Rumble Resources (ASX:RTR) is considering toll milling options for its Western Queen Gold-Tungsten Project in Western Australia following a better-than-expected resource upgrade.
There are five processing facilities within a 200km radius of Western Queen.
Rumble yesterday (23 July) unveiled a 29% bigger gold resource of 3.72 million tonnes @ 3.1 grams per tonne gold for 370,000 contained ounces. The grade increased 53%.
Speaking on the sidelines of the Noosa Mining Investor Conference, Managing Director Peter Harold tells Mining.com.au that Rumble was not expecting the resource to increase as much as it did.
“Based off the drilling we thought there’d be a little bit, but when we’ve looked at it from an underground perspective and we’ve redone the wireframing, we’ve realised that there’s quite a substantial difference when we change the cut off grade,” he explains.
“So it’s been a good exercise and it was really initiated when we had a look at the open pit and realised the capital had gone up a bit and we were better off to look at the underground.”
Rumble is now revising its numbers to work out whether to move forward with an open pit development or an open pit and underground development.
“We’re still talking to a lot of different people about toll treatment,” Harold says.
“So now what we really need to do is some infill drilling to convert more of that inferred into indicated. That’s probably the key and that’s something that we’re looking at now.”
Western Queen historically produced 880,000 tonnes @ 7.6g/t for 215,000 ounces of gold.
Rumble says Western Queen shows possible similarities to Spartan Resources (ASX:SPR) Never Never Deposit, which has a resource of 6.75 million tonnes @ 8.65g/t for 1.88 million contained ounces down to a vertical depth of 1km.
The company previously inked a term sheet with Bain Global Resources – a subsidiary of major Indian mining contractor BGR Mining and Infra – and MEGA Resources to mine the open pits at Western Queen.
MEGA is providing the mining services and Bain is investing up to $35 million for working capital.
Rumble’s goal is to start production in 2026.
The company is also considering bringing in a partner for its Earaheedy Zinc-Lead Sulphide Project in Western Australia.
Earaheedy hosts an inferred resource of 94 million tonnes @ 3.1% zinc plus lead and 4.1g/t silver for 2.2 million tonnes of contained zinc, 700,000 tonnes of contained lead and 12.6 million ounces of contained silver.
Rumble is in the process of completing a Scoping Study, which Harold says is expected to be completed in about four weeks.
“We want to know the order of magnitude, what’s the capital, what’s the opex so that we can open up a data room and bring some potential partners in,” Harold says.
“This is all going to be happening in the second half of this year.”
Mining.com.au is an official media partner of the Noosa Mining Investor Conference.
Write to Angela East at Mining.com.au
Images: Rumble Resources
