Wednesday, December 13, 2017

CH6 Colours

CH-6 Colour Comparison

When one looks at the value of a kimberlite pipe, they need to look at size, quality, inclusions, and also colour of the stone.

CH-6 valuation model is based heavily on the white/colourless stones that it produces. Here is a look at the colour distribution from 3 main sample populations.




The bulk sample was completed at surface in amongst the less dense weathered kimberlite. The pre-2017 core was basically core drilling processed with caustics and was drilled down to about 250 metres. The 2017 core was the recent program where they not only targeted the top 250 metres of the pipe, but also focused on defining the part of the pipe between 250 metres down to 500 metres. This last core drill program produced the 4 fragments of a unique green stone.

The great news about these ratios is that the white/colourless population is pretty much identical between the 3 sample populations. That gives good indication that mine production at Chidliak would produce about 40% of nice clear white/colourless stones on a regular basis.

The Off-white population is a bit more variable, but still shows a mine production that produces at least 30% off-white stones.

The next colours (Yellow, Grey, Brown and Green) are quite variable among the 3 sample populations. Grey and Brown are showing in very small amounts in the core samples, yet was prevalent at surface in the bigger macro population within the weathered kimberlite. Is this variance due to size of the stones in the sample or is it to do with the locale of the sample?  The opposite was true with the yellow population. The Bulk sample had less yellow then the two core populations.

It is probably safe to say that a mine at CH6 chidliak would produce up to 30% of varying combinations of yellow and grey/brown with the yellow's slightly bleeding into the green landscape. Most of this material will be on the lower end of the value spectrum with the exception of the bleeding into the green colouring. If green stones are produced in any statistical quantity at CH-6, that could add significant $$'s to the project.

 




Tuesday, December 12, 2017

Exploration Opportunities

Exploration Opportunities at Chidliak.

Peregrine Diamonds is finally moving into planning for a mobile DMS (Dense Media Separation Plant) at site. The current design capacity for the DMS unit is 10 tph (tonnes per hour) and Peregrine is looking at specific sites that make sense. Beyond that, permitting will be key, final design, and of course the money to fund the purchase. This unit will be used to cycle material that is trenched at CH6, CH7 and CH44. It will then look at material that has been extracted via LDD RC (large diameter drill - reverse circulation). After all that, it will then look at processing material from CH1, CH31, CH33, CH45, CH46, etc. It will process this based on the priority that Peregrine puts on them. There is probably at least 10,000 tonnes of targeted material to process before they move onto prioritizing the next stage of material to go through the DMS. Any trench work that is done at other pipes (beyond the initial three) will need more overburden definition that will most likely include the use of a heli-RC rig to poke several holes through the top of the kimberlite pipe at surface.

A lot of that work above utilizes trench work, LDD RC , Heli-RC...but not much use of the core drilling. Core drilling will be used to further define the pipes at depth and to gather more microdiamond information as needed, but with the DMS unit, it is not necessarily ideal for bulk material gathering. One can put a bigger core drill bit on the units and collect 20 or 30 tonne samples from deposits, but the main use of the core drills is to obtain microdiamond results for analysis. Where is the best fit for these core drills? Exploration opportunities on site may make the most sense.

Two of the key high profile opportunities on site could be both Area B and CH-61.

CH61:

Here are some details on CH-61 --> CH61 Kimberlite Details

Summary - CH-61 was discovered in 2012 via surface prospecting with an estimated 2.4 hectare size. It was discovered right near the time when the summer program was cut short that year because of cash liquidity issues. In 2013, as part of a due diligence program, De Beers ran gravity measurements over 9 grids at Chidliak. This included the CH-61 kimberlite pipe. De Beers eventually chose not to continue with Chidliak in the fall of 2013 and CH-61 has been left undrilled and untested.

This is what Peregrine had to say in 2012 -- "CH-61 will be evaluated by drilling in a future program". They said it will be evaluated by drilling...not evaluated for drilling in a future program.

CH-61 is about 20 km's SE of CH-7 and that has made it out of the very focused Priority circle that Peregrine has used to develop its current mine plan.  This does need at least one drill hole poked through it to confirm if a kimberlite pipe of this size has the potential to be a high value pipe.

Area B:

Here are some details on Area B --> Area B Anomaly

Summary - Area B was discovered in 2012 with discovery of some high interest kimberlite float. De Beers followed up in 2013 with their due diligence program that included some work on Area B.

The potential for a discovery at Area B is significant and yet deferral of any drill work on the site as been deferred to focus on the PEA (preliminary economic assessment) for the project. The potential has been high up on the list as indicated by Peregrine including this area in several of the exploration presentations over the years.

Area B is about 15 km's East of CH-6 and like CH-61, it is not included in the priority circle that Peregrine has focused on. This does need some drilling onsite to confirm the potential. It may need more then one drill hole as it is a bit more complex of an anomaly then the traditional anomalies...hence the name of 'Area' instead of 'anomaly'.