The Goldfield news and weekly tribune. [volume] (Goldfield, Nev.) 1911-1947, 1914-08-08
Handling LOU Grade Ores

In many of the mining sections of the west, whose mines have been
productive OF shipping ores for many years, it is almost invariably the
case that immense quantities of low grade ores have been developed
which we're too hungry to permit of successful handling by any then
known method of reduction, says the Salt Lake Mining Review. Being
too low in grade to pemit of shipping with the hope of recovering more
than freight and smelling charges, and not being amenable to success
full treatment by any OF the popular methods 50 long employed in milling
practice, these ore have been allowed to accumulate on dumps and in
slopes awaiting the day when some method might be devised whereby
the millions of imperishable wealth they contained might be wreNed
from them so that they might be made a source of revenue and profit
to the min owner and to the districts in which they were produced.
For years metalurgists and minmen have been wrestling with this
most important problem, but it has been only OF recent date that any
thing like a successful solution OF the difficulty has been reached. AS
a result, experimental plants have been established at different points
and the outgrowth of this study and research has been the installation
of good-sized reduction works in several of our mining camps and dis
tricts whose successful operation is sure to be followed by the erection
of similar plants throughout the west wherever ores abound which are
too low in metallic value to pay shipping costs and which could not be
proftaby handled by any OF the standard methods OF treatment How
much this means to the mining industry can hardly be realized at the
present time, but the day is not far distant when the mine owner will
be able to install a plant at his mine or in his district with which he
can derive a profit from the ores of his mine which, until now, have been
practically worthless to him, as well as a hindrance and an expense in
mining operations.
During the past year or eighteen months several mills have been
constructed in western mining camps for the treatment of low grade
ores, and several more are now in course of construction or III con-
temptation. At Park City, Utah, the Mines Operating company is sue
.cessfulv treating low grade ore by the teaching process. At Silver
City, Utah, the Observation-Disclosures company is meeting with gratifying
success in the teaching of ores carrying values OF from 81 to S. in sill
yer, lead, gold and copper. The Nevada-Douglas company, at Ludwig,
Nevada, has evolved a teaching process for its low grade copper-bear-
ing ores and is now engaged in mill installation. In Colorado many new
plants m in commission or in construction which employ or will utilize
new methods for the treatment of low grade material. At the Waldorf
near Empire, the fotation process is to be employed, and a number of
similar mills will probably soon follow. In Montana the treatment OF
low grade product is becoming exceedingly popular. The Timber
Butte, of Butte, is using the fotation process. The Bunwhacker, of the
same place, has installed the teaching process, and the Anaconda, at
Anaconda, has adopted the teaching method. The National, at Mulan
Idaho, is using flotaton, also. The Inspiration. of Arizona, has de-
cided on fotation, and the Calumet & Arizona will treat its low grades
by teaching.