Steve Rayner  has over 30 years experience in the laboratory development and testing of ores. Starting with Warman International in their Research and Development Division as a junior Steve studied at night school to obtain his degree, whilst working as a metallurgical technician and analyst. He became involved for a few years in the analytical side of the company first in operating and XRF machine and then in the setting up and operation of an optical emission spectrometer in Warman’s Artarmon foundry. He finally saw the light and returned to the metallurgical division and spent the next few years heavily involved in the development testwork on the Ranger uranium project, followed by many years of work in gold ore processing with the advent of the carbon in pulp revolution. In 1986 the Warman R & D division was sold, along with the Fox Laboratories division of Placer Exploration and Steve became the general manager of the new entity Fox Anamet Pty Ltd which again provided metallurgical and analytical services to the mining industry. Fox Anamet had a number of owners over a short time period but was finally purchased by ANSTO who renamed it Enviromet. Steve remained as general manager of the company through this period, finally leaving in 1990 to set up Metcon which specialized in metallurgical testwork only. The analytical requirements were sub contracted. This company grew over the following years and was eventually purchased by Ammtec in 2001. Steve has particular experience with copper/gold and uranium ores, acid leaching of copper ores and industrial minerals. He has been involved in on site testing and consulting at Ranger Uranium Mines (NT), Macraes Gold Mine (NZ), Lebong Tandai (Indonesia) and Coeur Gold  (NZ).  

Alan Eslake obtained his degree whilst an employee of Warman International R & D. After graduation he spent 2 years at the Macraes Gold Mine (NZ) as a contract metallurgist. During his time there he was responsible for projects including tailings detoxification, and flotation studies that led to the successful installation of a flash flotation unit cell in the grinding circuit. In 1992 he joined Metcon Laboratories as a Senior Metallurgist. He has experience operating a flotation pilot plant on site as part of a mine expansion program. Other sites on which Alan has worked include the Thalanga mine in North Queensland, Peak Gold Mine at Cobar and Beaconsfield in Tasmania where he spent the best part of a year running the metallurgical laboratory during the well documented start up phase at the mine.

Dr You Jin Kim obtained his masters degree in Mining and Minerals Engineering from Hanyang University in Korea. He was an assistant lecturer teaching mineral processing at the Dong-A University  and supervised the assay laboratory at the Geo-je gold mine from 1983 to 1985 before working as a mineral economist for the Korea Mineral Promotion Corporation (Korea Government Co) for 6 years from 1985. He then moved to Australia and completed his Ph.D in 1996 from the University of New South Wales in Mineral Processing and Extractive Metallurgy, majoring in hydrometallurgy – in particular electrochemistry, chemical kinetics and thermodynamic modeling. During his studies under the supervision of Associate Professor Tam Tran he worked as a research assistant for the recovery of base metals and minimization of hazardous wastes from mine waste and electric arc furnace dust in NSW. He was employed by Metcon on a casual basis until he completed his studies, and has been employed full time since. You Jin initially struggled with his English but is now dinki-di, as are his children. He is an important member of the Metcon team and has extensive experience in hydrometallurgical processes, particularly with gold ores.

Dave Ouvrier is an analytical chemist and has specialized in the analysis of ores and metallurgical products using OES, AAS and classical chemistry techniques. He obtained his degree in Applied Science (Chem) from the University of Technology Sydney in 1982 and worked for 18 years in the analytic section of what was progressively Warman R & D, Fox Anamet and then Enviromet. He spent his last 18 months at Enviromet doing hydrometallurgical testwork before a forced change of career when that company ceased operations. He returned to join Metcon Laboratories in 2001 as a metallurgical technician bringing with him his broad experience in analytical chemistry.

Tim Baily obtained his degree in Science from the University of New South Wales in 1996 and after a few years of casual employment, joined Metcon in 2001 as a laboratory technician. He has been active in a major program of complex lead/zinc flotation on a bench scale since he joined the company and has proven to be very reliable and accurate at his job. 

Rubin Rajasingham completed his PhD at the University of New South Wales in 2002, and has joined Metcon Laboratories to continue the subject work of his PhD, being Solvent Assisted Elution (SAE). This process focuses on the recovery of gold and copper from high cyanide consuming ores, while recycling the cyanide component.  

Mike Strodder is a qualified fitter with over thirty years of experience and is responsible for keeping the laboratory ticking. This includes maintenance, fabrication, model making and ideas. He is an invaluable asset to the company as he is multi skilled, resourceful and as his hobby is gold fossiking he tends to understand metallurgical applications. There are many clients who will acknowledge the contribution that Mike has made to their projects.