Tin mining Tin mining Tin mining began early in the Bronze Age, as bronze is a copper-tin alloy. Tin is a relatively rare element in the Earth’s crust, with approximately 2 ppm (parts per million), compared to iron with 50,000 ppm. Tin extraction and use can be dated to the beginnings of the Bronze Age around 3000 BCE, when it was observed that copper objects formed of polymetallic ores with different metal contents had different physical properties. The earliest bronze objects had tin or arsenic content of less than 2% and are therefore believed to be the result of unintentional alloying due
Sundown Tin and Copper Mine have been mined after 1923. There is no reference to copper after this date either. The tin mine area consists of the open cut, with a grided shaft in its floor, and a collapsed adit at the base of its work face. Above the open cut is the main shaft, located on a bench cut into the hillside, with a mullock tip, tripod steel poppet head and older timber shaft- head staging, over a three-compartment shaft. The concrete pad supporting one of the poppet legs is inscribed with the names "T Fredrick, S. Lynn, F. Meehan, GRM Kane". Adjacent to