bad feed rates

[seafox]

I know the idea is a stready flow of material and water into a sluice to it can be tuned. but my idea as a one man opperastor was to be able to dump a buckit in the distruction chamber ( term doc at gold hog uses for his header box) and walk away while the water blastng in chews up any dirt clods or cemented aluvium. and being a fan of taking everything including the kitchen sink I put matting in ther distruction chamber under a punch plate and then the material washes out onto a sluice shaped punch plate 5 feet long that I angled 10 degrees upward so the materal stays and gets washed untill pulled out with a hoe. under this grizzly I have the first sluice section of the highbanker then another sluice section under that so the water stops and changes direction and then finally run out onto sluice sections running down the hill. the highbanker width was 12 inch then a number of 9 inch sections placed at differnt slopes then back to 12 inch wide with gold hog matts in that section ( the rest mostly being home made matts of conveyor belting cut with a radial arm saw and one of the 9 inch sections being conveyor matting with strips of conveyor matting ( 3/8th inch thick glued on top) totle length came in at 35 feet and catch area at 42 square feet with the last section an 18 inch wide conveyor matting with slots cut with a curcular saw.

I found some gold all the way down and this bothered some friends who maintain gold is usually all caught up in the top couple feet. insteed of cleaning out regularly would run for a couple days then clean out.

but I would like to go bigger maybe ass a wash table above the highbanker to wash off larger rocks ( 12 inch wide highbanker seems not to like rocks bigger than say 6 inch) was thinking with the wash table maybe fee it with several buckits at a time or even with a small tractor. proble have table toped with matting and maybe a punch plate.

the question is are there some better ideas short of an auto loaded to feed in a steady suply of gravel from a hopper. I keep thinking of adding things like a trommel where I am digging so that I only buckit half inch minus material to the highbanker, and or maybe wash the secong half of the tromel and use a syplen nozzel to carry the fines to the highmanker so I am not toating buckits of mud. thankyou for any suigestions. I keep getting more ideas in my head than I can try even saw a vidio where a guy had a wooded railroad with ore cars hand pushed to feed his high banker but his set up had the highbanker down hill from the area he was digging so the trackks werr flat, I want to put the highbanker at the top of the claim so that the washed material can latter be moved down hill for reculmation purposes

 

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[mike(swWash)]

Video of your existing unit in action will help everyone with ideas.

 

[winners58]

You have to keep feeding it, a sluice works best with a mix of heavy and light material exchanging
when the lighter stuff is gone it gives a chance for the gold to work its way down the box.
might make something to set a whole bucket sideways with a small stream of water slowly feeding
the material from the bucket into the destruction chamber, giving time to get the next bucket ready.

 

[Goldwasher]

stockpile, run material at an even rate.

Though in my experience a sluice run with only water in it isn't moving gold once the gold has settled into carpet matt or moss.

In fact I would bet money that if you put a tub at the end and let a sluice run for hours after your last feed has processed. You won't find gold in it.

When I run out of material to feed. I will throttle down to an idle and get more dirt ready. Rather than shutting off.

But, I'm also captain danger and will top off my fuel tank while I'm at an idle. So, I don't run out of gas in the middle of processing.

So, you may not want to listen to me at all.

 

[SunshineMiner]

I thought refueling an idling gas engine that is scorching hot was standard practice

 

[Goldwasher]

I thought refueling an idling gas engine that is scorching hot was standard practice

I figure squinting and holding my breath is good enough

 

[mendoAu]

I hate the way my cig. smoke get's in my eyes every time I lean over and tip that 5 gallon container to fill up........

 

[seafox]

one thing I like about mats over the riffles and carpet is that when you turn off the water the material in the grooves stays pretty much while the material in my bosses keene that st a stready flow stays behind the riffles gets washed down ward . will try posting vidio but the way I have been running the distruction chamber if the water shoots in uphill and washes away at the lower end of the pile. I built a screen swing to shake off half inch minus dirt into a wheel barrow and stock piled that since the water went up at the material and then stoped and flowed back and therir was no oversized rocks hampering the flow the concentrate in the bottom of the distruction chamber enriched quite well.

a little different question would be you don't want to lose gold that may be clinging to larger rocks but then again a 50 pound rock has a lot less dirt on it than 50 one pound rocks Gold washer when you stockpile what size rocks are too big to carry to wash plant or highbanker?

one other point I have tilted the distruction chamber say 5 degrees down from the exit into the grizzley punch plate so the flow of water ( three inch and a half pipes pinched so they are a 1/4 inch high and 3 inches wide) can wash out the lighter material up out of a bit of depression and then againas I said the grizzley plate also angles up so the water washes material into sluice below and not out the end onto the ground.

 

[seafox]

ps I was at my local scrap yard and asked the forman about the cast on his forarm. he said he was pouring gasoline on a camp fire when it blew up and proke his arm. the punch line " alcohal was involved" have done the refuil pump while running too mostly at construction sites but when mining and a bit spills into the creek I sure hate to see that.

 

[mendoAu]

Ya...and about them jetliners dumping that extra fuel before landing....HA!