Titanomagnetite Ore in the Chiney Pluton

There are two Fe-Ti-V deposits in the Chiney pluton—Magnitnyi and Etyrko. They represent the largest deposits of commercially viable vanadium ore in Russia, with average content of 0.5 wt% V2O5 and 6.3 wt% TiO2 in ores. The Etyrko deposit hosts stratabound, mostly disseminated titanomagnetite, whereas the Magnitnyi deposit consists predominantly of cross-cutting ore veins and irregular bodies in gabbronorite. The Magnitnyi deposit contains about 1.5 billion tons of ore in several orebodies. The major orebodies account for 89.1% of the total ore reserves and 86.1 to 92% of mineable metal reserves. The individual orebodies are between 5.7 m and 26.5 m thick, with the total iron content gradually decreasing westward from 39.4 wt% to 28.9 wt%. Titanomagnetite and ilmenite (the amount of the latter rarely exceeds 10% of the total) are the major ore minerals. According to the Mossbauer spectroscopy, magnetite in the titanomagnetite ore is close to stoichiometric, and titanium is mainly contained in ilmenite (11–13%).