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Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)
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PostPosted: Jul 24, 2015 02:53    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns  

Don Lum wrote:
....Thanks for posting. Really enjoyed the comments and pictures. Well done...

Absolutely!
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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:36    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

From Dehne McLaughlin, the First Newsletter May to early June 2016 about the Malbunka Copper Mine Project (MCM Project)...

Enjoy!

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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:37    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

This newsletter is the first on field work undertaken in 2016 in the desert of Central Australia at the Malbunka Copper Mine by Dehne and Maureen McLaughlin for the recovery of discoidal azurite specimens on white kaolinite matrix described as “azurite suns”.

We set up the mine camp and advanced our down dip drive by 0.5 metre in late April 2016. As you can see by the photo below, the mine camp has had a growth of tents, accompanied by separate mini tents for men’s’ and women’s’ portaloos. This was bought on by an increase in workers, visitors and visitor/workers who wished to experience the mine site this year. All our water, food and fuel has to be bought into the mine site with our 2 4WD trucks along a rugged bush track so we work a 6 night mine and 4 night Alice Springs roster.



2016 1 Fig 1.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
Photo 1. There are 6 tents in photo and two generators that can be linked in parallel or run on separate power lines to at least 2 operational areas of the mine. But most important thing they keep the drinks cool in the Engel car fridges in the kitchen tent. The blue tarp in the right of the photo has been rigged to reduce storm water flow from quarry face cascades into the mine.
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2016 1 Fig 1.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:39    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

The weather was hot due to our early arrival at the mine so we did not overburden ourselves with too much waste rock removal. Dehne was limited to 12 shovel fulls to a barrow load. The down dip drive at this stage of development was a suitable scale for seniors and turned up specimens dominated by ~1 inch diameter suns on matrix in small to large plates. This was a pleasant surprise as we did not mine this face in 2015 due to lack of man/women power and wondered how it would turn out. The up dip face was running into problems in 2015 as advised in our last newsletter so alternate development faces needed to be revisited.

We had a break away from the MCM for 12 days and despite some serious vehicle problems, Dehne went off to the Mud tank zircon field to catch up with an old digging friend, Ivan Dainis.

Unseasonal rain at the field nearly trapped Dehne at Mud tank but he escaped back to Alice Springs to prepare for our second field trip to the azurite sun mine. On arrival back at the site, we found we had not put our storm water dam in place in the main adit and water had run into the decline. The land was in drought when we left it and of course it does not rain much in the desert!



2016 1 Fig 2.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 2. The water eliminated Maureen’s specimen processing bench and nearly cut our access off to the down dip drive (DDD).
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2016 1 Fig 2.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:41    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

On this second trip to out we were accompanied by Joshua a young miner from Alice Springs, who demonstrated how waste rock should be mined and moved. Once we had advanced another 0.5 metre into the Down Dip drive (DDD) Maureen and I undercut the azurite bearing formation while Joshua cut a vertical wall in preparation to undercutting the UDD.

Specimen recovery again was reasonable in the DDD and it took us 3 days to complete the collecting in this new cut due to the presence of not only a productive L1, L2 and L3 horizon, but also a frequent Lo horizon below L1. See PHOTO 3 below.



2016 1 Fig 3.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 3. A plate from the hidden Lo horizon in the DDD, 34 cms across and largest sun 9cms. This specimen should clean up to be an exceptional piece.
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2016 1 Fig 3.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:42    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

...


2016 1 Fig 4.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 4. Joshua with the big Makita hammer in the up dip drive face.
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2016 1 Fig 4.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:43    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

We identified a new sedimentary dyke in the DDD, the largest to date, that has been injected into the kaolinite and siltstone layers at a shallow angle. It crosses half of the 5.5 metre working face and has been continuous down the anticlinal dip for over 4 metres. It is comprised of silicified hanging wall sandstone and angular hardened kaolinite pieces with fine atacamite crystals in fractures in the sandstone. Good micros.


2016 1 Fig 5.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 5. Sandstone injectite cross section showing shredded kaolinite clasts.
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2016 1 Fig 5.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:45    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

Eric Melchior and Dehne have spent a lot of time developing an argument for azurite mineralisation and ground preparation bought on by hydraulic overpressure in the sediments during compaction and dewatering at a depth of over 300 metres (world’s first example). With several other specialist authors we submitted in April 2016 a paper to Mineralium Deposita in Europe. Clay and sandstone injectites along with natural hydraulic brecciation synchronous with azurite crystallisation is featured in the paper. This injectite has also been identified recently in the end face of the main adit and combined with reinterpretation of the azurite bearing horizon from DDD lithologies has changed Dehne’s ideas of where the azurite concentrations are heading.

We were accompanied on our third trip to the mine over May 23rd to 29th by Craig Bosel of Perth. The three of us did a half metre undercut into the UDD prepared by Joshua across ~9 metres using 3 Makita HK500 hammers with tile lifting type blades. The local gourmet butchers shop in Alice sharpens these blades (you need to know this). We proceeded to drop azurite layers and found that most of L1 and L2 was very poor. Good for azurite paint buyers but not for mine economics. L3 had high azurite concentrations but half of the L3 had highly fractured and silicified kaolinite which also had caused brittleness in the enclosed azurite.

The down dip section of the face down the anticlinal limb across 2 metres had a good L3 showing as in 2015.

In 2015 I advised in the last newsletter that we needed to check out the footwall for azurite mineralisation as this style of footwall azurite is obvious at the mine entrance. The fastest method has been to use the 1 metre long hammer drill steel attached to a 800 watt Makita power tool. Former newsletter readers may remember the photo….”..this is a drill”. Drilling vertical holes beats digging the floor up! So we started drilling 1 metre holes in the deepest sections of the cuts expecting to intersect footwall silicified sandstone based on measurements of the thick clay pillars at the mine entrance. Nada….no footwall silicified sandstone intersections. These results mean a rethink again as we know the footwall “should” be there. The best answer is normal faulting of which we have more than an abundance at the mine. So we will keep on drilling these holes and even if they do not hit footwall they tell us that as the kaolinite lens dips into the hill it has not thinned out……and clay=azurite.



2016 1 Fig 6.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
Photo 6. Craig trimming the left hand corner of the DDD on Trip 3 where we have left a natural rock pillar for ground support.
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2016 1 Fig 6.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:46    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

So by trip 4 to the mine on 2nd June with our Hard Worker Craig, we were quickly back to the productive DDD. On Trip 4 we were accompanied by Michael Grasso and Peter Kellor of Adelaide. Michael’s father had consulted for the mine in the early 1970s and like most of us is keen about wonderful Australian minerals, including azurite suns. Peter is handicapped by a copper mineral bias.

Michael and Peter put in a days work at the face in our underground gymnasium and had 2 great nights on site. Maureen did an excellent job of catering and other social stuff that women do better than men. It was rather strange seeing the boys leave the site in their rental 4WD Toyota reducing mine occupation from 5 to 3. A lonely feeling knowing the mine crew still had 4 more nights to go in the bush.



2016 1 Fig 7.jpg
 Description:
Photo 7. From left is Craig Bosel, Michael Grasso, Dehne and Peter Kellor. Have you ever seen such a fine bunch of guys?
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2016 1 Fig 7.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:49    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

But back to work and reality on the DDD where we had started dropping the azurite layers. (in case you are wondering how come there are layers, Dehne advises L1 and L3 are relic thrust fault planes that presented preferred planes of fluid flow for mineralising fluids pumped in under pressure into the dominantly clay formation. L2 azurite deposition is a mish mash of slip planes and original sedimentary bedding).

The DDD stepped up another notch and specimen quality was excellent on all azurite layers. We not only extended the working face down dip parallel to the anticlinal axis, but had also extended the face down the steeply dipping southern anticlinal limb requiring cutting of a stepped floor (Craig Steps). The DDD is sending a message on azurite concentration trends.

Craig and Peter worked on the left hand corner of the UDD where we are encouraged to carry out further exploration. The unfavourable ground has been turned into natural pillar support.

At the time of writing we are preparing for Trip No 5 to the mine. There are food items strewn everywhere in our B and B and the shed is full of stuff that needs to go to the mine, including a repaired electrical fault with a key hammer drill.

Sebastian Strauber is joining us for this trip as our mine worker. Shane Stanfield was to join us for this trip also but due to an important family matter, had to pull out.



2016 1 Fig 8.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 8. Fortunate to get this volume of matrix surrounding an undamaged ~5 inch sun. Specimen just fits in a standard “”6 inch” mineral flat with 8 inch high raisers stapled to the sides of the flat to safely protect the high part of the matrix.
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2016 1 Fig 8.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:50    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

...


2016 1 Fig 9.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 9. Azurite specimens have to be wrapped and boxed according to fragility and size to fit in with our modes of transportation. Most of the plastic tray material you see has to be re-boxed in Alice Springs for removalists. A little bit easier than the Rodgerly Mine where the fluorite specimens mostly go back to the USA for preparation. Maureen spends days on wrapping.
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2016 1 Fig 9.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 11, 2016 19:51    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

The last work done on T4 was to commence opening up the end of the old adit. Geological observations in the DDD suggest the main adit tunnel needs extension as it could be an important source of future azurite. We extended the old adit 2 metres during our exploration program in 2008.

We have three more trips into the mine scheduled and hope to update readers about how things go.

We are happy to comment on suggestions or questions from readers concerning the MCM Project. Thank you for your support and encouragement. This is not easy stuff. The senior years of Maureen and I and the logistics of maintaining these type of projects are quite testing. But I guess, where else would you be?

Cheers
Dehne and Maureen McLaughlin June 2016.



2016 1 Fig 10.jpg
 Mineral: Azurite
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 10. Azurite from the the L1 in the DDD with Lo exposed on the edge. This is as mined. No cleaning has been done. Specimen over 35 cms long.
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2016 1 Fig 10.jpg



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PostPosted: Jun 12, 2016 01:36    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

An impressive report of the mining work Down Under, I really enjoyed it though I'm not even a friend of the azurite "suns".

Really cool!
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PostPosted: Aug 06, 2016 03:31    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

From Dehne McLaughlin, the Second Newsletter June to July 2016. The Malbunka Copper Mine Project (MCM Project).

Enjoy!

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PostPosted: Aug 06, 2016 03:32    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

This newsletter is the second about mining undertaken in 2016 in the desert of Central Australia at the Malbunka Copper Mine by Dehne and Maureen McLaughlin and supporters for the recovery of discoidal azurite specimens on white kaolinite matrix described as “azurite suns”. This newsletter covers the last three mining periods at the mine based on our schedule of 6 nights mine work and 4 nights in Alice Springs. Dehne took several days off during the last field break between trips 6 and 7 to support the Creation Ministries outreach at the Alice Springs annual show.

Craig Bosel had gone back to Perth and our new Hard Worker from Western Australia, Seb (Dr Sebastian Staude, Geologist and Field Collector), turned up in Alice Springs after a 2 day gravel road drive in his 4WD across the desert via the Great Central Road that runs 1126 km from Laverton in Western Australia to Yulara near Ayers Rock in the Northern Territory. Now this is one keen guy.

You may remember how proud we were of our improved camp set up. We arrived back at the mine on 12th June 2016 to find every tent ransacked, several of them slashed, every pillow, sheet, sleeping bag and blanket stolen, food stolen or destroyed etc etc and a pile of important kitchen stuff piled up ready for loading in their car on top of our bedding and multiple other items.



2016 2 Fig 1.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 1. We do not usually leave our personal tent in such a mess. My mining clothes are so crappy that only one new mining shirt was stolen. Definitely not miners as they left Maureen’s helmet and lamp in the tent. If the thieves were so hard up for bedding we would have gifted or bought them bedding and food etc as the cost of delay to the mining operation is higher than the value of the stolen camp gear. They stole a pillow I hated. Bless them!
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2016 2 Fig 1.jpg



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PostPosted: Aug 06, 2016 03:33    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

The thieves, an Aboriginal group in a white 4WD station wagon, were interrupted in their looting by a passing Government Geological survey vehicle.

Without a bag of old blankets from my late mother that we had fortuitously stored underground we would not have been able to deal with the cold weather that week. Returning to Alice would had been the only option. There are no time extensions in the Project schedule as the Bass Strait ferry bookings we have for our two vehicles are set in stone. Its one of the crazy things about transport to Tasmania. Maybe its done to keep us on the island and visitors away.

So after camp patch up, we got on with the core business. Seb had bought his own 4WD in and swag so he was good to go. Our first task was to finish a 0.5 metre cut across a 2.5 metre width into the Adit face that Craig and I had started preparing at the end of trip 4. There was 4 years of wet weather waste rock dumping and 30 year old fossickers rubble that needed removing to advance the face.



2016 2 Fig 2.jpg
 Description:
PHOTO 2. Carrying a large slab containing suns from L3 in the Adit Drive during Trip 6 and Adit Drive cut 3. Ray Grant photo.
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PostPosted: Aug 06, 2016 03:35    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

Reopening of the Adit face, now called the Adit Drive (AD) was an important step in the Project. It was preceded by a reinterpretation of the geology of the azurite deposit, triggered by depletion in azurite mineralisation in the Up Dip Drive (UDD) in L1 and L2. The first four weeks work in 2016 that included 2 metres of driving in the DDD had shown that azurite richness was excellent specimen wise and constant and that the kaolinite host lens with its interbedded sandstone and quartzite layers was not tapering as originally expected but was actually thickening. This was proven by hammer drilling into the floor to find the depth of kaolinite as described in our first newsletter. As the boundary between the DDD direction and the AD is marked by a 0.5 down throw fault, it made sense to open the old Adit Drive centred on the anticlinal cusp and start pushing an exploration tunnel to test if the azurite mineralisation persisted to an acceptable level of quality and quantity. Seb added to this by pointing out on Trip 5 that the brecciated copper oxide rock he had noted in a quarry behind our mine hill suggested that the copper mineralising system could be continous from our waste rock dump area exposure of the same brecciated material documented in previous newsletters 120 metres to the east to the quarry. Google sat photos suggested a linear ~ E-W trend is possible. We had been deterred from re-entering the Adit Drive as past exploration indicated unfavourable groundwater impact on the azurite and a tapering of the kaolinite lens. Could we punch through this?

An important feature of the Adit Drive (AD) cuts was the exposing of the kaolinite and quartzite injectite at the base of the drive, the same layer encountered in the down faulted DDD as seen in Newsletter 1 Photo 5. And this injectite 1.5 and 2 metres into the tunnel was becoming enriched not just in atacamite but chrysocolla and azurite. You may say “well so what!”. Well add this to the large azurite disks found in sandstone/clay contact in this area we have both a serious large scale injectite being encountered not identified previously and an increase in copper mineralisation in the whole vertical face of the drive.



2016 2 Fig 3.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 3. Trimming with fine wood chisels at the collecting face in the Down Dip Drive with Seb looking on with baited breath. This drive has been developed over the last 4 years as a fall back face to the UDD. Exploration is always a must.
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2016 2 Fig 3.jpg



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PostPosted: Aug 06, 2016 03:37    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

Once Seb and I completed the 0.5 metre cut in the Adit Drive and carried out collecting, we moved to the DDD, our 2016 bread and butter area, and completed over the remainder of the week a 0.5 metre cut. Collecting the L1 to L3 layers took 3.5 days.

So the three of us mined away for 6 days during Trip 5. Seb was happy with his rocks he took home. He had never seen so much azurite in one place. Maureen and I enjoyed his company and humour and admire this young man’s dedication to field collecting. Yes, Germans do have a sense of humour and we hope to stay in contact when he returns to Germany.



2016 2 Fig 4.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 4. An excellent thick crystalline azurite sun in matrix seen insitu during Trip 5 with Seb in the DDD. 5 inches in diameter.
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2016 2 Fig 4.jpg



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PostPosted: Aug 06, 2016 03:38    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

Trip 6 was a big change in personnel. Maureens son flew into to Alice Springs, a veteran of the early mining efforts and fresh from building bushwalking tracks in the Hobart area and playing 6 games of basketball a week as well as Ray and Cynthia Grant arrived from Arizona via Western Australia in their 4WD. Ray and Cynthia visited the mine in 2012 and Dehne and Ray published a detailed article on the mineralisation in Rocks and Minerals in the Nov-Dec issue in 2012.

So we ventured out again with 3 vehicles in convoy after a 3 day break in Alice and recommenced mining our last cut for 2016 into the DDD. While Tim, Maureen and Dehne got stuck into the mining face with big hammers, Ray and Cynthia set up camp using their own camping system as they had been out of remote area camping practice for 4 years. We had a tent for them as a second worker had dropped out but their giant blow up bed needed their own tent. Beware the giant blow up beds as they love taking up room and then deflating at the wrong time. Stretchers are recommended.

So we had 5 people at once for a week in the wild yet to be increased by two for a short period from the Northern Territory Government (NTG). The NTG is remapping the local 1:250,000 geological map sheet last published by the BMR in 1964. Some of the survey team, Nigel and Jake, visited during T6. We showed them the underground workings, provided a copy of our 2012 Rocks and Minerals mine article and requested any feedback on information they may collect on the local and regional plunge of the anticline we were mining in.



2016 2 Fig 5.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 5. Sandstone injectite cross section showing shredded kaolinite clasts. We love this stuff as it speaks of the dynamic hydraulic environment that formed this unique azurite deposit. Rays Photo. Facebooked it as well.
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2016 2 Fig 5.jpg



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PostPosted: Aug 06, 2016 03:47    Post subject: Re: Malbunka Copper Mine, Home of the Azurite Suns - (23)  

Information on our mine anticline plunge could be useful in firming up reserve estimates beyond year 5. The sedimentary lens containing the kaolinite/azurite association is not exposed on the opposite side of the hill to the mine and one interpretation is that, instead of tapering out as previously thought, it could continue subsurface below a quarry containing brecciated rock with copper oxides. The possibility of an intersection of brecciated and mineralised rock from a near vertical fracture zone with the azurite containing clay lens is quite possible and exciting.

The 2.5 metres of new driving down the Adit Drive in 2016 has demonstrated an increase in copper mineralisation volume and distribution in the total 2 metre vertical face. Coupled with the azurite mineralisation in the DDD encountered in 2016 which parallels the Adit Drive, the persistent mineralisation in the anticlinal down dip cusp and near anticlinal limbs gives cause to be optimistic over the future of the Project. In these favourable circumstances, marketing becomes the limiting factor on financial income, not production.



2016 2 Fig 6.jpg
 Locality:
Malbunka copper Mine, Western Aranda, Ltalaltuma, Australia
 Description:
PHOTO 6. Adit Drive cut 3, azurite, atacamite, azurite and chrysocolla plus malachite.
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2016 2 Fig 6.jpg



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