the use of the cowl mounted sensors for feedforward control of the floor cut in modified half face cutting as the miner makes a half face cut to the right the lead drum 20 cuts the roof or near the roof and the trailing drum 22 idles and cleans up the cowl mounted sensor 24 measures the roof thickness for feedback to control the next pass on the return pass fig2 b the lead drum 22 idles and the cowl mounted sensor 24 measures the coal thickness for feedforward control of the trailing drum 20 which cuts the floor it should be noted that this cutting sequence could be further modified for feedforward control of the roof cut by mounting a sensor 25 on the upper portion of the right cowl and then during the first half cut fig2 a leaving a small amount of roof coal in addition to the floor bench and trimming the roof with the trailing drum using a feedforward control input from the sensor on the leading cowl this mounting arrangement for the sensor has been illustrated din fig4 a and 4b fig3 a and 3b illustrate the use of the cowl mounted sensors for feedforward control of the entire standard half face method in the pass to the right the lead drum 26 cuts the middle of the seam leaving coal on the roof and floor the lead cowl mounted sensor 28 measures the floor bench for feedforward input to the control of the trailing drum 30 which cuts the floor at the same time the trailing cowl mounted sensor 32 measures the roof thickness for feedforward.