COMPARISON OF THE GEOLOGICAL AND GRADE DISTRIBUTION MODELS IN SHEYTOOR IRON DEPOSIT, BAFQ, IRAN

Geological and geo-statistical modeling of ore deposits is critical for resource and reserve estimation in geo-statistical evaluations. This study focuses on the Sheytoor iron deposit located in the Bafq iron ore district of Central Iran. Geological assessments reveal that limestones and dolomitic limestones are concentrated in the northern and central regions, while iron ore outcrops are found in the center, southwest, and southeast. Utilizing borehole data, geological and geostatistical models of high and low-grade iron mineralization zones were produced using Rockworks v.15 software. The Inverse Distance Weighting (IDW) method was employed to process the data, resulting in satisfactory alignment between the outcomes. The analysis showed that iron (Fe) concentration is relatively high in the center, south, and southeast, with values in the high-grade zone ranging from 45 to 61.5% and in the low-grade zone from 3.64 to 57.64%. Additionally, concentrations in the intrusive granites varied between 30 and 48.73%. Given the significant sulfur presence, the predominant Fe-bearing mineral is pyrite. The study recommends further evaluation of copper-bearing minerals to enhance resource assessment, indicating that the high Fe values in granitic zones may stem from measurement errors and necessitating careful geological classification.