A Study of Macro-Rhythmic Layering and Cumulate Processes in the Jimberlana Intrusion, Western Australia. Part I: The Upper Layered Series

The upper layered series of the Jimberlana Intrusion rests unconformablyon the lower layered series and has resulted from a major newpulse of magma which entered the magma chamber during the finalstages of crystallization of the lower series. All parameterswhich vary systematically with fractionation are sharply reversedat the contact between the two layered series. The lower portion of the ultramafic zone of the upper layeredseries is composed of a repeated macro-rhythmic succession ofolivine cumulates, bronzite-olivine cumulates, and bronzitecumulates. A detailed investigation was made of this sequenceso that the contacts between the units could be compared withthe contact between the upper and lower layered series. Cu,Ni, Cr, P, and U were measured on a whole rock basis; the Mg/Mg?Feratios of the pyroxenes and olivines, the Cr content of pyroxenesand the Ni content of olivines were determined by the electronmicroprobe. Each of the macro-rhythmic units is associated witha reversal in mineral variation and in the Ni-Cr trends andhas a zone of high sulphide values at its base. These featuresare also found at the contact between the upper and lower layeredseries and, if the upper series is due to a new influx of magma,it follows that the macro-units are also due to multiple injection.This conclusion is strongly supported by the size of the reversalswhich are too large to be explained by the alternative hypothesesto multiple injection suggested by Jackson (1961) and Wager(1959). The anomalous sulphide-rich zones at the contacts between theupper and lower layered series and between the macro-rhythmicunits are thought to have formed from a narrow supercooled zonewhich developed for a brief period at the bottom of the magmachamber following each new magma pulse. The olivines from thesesulphide-rich zones are depleted in Ni, suggesting that Ni hasbeen scavenged by the sulphides. This is only possible if theolivine grains crystallized with the sulphides in the restrictedsupercooled zone at the bottom of the magma chamber.