Reviews of the gold snare mini dredge

[triple d]

Anyone using the 1" mini electric gold snare dredge. Or the newer 2" one. They both can be run on battery power or the 2" can be run on gas. First ive heard of them. Just wondering how they work

 

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[DizzyDigger]

I found thew web page for it, but there doesn't seem to be any
effort to market or sell them. Looks interesting though!

Did find this on another forum:

va-gold.com ? View topic - Electric Mini Dredge

Might be fun to try and build one, but doubt it would move
much material in a day.

 

[triple d]

Found Goldsnare items for sale on E-Bay. So I checked out his web site. Looks like the 1" is for cleaning bed rock. And sniping. But it looks like the 2" one can move some material. And there both lightweight. Just would like to know if they really work. Diz thanks for the reply.

 

[Timberdoodle]

The 2" is undergoing numerous design changes and this has taken more time than I anticipated. Just working out final things like latches etc..
The 1" is in production and just sold last one today so back to the shop I go.
Here's a video of the new 1" at Gold Rush Days in Ohio if your interested in seeing it in action.

 

[NeoTokyo]

Looks like it could be a neat little sniping tool.

Get all that overburden off and process the rich materials below.

I would like to see the 2", working or not.

 

[lyco panner]

I use. My 1 inch for a sniping tool and I use it set up as part of my clean up with a 2 gallon bucket attached to it. I love it

 

[Reed Lukens]

There's going to be quite a bit of loss with that mat. You could see how the gold was slowly migrating down it. Maybe some Goldhog UR would be worth a shot. It definitely needs something that will hold the gold up top.

 

[Timberdoodle]

Hi Reed, I had thought about gold hog mat, but due to it's solid riffle wall design it will not accept the curve required to be installed without deforming the riffles. I first started with miners moss and drop riffles cut from a piece of pvc pipe but it was difficult to lock down the riffles tight to the miners moss without a lot of force which could lead to breakage. Tried a lot of different things before trying this mat. Since the fingers create the drop riffle walls which are approx. 1/4 deep and 1/4 wide, the natural effect is that migration into the fingers occurs and helps protect it from scouring. Next time your at Lowes pick up a piece to try, comes as a 17X28 door mat. I run slow at about 1fps. Whenever I do any major testing, I will run 2-3 gallons of material through to build up material in the riffles, then 2-3 gallons of salted material, then another 2-3 gallons of unsalted material. This gives me the ability to capture the material separately for panning it out to look for losses whether they are direct capture losses or migration losses. I simply do not see migration losses more than a fraction of 1%. I think you will be impressed with this mat's ability.

 

[Reed Lukens]

Migration happens, The guy said there was 7 specks in the waste pan and you could see where there was more gold in the tail of the sluice. Did you try Vortex mat by itself? Migration as long as it's monitored can be minimized. The mat looks good but you can see where the design will allow migration to a point. You should do a time test, that was a pan full, it took 5 minutes give or take. Maybe you will find that cleanout shouldn't be more than 7 minutes apart to retain more gold. Could the mat be getting to full after so much time and that is what allowed those specks to get by? Did they just float out in the beginning, throughout, or was there just enough material packed in the riffles to cause smaller gold to blow by or over at the end? It's a nice looking little dredge. You could turn the riffle section into a tray even with bolts for clean out. It would be nice to pull the tray and dump it while leaving the mat in place. If you can maybe try ½ mat/ ½ vortex all glued down with the vortex in the back

 

[Timberdoodle]

Hi Reed, All good ideas.
I have tried many different things over the past 4 years. When I first started to build submersibles I tried everything available and made riffles from Hungarians to clarksons trying to improve capture and found out why subbies were known for loosing fine gold. I was lucky to get 60% retention following the basic designs still found today that have been around since the 50's. The real key in this design is in the material processing ability/fluid bed lifting and flow patterns. While matting/riffles can change percentages up or down 5% or so, they are not the primary capture factor. This design allows for a buildup of the material and works down through it sorting the material until the riffles are uncovered and allowed to work again. When I test for losses the gold that does make it through is a small percentage usually in the 50-60 mesh range and is extremely flat and is some of the hardest to capture in any sluice. The vast majority is collected in the first 6" which is also under the greatest velocity and boiling force in the sluice. Some gold will make it's way further down the sluice to be sorted and collected in the mat which also hold more heavies as you can see in the video. The end of the sluice uses a boiling action to lift material up and out of the sluice which keeps most gold from simply working itself off the end of the mat if it makes it this far.I have tried vortex by itself and experienced greater losses since their aren't any larger riffle areas to capture and process the material and the larger material can easily scour the mat. I have found that drop riffles work better in subbies or at least use a riffle pattern that is consistent in height. I am now using 1/2" raised expanded over vortex for my 2" design since I needed a way to hold a mat down tight and placing expanded over the finger mat was redundant. Really impressed with this combination for capture and hold ability, but really no better than the finger mat from all the testing I have done.

 

[Reed Lukens]

Yea I have 2 subbies myself and they do lose gold. I actually used my 4" this year for gravity dredging. Show us a pic of the 2", it sounds nice. For a 1" system I can't see where much loss would be in effect anyway other than in the mat and you have obviously done your work on this little machine
Another way to hold mat down is like in the old clean up concentrating sluice where they used a steel rod pushed through the abs sides to hold the v-rib in place. The rods made for a nice little riffle, though I was never impressed with their recovery with the v-rib as a final stage because a lot of the gold went back into the bucket. But they were good concentrators for their time. I don't remember the name of that old concentrator but I'm sure there are plenty here that can name it.

 

[Timberdoodle]

Thanks Reed! The 2" is still undergoing some work to get the molds the way I want them. In the video you can briefly see a 2" prototype sitting behind me at about 6:57 mark. I have gone to a larger header box and a square sluice vs my old pvc design which allows for more working surface area and the header has a unique feature to split the feed and create 2 vertical vortices which deliver the material across the walls and back to the very front of the sluice before moving through. Really helps capture much more right at the header and provides a smooth flow transition to the rest of the box after the two vortices meet. I will post pic's once I get the final molds done.

funny thing is I did use stainless welding rods slid through the box to hold the mat down in my clear prototypes.

 

[Reed Lukens]

Thanks Reed!
funny thing is I did use stainless welding rods slid through the box to hold the mat down in my clear prototypes.

I remembered it, the Micro-Sluice Concentrator for the riffles its just a steel rod that runs inside the 1/8" peto tubing. We called it peto tubing anyway but it's the off white sorta clear tubing in any hardware store. I found their video and in the first minute you can clearly see the riffle in action. It's probably too tall of a riffle for the 1" subbie but you can adapt it I'm sure. It's an old school machine that always worked good.

 

[Timberdoodle]

That was quite a nice little machine Reed. Looks like they put a lot of thought into it.

 

[MrTim4Gold]

Ah Rob, Glad to see you on here! we met at Gold Rush Days, also exchanged a few emails about how that demo went and idea on loss prevention! I am glad to see you are still actively working on your product. Most guys are just out to mine the miner, but you are truly sincere! Obvious when you showed us your losses on the run. I was wishing I had it on our last trip..I was on solid bedrock! Great time. You have really done your homework for fluid bed design, which I know nothing about! I too will be watching to see how your 2" works! If ya need some good footage for youtube send me a pm!

 

[benny]

New 49ers discussed this too. Think it'd be great for sniping into a bucket.

The New 49'ers :: Gold Prospecting :: Mini electric dredge. The first and only right now! Its battery powered.

 

[Timberdoodle]

I finally got the 2" design completed and a few built. Wish it wasn't so cold and frozen over here so I could make some video's of it in action.

 

[Gelmac]

Timber, it looks neat and lightweight . And a 2 inch can move some more material. You can use solar cells to charge the battery .

 

[Timberdoodle]

Timber, it looks neat and lightweight . And a 2 inch can move some more material. You can use solar cells to charge the battery .

This one is run off a gas pump which provides greater suction and the versatility to work both above and below the waterline, add hose length, attach to floats etc... Matching a electric pump/jet design for this sluice will be tested next spring/summer if it makes sense.