Just wondering if theres gold

[motohed]

I have been thinking about my past gravel operations , and I was wondering if anyone has ever panned any from a working gravel pit . I have found river gravel that was subsurface and never thought about the potencial for gold . I was just wondering , if anyone has ?

 

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[arizau]

Depending on the source of the sands and gravel that is a viable idea and there is some discussion of that on this and/or other gold forums. Also gold has been recovered from bagged commercial sands from Home Depot, etc. that were sourced from gold producing areas.

 

[Gold Maven]

yep.

I have worked around gravel pits my whole life, and have found some gold.

The glacially deposited gold is usually very fine, and flat. It can be found concentrated in black seems in the high-walls, but not very often in my experience.

Study the plant, and you will soon figure out where the heavies collect.

If it's a wash plant, with sand screws, in the bottom of the screw tanks is where you will find most of it. Even around the tank drains there will be black sand and gold, with out the chore of cleaning out the screw.

I used to hook a home made sluice right to the drain, take a fire hose and wash the bottom 2 feet or so of sand through the box.
the trouble with this is not being able to regulate the feed, and booming the box. We have installed larger screws at work, and the new drains are too low, so it's harder to get.

Any where you see black sand collecting, there is probably some gold.



Here's some Ohio Gravel pit Gold.

 

[motohed]

If I had known what I know now , I would have checked , we had almost a hundred feet of river gravel with black sand over granite bed rock , the site has been worked since 1980 and still going strong . I could have run millons of yards through a gold wash plant , we had three granate quarry whole when I bought the property

 

[SpecJet]

I've run bagged sand/gravel from HD, to test new setups and found gold many times.

 

[motohed]

I was wondering how much you found from the HD sand ?

 

[SpecJet]

usually just a couple fly poops.
A couple of times, I found enough to sit down and do the math. lol

It proved to be spotty at best.

That and my wife warning me that if she sees HD trucks showing up with pallets of bagged gravel for delivery, I'm a dead man.

 

[Jim in Idaho]

If you can find a copy of the book " The Extraction of Free Gold (Virgin Placer Gold)" by Al McGowen, 1973. It's a great read on adding a gold recovery operation to existing gravel operations. Includes many pictures of the equipment, along with descriptions of how it works.
Jim

 

[motohed]

Ok , I'm kicking myself now . I sold the bussiness in 2003 after a horific accident in Maine while I was playing , Ended up with more than anyone needed to retire . I got divorced in 2004 and it took everything I had to keep my children , from a woman that just went crazy . She got the money and I got sole custidy of my children and would not change a thing .

 

[motohed]

I could have run it and washed it right off my sand conveyor , and doubled my money , I bet . Now that i think back , it would have yielded gold off the operation , I'm sure .

 

[triple d]

I have heard they have found gold. In pits in Maine. If there near streams. And in western Maine its a good possibility. But you would most likely have to prospect the whole pit to get much.But you never know.

 

[Jeff95531]

If you can find a copy of the book " The Extraction of Free Gold (Virgin Placer Gold)" by Al McGowen, 1973. It's a great read on adding a gold recovery operation to existing gravel operations. Includes many pictures of the equipment, along with descriptions of how it works.
Jim

Well that was easy enuf...

Robot Check

 

[Jim in Idaho]

LOL....I'm surprised it was that easy, and REALLY surprised it is that cheap.....maybe they did another printing? At one time, it was in big demand, and few copies available.
Jim

 

[fowledup]

I use to do a lot of work on gravel plants, there were a few that had gold circuits, all depends on your location whether or not it's worth it. A friend of mine owns a gravel plant and he had one on his plant. Even though he was making money off of it he took it out as it ended up being a major distraction. It was the most well maintained piece of equipment in the operation said there was way too much special attention being given to the sluice.

 

[motohed]

Yes , thats what I would expect . I'm just thinking back the amount of black sand and granite bedrock that we blasted over a couple square miles .

 

[Jim in Idaho]

They came in, many years ago, and checked the local ready-mix plant to see if it was worth doing and decided it wasn't. Probably just too difficult to recover that Snake River flour.
Jim

 

[enamel7]

According to Perry Massey some gravel pits in NC do quite well getting gold.

 

[motohed]

I'm sure , I would have gotten gold if I had setup a sluice off of my pipe sand conveyer . Just an after thought after thousands , maybe millons of yards of material . We were running it with a wash plant and 500 to 600 yards per hour over a 23 year period .

 

[Lanny in AB]

Yes,

But only micron gold in our gravel pits around here.

All the best,

Lanny

 

[KevinInColorado]

Yes and it's a big business here in CO.