RE:How much gold will the TOTAL Bulk sample contain?
There is a strong possibility that GoldTheory's projections are on the conservative side. PVG has publicly announced that the higher grade material would be processed last , and that fact alone supports his hypothesis. However the other bonus consideration which is not likely well known by non mining professionals is that a considerable amount of free native gold ALWAYS builds up behind the ball mill liners and nooks and crannies within the mill circuits. The amount of gold thus trapped is often a function of the feed grade , ESPECIALLY the amount of free gold within the ore.
Now under normal milling processes this is just a fact of life that the mine / mil owners have to accept.....essentially they have gold inventory that cannot be turned into cash. In theory , depending on the nature of the contract between PVG and the contract mill , much of this gold could be recovered at the end of the mill run, but this is really labour intensive and may not be cost effective, but what is most relevant is that all the gold that is there , will have been derived from the initial 3-5,000 tonnes. No more will be accumulated once the nooks and crannies are filled. Thus there is reason to belive that even if the remaining 2000 tonnes to be processed is EXACTLY the same grade as thge initial 8000 tonnes , actual recovered gold per tonne could be appreciably higher than from the initial mill feed.