SHERRYs THREAD - My Gold Prospecting Journey

[Sideways Sherry]

Will do Kevin, I still have several of my past adventures to post here, as well as some other things we discussed previously... Yes, I'm slacking over here! :-/

 

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[goldenmojo]

Sherry. I Pan as much as i run my supermini. Because of this i have learned that one pan load will have 31 visible colors and the next will have digging in the exact same spot. Two more low among pans the 10 colors with a big flake. It changes with every pan. My suggestion is run it flatter and get enough water flow to blow most of the debris over the edge. Then stop classifying. That is what a superminis is for. Plenty of water flow then drop a glob on the plate, whack the pile with your shovel to flatten it out, make a scrape across the grizzly and then plop another pile on the plate. Take a panload of tailing and pan it out every now and then and if it has color in it shovel your tailings. Back through. Eventually you will know exactly his to run it for your water flow and material type. Hope this helps. Pm me if you have any questions. I am out cut camping be back Monday.

 

[goldenmojo]

Retread the above post. Sorry it sounds like jibberish. Sent from phone . Small buttons big thumbs.

 

[Sideways Sherry]

I'm moving some comments here so I can keep them for my records...

 

[Sideways Sherry]

Here's what Prospector70 had to say to me about my damming/BGT gold collection issues...


Originally Posted by RSMSherry
P70, you are one smart cookie!!! My friend did have a CalSluice! Not sure of the model though. Yea I think I'm overloading the Super Mini. My friend was digging with a small kitchen pot and I was using my hand dredge, I should have beat him hands down as one pull of my dredge was like 3 of his pots full. Quite depressing!

Well the rain came then the flood and it filled in my 4 ft deep hole that I just made it down to bedrock in. Oh well... More exercise. LOL!!!

YES, I'd love the Prospector! I wanted it first but just couldn't afford it. Sure wish I could find someone wanting to downsize!

Can you tell me how to build my dam to maximize the flow. I can't seem to get the trap to fluidize well. It may seem to be doing fine then I put in a small scoop and then it doesn't seem to be fluidized at all anymore. etc.
Hahah nice!

Check out some of the dams in this thread:
http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/sl...o-gallery.html

Basically I wedge in place and make sure it won't float away. From there I build outwards to direct as much waster as needed/possible on both sides. Think of a big V with your sluice at the bottom of the V. Sometimes you can get away with only one side of the V or sometiimes you have to wall off the whole creek to get your sluice to flow right (or so I've read. I'm a river sluicer, never had a water problem). But I also build a dam to block the current from where I'm shoveling (Careful not to interrupt your bgt wing dam water flow though), and sometimes I use the tailings to build a third dam (To help wash tailings away) ((Not too close to the back of the sluice though)).

You want to force as much water as possible to go through your sluice point, block off everywhere around it where the water is bypassing your dam if you need to.
I should draw a picture and upload it. I'll do that and upload it tomorrow.

Also don't forget to kick it all to pieces when you are done

Best,

 

[Sideways Sherry]

Here's what Triple D had to offer...

I have a 36 " prospecter. I find that were the grizzlys start to flatten out. If the bgt is fairly flat the box will load up. But if you can incline the bgt. At a decent angle you will get some of the top water flow. To go into the box. Instead of over it. Helping to move some of the material out of the box. I don"t think the size makes any difference. Its just easier to get an angle. With a smaller bgt. Ive had the same problem. And always go for more angle. And more water speed never hurts. Hope this helps.

 

[Sideways Sherry]

Ok so here's our mini river's issues. The "other people" who visit this river build serious dams every 20 feet or so and dig it out deep on the up sides to form a pool for their kids. So without major engineering and rock repositioning requiring significant time away from digging it is very difficult to form a V-Dam in those holes. So, having said that, what about if I build the V-Dam leading downstream from the drop offs say 3-4 feet down then dig out a trough behind the BGT for the tailings?

Any other ideas on how to deal with this

 

[goldog]

I would think those dams would work for you Sherry. I believe there is plenty of water and drop where you are at (E Fork) just find a spot where you can open a gate (remove a boulder) and place your sluice.

 

[Prospector70]

Yoinked a couple pics off google. If it's too wide, set your sluice up by the bank you want to dig in then only build one arm of the V. All you really want to do is force water up and over your sluice. Doesnt take that long...

 

[maui]

RSMSherry, wish you the very best of luck.

 

[Sideways Sherry]

P70... Where's the bazooka in those pics? LOL!!! ;-) Maui, thanks! Ya know guys, the mystery of what's in the trap probably is getting to me.... I hear the other guys all day long going "Hey, check this out! Look at all that color, looky looky at that picker!! Woohoo!!!" Ugh! I still suck at panning so for me to get excited I have to empty the trap into my pan, wish I could pan, and hope to see as much or more color as they are... So it boils down like this for me... It's like in that movie "Seven" where at the end Brad Pit is saying in an upset voice... "What's in the box, oh come on, what's-in-the-box?"

 

[Duckwalk]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong but I would say the 2 biggest mistakes rookie planners make are

1: not shaking the material around hard enough to liquify the material in the pan. Of you don't, the material on the bottom of the pan stays solid and doesn't allow gold to fall to the bottom, of this happens and you continue to pan, you will dump gold right out of the pan.

2: dipping into the water tok many times between shaking. Some people refer to this as dumping your pan because that's basically what you are doing. I shake vigorously for about 5 seconds, then dip and wash the dirt out 3 to 6 times the. Shake again and repeat.

Just my two cents.

 

[triple d]

Sherry if you pan in the field. Alway pan into another container. Then bring those cons home. You can pan them several more times. You may do this anyways. Then you can do a quick check. Im not that fast panning either. So i bring my cons home. And run them though a blue bowl. I usually just fine specks. I can spot them better in the blue bowl.

 

[goldenmojo]

Sherry I have a supermini and a prospector. I use the SM more because by the time you get to the end of the second fiver it is time to dump the trap and I ncan't be waiting all day to see a result. I don't build dams I just look for the best flow as close as possible, usually a shovel length but no more than 25 feet away unless absolutely necessary such as working up on a bank. The key is to pan the debris from the trap dump out quickly and shake the gold upwards about a 25 degree pitch to the right corner in your pan (about 30 degrees on the compass) and snuff the gold out . Do this about three times and then dump the rest in your cons holder. Quick and accurate works best for this process and then wedge you bazooka back in and have at it. If it sheds a few specs of gold downstream no big deal just re shovel your tailings pile. Takes about two minutes. If you just work every aspect of the process you will recover most of the gold. Plus if you have OCD you will want to work all aspects of the process, you'll feel much better. Good Luck.

GM

 

[goldenmojo]

Sherry Do you have some pics of the place? It always helps to snap a few pics of the places you are working so you can review them later.

 

[Prospector70]

 

[Sideways Sherry]

Well... I'm OCD about some things but probably just paranoid about losing the gold. I am however ADHD and that surely does not allow for patience in panning. I pan my little cup of cons in my small pan over my larger pan. Snuff up any gold and dump the black sands in a container. I then re-pan the material in the larger pan and if I missed any a snuff up that and if any black sand I put it in the container then dump the remainder. This weekend I tried re-running my tailings and found a bonus! I'll post about that soon. ;-)

P70, thanks for the video, good info. Funny thing is I have his same scoop... 99¢ Store specialty! ;-)

 

[goldenmojo]

Well... I'm OCD about some things but probably just paranoid about losing the gold. I am however ADHD and that surely does not allow for patience in panning. I pan my little cup of cons in my small pan over my larger pan. Snuff up any gold and dump the black sands in a container. I then re-pan the material in the larger pan and if I missed any a snuff up that and if any black sand I put it in the container then dump the remainder. This weekend I tried re-running my tailings and found a bonus! I'll post about that soon. ;-)

P70, thanks for the video, good info. Funny thing is I have his same scoop... 99¢ Store specialty! ;-)

Sherry you have way more patience than I. I pan directly over the water. The fear of gold loss makes me pan more carefully and the Hi Def AD makes me pan three times as quick. Waiting to see the bonus you found and a panshot of some gold! More AU to you.

 

[goldog]

With the kind of gold we have here in So Cal Sherry's doing it right. Pan into pan. Every lil bit counts. Classifying helps though.

 

[Prospector70]

I could listen to howtodrillawell all day, he reminds me of someone I went to school with. His dumping technique still scares the heck out of me but he gets good gold. I'd recommend you watch them all if you have a spare moment or three.

I'm looking at about a gallon of cons to pan out from my last couple outings. Got run off by lightning last saturday but got a sexy lil picker so i'm hopefull for more in the bucket.