The Kilba project is located within the Ashburton Region of Western Australia, 250km southwest of Karratha. To date, Tungsten Mining have focused on the historic Zones 8, 11 and 12 that Union Carbide discovered in the 1970s. Drilling has targeted high-grade tungsten mineralisation associated with skarns and calc-silicate units situated close to the Kilba granite.
This work has defined a JORC 2012 compliant Mineral Resource of 7.2Mt at 0.19% WO3 (0.05% WO3 cut-off) comprising an Indicated Resource of 5.7Mt at 0.20% WO3 and an Inferred Resource of 1.5Mt at 0.15% WO3. A breakdown of this resource is presented below in the JORC Resource Statements section.
Metallurgical testwork shows that the tungsten is present as coarse-grained scheelite that will respond well to conventional gravity separation. Testwork completed in 2015 has demonstrated the ability to produce an extremely high grade tungsten concentrate.
Geology
Tungsten mineralisation at Kilba is associated with skarns and calc-silicate units that wrap around the Kilba granite forming a dome structure. These skarns and calc-silicate units occur in a 40 to 100 metre wide carbonate-rich unit of the Morrissey Metamorphic suite and recent mapping has defined significant strike lengths of this unit around the Kilba granite.
Drilling has only targeted a small portion of mapped skarns and there is excellent potential to discover additional tungsten mineralisation.
JORC Resource Statements
Kilba (Ashburton) JORC 2012 Compliant1
| Classification | Mt | WO3 (%) |
WO3 (Kt) |
Mo (ppm) |
Mo (Kt) |
Au (g/t) |
Au (KOz) |
Ag (g/t) |
Ag (MOz) |
Cu (%) |
Cu (Kt) |
| Measured | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – |
| Indicated | 5.7 | 0.20 | 11.5 | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – |
| Inferred | 1.5 | 0.15 | 2.2 | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – |
| Total | 7.2 | 0.19 | 13.7 | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – |
Note: Totals may differ from sum of individual numbers as numbers have been rounded in accordance with the Australian JORC code 2012 guidance on Mineral Resource reporting.
1. Refer ASX (Tungsten Mining) Announcement 30 January 2015, “Kilba Mineral Resource Update”