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Show j . Ohio Copper World's Unique Mine (Uy (Jail Martin, Mining Editor, Salt Lake Tribune) - - , , - ' -' ' Irrigation as applied to mining; min-ing; the process of disolving the mineral contents of low grade copper rock by "leaching in place" of huge tonages of ore thus eliminating drilling, blasting, blast-ing, stoping, transportation, crushing and milling operations the possibilities of a type of pra ctically new to the mineral industry were exhibited to a group of representative Utah business men and engineers headed by Governor Charier II. Mabey. On the arrival at the Bingham Bin-gham property the surface of the Ohio Copper estate and the method of watering were first inspected. The formation is idea lly suited to leaching. The disseminating dis-seminating quartzite ore body has been thoroughly shattereed by fissures striking and dipping in all directions by the sills and and dikes extending from the im mense monzonite intrusions which from the Utah Copper deposit de-posit on the other side of the canyon. Cleaving the natural fissur- Turner, to the Ohio Copper k shaft where they were lowered , to the 750 level. At this horizon a trip was made through heading bordering border-ing the caved portion of he mine The scattered portion of the whole mass of quartzite was strikingly apparent. Even in j this portion of the mine, where no water has ever been run, the heat is so great as to be very un-1 comfortable and the air is bad. j For long distances the sides ! of the drifts are covered with i the copper sulphates of nearly every rare and delicate shade of green ranging from deep emer- aid to jade. In the cave portions of the! mine, merely because of the ox-1 idation resulting from air circu- j lating through the fissures and myriads of seams, the temperature temper-ature is unbearably warm and ! the air suffocating. Here the drifts are frosted, top, bottom; and sides, with crystals of malachite mal-achite hue, making drab, grim underground workings to ap-j pear as rifts in a summer sky ! leading to unknown depths of1 cerulean beauty. Next the Mascotte tunnel level le-vel was visited a distance of 1, j 100 feet, by the inclined Ohio Copper shaft, or 1080 feet below the surface. About 800 feet from the end of the East drift the water pours out of he fissure system a dear blue-green liquid. li-quid. The drift has been dammed dam-med up to form a reservoir. From thence the solution is led through troughs to the launder system, 1(500 feet in length on both sides of the tunnel. On one side the mineral-bearing liquid could be seen passing through the tanks filled with scrap iron, gradually replacing the iron and dropping its copper These two top pictures illustrate illus-trate the manner of watering the surface of the Ohio Copper Mine. Troughs and pipes carry the water to the desired spot. ( This picture shows the launder laun-der system through t which the water released over 1100 feet above is run after percolating through the crushed low grade ore deposits. Piled in the troughs can be seen the scrap iron used to precipitate the copper contained con-tained in the malachite-hued water. wa-ter. The product, a reddish mud assaying over 90 per cent pure copper, settles through a wooden wood-en screen to the bottom of the trough, from which it is shov eled on clean-up days, loaded into in-to electrically propelled cars run alongside and then pulled a distance dis-tance of three miles to the mouth of the Mascotte tunnel at Lark. Thence it is consigned to a Salt Lake Valley smelter. So strong is the solution that a nail held in it a few seconds comes out a bright copper hue. At the end of the launder the water robbed of its mineral, pours out into a dich a clear crystal, slightly azure colored. Launders on the other side of the tunnel were dry so that the various stages of precipitation precipita-tion could be seen. Some were heaped high with scrap tin ready for precipitation. Others but a few days ago full of iron showed but a reddish pile of scraps of the original metal In the bottom of the launders, into which it had dropped through a wooden false bottom, lay the product, a copper "mud" resembling both in consistency and color a rich mud carrying from 90 to 9r per cent pure copper. One of the features favorably commented upon was the new lighting system. Electric lights strung over the launders for a distance of 1600 feet on both sides at intervals of sixteen feet simplify and expidite operations to a great extent. The substantial substan-tial redwood launders and ten-inch ten-inch water pipe, the relay system sys-tem of electrically driven pumps were also inspected. At noon the visitors were hoisted to the surface, where each one was furnished with a well filled individual lunch box, the compliments of the management. manage-ment. Information concerning a'l phases of the operations were freely supplied by General Manager Man-ager Kellock and Superinten dent Turner and employees of the company. Present output of the company since the new equipment eq-uipment capable of pumping 1, 500 gallons of water from the Mascotte tunnel level to the surface sur-face per minute has been put into operation a period starting start-ing the first of November is at the rate of 750,000 pounds a month Recoveries are maintaining a high average, holding well above . 90 per cent over the year. Cost m of producing copper is ranking below 6 1-2 cents a pound, making mak-ing the Ohio Copper company one of the three or four lowest cost producers in the world. At the close of the trip members mem-bers of the party made up of representatives of Utah's largest larg-est mining companies were convinced con-vinced that by application of an old princiual in a startlingly original or-iginal way, an abandoned property prop-erty has been rejuvenated; an ore body which could not be worked profitably with copper less than 20 cents a pound has been made a steady and long type of operation proved practical, pract-ical, thus pointing the way for the development of other low grade tonages in Utah and other mining states of the west. ing are a system of great sub-sidance sub-sidance fractures resulting from the caving method of stoping formerly used. While many of these have been filled by recent erosion, there are still many cav ities hundreds of feet deep. As a result, the condition of the deposit de-posit lying within the bounder-ies bounder-ies of the Ohio Copper mine estimated to contain over 70, 000,000 tons of ore and 500,-000,000 500,-000,000 pounds of metal could hardly be better suited to leaching leach-ing in place than if operations had been purposely conducted for this type of procedure. So thoroughly is the ground cut by fissures, seams and fract ures that the whole block is po- The party saw one spot, triangular tri-angular in shape, 100 feet long and twenty feet at the base, con taining not over 1000 square feet, which had been continuously continuo-usly watered from December of last year to November of this year without any appreciable diminution of the value of the water being caught in the Mascotte Mas-cotte tunnel level and with the result of making over 2,000,000 pounds of copper. On returning to the company's com-pany's office the party was furnished fur-nished with "digging clothes" carbide lamps, hats and rubbers and then conducted by General Manager Samuel K. Kellock and Superintendent Frederick R. rous and intersticed to such a degree that its state is comparable compar-able to the material forming a macadamized road. Channeling of water seems impossible. Water Wa-ter released on the surface sinks through the ore body to the Mas cote tunnel level, from 1000 to 1300 feet vertically below, depending de-pending upon the slope of the ground. At present the water pumped by the company's plant installed last summer and put into operation oper-ation the first of the month is being eiv.ptied into one large o-pen o-pen fissure. In level places the water is distributed over the surf.e through holes bored at rojuhr intervals in the troughs. Group of representative mining men headed by Governor Charles E. Mabey who inspected the new installation instal-lation of the Ohio Copper company. First row (left to right) Gail Martin, H. B. Aven, R. J. Bryant, J. W. Knight, Governor Mabey, L. S. Gates, Samuel K. Kellock, Charles L. Smith, Norman Blye and L. K. Nicholson. Second Row Oscar Friendly, Boyd J. Bernard, J. B. Robb, H. R. Trenholme, R, L. Andrewberg, J. D. Shilling, F. A. Wardlaw, H. M. Hartmann and Louis Buckman. Third Row R. P. Nell, R. F. McElvenny, John E. Bergh, H. C. Goodrich, E. A. Hamilton and Frederick E. Turner. |