Mining tech

[desperance]

I know two separate and unrelated words for the material, the unwanted base rock from which you dig your ore or precious stone or whatever it is you're mining for; and one of them is matrix and the other is gangue, and the first is too formal or technical or some such and the second is too obscure. Sigh. You'd think it would be easy, wouldn't you...? A language famous for its range of synonyms, an obvious and long-established need for a simple commonplace word, and I got nuthin'...

Comments

[wishwords.livejournal.com]

Slag?

[woodrunner.livejournal.com]

Try "slag" or "runoff" for the material that gets discarded, and "bulk concentrate" or "tails" for the ore-grade material.

[woodrunner.livejournal.com]

Perhaps this website will be of use, though it is a glossary; it's all on one page and you can do a search for terms. I have used it in the past, though, coming from a mining town, most of those terms are in common usage.

http://www.rocksandminerals.com/glossary.htm

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Ooh, thanks for this...

[desperance.livejournal.com]

I think of slag as that-which-has-been-dug-out-and-discarded; what I need is a word for that-which-will-be-discarded-once-it's-been-dug-out, the living rock that is still holding the precious and desired object...

[woodrunner.livejournal.com]

Er, that'd be... "feed"?

I know that the raw rock material is called the "feed" before it goes into the smelter for refining, but a geologist would have a better term. I can ask tomorrow at work, if you like.

[woodrunner.livejournal.com]

That glossary calls it "run-of-mine"... but as I've said, I'll ask a geologist for a better term.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh, I don't know. Why not go with the "rough"?

[jeremy-m.livejournal.com]

It sounds like the word I need as a poetic metaphor for that portion of the Homo Heidelbergensis gene pool that didn't make it into Sapiens. Let us know if you find a good one (what it needs to beat in the current draft is 'the eye of the needle of speciation', so the bar is quite high...)

[mantichore.livejournal.com]

Not that it's capital to know, but that "rough" comment was made by it before logging in. Pfah.

You did remember I have a degree in geology?

[(Anonymous)]

Tails. Or dross. Or spoil.

Tails and spoil are more general mining terms. Dross is more specifically an ore term.

Simon