Possible solution?

[arizau]

Those who use magnets to remove black sands before panning know that often the black sands jump and clump on the magnet and trap some gold with them. I just ran across the following on an old post in another forum and it seems to be a viable solution to prevent or at least lessen gold "trapping". Here is the quote: "remove them thru a classifier with a magnet".

Have I tried it? Nope, I haven't nor do I use magnets at all.

Edit: I just found a video of his procedure.


Heavy pans.

 

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[Terry Soloman]

Unless you are an old geezer who has nothing, let me repeat that, nothing better to do, why would you bother with all that when a pan and a snuffer bottle is all you need?

 

[1637]

i use a magnet (under) a gold pan to move the black sand out of the way.but iam lazy.
brad

 

[Capt Nemo]

I just pan the mix with the magnetite in, and then separate, and pan again. Lake Superior magnetite is loadstone grade, and once magnetized, it stays magnetized. Also, once magnetized, it becomes less dense and will float on blond sand. If you have floating magnetite, any gold that it grabs will go out with the blond sand. Keep magnets away until it's been panned first!

Floating magnetite.


Removed magnetite.


Here's what the magnetite will push out of the pan on the first go around. That was about 1/3 of the gold in the bucket.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Cool demo Nemo!

Here in CO I’ve had great success just classifying then pulling the mag sand up thru a couple inches of water while swirling the magnet.

I recently gave about 30 pounds of this mag sand to an old, skilled miner with lots of fancy gear. He found zero gold left behind!

 

[Capt Nemo]

Yeah, I've only hit 1 or 2 of pieces in the removed magnetite when panning out the dregs from cleaning. So it doesn't grab all that much, but it will push some of the gold out when you first pan.

Now, for Nugget Lake material, I can remove the magnetite from the cons right away, as most of the gold is surrounded by zircon sand. So removal timing really depends on the material you're working.

 

[mendoAu]

Sometimes I'll dry the final pannings and stick a magnet under a metal pan. Tapping it back and forth usually produces No trapped gold and you have a nice pile of black sand in the middle.
....I'll also add a link to the magnet I use. These are super cool and STRONG. Also when you are done with the metal pan technique just brush the gold out of the pan and then flip the pan over, release the "knob" on the magnet and out drops your black sand.
https://www.google.com/search?clien...0i131k1j0i131i20i264k1j0i10k1.397.xXdrVvXKWYU

 

[dave wiseman]

Put the magnet in a plastic baggie and nothing will stick to the magnet...you'll still get the occasional speck with the black sand though.

 

[gold tramp]

I just drop a bead of Hg in the pan dont even worry about it
Save it up till i gets a golf ball sized ball of amalgam.

Gt.....

 

[KevinInColorado]

I just drop a bead of Hg in the pan dont even worry about it
Save it up till i gets a golf ball sized ball of amalgam.

Gt.....

I’ve resorted to that sometimes too, especially when trying to pan electrum. The risk is that mercury won’t grab dirty gold.

 

[gold tramp]

I’ve resorted to that sometimes too, especially when trying to pan electrum. The risk is that mercury won’t grab dirty gold.

Whats dirty gold? What risk if your pannin it will all stay in the pan gold n Hg.

Gt....

 

[Reed Lukens]

I use a large orange Keene magnet all of the time on the trommel cons, but I don't really see the purpose of classifying the magnetite thru a screen. I'm dealing with maybe 1gallon of magnetite out of a 5 gallon bucket of cons. I pan, pull the magnetite, drop them in a second bucket and continue. Most of the gold stays in the pan but the magnetite always holds on to some. Then after removing the bulk of the gold, I put all of the black sands thru a crusher, powderize, and get the rest of the gold out all at once.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Whats dirty gold? What risk if your pannin it will all stay in the pan gold n Hg.

Gt....

Gold with a slime of clay on it or iron oxides or other mineral coatings.

 

[Mitch Dickson]

If you tumble your black sand with a tablespoon of lye it will clean the slime and film off the gold. Then it will amalgamate easily. Don't hurt to charge that mercury either