Question About Miners Moss

flinthunter

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russau

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I would refrain from putting any Miner's Moss over the Gold Hod matting ! In doing so would stop the Gold Hog matting from doing it's job ! The punch plate (3 / 16) would help screen off the over sized material like you are thinking. And remember that if you just stop running your pump , remember to slow it down . before turning it off or when you start up again to slowly raise the speed up to eliminate the surge of the water and moving your fines down the sluice.
 

mikep691

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I'd start by running a test pan on the tailings before doing anythin to your sluice. If you have significant gold passing through your sluice, I'd try something different. Try changing the angle and flow of the sluice first.This will give the fine gold a chance to settle on your carpet. Then test the tailings again. If you still have gold passing through, then try mats and moss.
 

Reed Lukens

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You're going to trap a bunch of dirt and sand with that thick of Miners moss... It would work great in a dredge with high volumes of water flow, but in a regular sluice with a standard river flow, it will just clog up, making the gold hog riffles useless.
The gold hog mat also needs quite a bit of water, but it will work in a stream. In reality, you need to know how much water flow that you have & then build a system to fit. There's lot's of ways to deal with fine glacial gold, but a controlled system would work best.
 

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flinthunter

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You're going to trap a bunch of dirt and sand with that thick of Miners moss... It would work great in a dredge with high volumes of water flow, but in a regular sluice with a standard river flow, it will just clog up, making the gold hog riffles useless.
The gold hog mat also needs quite a bit of water, but it will work in a stream. In reality, you need to know how much water flow that you have & then build a system to fit. There's lot's of ways to deal with fine glacial gold, but a controlled system would work best.
Using it at the end of my 2 inch dredge is a consideration to try and catch the super fine gold that might blow out with the smaller heavies. We have a lot of gold that we need a loupe to see.
 

Carl So Cal

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Here in Illinois our gold is almost all super fine. I've got an old Keene sluice and I'm thinking about putting all Gold Hog mother lode mat in it with 10 mm thick miners moss on top. I plan to run a punch plate about 1 1/2 inches above the miners moss. Does anyone think this will work or am I wasting my time?
The best sluice to get really fine gold is the Popandson. It will recover 85% of the gold between 200 and 325 mesh. It is raised expanded metal over miners moss. backed miners moss is best but ribbed rubber mat will keep the gold from flowing out under the open moss. Three sizes of expanded are used : 3/4, 1/2 3/16. For only very fine gold leave off the 3/4. The 3/16 needs to be ordered and isn't real cheap. All 1/2 would work almost as good and be cheap and easy to find. Do a search for "Popandson plans" for detailed plans and operating instructions. there are YouTube videos showing it in operation.
 

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flinthunter

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The best sluice to get really fine gold is the Popandson. It will recover 85% of the gold between 200 and 325 mesh. It is raised expanded metal over miners moss. backed miners moss is best but ribbed rubber mat will keep the gold from flowing out under the open moss. Three sizes of expanded are used : 3/4, 1/2 3/16. For only very fine gold leave off the 3/4. The 3/16 needs to be ordered and isn't real cheap. All 1/2 would work almost as good and be cheap and easy to find. Do a search for "Popandson plans" for detailed plans and operating instructions. there are YouTube videos showing it in operation.
Thank you.
 

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flinthunter

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Consider running a section of the Gold Hog, a section of Miners moss and section of the 3M scrub pad (like on the back of sponges). Then let "GOLDy Lots" pick its favorite place to rest
That might be interesting. I plan on experimenting with a few different things. I've got several spots where the black sands are speckled with -300 gold under the lens of my loupe. That's what I want to catch. Over time that fine stuff will add up.
 

Carl So Cal

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Thank you.
To follow up Jason is the son in Popandson. He has a YouTube channel called Mount Baker Mining and Metals. This is partially used to showcase the mining equipment he manufactures. He did a video about a hammer mill grinding ore and then running it thru a Popandson sluice. . Normally he would sell the hammer mill with a shaker table. This was for the miner just starting out that couldn't afford the shaker table. he ran 3 buckets of ore and got a lot of minus 300 mesh gold. Next he did a follow up video running the tailings on a shaker table: . The shaker table was able to recover more mostly minus 300 mesh gold. After melting the gold into 2 beads the sluice had recovered 92% of the gold. Only 8% more was recovered by the $15,900 shaker table. Also the sluice used in the video used all 1/2" expanded.
 

Gare

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This is what i LOVE about this forum. Someone asks a very good question. The people with knowledge reply with what could and probably would happen !!!! Guys from the bottom of my heart I THANK EACH and EVERY ONE OF YA's
 

russau

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I wish I was 50 years younger ! I like his system and would have one back then when I was younger and able to use it but mounted on a smaller trailer to get it to where I would be recovering the material from regardless it be from a highbanker or my ole dredges .
 

Assembler

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I wish I was 50 years younger ! I like his system and would have one back then when I was younger and able to use it but mounted on a smaller trailer to get it to where I would be recovering the material from.
Yes it is a nice looking system. There could be a plugging up issues with the thin slot screen surface of the hammer mill with no cleaning action taking place.

Don't get me wrong as I love the hammer mill design. I think the unit needs to be made in different weights so as to make it more portable for more types of terrains out in the field / slopes.

I think a small stamp mill along with a scaled down hammer mill would be very hard to beet for some types of terrains / slopes. Just saying.

Plus if the units are scaled down then even older folks can have a go at it.
 

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flinthunter

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Thanks everyone for your replies and suggestions. I'm hoping this will be an interesting summer.
 

Assembler

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All Summers are interesting if you can get out to chase the gold! Good luck to your adventure and post some picks of how it turns out for you ! Be safe !
Even if one can not chase the gold due too fires and road conditions one can always improve equipment, maybe the over all process etc.
 

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flinthunter

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Even if one can not chase the gold due too fires and road conditions one can always improve equipment, maybe the over all process etc.
Good observation. Late summer or early fall I am scheduled to have major foot reconstruction. I will be out of commission for a year or more. That gives me a few months to get things running like I want. Since my wife, kids, and grandkids all like gold prospecting, I will be able to set back in my wheelchair, give orders and pan cons.
 

gold tramp

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To follow up Jason is the son in Popandson. He has a YouTube channel called Mount Baker Mining and Metals. This is partially used to showcase the mining equipment he manufactures. He did a video about a hammer mill grinding ore and then running it thru a Popandson sluice. . Normally he would sell the hammer mill with a shaker table. This was for the miner just starting out that couldn't afford the shaker table. he ran 3 buckets of ore and got a lot of minus 300 mesh gold. Next he did a follow up video running the tailings on a shaker table: . The shaker table was able to recover more mostly minus 300 mesh gold. After melting the gold into 2 beads the sluice had recovered 92% of the gold. Only 8% more was recovered by the $15,900 shaker table. Also the sluice used in the video used all 1/2" expanded.

I watched a wee bit of this video wasn't really impressed as one needs to run many tons to show something is working , now if he was actually running all day long really loading that sluice up, then doin a cleanup I would buy in to, but running 3 buckets doesn't prove much to me, I'm sure his equipment works, the one he showin was awful shiny...
Not knocking there product because I don't use it, just saying wasn't much of a test run my 2 cents...
Gt......
 

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flinthunter

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All Summers are interesting if you can get out to chase the gold! Good luck to your adventure and post some picks of how it turns out for you ! Be safe !
Thank you, I'll do that.
 

Assembler

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I watched a wee bit of this video wasn't really impressed as one needs to run many tons to show something is working , now if he was actually running all day long really loading that sluice up, then doin a cleanup I would buy in to, but running 3 buckets doesn't prove much to me, I'm sure his equipment works, the one he showin was awful shiny...
Not knocking there product because I don't use it, just saying wasn't much of a test run my 2 cents...
Gt......
I can see a major plug up problem happening. However if you run dry with some air flow going on and no screening at all to stop the bottle neck plugin up then yea you could run all day with the impact mill. You will have to keep rerunning the material a number of times to get the size to where you like it with the dry process. The sluice box is way too short for running very long and there is no change up in the box as well.

I could see some other processes happening between the reruns of the materials. For example a cyclone, centrifuge and even some shaker table action going on in between. However if you are cleaning up the screen in just minutes that is a bad bottle neck to bring everything to a craw.
 

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