Mt Piper Gold Project

Mt Piper Gold Project

Overview

The Mt Piper Project comprises five exploration licences (EL6775, EL7331, EL7337, EL7366 and EL7380) and one exploration licence application (ELA7481), covering some 1609km², located approximately 75km north of Melbourne, adjacent to the Hume Highway. It is only 1 hours’ drive by major highway from the state capital of Melbourne and boasts excellent onsite infrastructure. The Project lies within the productive Central Victorian Goldfields and is centred about 30km SE of Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd’s Fosterville Gold Mine. Mineral exploration by current and previous explorers provides compelling evidence of Fosterville-style mineralisation within the Project area. Torrens maiden drill program at Northwood Hill in July 2021 intersected:

• 5.4m @ 3.2g/t Au from 7.3m in NWHDD001, including:

  • 0.8m @ 9.4g/t Au from 10.8m

• 0.6m @ 8.7g/t Au from 43.7m in NWHDD004

• 0.65m @ 5.0g/t Au from 51.25m in NWHDD005

• 0.7m @ 5.4g/t Au from 7.9m in NWHDD008

• 0.5m @ 10.1g/t Au from 19.5m in NWHDD008

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Geology

The geology of the Mt Piper area consists of Cambrian metabasites and metasedimentary rocks, which are conformably overlain in the west by the Ordovician greywacke-turbidite and slate of lower greenschist facies. A phase of simple “nuggety” gold-arsenic-quartz vein mineralisation was probably emplaced around the time of the Silurian deformation of these rocks or during a later Early Devonian mineralising event.

East of the Mt William Fault Zone, the tenement is dominated by Silurian to Early Devonian sedimentary rocks, mostly pelitic with subordinate sandstone, which were effected by two main folding events.

All of these rocks have been intruded by Late Devonian granites. Minor post-granite deformation brought with it another important phase of gold-arsenic-antimony mineralisation.

Torrens is targeting Fosterville style, disseminated, quartz-poor stockwork gold mineralisation associated with granite intrusions.

Historical Work

The historical Heathcote, Lancefield and Reedy Creek goldfields were exploited immediately to the west and south of the project area and there is only very minor artisanal gold and antimony production recorded within the existing tenements. The most recent previous work in the region was undertaken by Oroya Mining, on previous tenements EL4947 and EL4948 in 2006, with some minor work before Oroya.

Exploration Rationale

Torrens’ exploration target is disseminated, sulphidic, quartz-poor stockwork bodies that contain gold-arsenic-antimony mineralisation, similar to those of the Fosterville and Nagambie mines further to the north-west and the north-east. This style of mineralisation is considered to be represented by the Mt Piper gold occurrences and other prospects within or near the licence and application areas.

The fine-grained nature of primary gold and paucity of quartz veins and associated alluvial gold occurrences is a feature of some deposits of this type, combined with the antiquity and uncertain quality of past regional exploration and different mining economics today, suggests that potential deposits might have been completely missed by previous explorers in the 19th and 20th centuries (e.g. as was discovered and mined at Nagambie in the 1980s).

Historical gold mining or prospecting activity has been identified or recorded at several sites within the area. Outside the area and excluded from exploration within the Mt Piper Conservation Reserve is the previously-mined Mt Piper gold-antimony mineralisation, which is hosted by an intensely brecciated porphyry intrusive. These occurrences, and accumulated geochemical data, are regarded as strong evidence that Au-Sb mineralising processes having been active in the target region.

Exploration Progress to Date

In February 2021, Torrens commenced infill soil sampling over gold geochemical anomalism at the Mt Piper Gold Project. The anomalous target zones were previously identified by a review of Geological Survey of Victoria’s (GSV) state-wide data. This review opened the possibility for other anomalies to be uncovered by interrogation of the GSV data. Key areas of interest that were targeted for infill soil sampling within EL6775 included Hawkes Nest, Crough’s Hill, Glenaroua South, Mount Chapman, Cameron Creek, Heywood Hill and Tyaak (See the Figure below). 

Northwood Hill Prospect

The Northwood Hill Prospect lies within EL7331 and was the subject of historical soil geochemistry and RC drilling by Perseverance Mining in the 1990s. Historical drilling, as reported in Torrens’ Prospectus of 13 November 2020, intersected important gold mineralisation within a 5km long corridor defined by both drilling results and by gold anomalism in systematic soil geochemical sampling (See Figures below). 

The Northwood Hill gold corridor extends in a north-westerly direction, from EL7331 into Puckapunyal ELA7481. Previous drilling by Perseverance, a predecessor company to Kirkland Lake Gold Limited, which operates the Fosterville Gold Mine located some 58km to the north-west of Northwood Hill, intersected shallow (less than 70m depth) gold mineralisation including, 7m @ 2.37g/t Au from 20m in drillhole NHRC3 (See Figures below). 

Torrens has commenced negotiations on both land access and drilling contracts, with the finalisation of these arrangements anticipated in May 2021 and with drilling expected to commence soon after.

The diamond drilling program at Northwood Hill was the first phase of drill testing focused on a ~5km long gold anomalous corridor defined by Perseverance Mining in the 1990s. The drilling program included 13 holes for 1073 metres and was undertaken at the south-eastern end of the gold anomalous corridor over a strike length of 360m.

Gold mineralisation at Northwood Hill appears to be controlled by a tightly folded anticline-syncline pair, concentrated within relatively more permeable, narrow (<1 m thick) brecciated and sheared fault zones which obliquely cross-cut, or are parallel to, bedding and/or the axial planar foliation of the Northwood Hill structure. These structures may be comparable to upper-level Fosterville-style mineralisation which occurs where bedding and fault angles are approximately parallel (e.g. Phoenix Lode).