Our Process
Curious about how Virginia Kyanite gets from the mountains to our customers? We’re demystifying the process in this month’s blog!
We mine two deposits in Dillwyn, Virginia: at Willis Mountain and East Ridge. They are both surface mines—there is no underground mining. Willis Mountain is a mountain, and East Ridge is a pit mine. We start the process by drilling and blasting. We work with an outside company to complete the blasting. Next, we haul the rocks to a centralized location for primary crushing. We try to blend rocks from both quarries at all times, to assist with blending and reduce variation for the rest of the process.
From there, the rocks head to secondary crushing and continue to be blended during this process. We then take the rocks into our wet separation facility where we use a variety of processes to remove impurities from the kyanite—including quartz, pyrite, and mica. This material then goes to wet storage where we use gravity to partially dry out the material. This storage also allows us to create stockpiles of in process material so we can routinely shut down part of the operation for preventative maintenance. Then, the kyanite heads to dry separation. We use magnets to remove iron oxide, reducing the iron content. From this point, the kyanite is ready to be distributed at 35 mesh!
From there, it can also be ground further to be made into the different sizes we sell. Or, the kyanite can go into our kilns for calcination to create mullite.
From start to finish, this process typically takes one to two months. Throughout this process, there are many checkpoints to maintain the quality we are known for!
Questions? Reach out to us to learn more!
