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By T. E. Burke-Gaffney

SHERRIT Gordon Mines transplanted a 2000- ton mining plant and concentrator along with a town and its people 165 miles into undeveloped and almost inaccessible country in shifting its base of operations to the new mine at Lynn Lake. Faced with ultimate exhaustion of its ore bodies at Sherridon, Manitoba, the company, beginning in 1938, carried out an intensive program of prospecting and exploration in search of a new property. Late in 1945, diamond drilling of a magnetic anomaly near a minor surface expression of metallic sulphides gave promise of what has developed into the Lynn Lake nickel-copper deposit.

Jan 6, 1953

By Howard S. Strouth

SINCE the days of the Conquistadores, people have told exaggerated tales of the wealth and possibilities of Mexico and Central and South America, and the mining fraternity has never been known to exaggerate any less than any other professional group known to man or beast. However, during a short stay in Mexico one can probably hear more whoppers than at any other time, when dozens of mining propositions are thrust across the desk, and it is not necessary to remind anyone that a listing of the do's and don't's for Mexico requires special mention of the fact that most mining propositions offered south of the border eventually turn out to be a beautiful fairy tale. The following is not suposed to be either an exact description of Standard Mining Corp.'s operations in Mexico by its mining associate, the Corporacion Minera y Beneficiadora Anahuac, S.A., or the last word as to the most economical way to start such an operation. But rather it is the sum total of the recent experiences of the writer while commencing such an operation in 1951-52 with the help of many qualified gentlemen.

Jan 6, 1953

Jan 6, 1953

By Charles M. Cooley

DURING the last week in April, cards were sent out from New York to Institute members affiliated with the Mining, Geology, and Geophysics Div. The cards requested recipients to indicate their main technical interest, within the division, i.e., mining, or geology, or geophysics. The reason for the cards is simple. Within the Institute more than 8000 have expressed either primary or secondary interest in this division. However, there is no way to determine the technical association stimulating this interest.

Jan 6, 1953

By E. W. Felegy

THE need for improved mine communication to increase efficiency and to insure greater safety has long been recognized. General and unrestricted communication between all points underground, and between the surface and all points underground, is probably the least advanced phase of the mining industry. An ideal system of mine communication must re- quire no fixed wire installations. The equipment must be small, lightweight, and readily portable, and the power requirements low. A system that can be used not only under normal circumstances but also in an emergency, when the continuity of wires, tracks, and pipelines may be disrupted, must function independently of any aid furnished by standard installations.

Jan 5, 1953

Mining and oil industry representatives are scheduled to testify May 15 at hearings on the Simpson bill to extend the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act, Several Congressmen have introduced bills to extend present trade agreements without modification. Price of copper appears to be stabilizing at 30[] per lb, after a period where market price ranged from 27 to 34[]. Copper offerings from abroad were finding no takers at 30.24[] per lb late in April.

Jan 5, 1953

By Chung Yu Wang

STUDY of two recent papers and a recent book leads one to raise anew the question-Why are certain regions of the earth more mineralized than others?

Jan 5, 1953

ION exchange is one of hydrometallurgy's new tools, new in application, vet old in principle. Cation exchange between solution and a solid exchanger has been known for more than a century, but ion exchange is still in its infancy for metallurgical use. Still hampered by cost of media, it is faced with much development of actual physical handling. Growing consumption of the rarer metals and need to treat leaner ores are pushing extractive methods ahead. Public concern with stream pollution, or legal requirements, are forcing a clean-up of waste discharge. Industries are finding it vital to make some recovery from heretofore waste material to help pay costs of discharge treatment.

Jan 5, 1953

New Products Equipment

Jan 5, 1953

AN indication that Mesabi Range iron use companies may develop their own flotation processes for low grade iron ores is the report that Cleveland Cliffs Iron Co. is adopting a variation of one of the oldest known methods at its new Michigan treatment plant. Basically, the method involves using fatty acids and fuel oil reagents. The idea was developed many years ago and should be free of patent control. With other laboratories working on the same tack, it seems to be a pretty good bet that they will come up with their own processes. Any outside process will have to offer considerable advantage or low royalty rate to get consideration. Much of the appeal of the fatty acid process is the cheapness of the reagent. One source is pulp paper liquor in semi-refined form. With stream pollution legislation acting as a strong pressure, paper companies have been seeking ways to dispose of the material. Wisconsin has even attempted to use it for road binder.

Jan 5, 1953

CANADA, which appears to be growing into one big mining camp, may soon be the background for another impressively large iron ore development. And again it will be Fenimore Iron Mines who will be the motivating force. Dr. J. A. Retty, Fenimore president, who was one of the important figures in the development of Labrador iron deposits, predicts a great future for property on the west coast of Ungava Bay in deep northern area of New Quebec. Fenimore properties consist of a 200 sq mile concession in addition to several hundred claims over about 112 miles along the Labrador trough, mainly in the Ungava Bay region.

Jan 5, 1953

To Install Waste Heat Boiler at White Pine White Pine Copper Co.'s smelter 18 miles southwest of Ontonagon, Mich., will have a six story high boiler utilizing what otherwise would be waste heat from a copper reverberatory furnace. Designed and under construction by the Babcock & Wilcox Co., the boiler will supply steam to a turbo-generator furnishing power for the projected development. The boiler will be in line with and following the reverberatory furnace. Using waste heat from the furnace in place of fuel for steam generation, about 50 pct of heat in the fuel originally supplied to the furnace will be recovered by the waste heat boiler. Exploration conducted over the past 15 years at White Pine, wholly owned subsidiary of Copper Range Co., has disclosed reserves of 309 million tons averaging 21.3 lb of copper per ton. Ore mineral is chiefly chalcocite (Cu2s).

Jan 5, 1953

Rum Jungle -deep in the unlovely Australian bush - is the scene of one of the world's most promising uranium finds.

Jan 5, 1953

By Reynold Q. Shotts

Nitric acid oxidation rate analyses of three coals, previously studied microscopically by the Bureau of Mines, revealed three components. Relative quantities agree with those found for the four components given by the Bureau and results are consistent with current ideas of coal constitution. Possible multi-component composition for bright coal and a reactivity-rank relation are suggested.

Jan 5, 1953

By Max Stern

ROOM and pillar coal mining methods employed in the United States keep the roof at original height by leaving untouched pillars of coal in the face area. But, German coal mines of the Ruhr district are exclusively operated on the longwall system. With this method the whole length of the coal face advances and the roof in the face area sinks 10 to 15 pct of seam thickness. Behind the face the roof may drop 50 to 80 pct of seam thickness due to the high rock pressures encountered at average mining depth of 2250 ft. Mining depth is increasing 20 to 30 ft per year.

Jan 5, 1953

LOUIS Buchman walks down the hall of Kennecott's Chrysler Building offices as if he belonged there, but it wasn't his setting of choice. The West has become his home, that and the scene of operations is there. When he was a child his family came to the United States from Latvia and settled in Michigan's Upper Peninsula where he went to school and on to Michigan College of Mines. Graduating with B.S. and E.M. degrees, he headed west in 1907 to the mining camp of Ophir, in the state where he spent the bulk of his career - Utah.

Jan 5, 1953

By J. Walter Snavely

PRESENT-DAY processing in many industries, calcining, sintering, briquetting, beneficiation and nodulizing, increasingly calls for the handling of large volumes of hot bulk materials. Various types of conveyors have been employed. This discussion will cover the factors governing their selection. For temperature ranges up to 400°F, or approximately 200°C, a wide range of conveyors is available. Special constructions of rubber conveyor belts. steel conveyor belts, vibrating and shaker conveyors, apron conveyors, and drag chain conveyors, all are used successfully. As temperatures go well above 400°F, however, choice of conveyors is narrowly limited. This paper will consider the problem of handling bulk materials only where the temperatures exceed 400°F.

Jan 5, 1953

Use of rock grinding media in a mill at Tennessee Copper Corp. was mentioned in the MINING ENGINEERING Annual Review. (February 1953, page 158). Because interest in use of self-grinding media continues high we asked F. M. Lewis, Superintendent of Concentration at Tennessee Copper, to supply more details on this trial, and of plans to expand use of rock media in their mills that grind marble. Here is what he reports.

Jan 5, 1953

By Paul F. Kerr

Uranium mineralization occurs in the footwall of the Sunshine vein from the 2900 to the 3700 level. Veinlets of uraninite associated with pyrite and jasper have been so extensively divided and recemented that units more than a few feet in length are seldom observed. The wall rock is St. Regis quartzite of the Belt series. The age of the uraninite, on the basis of isotopic analyses, is 750 t- 50, which agrees with geological data suggesting that phases of the Sunshine mineralization are pre-Cambrian.

Jan 5, 1953

By Kenneth B. Powell

EIGHT years ago the Eagle Mountain iron ore deposit located in the hills of the Colorado Desert in the extreme southeast part of California was known only to a few geologists, mining men and the oldest of the desert prospectors. Today, the deposit is the Kaiser Steel Corp.'s Eagle Mountain Mine, and the once lonely hills now shelter a model community of 225 people enjoying all modern conveniences. Nearest town to the mine is Indio, 60 miles distant by an excellent highway. Elevations at the deposit vary from 1400 to 3000 ft. The mine enjoys winter resort weather between October and May with occasional drops to 25" at night. From June to September temperatures rise to 120" at times. Rainfall is scant, approximately 2 in. per year, the majority of which comes during the summer months as cloudbursts.

Jan 5, 1953