Trial Mining Continues and Commissioning of Plant Underway
Perth, Aug 16, 2013 AEST (ABN Newswire) - ABM Resources NL (
ASX:ABU) presents an update on the Trial Mining and Processing at the Old Pirate High-Grade Gold Project in the Northern Territory of Australia.
Trial Mining continues:
Between 3,000 and 4,000 tonnes of gold bearing material stockpiled and ready for processing.
Mining of first bench (1 to 1.5 metre depth) from Old Pirate Central Area including Eastern Limb and Heartland veins) complete:
- High-grade gold bearing veins up to 3 metres wide extracted over a combined 300 metre strike length.
- Coarse and fine visible gold sighted throughout mining of Central area (including Eastern Limb and Heartland Veins), with the Heartland Veins containing very coarse gold (>4mm).
Mining of first bench (to 1 metre depth) complete from SE Veins:
- High grade gold bearing veins up to 0.5 metres wide over a 30 metre strike length.
- Fine visible gold sighted throughout mining of the SE Veins.
Mining of first bench (to 1.5 metres depth) from Western Limb is 80% complete:
- High-grade gold bearing veins up to 0.5 metre wide extracted over 240 metres strike length (300m total).
- Coarse and fine visible gold sighted throughout mining of Western Limb.
First benches now complete for all Trial Mining areas. Second bench ready to be mined at Golden Hind and Old Pirate South.
Commissioning underway at the Trial Processing Plant
- Generators are installed and operational.
- Tailings, pumps and water storage facility commissioned and ~3.5 million litres of water stored in preparation for trial processing.
- Three stage crushing unit has been tested and is operational.
- Coarse gold jig has been tested and is operational.
- Scrubber / trommel unit has been tested and is operational.
- Knelson Concentrator is installed and being commissioned.
- Ball Mill and motors installed, being aligned and commissioned.
- Ramping up to full scale trial-processing shortly.
Trial Mining and Pilot Processing Update
ABM is committed to a staged approach to the development of the Old Pirate High-Grade Gold Project. Stage One, conducted under an exploration license, involves the extraction and processing of up to 10,000 tonnes of gold-bearing material to test the system for grade reconciliation, recovery and dilution management. ABM anticipates that Trial Mining and Processing, using a modular pilot processing plant, will increase geological understanding of the mineralisation controls as well as expose new mineralised zones not previously identified as part of exploration work to date. The Trial Mining is ABM's equivalent of a feasibility study but has the advantage of providing more robust data, as well as producing saleable gold.
Trial Mining
The Trial Mining is well underway with concurrent excavation of several areas. To date approximately 3,000 to 4,000 tonnes of high-grade gold bearing material has been extracted. One of the key advantages of the project is that ABM can open up multiple high-grade mining areas over the nearly 2 kilometres of vein strike length exposed at surface. As each level/bench is complete, the area can be mapped and sampled whilst excavation is underway in other areas.
Following on from the previous update (01/08/2013), ABM has continued trial mining. Recently the Company excavated gold-bearing material from the main Central Zone including the Eastern Limb and Heartland Veins.
The Central Zone included quartz veins up to 3 metres wide with coarse visible gold (>0.5mm) sighted during the excavation (Figure 1). The Eastern Limb is a composite of multiple veins between 20 centimetres and 2 metres wide and again coarse visible gold was sighted during excavation. The Heartland Veins are narrow (~20 to 50 centimetres as previously noted in surface sampling) however, they differ from other veins in the area as they cross-cut stratigraphy and have a very grey recrystallised texture. The Heartland veins have revealed very coarse / spectacular visible gold >4mm (Figure 2 in link below).
Trial mining from the Western Limb has continued with 240 metres of strike length of material extracted from a >300 metre long first bench (to depth of 1.5 metres). Similarly to previous reports the Western Limb ranges from 20 to 50 centimetres wide and visible gold has been observed throughout the extraction process. Approximately 30 metres of strike length of the SE Veins have been extracted from the first bench. The SE Veins range from 0.2 metres to 0.5 metres in width and fine visible gold was also observed during the extraction.
The first benches of the trial mining areas including Golden Hind, Old Pirate South, East-Side, SE Veins, Central areas are now complete. The Company is now commencing extraction of gold-bearing vein material from the second benches at the Golden Hind and Old Pirate South.
Commissioning of the Pilot Processing Facility
The Commissioning of the Pilot Processing Facility has commenced. The generator has been tested and is operational. The tailings storage / process water facility is complete and the dam is now filled with ~3.5 million litres of ground water from existing water bores in preparation for processing. Return water pumps from the dam and water feed have also been installed and tested. The second-hand, three-stage crushing plant has been tested and is operational. The scrubber / trommel and the coarse gold jig installation and testing are also complete. The Ball Mill along, with the Knelson Concentrator have been placed and are being tested and commissioned. The concentrate upgrade tables have been put in place including the secured concentrate upgrade room. ABM expects to complete commissioning and move into processing shortly. The production rate for trial processing is targeted at 15 tonnes per hour on a day-shift basis.
To view all diagrams and pictures, please visit:
http://media.abnnewswire.net/media/en/docs/ASX-ABU-645723.pdf
About ABM Resources NL
ABM Resources (ASX:ABU) is developing several gold discoveries in the Central Desert region of the Northern Territory of Australia. The Company has a multi-tiered approach to exploration and development with a combination of high-grade production scenarios such as the Old Pirate High-Grade Gold Project, large scale discoveries such as Buccaneer, and regional exploration discoveries such as the Hyperion Gold Project. In addition, ABM is committed to regional exploration programs throughout its extensive holdings including the alliance with Independence Group NL at the regional Lake Mackay Project.
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