Licola sign STOLEN

Raymond, I very much doubt they would use the mill genset to power a camp. Part of my job was running the engine room. That Lister engine, about 12' long had 8 pistons about 12" diam. To start her was quite a procedure, nothing like pressing a button! She had to be barred around on the flywheel to a start position. Then, oil pressure, fuel pressure manually pumped up. Was then a matter of a rapid opening compressed air valve to crank her over and then a 20 min. warm up before the mill started. Quite a bit of checking, main switches etc. Certainly dont need that power for size of Licola! To hear that engine on load with the turbo whistling was something else I can tell you!!
The aux. genset which ran overnight to supply the village was a 3cyl. GMC 2 stroke diesel (3/73) genset, very quiet, but could be still in use?
If I remember correctly the mill was owned by G N Raymonds?
cheers the kesh

Kesh, at last look the camp and town is being powered by a Cat Genset. Not a lot of romance there ! You would be surprised at Licola these days if you haven't seen it since the mill times.
The shop has a licence now and the number of people about, particularly on long weekends, Easter etc. is amazing.
Gone though are the big trees in front of the shops. Too dangerous said the local council. Toilets nearly went too, didn't meet latest specs. Ahhrr progress.
Ken

Ken, Thanks, I really dont I will bother with any return visits!
In the 50,s early 60,s I worked at quite few of those once wonderfull spots. Spud picking at Moondarra where they were taken to Moe on the narrow guage rail, Logging crew around Walhalla, (still have the chainsaw I bought new in '59), sawmills Ensay, Swifts Crk. Nowa Nowa, Cann. R., roadwork on the highway Club Terrace, (also chased a bit of gold there)
These days take life much easier opal mining 5 months of the year in sunny W.Qld. where you hardly see a soul all week!
cheers the kesh

Kesh, at the risk of hijacking this post you must have some great memories of these jobs and places. They get better of course with time but I look back on these jobs, places and activities and wonder if the current workplaces, equipment and stuff will ever be held in the same regard as the sort of stuff and experiences you [and to some extent I] have had.
There was another old Blackstone in a Melb telephone exchange when I was a lad. The starting proceedure was the same as you described, and there was only one bloke who could get her going single handed. Keeping the oil pressure up was a juggling act with opening the compressed air valve to get her to turn over. If things got out of shape you used all the stored air and had to wait until the electric compressor filled the cylinder up again. It drove a 50v DC generator which provided power to the 50v exchange battery system and was used when the mains failed. It had to be got going pretty quickly as the exchnge drew about 3000 amps at 50 volts and the batteries could not sustain this sort of current for long.
I often wonder what happened to it as this exchange was decommissioned and all the exchange equipment removed. The Blackstone was in a basement and would have been very difficult to remove. The flywheel would never have got out of the building in one bit.
Enjoy Qld and the peace and quiet, I spose like most opal miners you are "scraping by" !! Good luck

Ken

If you have a look at the Nuff Nuffs that Licola attracts latley I'm not surprised, 20 years ago that place was fantastic, to get the most out of that area now you must visit during the week/off peak.

Shame but its progress if we can call it that.

Wont be long the area there will be closed to all, should see the damage being done up there, total shame, small group buggering it up for all.

"Nuff Nuffs" ..... WTF .... it's obviously derogatory but please explain for the dummies i.e. me :)