I appreciate your reply and I understand that this is your line...

I appreciate your reply and I understand that this is your line of work.

I think we look at what has or hasn't happened since the beginning of this FY from a very different point of view so the picture we see is different.

I will agree that in comparison to complex chemical processing of ores with toxic chemicals or other dangerous substances ADN plant will be relatively simple and will have less safety risks.
However we are not talking about just separating kaolin from the sand but further splitting product flows into reasonably tight particle size streams for different applications where quality standards require tolerances somewhere in 10 micron range on a dynamic feed. I used to work in similar hydro cyclone separation operation where tolerances were in 100 micron range and it was far from simple.

Company presentations shown after the CR mention significant changes in design required to incorporate production of PRM.
PRM was supposed to be supplied in 25kg bags with onsite bagging operation as per BOA.
In December we were told that the company has been negotiating with the PRM offtake customer to supply PRM in bulk bags and customer looking for someone else to bag it into 25kg bags.
We were told that DSO in bulk is now being considered.
New concrete additive product HRM is being considered, produced either as a waste stream in normal wet processing or in dry screening process.

To me these look like pretty big changes in concept and production process requiring big changes in design.

We have not seen any company announcements with details of the completed design or costs showing progress in design.
In my opinion plant and process design at ADN is far from finished.
Time will tell whose picture was correct.

"The placement of the orders and any up front deposits will only happen later.

The "first ore" or "first shipment" dates will only be known later, but first things first ... official decision to go mining, raise the funds, start up the procurement phase, provide the detailed engineering, start site preparation works, construct the plant."

I completely agree with the above quoted part of your post and this is how I see the project developing.

I have a question.
With your experience in the field and understanding of the process for getting from here to "first shipment" when would you estimate that shipment happening?