Boil Box for fine Gold on the Beach

[Bonaro]

There was a discussion about boil box tech on here but I cant find it, starting a new one.

This was posted by Zooka (remember him?) on the gold miners yahoo group. Its a write up from TrevNZ who by any account is the godfather of boil box.
Very good info on how to build and set up a correct BB with direct respect to beach mining.

 

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[Jeff95531]

Thanks for posting. It's now in my resarch folder for 2016.

 

[Bonaro]

There is a ton of this kind of info on the goldminers group in yahoo. Subscribe to see it

 

[KevinInColorado]

Good stuff. Looking backward you can really see the connection from this to the Gold Cube. Each tray of the cube being a boil box and mat.

 

[Bonaro]

Trev and Mike worked together on the concept

 

[KevinInColorado]

Trev and Mike worked together on the concept

...and Red. Can't forget Red Wilcox.

 

[johnedoe]

There was a discussion about boil box tech on here but I cant find it, starting a new one.

This was posted by Zooka (remember him?) on the gold miners yahoo group. Its a write up from TrevNZ who by any account is the godfather of boil box.
Very good info on how to build and set up a correct BB with direct respect to beach mining.

That is some great info....
A very efficient system.

 

[johnedoe]

I guess we need more beach miners here to get this thread going......

 

[Oregon Viking]

I might build a "boil box"
Most of my black sand goes right through the -100 classifier...

 

[johnedoe]

It would be interesting to see..... The biggest problem we face in Oregon though is the "No Power Permitted" crap though... And you definitely need a pump to operate this system.

 

[Oregon Viking]

It would be interesting to see..... The biggest problem we face in Oregon though is the "No Power Permitted" crap though... And you definitely need a pump to operate this system.

Yep. If a gold cube does the same thing, maybe better....then.... We can use the gold cube above the vegetation line.

 

[johnedoe]

I guess that is always an option.

 

[ncclaymaker]

Read the docs, great idea and it appears somewhat simple to build. Does it really make any difference having the channel bottoms round or square? I noticed that the Gold Cube and the Grumpy Prospector sluices are rounded. I did see a patent from the 1880/90's of a similar design principle. The difference was - they put mercury in the bottom of the boiler trough.

 

[johnedoe]

Mercury just isn't a good option anymore.
As to round or square bottoms to the boil box...... I don't know that it makes too much of a difference.... I suppose the square ones were just easier to build at that time.

Can you post a link to the patent you found?

 

[arizau]

Read the docs, great idea and it appears somewhat simple to build. Does it really make any difference having the channel bottoms round or square? I noticed that the Gold Cube and the Grumpy Prospector sluices are rounded. I did see a patent from the 1880/90's of a similar design principle. The difference was - they put mercury in the bottom of the boiler trough.

If the goal is to completely clear the box of all material while in operation then the rounded bottom is the way to go. Square corners are likely to collect dunes in them that kind of resemble a rounded bottom (take up the same space) when in operation and will require additional cleanup efforts to clear them after shut down. Not a big deal but adds time to clean up.

The most important thing is to have the end of the box vertical. The more it slopes in the direction of the flow the less desired effect it produces. If it is sloped then the material including gold mixes up and pretty much exits the boil box at the same height in the water column and that is not the goal.

 

[johnedoe]

After reading through the treaties again I see he had the boil boxes made of sheet metal because he mentioned using a break.
Now I have been looking for some oval stock that could be used for this and here is what I have found.
The stock is muffler stock and available at a good muffler shop. You would then have to have it cut and some tabs welded onto it along the full length, all this can easily be done .

Here is a possible supplier, looks like they have a lot of sizes available and can even custom fabricate... http://www.louisianasteel.com/oval-steel-tubing.html


4cm is approx 1.5 inches

 

[ncclaymaker]

Mercury just isn't a good option anymore.
As to round or square bottoms to the boil box...... I don't know that it makes too much of a difference.... I suppose the square ones were just easier to build at that time.

Can you post a link to the patent you found?

It appears that the boiler box idea has been around a considerable period of time. Couldn't find the exact link to the image file, there are hundreds of patent images that I viewed, but here are a few that have similar characteristics -

http://www.fastonline.org/CD3WD_40/CD3WD/APPRTECH/G10TOE/EN/B1125_24.HTM#B1125_24_6

http://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/pages/US754657-1.png

If nothing else, a good source to start at for more ideas, some that work, some otherwise.

 

[johnedoe]

Interesting old concepts........ Thank's for finding them...

 

[Oregon Viking]

Scroll down to the mini underflow sluice....looks like "boil box" technology to me.

Products

I'am glad I'am not rich....I would buy one of everything out there just to test!!
Goldwell,underflow, slate miller tables, rubber mat miller tables....vortex tech, Gold Hog, sidewinder, magnetic tech....Wheels, cubes, shakers, maybe even voodoo!

 

[ncclaymaker]

Decided to build one, tried with square bottom troughs, easy to build, but impractical for long term. Tore out the square bottom troughs, used 2in (5.2cm) PVC pipe. Advantage to round is simple... no beginning or end. To maintain a 4:3 ratio regarding the ingress/egress elevations, I made a simple design modification. Under the uphill angle iron, I inserted a 1cm thick strip of angle cut plywood. This raises the ingress water column to 4cm, while maintaining the egress height at 3cm. The blade will be parallel (28 degrees) to the sides when finished. I'll upload images when completed.

View attachment 1237179

Prototype complete, maybe -

Slurry gates to even out the flow of material and water to the underflow troughs.

View attachment 1237280


Underflow gates installed. You may have to click on the image to enlarge the Lexan gates.
I used lattice caps as guides on the right/left sides of the sluice, and lattice joints on top of the
Lexan gates to create more rigidity.

View attachment 1237281 View attachment 1237283 View attachment 1237284

Under-flow blade set to 28 degrees, which will be the sluice angle of attack

View attachment 1237287


Discharge end of sluice - Underflow blades in place. At the very bottom, there is a 1inch ledge acting as a nugget trap. As if I ever get one in North Carolina... the fine gold capitol of the USA.

View attachment 1237288

Total time for this beast to be built - 6 hours, four cups of coffee. To seal and make the sluice assembly more rigid, I'm going to apply high expansion foam to the underside of the troughs.