I passed this query to a colleague of mine who has done extensive research
into the treatment of gold ores. His response may be of some assistance to
the enquirer.
Gerard MacGill
52 Harvest Road, North Fremantle WA 6159
(08) 9335 7471; Facs (08) 9335 8241
Re. ‘Cashcrofts Process (1896)’, Mr Moore does not give many clues does he?
The name did ring a vague bell though. The Process was obviously not an
‘early float process’, however. The first successful ones were Elmore (1898
in Wales) and Potter (1901 at Broken Hill). However, Moore’s associating
Cashcroft’s Process with flotation suggests that the process might have been
associated with Broken Hill or with base metal processing elsewhere. This
makes me think that Moore may have confused ‘Cashcroft’s Process’ with
Ashcroft’s Process, an innovative electrolytic process built at Cockle Creek
near Newcastle (NSW) for processing zinc-rich tailings and slimes from
Broken Hill in about 1896 (the same date quoted by Moore). The process
worked but the general run of tailings was not as rich as the ones Ashcroft
designed the plant for, so the process was a commercial failure and was
abandoned. Ralph Birrell has a page on it in his monograph on the flotation
process but if the query comes from the UK Ashcroft’s original paper might
be easier for Moore to sight:
E.A. Ashcroft, ‘The Treatment of Broken Hill Sulphide Ores by Wet Extraction
Processes’, Transactions of the Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, London,
1898, pp.282-337.
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