Core services

Core Sawing

ALS offers safe, fast, efficient, and high quality core sawing in a clean environment. Our sawing technicians are well-trained and can handle most rock types, from soft sedimentary units to extra hard granite. We use sophisticated semi-automated and computerised core saws with the option of speed control for precision cutting. Manual saws are also available for broken intervals requiring extra care.

Highly broken and friable core

If your core is friable or highly fractured the optimal method for sampling may be by chisel and/or scoop. ALS will sample using instructions provided to ensure the most representative sample is produced.

Core Photography

Whether you’re logging on site and shipping core to ALS, or you have an ALS core management system in place at your project, ALS can handle core photography for you. High resolution photos (wet and dry) with excellent lighting are taken for each core box and the photos are uploaded to our CoreViewer™ system for online archiving. We go even further and create a photographic core strip from the box photos, which may be depth-linked to any down-hole data you have. This includes geochemical analyses, down-hole geophysics, and any portable XRF or spectral mineralogy data captured on the intact core.

Standardised photographs

ALS produce a standardised photograph with consistent lighting, lens angle, labelling and colour charts to ensure the highest-quality archive photographs. These photographs can be particularly valuable because many characteristics of the original material may be lost following core cutting, such as the location of natural breaks in the core and identification of driller breaks. Retaining quality photographic records is a valuable step in all core processing and can save considerable time and expense by often removing the need to retrieve physical core samples from storage for review.

Core Logging Facilities

ALS provides bright, well-lit, and secure rental space for core logging. These core sheds can be outfitted on your project site as well. ALS facilities include layout tables with rollers, a DSLR camera positioned for core box photos, internet access, a computer station, desk space, and facilities. Portable instruments such as pXRF and various spectral mineralogy solutions are also available.

Long Term Storage 

ALS will work with you to design a core handling and archive system that best suits your needs. This can be as simple as organising shipping core boxes between our global labs and your project site. It can also be complex as full featured, on-site management of your core warehouse including on-site batch entry, core cutting, photography, sample collection, preparation, and shipping logistics. Regardless of location, all core is stored in secure facilities with online inventory tracking. Our archive system can quickly find the location of any core box anywhere in the world to save precious time and effort locating and retrieving archived core from our barcoded storage racking.

Hyperspectral Imaging & Processing

ALS hosts TerraCore International's Core Imaging Spectrometers™ (CIS) in several major exploration regions. These instruments generate detailed hyperspectral mineral maps and high-resolution true colour images of drill core. The mineral map identifies a wide variety of fine grained and intermixed alteration minerals, while mineral spectral abundances and other statistics are compiled from the scan data. ALS CoreViewer™ allows cross-platform compatible viewing of detailed mineralogy and unprecedented investigation of your core.

Longwave infrared spectral imaging

TerraCore is the industry leader with commercially available long wave infrared (LWIR) spectral imaging as well as the standard visible near infrared (VNIR) and short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectral range to deliver the full spectrum required for rock characterisation.