AN IMPROVED MINER'S PICK.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 233, 17 December 1887, Page 3

AN IMPROVED MINER'S PICK.-

Wfi beg; to acknowledge receipt of a minei's pick, witb tltiplicate points, .from. Mr A A Wallace, blacksmith, WuioronThe invention is known us « Wnilacft & Mace's Patent bteol Pick, and si.ouitl it b« ionwl in practical work t« come up to the expectation? of the ,nven tor* there is not the .slights doubt but he pa ont will prove a px* thing for the owners thereof, and the picks havo an owners theieo1 ' Wal i a ce informs us the SS?S"h«vti a Hck with duplicate points fiS'oicnrred'tn him when he was l.vmj at nnntley (W-ukato), forking in the coal mines. There, be states, the conl minors have each four picks for the day s woik, which every niarht an; earned some distance to the force to be sharpened aid then carried back by the men going .to work next morning The ordinary piok mri is composed of part steel and n.ut iron, and every time the p.ck ha, .to be laid and steeled. it is conssd^iably weakened from scaHmr. The ordinary picks are nUo Hah o to bun at tho eve when the handle is boinar wed-ed up, hut this cannot occur in the case of the steel pick, The cort of In.v.nar and steeling is about Is 6.1, and thw hiu to bo done some five or six times a year, whilst the first cost of the ordinary imnei* pick is stated to We 5s ™ with handle 6S6 S so that the first cost to the turner of even three nick* with handles would be 18^. Mr Wallace, however, is prepared to supply the new style of: pick referred to made'of solid stoel thiousfhout and v,th th«o solid steel points, for 10s the set, o. with handle, Us. So that in fi.st c-t there is a very larffo saving. But in addition to that, the solid steel points will do away with the necessity for laying andfteelinjr, and wear ft r longer without reqiiirins to be Sharpened. The point* ar* attached to the solid head as follows : Tn the bend ofthe pick is a slot about two incbe^ deep, into which accurately fits a piojoctms portion of the steel point, about % in. deep by e m. wide, whilst a smil! screw is placed underneath which arista in keepmsr the point in its place, but is scarcely needed as in actual work the pressure is borne by the shoulders of the joint. A sample cisc of these picks has just been received from Sheffield, and they are being distributed in the various mining centres throughout Isew Z -aland; so that we may ere lont? expect to hear the opinion of practical miners from all parts of the colony with respect 10 the now invention. To those goin<? proßpectintrinthc bush etc., far away from an y for°e, the possession of one of these pick* and a couple of extra points will be a great boon. We wish the- inventors the success they so well deserve.