Panning is for testing, learning and cleanup only. The skill you will use most is the knowledge you learned from your experiences mining, once you learn how to read a river you will always see where the gold is. It is a rare situation where panning can out do a sluice, it all depends on the river you are mining or the location on it, like canyons or gravel bar. But still I would rather walk 200ft. carrying my classified to 1/2 inch gold bearing material in a 5 gal. bucket to my A52 sluice than sit and pan the equivalent of unclassified material,3 to 4 full buckets. Dig, classify and sluice run 20 min. vs. at least 2 1/2hrs and that also depends on depends on the material you are running, black sand little or a lot will make it even longer when panning. If you are new to mining don't get the Bazooka, It is a area specific sluice needing a lot of flow to run properly, the A52 and other sluices are more forgiving in there setup location and with a few mods you will see instantly see if you are finding gold, great for learning. Remember it is your experiences and knowledge that determines how much gold you find not the equipment.
