3D Resources Limited announced that it has been granted a 6 year extension to its Exploration License EL5728 which now sets the stage for a concerted effort to expand exploration activities and resources at Adelong. Background: Much of the historical drilling and exploration at Adelong had focused on the main mines covered by the company's mining tenement (ML1435), which had generated JORC Resources for the Challenger and Currajong deposits. Following its acquisition of the Adelong gold project, 3D Resources focused its efforts on two of the other deposits outside of ML1435 (Donkey Hill and Currajong) and thereby increased the project's JORC Resources from 129,000oz to 171,400oz and identified the necessary steps to reopen the existing mine.

Importantly, there is also significant exploration potential within EL5728 both in terms of extensions to known deposits but also major structures that have historically remained untested or undrilled. As the company nears completion of its initial planning phase to reopen the existing mine it has now turned its attention to the project's exploration upside, which is substantial. Obtaining an extension to EL5728 was an essential component of that plan that has been achieved.

Future exploration opportunity: The recent drilling at Adelong at Caledonian and Gibraltar has highlighted the importance of the exploration potential of EL5728 as the high grade intercepts of drill holes at Caledonian (CAL009 and CAL012) and the new discovery at Gibraltar identified in drill hole (3DGIB003) are all located in this exploration license. Recent drilling at Caledonian also shows that there is some depletion in grades in the near surface environment and supergene enrichment at depth, so a lot of the exploration efforts of the past that tested for the presence of mineralisation using shallow RAB lines between Challenger and Fletchers have failed to properly identify the mineralisation. This is exemplified by a series of RAB holes located above the recent hole CAL009.

These RAB holes had not generated any grades >1g/tAu yet the deeper hole drilled recently had generated 6m @ 6.68g/tAu and further 4m of mine workings that presumably had been mined with grades in excess of 30g/tAu. This potentially opens up the entire zone from Challenger through to Donkey Hill to additional exploration opportunities and certainly offers scope to expand the Caledonian deposit both North and South of the recent drilling. All the mineralisation mined to date at Adelong has been located in major fault lines that can be traced for kilometres such as the Old Hill Line which is the same structure that contains the Challenger, Caledonian, Fletcher, Donkey Hill and Lady Clare Deposits.

Most of these mineralised faults are in North- South trending structures with the major exception being the Gibraltar vein deposits which trend NE-SW. Recent analysis of the detailed ground magnetics has shown that the main deposits at Adelong are located close to the intersection between these NE trending fault structures and N-S faults. These structures are only visible on the detailed 5m line spaced ground magnetic data which has limited coverage.

In particular there is no coverage of the western deposits (Currajong and Gibraltar) nor does it cover the deposits in the South. One of the findings of the Scoping Study was that any additional open cut resource can add significantly to the potential profitability of the project. For this reason, the 2022 drilling program focused on exploring the open cut resource potential and targets in the Caledonian and Gibraltar Deposits.

The Caledonian drilling was designed to upgrade the open cut resources for inclusion in the Scoping study, and the high grade values received at Caledonian will no doubt add some open cut resources to the target production in order to improve the project economics. However, the improved knowledge gained from drilling at Caledonian also shows the potential for further resource extensions both north and south from the areas drilled. Exploratory drilling at Gibraltar successfully identified the potential for another shallow resource that could add to the open cut resource potential of the project.

Hole 3DGIB003 intersected a series of +5 silicified zones/veins that carried gold which cumulatively added up to 11 metres with an average grade of 3.46g/tAu. These 5 veins were intersected in hole 3DGIB003 between 2 metres to 47 metres. All three drill holes into the Percy Workings at Gibraltar had showed signs of silicification/gold values but also shows gold values are progressively increasing to the west and 3DGIB003 is the westernmost drill hole.

The company provides an overview of the potential of the Gibraltar area. Drill intersection 3DGIB003 is geologically very interesting as some 350m to the west of hole 3DGIB003 is a major N-S shear zone called the Wondalga Shear that is located beneath the Adelong Creek alluvial deposits. This would make this a significant geological target given that it represents the intersection between one of the larger N-S trending shear structures with the NE trending Gibraltar veins.

However even close to drill hole 3DGIB003 there is evidence of N-S shearing present in rock exposures in the base of the track. No drilling has ever taken place west of 3DGIB003 so the area could host a major deposit. This represents a prime target for generating additional resources in the near term and is scheduled for the next drilling program.

The company also highlights other targets within the Gibraltar area that could offer targets for open cut resources including the multiple veins that have historically been untested with drilling and the occasional shallow vein intersections such as 3DGIB004 and some additional historic single vein intercepts that have never been followed up. Gibraltar was one of the significant producers in the past with production of 140,000oz at an average grade of 34g/tAu. So the relatively small amount of historical drilling at Gibraltar and the multiple vein system makes this site a prime exploration target for further discoveries.

Viewing the regional potential, the company highlights other major mineralised structures that have largely remained untested. To the south east of Adelong there are a series of historical workings that can be traced for over 3km from Sawpit in the south to Lady Mary to the north.