Drilling blitz sets up Locksley for important copper-gold resource upgrade

Drilling results at Locksley Resources’ historical ‘Tottenham’ copper project in central NSW “confirm the consistency and robust nature of the deposits” ahead of an all-important resource update.

Locksley Resources (ASX:LKY) only listed in July this year, but it was incorporated way back in 2018 for the purpose of funding, exploring, and developing the Tottenham copper project in the mineral-rich Lachlan Fold Belt of NSW.

The 470sqkm ‘Tottenham’ project represents an impressive group of gold and copper assets.

About 3907 tonnes of copper and smaller amounts of gold and silver were mined by hand from the Bogan River, Mount Royal – Orange Plains, Carolina, and Ace deposits; mostly between 1905 and 1917.

It remains largely underexplored by modern standards.

Carolina is the most consistently mineralised deposit, with an exploration target of 3.4Mt at 1.5% Cu, 0.5g/t Au for 52,000t copper and 59,000oz gold.

The Mount Royal – Orange Plains target has an exploration target 3.9Mt at 0.9% Cu, 0.3g/t Au for 34,000t copper and 30,000oz gold.

Locksley’s early drilling priorities include upgrading these potential project resources to JORC 2012 standards – a must-have for ASX listed project developers — and making them bigger.

Over August, September and October Locksley completed 1,560m of diamond and 3,400m of RC drilling at the Chris Watson, Orange Plains and Carolina Deposits. Early results are promising.

Assay results have been received for four diamond drill holes and 23 RC drill holes, with mineralisation reported in every single one. Reported grades top out at 10.3% copper and 6.9g/t gold.

Significant results include:

1.79m @ 4.16% Cu, 1.12g/t Au from 69.74m
9.50m @ 2.39% Cu, 0.79g/t Au from 109.5m, and
3.0m @ 1.88% Cu, 0.41g/t Au from 33.0m

Results for three diamond and five RC holes from the recent programs, as well as sampling of holes TMD029 and TMD030 that were drilled in 2020, are pending.

Over 9,000m of previous diamond drilling is stored at the Orange Plains field camp.

Many of these holes contain unsampled intervals of mineralised core. Holes TMD021, TMD022, TMD028 and TPDD008, from the deeper sections of the Chris Watson deposit, are now being relogged and all unsampled mineralisation sent for assay.

Multiple historic drill holes are also present at the WB Clarke Geoscience Centre in western Sydney. The relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions now means that these holes are accessible to be relogged and sampled through to February 2022.

All these holes contain significant copper mineralisation that demonstrates the system remains open at depth. Assay results are expected January 2022.

Resource upgrades

Once all assay results from the recent programs are received, data will be sent to an independent consultant to calculate a resource for the Mount Royal to Orange Plains and Carolina Deposits.

Locksley expects this to be released in Q1 next year, followed by a scoping study – the first proper look at the economics of building a mine.

“Locksley are delighted by these very positive drilling results,” Locksley managing director Steve Woodham says.

“The copper numbers confirm the consistency and robust nature of the deposits.

“The project continues to deliver additional copper value as the company moves toward a JORC 2012 compliant Resource calculation. We look forward to updating the market as additional pending results come in.

“The deposits remain open in multiple directions including down plunge and along strike.”

This article was developed in collaboration with Locksley Resources, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing. This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.