Drilling

PGSurvey has investigated some time ago in the potential to expand its service to its clients by offering a drilling service. The investigation indicated that there is a need in the mining industry that comprises of three categories namely:

• Auger Drilling by hand auger
• Reverse Circulation (RC) by percussion drills
• ​Diamond Drilling

Both diamond and RC drilling (recently done in association with Watermad, a division of Arundel), completed several projects. A combination of diamond and RC drilling has been conducted very successful on various chromite deposits to determine the seam thickness and to map the geological structures.

PGSurvey also established sand and stone reserves by means of a RC drilling in a crushing and screening operation. In the process we discovered a major fault and dyke zone, which caused the deep weathering zone in the granites.

Auger drilling was done on old slimes dams, with samples taken at one metre intervals and analysed for its metal content. All borehole collars and where possible the outline of the deposit were surveyed together with the assay results enabling PGSurvey to present a reserve estimate with grades.

Soil sampling was done recently to determine the clay thickness in a dry river bed.