opal mining white cliffs nsw

Prospecting Australia

Help Support Prospecting Australia:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
had the day off today and tomorrow to I think, slowly building physical fitness. been having a think about what I have learnt so far and in reference to where it says
'occurance and before proceeding to description' a key word that stands out is 'alude'. to me that translates to opal found outside the description cant be explained.
two examples of this would be 1. the opal we found down deep in the decomposed slate strata itself. and 2. the lense of quartzite boulders in the strata also containing traces of opal.
when I went down to retrieve gear and tipper rail I discovered that one side of that drive we did down there had slid and caved in anyway. danger, no thanks.
so my plan is just to continue driving straight ahead along the kaolin line. dad has come up to the same level and began the same thing in the opposite direction.
its working out to about 1m of drive per 8 hrs but this will slow down once we fill the shaft and drives to the bottom/slate strata with our tailings. then its back to 1 tipper bucket every 2 minutes. :cool:
 
Hunting the yellow said:
20xwater said:
in this photo I'm interested in the thin faults I think are called slides and from what I have read is whats needed for the formation and deposit of opal. if this is what they are
then I need a hard bottom at the bottom of the slides for it to concerntrate. time will tell lol...I love learning :cool:
https://www.prospectingaustralia.co.../2569/1489405496_wp_20170312_16_11_00_pro.jpg

a slide is a horizontal fault :Y:

agreed old friend, what slid was a big dip in the angle of the slate foliation?
 
off topic but went for a drive this morning to check something out..

panned the ground around it, no colour but magnetite is there..
1490761076_q_reef.jpg

awesome detector country maybe..
1490761134_q_ground.jpg

1490761154_q_ground_pan.jpg
 
as I was driving this arvo I noticed a different ground type(bottom right of drive beside my pick)..
1490778512_my_drive_29-3.jpg

not long after noticing that dad calls 'opal', the mongrel beat me lol. what was interesting was it was in the same ground type
and at the same ground height, seems to be a band of it..
1490778794_1st_line_opal.jpg
 
So what next 20x
Do you dig around the exposed opal very carefully or this there a system now for getting it out

Very nice piccies too
 
Would be good to see a bit after it's been gouged out (in a closeup) if possible 20x . :Y:
 
thanks fella's but its still just paper trails, its all in dads drive, he is getting a bit here and there maybe worth working with..
1491013820_wp_20170331_13_17_11_pro.jpg

I am still driving with no colour at all, all good.

ps..its taken me a while to see it but there is actualy a tiny fine horizontal fault that varies from .5 to 1m below the kaolin line, this actualy
runs through the line of ground the opal is in.
 
Top