Is a Container Gold Leaching Plant Right for Your Ore? (It Depends on One Number)
Right now on our factory floor, two containers are taking shape for a gold client in South Africa. One holds the crushing and grinding section. The other holds thickening and leaching. Together they make up a complete CIL plant that fits on the back of two trucks.
Clients ask me about these container plants almost every week, and most conversations start with “how fast can I be in production?” I understand why — but before we talk speed, there’s a question about your ore that matters more. I’ll cover it below. First, here’s what we’re building.
What’s Inside the Two Containers
Container 1 — Crushing & Grinding. Raw ore goes in, and this unit crushes and mills it down to the fineness the leaching stage needs. If the grind is too coarse, gold stays locked inside the particles and never touches the cyanide — so we size this section against the client’s ore hardness from lab test results, not from a standard template.
Container 2 — Thickening & Leaching. The slurry is thickened to the right density, then goes through leaching, where cyanide dissolves the gold and activated carbon adsorbs it. Every stage of a full-size CIL plant is here — just packed tighter.
One detail that buyers appreciate most once they’re on site: the plant ships with cables, the power cabinet, all piping, and the working platform already installed and connected. We wire it, plumb it, and test-fit everything before it leaves our factory. On your site, what’s left is basically to set it down, hook up power and water, and run it. On a conventional plant, electrical and piping work alone can take weeks in a remote location — and finding qualified electricians out there is its own problem.
As for performance: gold recovery runs above 90%. Every component inside works the same as its full-size counterpart. The only thing we shrank is the footprint.
Who Should Not Buy This Plant
If you’ve read our articles before, you know we’d rather lose a sale than sell you the wrong plant. So here it is straight:
This plant works best on high-grade ore. If your raw ore runs below 1 g/t (1 ppm) gold, a fixed plant with bigger capacity will make you more money.
Do the math with me. A container unit’s capacity is limited by what physically fits in the box. With high-grade ore, every ton you process carries enough gold that the plant pays for itself fast — our South African client chose it for exactly that reason. With low-grade ore, you need far more tonnage to extract the same amount of gold, and a small plant can’t move that much material. You’d run it at full capacity and still wait years to break even. In that situation, put more money upfront into a fixed high-capacity line; the cost per ton drops, and the investment starts making sense again.
| Container Plant | Fixed Plant | |
| Best for | High-grade ore (above 1 g/t) | Low-grade ore, large reserves |
| Time to production | Days after arrival on site | Months (civil works + installation) |
| Site works needed | Minimal — level ground, power, water | Full foundations and construction |
| Capacity | Small to medium | Small to 200TPH+ |
| Can it relocate? | Yes — load it on trucks and move | No |
| Recovery rate | Over 90% | Over 90% |
Everything in that table depends on your ore grade, and there’s only one way to know it: test the ore. Our lab does that assay free of charge, same as we do for every project.
Why Buyers Are Asking for 10TPD container gold leaching plant Right Now
The gold market is running hot, and I’ve noticed a clear pattern in recent inquiries: people don’t want to wait a year for a plant anymore. Every month spent on construction is a month of gold prices they might miss. For a licensed high-grade deposit, a containerized plant cuts that waiting time down to almost nothing — manufactured in our factory, shipped pre-connected, producing within days of touching the ground.
We made the same call at our own tantalum-niobium-tin mine in Nigeria: start producing early, then use the revenue to expand. Having run that decision ourselves, we know why our clients want to.
FAQ
What recovery rate does the container plant achieve?
Above 90%, on suitable ore. Every processing stage — crushing, grinding, thickening, leaching, carbon adsorption — works identically to a full-size CIL plant.
What ore grade do I need for a container gold leaching plant to be worth it?
As a rule of thumb, above 1 g/t (1 ppm) gold. Below that, the limited throughput can’t carry the economics, and a fixed higher-capacity plant is the smarter investment. Send us a sample and we’ll tell you which side you’re on — the assay is free.
What’s included besides the processing machines?
Cables, power cabinet, all piping, and the working platform — installed and connected at our factory before shipping. On site you connect power and water, and you’re running.
How long until production after the plant arrives on site?
Typically a matter of days, since there’s no plant construction to do. For clients whose priority is a fast return on investment, this is usually the deciding factor.
Can the plant be moved to a new site later?
Yes. When one deposit is worked out, load the containers onto trucks and set up at the next site. For small mobile operations, this alone can justify the choice.
Find Out Which Plant Fits Your Ore
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