Case Studies
Case Studies
From compact onsite sample prep at remote exploration sites to full-service container labs running prep, fire assay, instrumentation, and photon assay — every case study below is a real, drawn-to-spec layout we've designed to suit the specific requirements of each project.
Modular Lab Solutions tailors each lab around the realities of the site: terrain, throughput, target metals, and regulatory environment. The configurations below show how that plays out in practice.
Real layouts, built for the realities of remote operations.
Simple Sample Prep Diagram
Small simple sample prep for onsite prep at the exploration site, prior to transport to the central lab at the mine camp.
Read More
Fire Assay
Fire assay module to accompany sample prep module for on site gold and silver analysis.
Read More
Core Cutting Shed
Core cutting shed with pass-thru conveyor.
Read More
Photon Assay with Sample Prep
In-house CSS structure housing photon assay equipment with companion sample prep.
Read More
Complex Lab
Full service lab including prep, fire assay, instrumentation and photon assay.
Read More
Full Mini Lab
Full service single container lab utilizing Block 10 benchtop equipment.
Read MoreReady to Connect?
Let's start the conversation about your modular lab.
Contact Us
Simple Sample Prep Diagram
A compact, single-container prep module for onsite sample handling at exploration sites, ahead of transport to a central lab.
This layout is designed around first-pass sample reduction at the source — the kind of work that needs to happen close to where the material comes out of the ground, before bulky samples get loaded onto trucks and shipped further down the line. By doing the early prep work onsite, exploration teams cut down on sample volume, sample weight, and the time between drilling and getting first-look data back from the central lab.
The container is organized as a clean linear workflow: crushing → splitting → pulverizing, with dust control integrated through a workstation hood and dedicated dust collection. A roll-up door on the working side keeps material flow moving, and a small drying area handles wet samples before they enter the prep line.
The configuration is deliberately stripped down. There's no fire assay, no instrumentation — just the equipment needed to reduce raw material into representative sub-samples that are easier and cheaper to ship. It's a workhorse layout for greenfield programs, satellite drill sites, and any operation where the geology comes out of the ground far from where the analysis happens.
Fire Assay Module
A purpose-built fire assay module designed to pair with the sample prep container, bringing precious metal analysis directly to the site.
Fire assay remains the gold standard for determining gold and silver content in mineralized samples. Traditionally, this work happens at a central lab — which means waiting on logistics, shipping schedules, and external lab turnaround before geologists know what they have. This module brings the full fire assay workflow onsite, in a single 40-foot container, so results are available in hours instead of weeks.
The container is laid out as a compact production line: fluxing and mixing → fusion in the Cress furnace → cupellation → AA spectrometry. Each stage has its own zone with appropriate ventilation, dust control, and hood coverage. The instrumentation section at one end houses the AA spectrometer, acetylene supply, and microbalance for bead weighing — separated from the high-temperature furnace work to manage both heat and contamination.
Designed to operate as a companion to the Sample Prep container (Case Study 01), the two modules together form a complete "sample-in, results-out" workflow at the mine site. The result is faster decision-making during active drilling campaigns, tighter feedback loops between geology and assay, and dramatically reduced sample logistics.
Core Cutting Shed
A purpose-built core cutting unit with pass-through conveyor design, engineered for efficient drill core sample flow from intake to downstream prep.
Drill core handling is one of those workflows where the difference between a well-designed space and a poorly-designed one shows up in everything — sample contamination, throughput, operator fatigue, and even the quality of the resulting analysis. This unit is built around a single design principle: core moves through, not around. Roller conveyors extend through both ends of the structure, letting core trays enter from one side, get worked, and exit cleanly on the other.
Inside, the Corwise saw handles the primary half-cutting work, with an integrated recirculating water tank to keep the saw cooled and dust suppressed. A chop saw handles the secondary work of cutting samples to assay length. Pallet and bin staging areas sit outside both ends of the unit, so the operation can scale to whatever throughput the drill program demands without bottlenecking the cutting itself.
The pass-through layout is what makes this case study distinct. Traditional core sheds tend to be U-shaped or single-entry, which forces operators to handle samples multiple times. The conveyor-through design cuts handling steps, reduces contamination risk, and improves daily throughput — especially valuable on high-tempo drill programs where the cutting shed can otherwise become the limiting factor.
Photon Assay with Sample Prep
An in-house CSS structure housing ORBIS OM100 photon assay equipment, paired with a companion sample preparation module — a complete onsite analytical solution built around photon assay technology.
Photon assay represents one of the more significant shifts in gold analysis to come along in decades. Unlike fire assay, which requires destructive sample preparation, photon assay is non-destructive, fast, and handles much larger sub-sample sizes — improving representativity for coarse gold mineralization and dramatically reducing the per-sample turnaround time. This case study shows what a full deployment of that technology looks like at site.
The main facility houses a twin ORBIS OM100 console layout, with drying racks, sample staging, and a QC hood integrated into a single 80'-long structure. Adjacent to that, three dedicated shielded cabins — Linac, Modulator, and Automation — house the linear accelerator system that drives the photon assay process. A connected 24'-deep prep area holds Alsto drying ovens for upstream sample preparation, with dust collection and make-up air systems coordinated across the facility.
This is a more ambitious deployment than a single-container module. The footprint reflects what photon assay actually requires: real shielding, real sample handling at scale, and a workflow that can sustain hundreds of samples a day. For producing mines or large-scale exploration programs evaluating coarse gold deposits, this configuration is what onsite photon assay looks like done properly.
Complex Lab
A full-service lab including sample preparation, fire assay, digestion, instrumentation, and photon assay — built for sites that need every analytical capability under one footprint.
This is the configuration for operations that have outgrown sending samples out. When throughput is high enough, when target metals are varied enough, and when the value of onsite, real-time analytical data is high enough, a full-service modular lab makes more financial and operational sense than a network of containers feeding an external lab. The Complex Lab case study shows what that looks like assembled into a single, coherent facility.
The layout is structured by workflow zone: Sample Prep on one end, Fire Assay and Cupellation in the middle, then Digestion, Instrumentation (AA, ICP, LECO/Microbalance), and a Cyanide area. A dedicated MCR (master control room), QC chemists' station, and lab manager office anchor the supervision and data-handling functions. Pulp storage, weighed sample handling, and reagent storage sit adjacent to the working areas they support.
Critically, the design also incorporates a full Photon Assay block — Linac, Modulator, and Automation cabins, plus an extensive jar storage area — making this one of the few modular configurations that brings together conventional wet chemistry, fire assay, and modern non-destructive analysis in the same facility. The result is a lab that can handle a mine's full analytical workload onsite, from drill core all the way through to reported results, without samples ever leaving the facility.
Full Mini Lab
A full-service lab packed into a single 40-foot container, built around Block 10 benchtop equipment — a complete analytical workflow in a deliverable-ready footprint.
The Full Mini Lab answers a specific question: how much real analytical capability can you fit into one container? The answer, as this case study shows, is more than you might think. By building around the Block 10 Series benchtop equipment — the BX-M Crusher, BX-C Disc Mill, and a compact splitter — and pairing those with a 40" hood for fire assay, a Cress furnace, and a properly-sized instrumentation bench, you get a fully self-contained lab in a single deliverable unit.
The 40' layout is divided into three distinct working zones: Sample Preparation at one end (with drying oven, crushers, splitter, and dust collection), Fire Assay in the middle (mixing/deslagging/pouring hood + Cress furnace), and Digestion and Instrumentation at the other end (fume hood, AA spectrometer, ICP exhaust, and microbalance station). Each zone has dedicated HVAC, exhaust, and utilities sized for its actual workload.
The deployment story is what makes this configuration distinctive. Because it fits in a single 40-foot container, the entire lab can be shipped, sited, and commissioned faster and more cheaply than any multi-container configuration. It's the right fit for small-to-mid-scale operations, junior miners running active programs, or any project that needs real analytical capability without the overhead of a full facility build.
None of these match your situation exactly?
Every one of these case studies started as a conversation about a specific site, a specific workflow, and a specific set of constraints. Tell us what you're working on and we'll come back with a layout.
Start the Conversation
