ASX-listed Classic Minerals is making steady progress on its ambitions to become a gold producer and has begun installing a processing plant on foundations at the company’s flagship Kat Gap project in the WA Goldfields.
The company reports that the heaviest parts of the plant have been placed on the pad and is being secured to foundations. Work is now beginning on ancillary and supporting structures in addition to electrical and plumbing work.
Classic has made steady progress in recent months along the path of evolving from explorer to producer. Since the State regulator gave the green light to the gold processing project in November last year, work has focused on such areas as the tailings facility and enabling water to be pumped from a bore about one kilometre away to large storage tanks.
Classic opted for the Australian-made Gekko processing plant, saying its advantages include being scalable, able to be delivered in a transportable modular design and is well suited to Kat Gap’s mineralisation.
Kat Gap is approximately 170km south of Southern Cross and 50km south of the company’s Forrestania gold project.
Forrestania comprises the Lady Magdalene and Lady Ada deposits, 250,000 ounces gold and 59,700 ounces gold respectively. However, Kat Gap is Classic’s flagship project boasting almost 93,000 ounces of gold and is the highest-grade contributor to Classic’s total inventory of 403,906 ounces gold with a grade going 2.96 grams per tonne gold.
The company is keeping a keen eye on the economics of its gold processing plan, aiming to cut overhead costs and mitigate risks with a staged approach to mining at Kat Gap. Classic hopes it will not take long to reach full-scale production thanks to its strong grades and near-surface mineralisation, in addition to the prospect of new zones outside the original drilling perimeters.
Some idea of the potential was revealed in January when Classic announced assay results from extensional drilling. Headline figures included a 6m section going 12.12g/t gold from 70m, featuring a 1m hit at a very impressive 51.1 g/t gold from 70m. Another drill hole returned a 10m intercept grading 9.26 g/t gold from 57m, including a 3m hit of 28.3 g/t gold from 70m.
However, before any mining begins at Kat Gap Classic is aiming to work its way through a bulk sample ore stockpile of 6500 tonnes at 6g/t gold ready to be processed as soon as Gekko is up and running. Gekko is expected to recover about 96 per cent of the precious metal from its ore.
With the gold price undergoing a welcome resurgence since last November – it put on almost 2 per cent last Friday alone – Classic Minerals will be glad when Gekko starts earning its keep and churning out the gold bars.
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By Matt Birney
