My idea for a new method of seperating gold from dirt.

[Wes54321]

First let me state that I have no experience gold mining and I'm not a professional engineer. That being said, I think I understand the very basics of each. My idea is for a machine that could more efficiently extract gold from dirt without the need for water and pumps. I got the idea from how some people mine diamonds. From what I've read, the diamond bearing ore travels down a conveyor belt and the ore is blasted with X-rays. Since diamonds fluoresce when exposed to X-rays, photoelectric sensors precisely can spot the diamonds and blast them with a jet of air down a separate path. My theory is that you could feed the dry gold bearing pay dirt into a machine and with gentle vibration the pay dirt would pass through a magnetic induction coil (induction heating gold is common). This coil would cause any metals in the dirt to heat up at least 10 or 20 degrees. Now after the dirt passes through the coils it would then slide down a large slotted tray with many strategically placed infrared thermal sensors. These sensors would look for anything that's above ambient temperature and kick them down a separate path ending up in a bucket. Now infrared sensors can detect as little as a tenth of a degree difference. So, to the sensor, spotting little specks of warm gold would be as easy as spotting fireflies on a moonless night. I feel like this would allow you to isolate and get every last bit of gold out of a yard of dirt. Also, wouldn't it allow you to mine in desert areas where water is unavailable? I'm sure you would save money on gas for the water pumps too. Without miners moss you wouldn't have to stop to do clean ups. You just empty out your bucket of gold. So how does my idea sound? Any engineers out there have any thoughts? Do I just have no idea what I'm talking about? This is just a theory from an outsider so don't judge too harshly I feel like there has got to be a better way to separate gold from dirt. There is just too many things that go wrong with sluicing. You set it at the wrong angle you lose gold, too much water not enough water you lose gold, you wait too long to clean your carpets....you lose gold. There must be a more fool proof way to do it. Well, thanks for reading!

 

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[Wes54321]

It would be cool to see the induction heating work. I'm skeptical both based on actual heat / particle size and detector capability, considering a dusty environment. But freakn go for it if for nothing more than to build the inductor to play with!

Feed the overflow into your idea.

Induction heating works because of eddy currents in the conductor. An idea I've been kicking around for 1/2 year which I think would use far less current but use the same eddy current principle in a slightly different way:

But I'm not clear how far find gold can be tossed. My original test was with a drill and super powerful neodymium magnets but I don't think I had enough rotational speed.

The medal detector idea has merit, but don't think of the complex single particle sperator, think grabbing that scoop of dirt off the belt and setting it aside. Detector goes off, x seconds later a diverter moves for .y seconds grabbing that segment of material coming off the belt then closes. So now maybe 10 buckets of material become 2.

That or just run the material over an air fluid bed. Whatever happened to that guy?

Hey jcazgoldchaser, good to see another techy. Firefighters use thermal cameras to see thu smoke and beach perverts use infrared cameras to see thu bathing suits so I'm sure some dust wouldn't be an insurmountable obstacle Thanks for the videos!

 

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[jcazgoldchaser]

But how well do those drywashers scale up to the level of bulldozers and backhoes?

Stare at the tailings coming off these two for a bit.

 

[Wes54321]

Stare at the tailings coming off these two for a bit.

Hmmm... I wonder how much gold they're getting out of that a day. That eddy current stuff is mighty interesting by the way. Found this post online by some guy-

"I am not an expert on this subject, but I do know that the texture and surface area of small gold particles hinder the repulsion effects of an eddy current separator. For example, a crushed soda can will not be repelled as far as an uncrushed can due to the fact that the uncrushed can has a larger, smooth surface area compared to it's weight. If gold particles were flat and smooth there would be a greater effect, but the movement wouldn't be as much as aluminum because of golds density.

I built a Hallbach array with neodymium magnets and attached it to vibrating sander. I put a gram of small gold flakes in a plastic container and subjected the gold to the vibrating magnetic field. I did observe a very small amount of movement of the gold. I placed a clean piece of aluminum foil in the magnetic field and effect was strong. I crumbled the foil and the effect was weaker.

My personal conclusion is that eddy current separation of small gold may be possible but the gismo would not operate like the separators used in recycling, with the gold being flung off the end of a conveyor belt. I think that the power and speed of the rotating magnetic field would have to enormous. Movement of small gold particles will be minimal but may be taken advantage of. The sky rocketing price of these magnets, due to China sticking it to Toyota and the Prius, is a major factor with such a gismo."

 

[okla. prospector]

Keep it up, hopefully you will come up with something

 

[WVPapaw]

Hi Wes, and first off....WELCOME to T-Net!

Your concept is an interesting one. Would you mind if I played
"Devil's Advocate" and pointed out a couple of hindrances to
making it all work as described?

Along with the gold in that aggregate blend are many other metals,
especially iron. The black sand will heat up at nearly the same speed
as the gold, or even faster, and this would be problematic for the
sensors to differentiate one metal from another.

If I understand correctly, we wouldn't need to bring water along to
run a recirculating sluice or other water-fed system, but we would
need to bring in a large enough generator to power the induction
coil and other sensitive equipment. That generator would need to be
running very clean power for those sensitive sensors, so if it's a regular,
off-the-shelf generator you can also add in at least one 30A power filter
(about $450). Bigger the induction coil, the more juice it'll take to operate
it.

Biggest hurdle I can see though is the black sand and gold heating up
together. Much of that gold is fine to micro stuff (-50 to -200 mesh),
and I just can't quite picture a mechanical device that is going to reach in
and remove that micro-fine stuff from the black sand and gold mix
Once those hurdles are overcome it might be something worth a try
on a very small scale. Know anyone with a lab you can use to develop
a prototype?

You're thinking though, and that's where great ideas get started!

Seems like a strong magnet could pull out the iron. I keep thinking there should be a way to melt out the gold, but if all else fails, it shouldn't be hard to use a sluice to separate the gold since it has a heavier specific gravity than most metals and sand. At least the dirt would already be separated using the method suggested by Wes.

 

[TerryC]

Welcome to the Net, Wes. If you do come up with the right formula to make it work.... big time... can I talk you into calling me before you post the idea Tnx. TTC

 

[DizzyDigger]

Seems like a strong magnet could pull out the iron.

It certainly can, but unfortunately along with the magnetic sands there will be
a large amount of very fine gold in that matrix of materials sticking to the magnet.
In this process, I'm afraid the magnets would be counterproductive, as the goal is
to get that flour gold away from the magnetic sands.

 

[WVPapaw]

Well we love that dirty water.... aahhhhhhh The desert is our home!

Brings it out in EPA and state environmental agencies too. That is why they don't like power sluices that pump and discharge dirty water or dry washers that pollute the air. I have seen what happens when an operation puts saltation into trout streams, etc. Fishermen and environmentalists get upset, and rightly so. If I were going to use a power washer, It would be a closed system that does not muddy the stream. Still, just about everything requires an environmental permit to operate these days.

 

[golden ray]

Wes54321, spent a lot of time in the florida keys many years back. Know of
3 different people who built mini subs (not for placer gold,but for working the
old ballisttalk piles.) Only one was considered successful. And talk about
the money involved !!, you had to be rich to start with.
Not many people know that the state of Florida wants 75% of your finds.
And to further piss people off, they 'exstended' their state water line to 20 miles.
And outlawed the use of 'mailboxes'. (strong water jets) I once spent almost 8 hours
on a hooki system (20 foot water) & looked like a wrinkled prune on surfacing.
I,ll stick with my saying of------ DIG AND SHUT UP. KEEP WHAT YOU FIND.

 

[TheNewCatfish]

Before you spend any serious money on equipement.. FIND SOME GOLD FIRST !.. That even goes for basic equipement. No point buying a $300 dollar sluice box and carrying it around unless you know where you can find some gold. I recommend a two foot plastic sewer pipe (Poop-Tube Sluice) for prospecting. It's cheap (about $6 dollars at Home Depot), and it's lightweight. i

 

[TheNewCatfish]

The most ingenious method i saw was a guy using a variable speed wet vac with a clear plastic hose attached. The hose was laid out in a series of loops. When it was properly adjusted (which appeared to take about two minutes) the black sand passed over the top of the loops and the fine gold fell back and collected in the bottom of each loop. Looked pretty efficient to me. I even asked to check the dirt in the wet vac. Panned it myself and found no gold.. not even a micro fine particle.

 

[Dustedyou]

Dry washers scale up to the ridiculous! this is the last size that i think a single man could run but your still going to need some one to dump the 100 cubic yards an hour thru it ! lol
GO BIG And get some GOLD!