Phoenix’s high powerd TXU – 30 transmitter has provided a significant adwantage in the ongoing study of HudBay Minerals’ deep, rich polymetallic ore body at Lalor Lake, Manitoba, Canada.

The desposit, discovered in 2007, extends from approx. –500m to –1500m below surface and is still being explored at depth.

Discovery Geophysics Inc. of Saskatoon (Canada) used an innovative combination of three TEM components from around the world to explore to these great depths. Phoenix’s high-powered TXU – 30 transmitter was used with the sensitive, high-temperature SQUID B-field TEM sensor from IPHT / Supracon in Jena, Germany and the SMART Team full-waveform receiver from EMIT in Perth, Australia.

Discovery Geophysics developed the system for uranium exploration in the deepest parts of te Alhabasca Basin.

However, to test the system over a target deeper than any in the Alhabasca, afour-day trial was carried out in December 2009 over the Lalor Lake deposit, particularly over the deep coppergold, massive sulphide lens, which extends from – 1200m to –1500m.

“The future of deep TEM exploration is ultra-high sensitivity TEM detectors combined with high powered TEM transmitters such as the Phoenix TXU-30,” says Dennis Woods, chief geophysicist of Discovery Geophysics.

Hudbay Minerals Inc. discovered the Lalor Lake deposit in March 2007, following up a broad anomaly from a conventional, fixed-loop TEM survey with a Crone TEM system. At a depth of –780m, the discovery hole intersected 24m of massive sulphides containing over 13% Zn. Subsequent drilling outlined a sequence of stacked massive sulphide lenses (see frill section, p.2) comprising one of the most significant recent base-metal discoveries in Canada; as of October 2009, with indicated and inferred resources of 17.3 MT with Zn, Cu, Au and Ag.

The massive sulphide lenses are now known to occur at –500m to –1500m depth and dip at 20-30 degrees to the northeast. These high-conductance zones have been detected using a variety of large-loop TEM surveys. However, at this depth, the limited signal-to-noise ratio of conventional systems reduces.