JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – TSX-V-listed Tsodilo Resources has started the large diameter drill (LDD) drilling programme at its wholly owned BK16 kimberlite project, within the Orapa kimberlite field, in Botswana.
The diamond and metals exploration company planned to drill 14 holes, 24 inches in diameter, to a cumulative depth of just over 3 000 m, with around 2 000 t recovered by this process, spread across a 6 ha pipe and varying in depth from 96 m to 366 m, depending on the kimberlite intersections.
“Pilot NQ size core holes have been drilled adjacent to each proposed LDD hole to ensure the hole intersections with these large diameter holes and the kimberlite are maximised but also to correlate the diamond recoveries directly with the geological model once the results are available,” the company said in a statement on Monday.
The LDD programme will sample the various kimberlite phases every 12 m resulting in 237 samples to be treated through the company's dense media separation (DMS) plant, just outside Letlhakane.
The plant is being refurbished and upgraded for treatment in September.
The first test samples through the crushing and DMS section of the plant are schedule for the third week of September, the company said.
While the plant has the capacity to treat some 10 t/h, the treatment of individual samples with blank samples in between, and the purging and cleaning of the circuit between different sample consignments, dictated that a more realistic 5 t/h production plan be used for drill samples.
Edited by: Creamer Media Reporter
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