Amur Minerals PLC (LON:AMC) reckons it has added another three years of production at its giant Kun-Manie project in Russia - as it unveiled favourable drilling results from the Kubuk deposit there.
The results are from work between June 30 and July 21 this year, which aimed to drill gaps between the Kubuk and Ikenskoe/Sobolevsky (IKEN) targets, and to upgrade their existing resource to the more certain 'indicated' category.
READ: Amur Minerals confident as consultants show Kun-Manie as low-cost
Amur said the limits of the mineralisation have now been expanded by around 50% from the February 2017 resource model, which contained 14.5mln ore tonnes and 112,000 nickel tonnes (at 0.77%) and 30,000 tonnes of copper (at 0.20%).
It added that the newly defined mineralisation averaged around 14.3 metres (m) thickness per hole with average grades of 0.78% nickel and 0.20% copper.
"We are pleased with the continued progress at Kun-Manie. Drilling at Kubuk continues to identify new resources of economic grade," said Amur chief executive Robin Young.
"Having added additional resource potential, at both the eastern and western limits of deposit, and having drilled them at a spacing used to define Indicated resources, we are pleased to be adding to the mining potential of Kun-Manie.
"We believe we have added as much as another three years to our production through resource conversion to Indicated resource and newly defined mineralisation."
He added that there was substantial potential to expand the resource at both ends of the Kubuk deposit, with over 3,000 metres of target length remaining to be drilled.
The largest potential is in the west toward the Ikenskoe / Sobolevsky deposit.
There lies a target with a total length of 2,500 metres. Successful drilling here could result in the joining of the IKEN and KUB deposits to create a single large deposit of more than four kilometres length, the group noted.
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