[1] During Moffat's absence from Irvinebank, a syndicate of local miners banded together to purchase the Vulcan mine from the Italians for £2,100 and formed a public company, the Vulcan Tin Mining Company Limited, on 13 December 1890 with a capital of £4,400 in £1 shares paid to ten shillings each.

[1] Moffat continued his policy of technical innovation, installing in 1893 a first motion double action winding engine, the first on the Walsh and Tinaroo field.

Unfortunately for Irvinebank miners the output of the Vulcan mine fell in the period from 1905 to the outbreak of World War I from an average assay of 10.2% to 4% and the value of tin output dropped from £61,618 to £12,805, an alarming drop due both to declining tin prices and to poorer ore at the 366-metre (1,201 ft) level.

[1] The 1907 and 1908 strikes seriously affected the value of the Vulcan ore in relation to its chief competitor on the field, the Stannary Hills Company operating the nearby Rocky Bluff battery.

The Whitworth Finance and Mining Corporation Limited employed over a dozen men renovating the surface plant at the Vulcan in early May 1929 prior to commencing dewatering operations.

[1] North Broken Hill Limited applied for 60ha lease over the old Vulcan workings in 1947, but in 1981 Don Walker of Herberton purchased the mine which is not operational but it has become a local tourist site.

[1] The mine and machinery foundations are situated on a narrow bench excavated into a steep hillside at the head of a gully running down to Gibbs Creek.

Immediately south again are large concrete foundations for a winding engine containing a relief inscription reading - Vulcan T M Co. 1906.

The Tornado Mine winding and pump engine foundations are located on the hillside above and to the north of the Vulcan.

[1] The surviving plant includes the steel headframe (base plate inscribed) - Engineering Supply Co of Aust Ltd Brisbane.

A beehive brick covered underground water tank above the mine is now rare in the North Queensland context.

[1] The place has a special association with the life or work of a particular person, group or organisation of importance in Queensland's history.

The mine is also associated with William McCormack and Edward Theodore, later Queensland Premier and Queensland and Australian Treasurer, who came to Irvinebank as an underground miner in the Vulcan mine and established the Amalgamated Workers Association (later amalgamating with the Australian Workers Union).