If I said advantage, it was a clear typo. I would have meant disadvantage.
And normally in most ore deposits the supergene ore is of higher grade than the sulphide ore. I haven't studied Tucano properly so can't pass specific comments on the geology but I know it is not a typical gold deposit as a lot of the gold is associated with the itabirite (the South American and West African equivalents of our BIF's). Didn't Beadall initially start beneficiating these iron ore before the iron ore price collapsed?
I'll have to take a closer look as I've never looked at it before but the oxide components at Tucano, judging by the overall grade, could be a mixture of leach ores, supergene enriched ores and local higher grade occurrences of high grade gold veining.
The itabrites will vary in hardness depending on the degree to which the magnetite has been replaced by hematite and geothite. In the fresh ore I'll have to check to see where itabirite sits on the hardness scale. At a guess it's likely to be pretty hard, I'll get back to you.
Eshmun
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