Sluice Help

[H&F909ORO]

Hi All,

I recently bought an Angus Mackirk Foreman and awaiting arrival. I had a few questions regarding sluicing in general about sluices. I have very little knowledge about setting up the sluice, the right water flow, angle, material load (depends on sluice I know), and cleanup. As you can see I'm not experienced at all with sluices. Next purchase is a bazooka sluice. Any input or your 2 cents would be great.

Thanks!

 

[KevinInColorado]

Well, lots of folks on here use AM sluices and I have one so here's a start on a tip list...
1. Key to get it level from side to side so one side of the riffles don't get blown out by the water while the other side loads up with material
2. The water needs to enter the sluice smoothly (see above), use rocks to adjust incoming water
3. Adjust the drop based on water speed so your skid plate clears in about 15 seconds...maybe a bit less, experiment with this.
4. The material in the riffles should be "dancing" a bit, especially in the upper riffles
5. Be careful of changing water levels...if the water level rises it can sweep the material right out of the sluice
6. You will probably see gold flakes just downstream of the bumps on the skid plate...cool right?!

 

[H&F909ORO]

Thanks for your help Kevin it really helps. I will definitely do this when I go to the gold bearing areas.

 

[Prospector70]

How did this adventure end H&F909ORO?

 

[goldenmojo]

It's never ending........

 

[H&F909ORO]

How did this adventure end H&F909ORO?

Never got to go Weekends booked too, bit next week I'm hoping to go up Saturday to finally test the sluice out. I will give an update on how it went.

 

[Prospector70]

I know that pain all too well! I'm hoping to get out on Saturday as well (knock on wood).
Bets of luck!

 

[KevinInColorado]

Two more tips for you when you do get out...remember that it only takes a moment to clean out an AM sluice so you can stop and check to see if you are on the gold much more easily than with older style sluices. Also get a bucket you can drop your sluice into...and use it to slide up onto the bottom end of the sluice when you want to pull it out of the stream. Then you can just lift the sluice right up, standing it up in the bucket...no chance of washing gold out as you pull your sluice :-)

 

[Prospector70]

A much more difficult task with a 48 inch bgt. Gotta have the oomph to get it out of the water

 

[KevinInColorado]

True but also less necessary with a Bazooka as it's much harder to lose the gold as you pull it out of the water...while it's a real issue with a plastic sluice.

 

[H&F909ORO]

I'll be sure to do test runs of my sluice. I will put some random dirt in and then try and put it into the bucket to see what it does. Need to learn from experience.