Chain Conveyor
May 1965

Chen Kombea
[Chain Conveyor]
38.0 x 53.9 cm Painting in Watercolors and Ink

From around 1937, the coal pits began to use chain conveyors (chen kompea in dialect) at coalfaces instead of water chutes (mizunagashi shuuto/toi) or shaker conveyors (seka kompea in dialect) which had been used for the haulage of coal until then. Chain conveyors were more efficient than the latter but the rhythmic noises produced by their chains scraping against the bottoms of their troughs (torafu) were very loud. It was probably because their chain rollers were made very small so that gearwheels meshed well with them.
The miners in Nittetsu Inatsuki Coal Pit worked like a military corps. Their pit foreman was called "battalion commander," executive officers "company commanders," low-level officers "platoon leaders," and expert sakiyamas (hewers) were called "squad leaders." Other miners as shoveler corps started or stopped working by orders under the leadership of the "sub-squad leaders" and worked actively and briskly. (Shovelers had to work especially hard before moving troughs.)

Words in the Picture
ukeita: anti-fall board
torafu: trough

Inset 1
A piece of the trough was made from a steel plate with the thickness of 1/8 inch or 1 bu, the width of 5 feet (1.56 m: sic) and the length of 10 feet (3.12 m: sic), which was divided into two pieces each with the width of 2 feet 6 inches (76 cm: sic). Both sides of each piece were bent 50 degrees in the width of 13 and a half inches (34 cm: sic), leaving the bottom 3 inches (7.6 cm: sic) wide. Angled or curved steel plates of 2 inches (5 cm: sic) long were fixed on both sides and the bottom of its one end as joints.

Word in the Inset 1
chen: chain

Inset 2
The chain was composed of units with shafts 3 inches apart from each other. The link was 1 inch (25 mm: sic) wide, the roller was 1 and 6/10 (6 bu) inches in diameter, the connector was 1 and 3/4 inches wide, and the rivet was 5/8 inch (16 mm: sic) or 5 bu in diameter. On the slopes with gentle inclination, chains with angled wings were used.


Translation Assisted by Mr. Nathan Johndro

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