Has Anyone Tried This Pan For Gold Panning?

[AzViper]

I own the Fossickers pan but I have never used the pan the way it was intended to be used. I use the pan in my Blue Bowl Recovery System as a back up. Just wondering if anyone uses the pan to pan their concentrates.

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[DizzyDigger]

Never used it for panning cons, but have used one in the field.

It does a great job working very fine material down to just black
sand, and the only issue I have with it is that it's a "single action"
pan. Once you settle the heavies into the pan, the washing action
is all forward and back, and while it does a great job of washing lighter
material off the front, you can't "swirl" the material like you can in a
round pan.

When working down a pan filled with classified material, I often employ
a swirling motion to wash off much of the lighter material. It's a different
action for the wrist/arm, and is often a more comfortable action than simply
going forward and back.

For working cons down (if needed) I use the old standby...a small Garrett
pan working in a tub.

 

[goldenIrishman]

Though I've never used one of them I have to agree with Dizzy here Keith. It seems limited in its uses. I've been using the Garretts 14" gravity trap style of pan for so long now it feels like an extension of my arm. I like that it will take the materials down to black sands quickly and with the wide bottom you can swirl the cons to check for those big pieces fairly early in the process. Plus the offset from the bottom to where it starts to flair towards the rim makes a nice trap for heavies.

Robi has expressed an interest in those Aussie "Turbo Pans" I think I'll get her one to work with soon and of course I'll have to give it a test drive myself. On second thought I may have to get a pair of them. One in pink for her and one in any other color for me....

 

[DanB]

I'm not impressed with those pans..... stick with the round ones they work a lot better.....HH....db

 

[deserdog]

Looks like a smaller version of a la trap pan. Have not used the one you are speaking of, but I did use my la trap until it fianlly broke after 15 or 20 years. La trap is a great pan for building cons, much faster that a round pan. But I prefer a round pan to clean up the cons.

 

[TheNewCatfish]

I've seen great pans used badly and I've seen "rinky dink" pans used with incredible expertise. One of the best panners I ever saw could I'm sure out pan me using a pie tin. Using a 14" Garrett Gravity Trap pan the guy could clear ten times the material I could in the same amount of time. You couldn't touch his speed panning technique, (The guy was a Speed Panning Master). I even checked his tailing pile convinced he was losing lots of gold. Not so. There wasn't even a micro speck of gold in the pile. This guy started out with a couple of quick side to side shakes. Then he used a whole body "forward and back" rocking motion and stopped occassionally to swipe off the top layer of material with the palm of his hand. Repeating the process over and over. I rarely saw him using a swirling motion at all, except when he was clearing material away in order to extract very fine gold. He would also gently drum the front of the pan to "vibrate or walk" the fine gold out of the black sand. Spending a few hours with one of these Ole' Time Masters is worth years of hard earned experience. These guys also know WHERE the gold is located and can teach you what to look for.

 

[bedrock bubba]

That pan you showed looks exactly like a LeTrap pan.

It will give you a better recovery than a round pan, get more fines and you can do it in half the time it takes with a round pan!

You use a back and forth washing motion, and can do it easily with one hand. It will leave nothing but gold to put in your vial, and gets rid of all the black sand! Remember, you need the other hand to hold the beer!

 

[gnatnutz]

Gold pans are like new high tec fishing reels. Some are good and some are bad, but all are usable. My opinion is that you have to learn how to use that particular model. I work at a sporting goods retail store and you wouldn't believe how many fishermen can't use the newer high tec free spool reels and just pass them off as being junk! But if I coach them on using them and adjust them { the reel and the person } they usually eventually get the hang of it and like the product. I usually wind up at the end of the teaching session by saying , ( isn't it amazing how a simple mechanical device can be smarter than we are? ). Sometimes while fishing for Steelhead ( big sea run rainbow trout in the 6 to 20 lb range ) I get bored due to our poor run returns and while waiting for friends to fish various areas, I turn my attention to possible gold holding areas along the river. Bad part is I'm usually so loaded down with tackle that there's no room for a gold pan. Once I found a large 1 gallon coffee can and cut most of the top off to make a pan and used it to pass the time away panning and found a couple of small flakes. Another time I found a old round Ford hubcap stuck in the gravel bank and used it to pan with. Point is that you can use a lot of items to pan with, if you experiment, apply yourself, and most of all learn how to work with what you have at the moment.