Abstract
Pits and trenches, or to use the old Cornish mining term, cos teans, can be a quick and cheap way of obtaining lithological, structural and assay information in areas of shallow cover. Underground development, although neither quick nor cheap, has also been successfully employed in exploration programmes to gain direct access to mineralised rocks for detailed mapping and collection of bulk samples for assay or metallurgical studies.
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Usually adapted from machines designed to dig trenches for shallow pipes and drains.
References
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Marjoribanks, R. (2010). Trenching and Underground Development. In: Geological Methods in Mineral Exploration and Mining. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-74375-0_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-74375-0_4
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