RE: RE DRILLING TIMEI don't know where you got your information from; the actual drill time without rig moves is about 8-12 hours for a thousand feet for shallow gas wells. I'm not familiar with gas drilling in eastern Canada, but out west, coring is almost never done now and if it is; it's more for oil. Oilfield core barrels can range in length from 9-13 meters and depending on type of formation eg: shale to conglomerates and size of core taken; it can be done in 3 to 15 hrs to retrieve one core including trip times. I imagine coring would be no different in mining, and would almost always be shallow! (Guessing up to 5000 ft) If this is the case, and the rig hands are decent along with a good core hand, cores for a 1000 feet should be retrieved (30 individual cores retrieved with a 10 meter core barrel drilling shales should be done in 7-10 days. Tougher formations could take longer barring any problems. Variables include type of core bit and bit condition eg: diamond enhanced or not. Although I may be wrong on the mining end of things as far as timing, not so in the oilfield as having 30 years in the industry allows me a bit of say. I'm not here to step on anybodie's toes and I welcome any follow-up on mining.
WDV