Mount Burgess Mining N L : Quarterly Activities & Cash Flow Report - 31 December 2020 28/01/2021 (pdf 4.4 MB)

ASX CODE: MTB

QUARTERLY REPORT TO 31 DECEMBER 2020

KIHABE-NXUU POLYMETALLIC Zn/Pb/Ag/Ge/V PROJECT BOTSWANA

Prospecting Licence PL 43/2016 Title

On 4 November 2020, the Company received written confirmation from the Department of Mines Botswana that its Second Renewal Application for Prospecting Licence PL 43/2016 which contains the Kihabe-Nxuu Project, had been granted for a further two years to 31 December 2022.

PL 43/2016 covers an area of 1,000 sq km and is situated right up against the Namibian border in Western Ngamiland, Botswana. PL 43/2016 covers that whole portion of a Neo-Proterozoic belt situated on the Botswana side of the border, which is highly prospective for base metals.

Work Conducted During the Quarter

During the quarter COVID - 19 restrictions imposed by the Botswana Government were relaxed to the extent that travel within the nine national COVID - 19 zones was no longer restricted. Crossing borders from one zone to another requires permits. However, travelling within individual zones no longer requires permits.

The Company is fortunate to have one of its geologists living in the Maun zone which is where its Kihabe-Nxuu project is situated on the Namibian border. Despite having to travel some 370 km from Maun to site, this allowed the geologist to access site in order to collect drill core.

Some 1,376 kg of ½ HQ drill core was collected for metallurgical and mineralogical test work as follows:

Nxuu Deposit Drill Core

•  Around 1,000 kg of the Nxuu Deposit drill core was destined for Energy and Densification Systems (EDS) South African in order to conduct bulk test work on the EDS Vertical Milling process.

•  Around 366 kg of Nxuu Deposit drill core was destined for STEINERT (Australia) Pty Ltd (STEINERT) to conduct bulk Sensor Sorter X - ray test work.

(Refer to Figures 1 to 6 showing drill hole locations and intersections selected for the above test work)

Kihabe Deposit

•  Around 6 - 10 kg of Kihabe Deposit drill core was destined for Naples University, Italy, to conduct mineralogical test work to determine the host minerals for Vanadium and Germanium.

(Refer to Figures 7 and 8 showing drill hole intersections selected for the above test work)

An export permit was granted by the Botswana Mines Department to export the drill core to South Africa.

On 5 November 2020 the core arrived in South Africa and the EDS core was collected by EDS. The core destined for STEINERT, Australia and Naples University was collected by Intertek Genalysis in South Africa and through their cooperation, it was then couriered on to STEINERT, Australia and Naples University through DHL.

The STEINERT core arrived in Australia on 24 November 2020 and the Naples University core arrived at the University on 10 December 2020.

Both the EDS Vertical Milling Process and the STEINERT Sensor Sorter X - ray test work were planned to be conducted in order confirm to what extent the Company could reduce the power requirements of the project. The originally estimated power requirements were in the region of 20 MW.

EDS Vertical Milling Process

If the EDS Vertical Milling process works effectively, it can require as little as 25% of the power required for a conventional Ball/SAG/Rod mill. Also, the capital cost of a Vertical Mill is significantly less than a conventional Ball/SAG/Rod mill.

Vertical Milling Power Consumption

On 3 December 2020, the Company announced preliminary results from the Vertical Milling test work conducted by EDS South Africa. Half HQ diamond core from 14 holes drilled into the Nxuu Deposit (Refer to Figures 1 to 6), amounting to 688kg with a maximum size of >50mm and a F80 of 47.68mm was used by EDS for this comminution test work. The results from this test work were seen as very encouraging, indicating that after primary and secondary crushing to < 40mm, it has the ability to reduce the particle size to a P80 of 1mm (1,000 microns) for a < 2kWh/t power requirement. A further reduction to 106 microns at 80t/h, through a small ball mill with an estimated average work index (BWi) of 10kWh/t should only require an additional 6.5 kWh/t.

A typical ball mill feed at a crush size of 12mm would require at least an extra 40% of power, estimated in the region of 10 kWh/t.

Vertical Milling Process Flow

The below process flow diagram shows the set up and testing process used by EDS

There were two sampling points. The first was collected from the main feed belt (feed sample). This is usually done as a belt cut. The second was collected from the discharged sample collection bag under the EDS mill. Particle size distribution (PSD) tests were conducted on both the belt feed and the mill discharge product. The laboratory testing equipment consisted of PSD sieves of varying sizes. Other equipment included ovens, scales, a riffler and a sieve shaker.

Test Work Results

It was immediately noted from these 7 tests that the 1mm (1000µ) passing size was 72% to 87%. Three of the initial seven tests were passed through the mill a second time as below:

The second pass did not greatly improve the percentage passing 1mm (1000µ).

Power Requirements

The power requirements for the seven single pass tests are as below:

The kWh/t test results as shown above are conservative, as they include the power required for all the other associated equipment used by EDS in this test work, such as conveyers, feeders, etc. It is expected that the actual mill steady state operation on its own would be in the order of 75 - 80% of the above 2.55 kWh/t average, resulting in mill power requirements of 1.9kWh/t

EDS Multishaft Mill

Figure 2: Six shaft model showing internal milling process mechanism