Collecting heavy’s in a hurry.

[Ohiogoldfever]

As we all know placer prospecting/ mining is the action of washing lighter dirt and stones away from the heavier things that we are after. Over the years I feel the industry has focused heavily on washing down to the least amount of cons possible but sacrificing speed in the process.

This makes sense to a degree but in my case leaves a bit to be desired. We have fine gold here so moving the most you can with the time you have is the key. A guy can run three times the dirt if he’s not trying to leave 99.9999% in the creek but you have to be willing to tote more cons home.

I have spent the last several months working on a concentrator. I’ve made about ten or twelve different units all working a bit different than the last but more or less the same premis. A basin that supports its self in the water allowing you to toss full shovels into it and stratify the material without carrying the weight of it like you do with traditional classification and panning. Shaking 15-25 lbs at your angles for a few hours is rough on a fella.

I know I’ve been a bit vague but assuming I can get things working the way I’m hoping, I may bring it to market. My current working unit is still in need of some refinement so I’m not quite yet ready for show and tell.

I suppose I’m hoping to get some feedback. Thoughts from the community. Could you see yourself using a concentrator/classifier designed to move quantity although leaving you with a 10lbs bag of cons to tote home. Have any of you guys used or built something that’s outside the normal pan/slice/highbanker etc?

Just spitballing I suppose.

 

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[arizau]

As we all know placer prospecting/ mining is the action of washing lighter dirt and stones away from the heavier things that we are after. Over the years I feel the industry has focused heavily on washing down to the least amount of cons possible but sacrificing speed in the process.

This makes sense to a degree but in my case leaves a bit to be desired. We have fine gold here so moving the most you can with the time you have is the key. A guy can run three times the dirt if he’s not trying to leave 99.9999% in the creek but you have to be willing to tote more cons home.

I have spent the last several months working on a concentrator. I’ve made about ten or twelve different units all working a bit different than the last but more or less the same premis. A basin that supports its self in the water allowing you to toss full shovels into it and stratify the material without carrying the weight of it like you do with traditional classification and panning. Shaking 15-25 lbs at your angles for a few hours is rough on a fella.

I know I’ve been a bit vague but assuming I can get things working the way I’m hoping, I may bring it to market. My current working unit is still in need of some refinement so I’m not quite yet ready for show and tell.

I suppose I’m hoping to get some feedback. Thoughts from the community. Could you see yourself using a concentrator/classifier designed to move quantity although leaving you with a 10lbs bag of cons to tote home. Have any of you guys used or built something that’s outside the normal pan/slice/highbanker etc?

Just spitballing I suppose.

The way I understand what you describe is another method/sounds a lot what I and others call production panning which is....Fill a pan then pan down about halfway or more, add more dirt to the pan and repeat over and over. At the end of the day or whenever the concentrates are mostly black sands, etc., save it and start the process again. Do the final concentration/gold recovery at home.
I hope your test pans are truly representative of the whole bar!
Good luck.

 

[Assembler]

As we all know placer prospecting/ mining is the action of washing lighter dirt and stones away from the heavier things that we are after. Over the years I feel the industry has focused heavily on washing down to the least amount of cons possible but sacrificing speed in the process.

This makes sense to a degree but in my case leaves a bit to be desired. We have fine gold here so moving the most you can with the time you have is the key. A guy can run three times the dirt if he’s not trying to leave 99.9999% in the creek but you have to be willing to tote more cons home.

I have spent the last several months working on a concentrator. I’ve made about ten or twelve different units all working a bit different than the last but more or less the same premis. A basin that supports its self in the water allowing you to toss full shovels into it and stratify the material without carrying the weight of it like you do with traditional classification and panning. Shaking 15-25 lbs at your angles for a few hours is rough on a fella.

I know I’ve been a bit vague but assuming I can get things working the way I’m hoping, I may bring it to market. My current working unit is still in need of some refinement so I’m not quite yet ready for show and tell.

I suppose I’m hoping to get some feedback. Thoughts from the community. Could you see yourself using a concentrator/classifier designed to move quantity although leaving you with a 10lbs bag of cons to tote home. Have any of you guys used or built something that’s outside the normal pan/slice/highbanker etc?

Just spitballing I suppose.

A crude way of tumbling such as a cement mixer wet or dry will process a lot of material in a short period of time saving the back and just toss away most of the top material to get some concentrates. Moving the cement mixer with the generator is a different story in and out.

It is hard to beat a shaker process of some kind including the pan.

 

[Assembler]

The way I understand what you describe sounds a lot what I and others call production panning which is....Fill a pan then pan down about halfway or more, add more dirt to the pan and repeat over and over. At the end of the day or whenever the concentrates are mostly black sands, etc., save it and start the process again. Do the final concentration/gold recovery at home.
I hope your test pans are truly representative of the whole bar!
Good luck.

The test pans will not reflect the whole bar most likely. This does not mean it is not worth working the deposit in general. Who knows about the bedrock layer.

 

[DizzyDigger]

We have fine gold here so moving the most you can with the time you have is the key.

I wondering how deep down you have gone. Often times "float gold" gets caught in the top 10"-12" of material, and there's very little down deeper.

 

[Ohiogoldfever]

I wondering how deep down you have gone. Often times "float gold" gets caught in the top 10"-12" of material, and there's very little down deeper.

Of course every spot is different. I know what your saying and have found this scenario In more than one spot. I work a lot of gravel bars and a couple I have worked keep producing well as I get down into clay layers.

 

[Ohiogoldfever]

The test pans will not reflect the whole bar most likely. This does not mean it is not worth working the deposit in general. Who knows about the bedrock layer.

Agreed. The chase of gold can be a finicky one. Gotta keep up on those test pans

 

[Ohiogoldfever]

The way I understand what you describe is another method/sounds a lot what I and others call production panning which is....Fill a pan then pan down about halfway or more, add more dirt to the pan and repeat over and over. At the end of the day or whenever the concentrates are mostly black sands, etc., save it and start the process again. Do the final concentration/gold recovery at home.
I hope your test pans are truly representative of the whole bar!
Good luck.

Yes the unit is very much like production panning. I have trust issues! I doubt I could run longer than 30-40 mins without testing to be sure I’m not just digging holes in the wilderness.

 

[tamrock]

Go to this event. I've been to several over the years and for the most part it's all about the big players, but mining around the globe isn't all being done by large operations. You'll see quite a few machines designed for the small to large placer operations. The times I've gone my head has gotten full of ideas with all the info found there in one place.

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[Assembler]

A crude way of tumbling such as a cement mixer wet or dry will process a lot of material in a short period of time saving the back and just toss away most of the top material to get some concentrates. Moving the cement mixer with the generator is a different story in and out.

It is hard to beat a shaker process of some kind including the pan.

I should point out if you try something like the cement mixer take the paddles out and when you finish a batch of tumbling, rock the drum back and forth to help get the heavies down to the bottom before you shovel out the top lighter materials.

The main point here is let the mixer / tumbler do most of the work for you before you shovel out the lighter materials for your batch of concentrates.

 

[Assembler]

I should point out if you try something like the cement mixer take the paddles out and when you finish a batch of tumbling, rock the drum back and forth to help get the heavies down to the bottom before you shovel out the top lighter materials.

The main point here is let the mixer / tumbler do most of the work for you before you shovel out the lighter materials for your batch of concentrates.

I'm on 'A roll' here with the tumbler idea....... .
In stead of just shoveling the concentrates into a container to take home for further processing. Shovel into a plastic drum / PVC pipe with magnets mounted to the outside to catch and remove much of the iron or black sands first.