In gold processing, not all gold is created equal. While coarse, visible gold is relatively easy to recover, fine gold presents a much greater challenge.
Often invisible to the naked eye, fine gold can quietly pass through processing circuits and end up in tailings — representing lost revenue and reduced efficiency.
Why Fine Gold Is Difficult to Recover
Fine gold particles are extremely small and lightweight, making them:
- Difficult to separate using conventional gravity methods
- Easily carried away during processing
- Hard to detect without proper testwork
Unlike coarse gold, which settles quickly, fine particles require carefully controlled conditions and specialised equipment to be captured effectively.
Where Losses Occur
Without an optimised process, fine gold losses typically occur during:
- Crushing and grinding (over-grinding can reduce recovery efficiency)
- Gravity recovery stages (where fine particles may not settle)
- Tailings discharge (where unrecovered gold is lost permanently)
These losses are often underestimated but can have a significant cumulative impact.
The Impact on Recovery and Profitability
Even small percentages of fine gold loss can translate into substantial financial losses over time.
For many operations, improving fine gold recovery by just a few percentage points can result in:
✔ Increased overall recovery rates
✔ Higher revenue from the same ore
✔ More efficient use of resources
To minimise losses, operations must focus on:
- Detailed metallurgical testwork to understand gold size distribution
- Optimised flowsheet design tailored to the ore
- Appropriate equipment selection for fine particle recovery like the Knelson Gravity Concentrator
- Careful process control to prevent gold from being carried away
The key is not just processing ore — but capturing every recoverable fraction.
Takeaway
Fine gold may be small, but its impact is significant.
💡 The most successful operations understand that recovery isn’t just about visible gold — it’s about capturing what’s hardest to see.
📩 Planning your next testwork? Start with your ore.
Because in gold processing, what you don’t recover matters most.
