Headgear / Headframe

The structural frame built directly over a mine shaft to carry the wheels that guide the winding cable — the single most recognisable structure at almost any mine site, also called a headframe, winding tower, gallows frame or poppethead.

Historical usage

Headgear has stood over mine shafts for as long as cable winding has been used to raise ore, water and men. Early headgear was built of timber; steel and concrete largely replaced wood through the 1920s as headgear grew taller and had to carry heavier loads at greater speed. South Wales became particularly associated with headgear in the popular imagination, thanks to the sheer number built across the coal-mining valleys during the Industrial Revolution.

How it worked

A sheave wheel — a large grooved pulley — sat at the top of the headgear, with the winding cable running up from the shaft, over the wheel, and across to the winding engine in its own engine house nearby. As the engine wound the cable in or out, the cage or kibble attached to the other end was raised or lowered through the shaft.

Why it was used

Headgear was structurally necessary wherever a shaft was wound with a vertical cable rather than hauled some other way — the frame had to be tall and strong enough to carry the sheave wheel directly over the shaft centre and take the full load and speed of a loaded cage or kibble passing beneath it.

Regional variation

Timber headgear predominates in the surviving record of older, smaller mines; the tall steel headgear most people picture today became standard only from the 1920s onward, and is particularly associated with the deep collieries of the South Wales valleys.

Related terminology

King Hook

Images

Mines associated with this term

Included only where MineArchive's own research gives a reasonable evidential basis — not every mine where this might plausibly apply.

• Astley Green Colliery — Greater Manchester (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Bersham Colliery — Wrexham (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Caphouse Colliery — West Yorkshire (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Chatterley Whitfield Colliery — Staffordshire (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Frongoch Mine — Ceredigion (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Grove Rake Mine — County Durham (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Long Rake Spar Mine — Derbyshire (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Minera Lead Mines — Wrexham (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.
• Point of Ayr Colliery — Flintshire (well documented example)
  Surviving or recorded headgear is a named feature of the mine's own history.

Sources

1. (secondary) Headframe — Wikipedia
2. (secondary) Headstocks — Mining Heritage

Record created: 22 August 2026 · Last researched: 22 August 2026