The Basic Method of Extraction of Diamonds

The diamonds and other precious and semi-precious stones are extracted from the ground by three main types of mines. These methods of mining diamonds varies minerals are deposited in the soil around the desired stability of mineral and peripheral damage to the surrounding environment. The basic method of extraction of diamonds are:

1. Artisanal Mining
2. Hardrock Mining
3. Marine Mining
4. Mining Mine
5. Placer
6. Hard-rock mining

Hard-Rock Mining
The term "Hard Rock Mining Diamond" (top left) refers to various techniques used to mine gems, minerals, ores and agencies of underground subway tunnels and create "rooms" or "Slopes" supported by pillars of wood, rock. Using the underground ore is carried by the "decline" or "tree." Autumn "is a tunnel, spiral wheels, or moving bed wing of the bond." tree "is a vertical tunnel used to transport ore and runs alongside the ore. "Autumn" is normally used for access to ore and machinery.

Mining Mine

Open-pit mining of diamonds, or "career" (upper middle) is a method of extracting rock or minerals in the soil after removal of the pit or burrow. open pit mines are used when mineral deposits are located near the surface or along the kimberlite pipes. Careers is used when the overburden "or materials to cover the deposit is very thin and / or minerals are embedded in a structurally unstable soil (slag, sand or gravel) that is not suitable for tunneling." Pit Lakes tend to form in the open pits as a result of the intrusion of groundwater.

Placer

Placer Diamond Mining, also known as "sand mining bank" (top right) is used for the extraction of minerals and alluvial secondary deposits. Placer mining is a form, or cast quarries used to extract minerals from the earth without tunneling. Excavation should be carried out using water pressure (hydraulic mining aka) or surface excavation equipment.

Marine Mining

Marine mining technology profitable until the early 1990s. Marine diamond mining employs both vertical and "horizontal" sample of marine technology placer diamonds. Vertical uses offshore 6-7 meters in diameter in the drill head to cut into the seabed and suck up the diamond bearing material from the seabed. Mining employs the use of robots horizontal seabed (remote control, mining vehicles CAT-submarine crawler) move across the sea floor pumping gravel to ships.

Diamond Geology

Kimberlite

Diamonds form at a depth of more than 93 miles (150 km) beneath the surface. After their formation, diamonds are in the earth's surface by volcanic activity. A mixture of magma (molten rock), minerals, stones, diamonds, and from time to time as a flute pipe-shaped glasses of champagne upon reaching the surface of the earth. These tubes are called kimberlites (see table below). kimberlite pipes may be located directly beneath the shallow lakes created in inactive volcanic calderas or craters.

Kimberlite is a melt-rock matrix consists of carbonate, garnet, peridot, phlogopite, pyroxene, serpentine and upper mantle rock, with many trace elements. Kimberlite occurs in the area of the crust in vertical structures known as kimberlite pipes (above, right). Kimberlites in the trees "and" volcanic tubes "that underlie and are a source of rare and relatively small volcanoes or" maar "(top left). Kimberlite pipes are the largest source of diamonds, but only about one in 200 kimberlite pipes contain gem quality diamonds. Many kimberlite pipes produce alluvial diamonds gold.

Diamond bearing kimberlite in parts of South Africa is black (top right). Most kimberlite is called "blue-ground" kimberlite (top left) or "yellow-ground" kimberlite and can be found throughout the world. The name "kimberlite" of the South African town of Kimberley, where the first diamonds found in this type of conglomerate (see "Kimberley - Northern Cape", below).

Lamproite Pipes

Pipes lamproite diamond production, to a lesser extent than the kimberlite pipes. Lamproite pipes are created in a manner similar to the kimberlite pipes, except the boiling water and volatile compounds contained in the Act corrosively magma on a cliff, where a large fan of rock eviscerated on the surface. This results in a martini glass-shaped deposit, unlike kimberlite shaped champagne flute.

Alluvial (Place) Diamonds

Location of flood plains (or packer) deposits of diamonds is controlled by the topography of the region. alluvial deposits are generally located in river terrace gravels, which have been transported from their place of origin, usually from kimberlites.

Alluvial terrace gravels (below, left) and marine gravels on the southwest coast of Africa are one of the largest alluvial diamond deposits. best known to the world of gem quality alluvial diamond deposits located on the southwest coast of the Namib Desert in Africa, known as Sperrgebiet or "prohibited area". Namibia placer deposits of diamonds are up to 40 million years.

Alluvial diamond mining in Angola takes place along a section of river meanders Cuango floodplain, which is also along the southwest coast of Africa. One of the largest and diamond jewelry is very high quality product from the extraction of alluvial gold in the region, including the two largest diamonds in Angola 105.9ki 101.8k.

Many of these alluvial diamonds in Pleistocene and Holocene decline (1.8 million to 10,000 years ago). Diamond in these deposits have been transported to the deep erosion of kimberlites and to a lesser extent, olivine lamproites formed during the Cretaceous period, or the Permo-Triassic. Drainage west of the river of diamonds transported to the mainland coast of Africa for the final submission on the seafront terrace gravel. Diamonds which have been taken down, but have not been filed in the land, went to the sea bottom only diamonds in marine areas are usually trapped in the depressions of the substrate, such as ravines , potholes, depressions, channels or other trapsites for diamond deposits.

Artisanal Mining

Artisanal diamond mining (aka "the small-scale mining") to include no more digging and sifting dirt or gravel from the river alluvial deposits (above, right) with his hands naked, shovels, or sit. Workers who are employed in artisanal diamond mining diamond diggers are called "(bottom left). Artisanal diamond mining is a form of" maintenance "not mechanized mining, which is used in poor countries worldwide.

Artisanal diamond mining accounts for 90% of exports of diamonds in Sierra Leone and is the second largest employer after the country of subsistence farming.

via khulsey