The Ruddock Creek property hosts “SEDEX” style mineralization that has been compared to the Broken Hill (BHP) deposit type. SEDEX deposits result from seafloor deposition of sulphides within a third order basin, usually associated with a regional fault system, which acts as a conduit for the mineral bearing fluids.

Mineralization at Ruddock Creek consists of a conformable planar massive sulphide horizon, exposed intermittently for over 5 kilometres along strike. The Ruddock Creek Sulphide Horizon consists dominantly of calc-silicate rocks, pegmatites and lesser biotite schist. Lenses of massive sulphide, composed of sphalerite, pyrrhotite and galena in order of abundance are hosted by the calc-silicate portions of the package. The Ruddock Creek Sulphide Horizon varies from less than 5 m to over 50 m in true thickness. Massive sulphide lenses consist of sphalerite, pyrrhotite, galena, pyrite and minor chalcopyrite, and are generally medium grained.

The Ruddock Creek Sulphide Horizon consists dominantly of calc-silicate rocks, pegmatites and lesser biotite schist. Lenses of massive sulphide, composed of sphalerite, pyrrhotite and galena in order of abundance are hosted by the calc-silicate portions of the package. The Ruddock Creek Sulphide Horizon varies from less than 5 m to over 50 m in true thickness. Massive sulphide lenses consist of sphalerite, pyrrhotite, galena, pyrite and minor chalcopyrite, and are generally medium grained. The coarser grain size is thought to be a result of recrystallization during the metamorphic event. They are often complexly folded within themselves on axes that plunge to the west. The folds within the sulphide layers are usually irregular in form. Galena and sphalerite also occur as scattered grains in marble and calcareous quartzite occasionally associated with fluorite.

Multiple individual massive sulphide lenses are present within the horizon, ranging from less than 1m to greater than 5m in true thickness, separated by variable thicknesses of non mineralized pegmatite, calc-silicate or biotite schist. Locally these stacked lenses of massive sulphide and host rock, attain true thicknesses of over 30 m of ore grade material.

There have been nine zones of mineralization identified on the Property to date: E, F, G (including the Upper and Lower G), M, T (including the Upper and Lower T and Creek Zone) in the eastern half, and the U, V, R, and Q which occur as contorted layers and lenses forming the western half. The mineralization at the E Zone has been the main focus of most previous exploration programs as it is the best exposed and contains the most continuous ore horizons known to date.

The Project consists of four ore zones (or underground workings) referred to as:
- Upper E;
- Lower E;
- Creek; and
- V-Zone.

Access to the underground workings will be by level entry adits using five separate portals for the extraction of ore from the four zones. Step room and pillar mining will be used in stopes with an ore thickness less than 6 m. All other ore will be mined using longhole stoping methods.

For step room and pillar mining, an initial ore drift will be driven parallel to the strike of the orebody for the extent of the stope, exposing the hanging wall. A second parallel drift will then be slashed beside initial drift, stepped down in elevation to follow the contact. A third drift will then be slashed down-dip, widening to the maximum allowable span. This pattern will then be repeated, nominally every 8 vertical metres of the ore body. Mining will generally proceed on an up-dip direction. The stopes that remain from step room and pillar mining will be backfilled with paste backfill after the completion of mining in the area.

For longhole stope mining, stope accesses will be located in the center of the ore body. An ore sill will be driven on each the upper and lower levels of each stope to the extents of mining, exposing the full width of mineralization. These will be nominally sized at 6 to 10 m wide by 5 m high so that drill holes can be located on the hanging wall and footwall contacts.

The processing of ore mined from the underground workings into lead (Pb) concentrate and zinc (Zn) concentrate involves five key steps:
• Underground crushing and conveying;
• Tertiary crushing and dense media separation;
• Primary grinding;
• Pb flotation circuit; and
• Zn flotation circuit.

The Pb concentrate is also anticipated to contain small quantities of silver (Ag), so it is sometimes referred to as Pb + Ag concentrate.

An additional step, the pyrrhotite flotation system, will separate the PAG fraction of the tailings stream from the NAG fraction. Pyrrhotite (Fe(1-x)S (x = 0 to 0.2)) is also called magnetic pyrite because the color is similar to pyrite and it is weakly magnetic.

All ore mined from the underground workings will be crushed underground prior to being conveyed to the surface by transfer conveyors. Haulage trucks will be used to transfer mined ore to the crushing and conveying system.

From the underground workings, the crushed ore (approximately ½ inch size), will be conveyed to the surface and crushed in the tertiary crusher at the Dense Media Separation (DMS) plant located at the processing plant. The DMS circuit will separate the “light” fraction (waste minerals) from the “heavy” fraction (ore minerals). The light fraction, which is non-acid generating, will be transferred to the surface waste storage areas or mixed with paste backfill for backfill of underground workings. The heavy fraction will be sent to primary grinding in the form of slurry for further concentrating.

Slurry from the DMS circuit will be pumped to the primary ball mill and pass through cyclones for sizing. Flocculent will be added to the feed of the primary ball mill in order to depress the zinc in the ore. Oversize ore from the cyclones will discharge into the ball mill for grinding and undersize ore will be sized. The product of primary grinding will feed the Pb flotation circuit.

The Pb flotation circuit will consist of mechanical rougher flotation cells that make up the rougher circuit. A collector and frother will be added to the slurry from the primary grinding circuit prior to being fed to the rougher circuit to increase recovery. The tailings of the rougher circuit will form the majority of the feed for the Zn flotation circuit.

The cleaning circuit will consist of five column cells operating in series to produce the final Pb concentrate. The final Pb concentrate is thickened to 65% solids and then pumped to an agitated stock tank to dewater the Pb concentrate to a desired moisture content of 8%. Dewatered Pb concentrate is discharged onto a conveyor and transported to a load-out for transport by truck to market.

Tailings from the Pb rougher circuit will be fed to the Zn rougher circuit. Copper sulphate, lime, a Zn collector and a frother will be added to slurry to activate the zinc and maximize recovery. The Zn flotation circuit will consist of mechanical rougher flotation cells, a regrind mill with cyclones and a cleaning circuit of 4 column cells operating in series. The final Zn concentrate will be thickened to 65% solids and filtered press in order to dewater the product to the desired moisture content of 8%. The dewatered Zn concentrate product is discharged onto a conveyor that transports the material to a load-out for truck transport to market.

The tailings of the Zn rougher circuit combined with the Zn cleaner scavenger tails will form the tailings for the pyrrhotite flotation circuit. Test work has shown that the combined tailings have a low capacity to be potentially acid generating, though the acid generating potential will be further reduced by pyrrhotite flotation circuit. Further static Acid Base Accounting test work will be conducted on each stream in order to determine whether one or both are potentially acid generating.

A pyrrhotite flotation system will separate the PAG fraction of the tailings stream from the NAG fraction. The flotation circuit will remove pyrrhotite from the tailings, which may prevent acid generation from tailings by removing one of the agents of acid drainage.

Pyrrhotite flotation will include a desulfurization process and will reduce the pH of the tailings from the alkaline (pH > 10) conditions that resulted from the use of lime in the previous Zn and Pb flotation S-25 of S-46 circuits. Pyrrhotite surface activation will be induced by oxygen and oxidation of ferrous iron to ferric hydroxides or oxyhydroxides. Carbon dioxide dissolution will lead to calcium carbonate precipitation and adsorption onto pyrrhotite surfaces.

The products of the pyrrhotite flotation circuit are a NAG tailings stream and a PAG tailings stream.