Barton Gold’s mill clean-up yield now hits $3.4m worth of gold
Barton also has 10t (wet) of gold it will process and sell “in due course”.
Barton Gold (ASX: BGD) has the results back from the second parcel of sweepings it sent for analysis from the mothballed Central Gawler mill — and the gold recovered has now reached a value of about $3.4 million.
And there is one final parcel yet to be sent off for processing.
The mill is located at the historic Challenger mine in South Australia which operated between 2002 and 2018, producing 1.2 million ounces of gold.
The mill is being prepared for re-start when production begins from Barton’s two gold projects in the Tarcoola region.
Barton’s first parcel of 3.8 tonnes yielded about 375oz of gold, worth roughly A$1.1 million, that 3.8 tonnes returning gold at an average grade of 3,000 grams per tonne.
Second parcel returns higher grades, more ounces
The second batch sent to a laboratory, weighing about 3.6 tonnes, returned an average grade of 7,000 grams per tonne for about 815oz.
That means the clean-up of the mill has now yielded about 1,190oz.
The clean-up at the mill has so far produced about 10 tonnes of gold-bearing materials from the gold room, ball mills, sumps, floor and gravity circuit.
The cleaning program was undertaken last December.
Gold income will advance regional work
Barton Gold says the third, and final, mill parcel of about 3 tonnes is scheduled to go through processing beginning mid-July.
Barton Gold does caution that these parcel results figures are indicative only “and final recoveries may vary significantly based upon metallurgical and other factors”.
Managing director Alex Scanlon says the Central Gawler mill is already yielding considerable value to Barton shareholders as the company pursues Stage 1 re-start work at the mill.
“Sale proceeds will provide significant additional cash to advance our regional strategy,” he added
Only gold mill in region
Barton Gold listed on the ASX in 2021 bringing to the market South Australian assets.
These were the Tarcoola project near the junction of the trans-continental and Darwin railway lines and, 70km to the south, the unmined Tunkilla project which had a JORC resource in place.
In addition, Barton had acquired the region’s only gold ore processing mill, the Challenger plant (as well as the mothballed Challenger mine which is not deemed a priority).
Tarcoola until 1956 was South Australia’s major hard rock gold mine, producing 77,000oz at an average 37.5g/t.
Mining resumed at Tarcoola in 2016 when the former WPG Resources worked the open pit and hauled ore to the Challenger mill, the operation lasting until 2018.