The Glamorgan-Gwent Archaeological Trust
Historic Environment Record
 

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Dyne steel inclined plane, Blaenavon

Primary Reference Number (PRN) : 05493.0g
Trust : Glamorgan Gwent
Community : Blaenavon
Unitary authority : Torfaen
NGR : SO23501060
Site Type (preferred type first) : POST MEDIEVAL Tramway
Status : Scheduled Monument

Summary :
Ironbridge assessment Pwll Du 1994 - Dyne Steel Inclined Plane: The remains of an inclined plane on a north-east/south-west orientation, dismantled by 1880.

Description :
Ironbridge assessment Pwll Du 1994 - Dyne Steel Inclined Plane: The remains of an inclined plane on a north-east / south-west orientation. The remains are divided into two distinct sections. One runs north-east from the site of New Pit (Mi13) for approximately 750m, climbing steeply until it reaches the remains of a ruined building on the top of the ridge. The route of the incline is clearly visible, although the trackbed is poorly preserved and no fixtures remain. As the incline starts to descend towards Pwll Du, its route has been destroyed by wartime opencasting and metalling to provide vehicle access to the opencasting. It does not appear again until it has crossed the line of the road from Pwll Du to Blaenavon. Here a well preserved section, approximately 50m long, runs towards the Lamb Inn.
The Dyne Steel Incline was named after Thomas Dyne Steel, the Blaenavon Company's engineer who was appointed in 1848. The incline was built c.1850 to solve the transport problems caused by the Pwll Du tunnel, which had become something of a bottleneck (Rattenbury, 1980, 39). Dyne Steel left a detailed account of how the incline worked in his memoirs (Dyne Steel, 1893, 44-45). The incline had two lines of rails and upon these were mountedfoitr boilerplate trucks. Each boiler plate truck was capable of carrying four loaded coal trams. The whole operation was powered by a winding engine and drum with four wire ropes, situated at the summit of !he incline. Dyne-Steel recorded that on one occasion a truck came loose on the Blaenavon side of the incline, ran down the slope and at the bottom 'cut through all embankment 25 to 30 feet wide and 4 feet to four feet 6 inches deep and half buried itself at thefoot'. By 1880 the incline had been dismantled.

Sources :
Richardson, S. , 1994 , Pwll Du, Gwent; An Archaeological Desk Top Assessment
Ironbridge assessment Pwll du 1994

Events :
E003587 : Dyne Steel's Incline, Blaenavon (year : 2009-2010)
E003574 : Forgotten Landscapes Project (year : 2010)
E003864 : Pwll Du, Gwent; An Archaeological Desk Top Assessment (year : 1994)

Related records

Compiled date : 09-03-1998


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