Property Location
3D Model of the Lac des Iles Deposit
Offset Zone Cross Section 506N
(Looking North)
Offset Zone Cross Section 506N
(Looking West)
Geology
The Lac des Iles Mining Operation is located 85 km north of the city of Thunder Bay, Ontario. The Roby Zone Deposit is hosted within an Archean aged (2689.0 +/-1.0 Ma) suite of mafic/ultramafic intrusives called the Lac des Iles Intrusive Complex (LDI-IC).
The LDI-IC lies immediately north of the boundary between the Wabigoon and Quetico Subprovinces (which is marked by the Quetico Fault Zone) of the Canadian Shield and is the largest of a series of mafic to ultramafic (MUM) intrusives that define a regional circular pattern approximately 30 km in diameter.
The LDI-IC has been subdivided into three main intrusives bodies, from north to south, these are: the North Lac des Isles Intrusion (predominantly ultramafic in composition), the Mine Block Intrusion or MBI (compositionally and texturally the most complex and the host for the Roby Zone Ore Body), and the Camp Lake Intrusive (a border phase of the Shelby Lake Sanukatoid).
The Roby Zone Ore Body is dominated by varitextured gabbro containing pipes and pods of breccia. The breccia contains blocks up to (~60 m across) of varying lithology. Mineralization at Lac des Iles occurs as: (1) PGE-Ni-Cu rich breccias (breccia ore); (2) mineralized dikes or sills (North Roby Zone); and (3) within a 15m to 25m thick unit of high grade Pd mineralization located along the eastern portion of the Roby Zone in contact with the barren East Gabbro that forms the hangingwall of the deposit.
Mineralization to date at the Roby Zone has been outlined by surface trenching and diamond drilling over a 900m long by 850m wide area, and has been traced to a vertical depth of 1220m.
Current Exploration Activities
During 2005, the Company completed a 15 hole, 18,230 metre deep drill program designed to test the down plunge extension of the High Grade Offset Zone.� This zone has now been traced for over 600m along strike and 700m down dip and it remains open down plunge and to a large degree down dip. The Exploration Group was successful in expanding the known inferred resource from 1.03 million ounces to 2.455 million ounces of palladium. Roscoe Postle Associates Inc. recently completed an updated resource estimate for the Offset High Grade Zone at a 3.2 gram per tonne palladium equivalent incremental cut-off. The study defined an inferred resource of 14.59 million tonnes grading 5.24 grams per tonne palladium (7.26 grams per tonne palladium equivalent) within the mineralized envelope.
Assays results from this years program included: 136.70m @ 5.56 gpt palladium, 0.37 gpt platinum, 0.34 gpt gold, 0.09% copper, and 0.12% nickel from hole 05-016 which is the strongest intercept drilled to date on either the High Grade or Offset High Grade Zone. These types of widths are significant because they may be amenable to future lower cost, large scale bulk mining techniques.
During the 2005 drill program a potential second zone of higher grade mineralization (Roby Footwall) was intersected in several of the holes in the footwall to the main High Grade Offset Zone. This zone will be further evaluated in 2006 with our planned infill drilling program.
The Company�s Board of directors has approved a $3.3 million dollar budget for 2006 to better define and upgrade a portion of the known inferred resource of the Offset High Grade Zone. Current drill spacings within the Offset Zone are approximately 120 to 140m. This infill program is designed to tighten up this spacing to approximately 50x50 meters in and around some of our recent wider intercepts.
Currently the Company has two surface drill rigs active at Lac des Iles. It is hoped that by the fourth quarter of 2006 there will be sufficient underground development completed so the Company can start drilling off the Offset High Grade Zone from underground.
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