Results of Pilot Bulk X-Ray Technology Demonstrate Rockwell's Delivery on Total Diamond Value Management

Results of Pilot Bulk X-Ray Technology Demonstrate Rockwell's Delivery on Total Diamond Value Management PR Newswire VANCOUVER, December 3, 2012 VANCOUVER, December 3, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Rockwell Diamonds Inc. ("Rockwell" or the "Company") (TSX: RDI; JSE: RDI) updates the market on its pilot Bulk X- Ray project at the Saxendrift Mine. Despite this project being a pilot study it has already repaid the cost of setting it up from processing the old recovery tailings. The Bulk X-Ray project was initiated in November 2011 and commissioned ahead of schedule, five months later with a capital outlay some 7% lower than the initial budget of $1.5 million. During the six month period to date, a total of 1,596 [3]carats have been recovered from reprocessing 27,609 m of old recovery tailings that had previously been processed by another operator using older technologies. These included three particularly large stones weighing 52, 72 and 145 carats respectively. In addition to a capital investment of $1.4 million, operating costs of $0.39 million were incurred, with revenue from sales of the diamonds recovered totalling US$4.2 million over the period to October 31, 2012. [3]The recovery tailings achieved a grade of 2.97 carats/100 m .