A Golden Cure for Cabin Fever!

[CGC Miner]

Hey guys, as cabin fever really starts to set in, let this video take you back to the Good Golden Days!

It took a few hundred hours of prospecting but I finally found the paystreak!
Just 2 weeks after this dredge trip we had ice on the water.
We are still currently buried by around 3ft of snow.
Hope you are keeping warm and enjoy! D

 

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[IMAUDIGGER]

Nice. The video makes it sound like you have long stretches of open river available to you to float and prospect. We all dream of that! What part of the world is this?

Looks like you have a good spot to come back to this summer. Maybe you are not quite on the pay streak yet...imagine that.

 

[Reed Lukens]

Nice job on the video.
You have way too much black sand coming down the upper sluice. From what I could see, you need to open up your upper tray at least a couple more inches, this will give you more needed water for your undercurrent to run. Then max out your pump and that should keep your top box cleaner. To me, from the sidelines, it looks like you lost a bunch of fine gold out of the top sluice because #1, your lower box was closed way down. #2, you didn't have enough water to keep your riffles clear up top. You want all of the fines to drop into the lower box and on that dredge, the slide plate should be sticking out the back of the box roughly 3-1/2" if it's the stock Keene header box undercurrent set up. Personally, I would pull the riffles out of the undercurrent and just run 1/2" expanded.
Here's an old article on the mods, the old riffles that you are using aren't needed in the undercurrent

http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/d...1-how-build-over-under-dredge-conversion.html

 

[CGC Miner]

GoldDigger,
I'm up in the mountains of Colorado. Fine gold country so the paystreaks are a bit more erratic.
With about 1/2 mile of river it's fairly easy to find small richer pockets but the actual paystreak has been more elusive. I'm not even close to bedrock in this stretch. Not sure yet if it is attainable but there could be a real treasure trove down there if I can ever reach it.

Nice. The video makes it sound like you have long stretches of open river available to you to float and prospect. We all dream of that! What part of the world is this?

Looks like you have a good spot to come back to this summer. Maybe you are not quite on the pay streak yet...imagine that.

 

[Johnnybravo300]

I havent seen much bedrock here in CO. Mostly glacial deposits and deep.

 

[Mudflap]

Cool video! Can see why your excited.

 

[IMAUDIGGER]

Bedrock isn’t all it’s worked up to be sometimes.

 

[Wiggler]

Bedrock isn’t all it’s worked up to be sometimes.

But then again….. sometimes.....sometimes it is ; ) The Gold is where you find it ….. every single time ; )

 

[63bkpkr]

CGC Miner, thank you for sharing your Success and Joy, great video that brings back my own memories! 63bkpkr

 

[N-Lionberger]

Reeds right the opening to your undercurrent is really short, mine is around 20 inches. Looks like your on a great spot.

 

[CGC Miner]

You are right Reed. The box is overloaded. I simply hog the nozzle too much on this ground. This is the nastiest black sand ground that I have ever dredged. I am yet to see a dredge sluice that can handle this material at capacity, and we've tried quite a few. I think the only real solution is to either send way less material up the nozzle....not gonna happen or build a sump system at the tail of the sluice to send the fines to side fine gold sluices.
The undercurrent is wide open plus 2 inches.. Still not enough material goes down.
My next idea is to drill the holes larger in the punch plate below the crash box and figure out a way to slide the top tray down even further. Thanks for your insights!

Nice job on the video.
You have way too much black sand coming down the upper sluice. From what I could see, you need to open up your upper tray at least a couple more inches, this will give you more needed water for your undercurrent to run. Then max out your pump and that should keep your top box cleaner. To me, from the sidelines, it looks like you lost a bunch of fine gold out of the top sluice because #1, your lower box was closed way down. #2, you didn't have enough water to keep your riffles clear up top. You want all of the fines to drop into the lower box and on that dredge, the slide plate should be sticking out the back of the box roughly 3-1/2" if it's the stock Keene header box undercurrent set up. Personally, I would pull the riffles out of the undercurrent and just run 1/2" expanded.
Here's an old article on the mods, the old riffles that you are using aren't needed in the undercurrent

http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/d...1-how-build-over-under-dredge-conversion.html

 

[CGC Miner]

Thanks guys, I appreciate the support.
I spend hundreds of hours out there by myself and sometimes feedback is much appreciated!

On the subject of bedrock......
Does anyone have any experience or knowledge about Ground Penetrating Radar?
As you well know, frequently the quest for bedrock can be just that, a never ending quest. GPR could possibly tell me how deep bedrock is in any given stretch of river.

We've punched holes 12' deep into the gravels with no signs of bedrock though who knows, it could be just 1" further down. Extremely frustrating.

I'm just starting my research on GPR.

 

[IMAUDIGGER]

I’m no expert and do not dredge. I HAVE laid eyes on a few deepish excavations.
From that..personally I’d be looking for a well defined pay layer to follow.

 

[N-Lionberger]

You're running too fast, if black sands and visible gold is popping up that far down your upper deck you're blowing fines out. I based my screen on Hoser Johns and undercurrent riffles on Reeds video with the v dam riffle risers on expanded metal, in the video it looks like the opening to your undercurrent is as long as the base of the crashbox?

 

[Reed Lukens]

Show us some picks of the box, give us the pump specs, etc and we can help you get it tuned. If you're in a ton of black sand, then pull the lower riffles and just use expanded like I have in the picks. It stays clear. Up top isn't from hogging material, it's from not running enough water over those riffles. Those riffles were originally designed back in the 80`s for a single sluice, so if you can turn the pump up higher, it will help. If you like hogging material, then attach a 1" blaster hose to the front of the nozzle, pointed straight ahead of it at the material, this will double your speed. That was one of the first things I noticed in your video was that you could run it a lot faster. Bungee balls work great for holding the blaster to the nozzle and you just want a standard hose valve if your just running garden hose. You'll be amazed at how fast it runs with a full time blaster hooked up to the hose, liquefying everything before it goes into the nozzle.

 

[Johnnybravo300]

Awesome gold!

 

[CGC Miner]

I will have to get some specs.
This is a new to me dredge and I'm still getting it dialed in. Last summer, I added the heavy expanded to the top of the top box and medium expanded to the head of the bottom box.
Interesting what you say about not enough water for the top box. I think you are correct. Rocks were not clearing well up top so mid season I added a punch plate and woven wire over the the lower half of the top box. Rocks would clear but the large hungarian riffles would load up like you see in the vid.
This particular river has extremely dense heavies and 80% of the gold is 30-100mesh fine, scaly, thin, sail gold... it's really tough.
Mods fairly easy:
-Expanded down the lower box makes sense.
-Larger opening to lower box

Full reconfigure of top box. Leave expanded at top. Cut out all but last 3-4 hungarians and replace with the small hungarians from lower box or something else?

Show us some picks of the box, give us the pump specs, etc and we can help you get it tuned. If you're in a ton of black sand, then pull the lower riffles and just use expanded like I have in the picks. It stays clear. Up top isn't from hogging material, it's from not running enough water over those riffles. Those riffles were originally designed back in the 80`s for a single sluice, so if you can turn the pump up higher, it will help. If you like hogging material, then attach a 1" blaster hose to the front of the nozzle, pointed straight ahead of it at the material, this will double your speed. That was one of the first things I noticed in your video was that you could run it a lot faster. Bungee balls work great for holding the blaster to the nozzle and you just want a standard hose valve if your just running garden hose. You'll be amazed at how fast it runs with a full time blaster hooked up to the hose, liquefying everything before it goes into the nozzle.

 

[spaghettigold]

Had the same Problem with my box loading up.Increasing the tilt of sluice or getting rid of the classifiers on the topbox helped.
Where there light sands under the blacksands in the top box?If so you just don't generate enough watervelocity to get a proper vortex forming.

 

[Reed Lukens]

If you can build your own riffles then you should put dovetail riffles down at the end because they allow the fines that don't make it into the bottom sluice to have a place to drop in and settle. I originally started making this video way back in 2005 after a lot of people were asking me to put together the info that I had posted on the forums. Then I made it into the 21st century in 2011 when dsl was finally able to extend way out in the bush where I lived. I rebuilt the video again a few years ago and you can see the dovetailed riffles about 15 to 16 minutes in. I'll see if I can find the post on the riffle build.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2hp0fzLzZBs&t=1s

 

[N-Lionberger]

Those dovetails look pretty effective, I can see the big rocks slicking over that pretty clean.