Patent ID: 8157331

Claim:
A method of steering a trailing drum of a double-ended mining machine in which the mining machine is of the kind having a body arranged to be progressed along a mineral face being cut, the body having at each end a ranging arm pivotally mounted on the body and each arm carrying a rotatable cutting drum, a plurality of sensors being mounted on the machine and being adapted to measure different parameters of the mining operation and to generate signals representative of said parameters, a first of said sensors being arranged to measure the positions of each of said arms with respect to the machine, a second of said sensors being arranged to measure the movement and direction of the machine, a third of said sensors being arranged to measure a roll of the machine along the mineral face, the method comprising the steps of: establishing from the first and second sensors, signals indicating the direction of movement of the machine and the position of the machine relative to the mineral face, and signals indicating the position of the ranging arm relative to a mine floor, establishing from the third sensor, signals indicating the roll of the machine, processing the signals to determine if the machine is leaving a gate end of the mineral face in a direction towards an opposite gate end of the mineral face, determining a current position of at least one ranging arm, comparing the current position of the ranging arm with an undercut limit defined along the mineral face, and stopping movement of the ranging arm when the current position of the ranging arm is below the undercut limit.