may be useful for blending with more strongly coking coals in order to produce a good metallurgical coke.
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Northumbrian Coals. Nature 129, 230–231 (1932). https://doi.org/10.1038/129230d0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/129230d0