RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:"The deeper miners go, the richer the ore being uncovered."Iskyhigh wrote: tbnorthstar wrote: We don't have to really concern ourselves with anything at depth as there is more than enough gold near (15 meters or so) or on surface @Comet Well to keep Novo going for a long, long, long time....you would either would have made the discovery or know the person who did to realize the magnitude of what is there....Comet Well dwarfs Purdys Reward by many times.
We should all have a profitable 2018 if things evolve as hoped for....
Well a guy could do the Maths. Bit premature though, because we don't know how much of the reef contains gold.
At this stage, Novo is an exploration company. The mandate is, 'to evaluate, acquire and explore gold properties. What is the fastest way to prove up the oz's?
Personally, I think it (the fastest way) is to bulk sample / mine the edge, AND to sink a decline or two. On Purdy's they should try to find a shallow spot under cover, and confirm there is gold. Then sink a ramp underneath the gold. And do another one or two on Comet Well.
Bulk sampling could be done from underneath at depth. Say every 50m along dip, do another bulk sample upwards. Whatever works best.
Obviously bulk samples would be taken along strike too. I envision fan shape progression / sampling. Not indicated on my crude markups.
Isky,
Nice diagrams you have in your post.
The x-section (slide 21 of Corp Presentation) starts near the boundary of Purdy's and Comet Well and the slope is quite shalow (note the vertical exaggeration is 3:1, so it looks steeper in the diagram). In your first diagram, the overburden at the junction (where your proposed ramp meets an upward line, an up ramp to extract the samples?)
is about 75m. This is portion from the exposed surface at Purdy's to the basin is still within the Purdy's area (purple square in slide 15). Novo could start doing a small open pit operation there in the SE direction.they would have about 1km before they start running into the pink corner that belongs to Comet Well. 75m is shallow and they could perhaps get a quarry permit to start this open pit.
- Option 1, Ramp from Purdy's: This can be started from the side wall of the quarry, starting from Purdy's 50-50 JV, but
- Option 2, Ramp from Comet Well: A better option would be to start the ramp from Comet Well (NOV has better control, since Comet Well JV is effectively 100% Novo, 80% JV with 2 whole own subsidiaries. They can find a good spot and build a ramp in the bed rock (shift the x-section to the SW)...just make sure that the exploration/production ramp would be in the bed rock and below the conglomerate layers.
- Block Caving: Your Figure 2 mentions "sampling from below". This could be done in the the exploration phase, but block caving could be an option for large amount of ore extraction, if the samples show high grades. Then they can use the ramp for production as well, if the ramp is wide enough, say at least 5m x 5m (as they have done at ICG's Triangle deposit (now belongs to ELD).
Anything grade above an average of 10gpt would be economically viable. Kaiser has used this grade for his Purdy's Outcome Visualization (OV) of 27 Oct 2017. His CapEx was high. Keith Barron could perhaps help QH to reduce the the costs used in Kaiser OV. Actually, the person at NOV who has experience with mining operation is Rob Humphryson, the CEO, not QH, according to Moriarty.
As a side note, the arrangement at Novo is a bit strange. Usually, the President is the guy doing the day-to-day operation of the company, including mining/ production. The CEO would set direction. The Chairman would take care of the BoD business. It's quite common to see CEO/President, or Chair of BoD/CEO go to one person, and President (the nut and bolt guy) goes to another person. In Novo case we have Humphryson inserted in between the Chairman and the President job, as CEO. QH should have the title Chairman and CEO and Rob Humphryson should be the President who would be involved in testing methods, mining operations for this unconventional nuggety conglomerate deposit.
QH can talk till the cows come home about the Au precipitation theory some 2-3 billion years ago. But let's hear from Rob H about a cheap way to extract the near surface stuff we have
now at Purdy's and Comet Well.
GH