Warriedar Resources’ (ASX: WA8) initial flotation testing of a primary antimony composite core sample from Ricciardo delivered a saleable concentrate grade of 38.5% Sb at a high antimony recovery of 83%.
Ricciardo is part of the Golden Range Project in the Murchison region of Western Australia.
Diamond drilling undertaken at the Ricciardo deposit last year revealed high-grade antimony intervals, such as 1.9m at 28.5% Sb. A subsequent review of historical drill assay results revealed the potential for a significant, high-grade antimony deposit at Ricciardo.
Given this potential, Sb mineralised core samples from the 2024 diamond program were despatched for initial metallurgical testing. The preliminary test work on a composite sample demonstrated the potential to produce an antimony concentrate grading 38.5% Sb and recovering 83% of the in-situ antimony (following grinding to 65% passing 75 microns).
Subsequently, detailed bench flotation test work was completed. Using the same grind parameters, the new results demonstrate the recovery of an antimony concentrate grading at a substantially higher grade of 48.5% Sb and delivered at a still attractive 80.8% Sb recovery and 2.7% mass pull.
The next stage of antimony metallurgical test work will focus on optimising the current metallurgical processes. This will include evaluating the antimony mineralogy and metallurgical characteristics of other parts of the Ricciardo deposit and the recently discovered antimony mineralisation south of Ricciardo.
“This latest set of antimony metwork from Ricciardo is further excellent news. It demonstrates the potential to produce a considerably higher antimony concentrate grade, for only a very modest recovery trade-off of circa 2%, Managing Director and CEO, Amanda Buckingham, said.
“The context to the two sets of metwork results to date is the identification of significant volumes of antimony at Ricciardo during H2 2024. This includes high-grade zones that appear relatively discrete from the higher-grade gold mineralisation but are not yet well-defined and show serious scale and grade potential.
“Further antimony-focused metallurgical test work is planned for Ricciardo, as well as testing of primary antimony samples from other identified areas within the ‘Golden Corridor’ at Golden Range.
“We are also on track for the declaration of a maiden antimony Mineral Resource Estimate for Ricciardo during the current quarter. While we are excited about this emerging opportunity at Ricciardo, I want to emphasise again however that pursuit of this opportunity will be in parallel with our growth-focussed gold drilling at Golden Range, which remains our current core focus.”
