Whats your favoret clean up machine?

hunterbill

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Sep 26, 2012
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AK,S.OR,N.Cal
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Thinking of getting a Keene super concentrator or a spiral wheel or some sort of mini tromel type thing for running the cons out of my 3 inch dredge/banker combo. I will be setting it up in my cabin, so portabillity is not a huge factor. Mainly, I want it to be pleasant to work with while siting by the wood stove and reading by candle light
 

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Bonaro

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Aug 9, 2004
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Olympia WA
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Minelab Xterra 70, Minelab SD 2200d, 2.5", 3", 4"and several Keene 5" production dredges, Knelson Centrifuge, Gold screw automatic panner
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The super concentrator and then panning whats left is probably the fastest method. Your combo is only going to give you 2 gallons to process, you will be done in less than a hour.

Or you could save some money and time and get a Le Trap sluice and re-concentrate the cleanup right at the steam then go back to the cabin with only a quart of material to pan by the woodstove.
 

Hoser John

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Mar 22, 2003
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Redding,Calif.
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For small gold my ol' faithful Dam Industries-Blue Bowl- is/has and so far in 30+ years my favorite. Many pounds of talcum powder gold sure is nice over the years-John
 

ratled

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Feb 18, 2014
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We have tried sooooooo many units but settled on only couple that are fast, easy and don't loose gold. No matter what unit we screen to #8 at the dredge and quickly pan off everything above. You do want to pan the big stuff off as crusted gold or gold that is attached to host rock could be missed if you just hand sort it. You can hand sort the real big stuff.

We now run all of our cons, and quite a few other folks seem to show up at clean time with their cons to run on a Gold Cube. Has been the best recovery so far for us and will run the volume of material we have in a timely amount. That will leave you about 3 cups of material when done. Screen that down to to 20 and 30 cuts. While using a magnet we will pan out each cut in a finishing pan. These are the only ones we use for that Dredge Sales, Dive Equipment, Mining Supplies and Metal Detectors - ArmadilloMining.com. I save the -30 stuff for the winter but do the rest in camp. It takes us about an hour to clean for our 8".

We use to use, and I still do for the -30 stuff over the winter, a Micro Sluice 2 Micro-Sluice 2. It really does keep the gold as promised but it is not as fast as the Cube.

Hope this helps
ratled
 

rebel003

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Feb 17, 2011
149
71
Winston, Georgia
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I just pick up the nuggets by hand no cleanup machine required... J/K of coarse. Gold cube classifiers and blue bowl. for extreme super micro gold I use a furnace to smelt it down.
 

Reed Lukens

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Jan 1, 2013
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I agree with Ratled especially on THAT finish pan - Flat out it is the best and not many places carry that Finish Pan - Dredge Sales, Dive Equipment, Mining Supplies and Metal Detectors - ArmadilloMining.com
I use a Gold Cube trommel and then quick pan. I had a Micro sluice concentrator for years but it didn't retain all of the gold so I sold it. After quick panning most of the gold out of the Gold Cube, I crush everything, screen it down, and use our Wilfley 800 lab table or depending on maybe just a small amount - our home made Blue Bowl Gold Lab and the slate table russau made for me :)
Products - Holman Wilfley Shaking Tables for Metal and Mineral Separation

 

bobw53

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Oct 23, 2014
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Hatch, New Mexico
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Now I know I'm not the only one that likes a plain 10" pan with a decent bottom for doing cleanups. I just picked up a pack of 10 of these for
almost free. There are 3 little riffles in there, but they are basically plain.

10 Gold Pans and 10 Free Plastic Vials 10 1 2" Pans | eBay

Funny color green, but exactly what I want.

Gold cube... I only take the top tray, and dump the second and third into a bucket there is almost nothing down there anyways, and once in a while take all
the panning tubs and the 2nd and 3rd tray bucket and run it back through.

Then classify classify classify 20 40 60 80 and 120.. Then pan. I have one of those black magic sluice/miller table things... But I found that once its all classified panning
it out takes almost no time at all, especially with only the cons from one tray of the cube. I do want to get some smaller screens though. Take it down 1 or possibly 2 more
steps.
 

KevinInColorado

Gold Member
Jan 9, 2012
7,037
11,370
Summit County, Colorado
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Grizzly Goldtrap Explorer & Motherlode, Gold Cube with trommel or Banker on top, Angus Mackirk Expedition, Gold-n-Sand Xtream Hand pump
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Prospecting
A smooth bottomed 10" pan is my favorite tool too. A set of those, one for each classification size, classifiers (20 and 50 are key, 100 is occasional) a magnet and some jet dry does most of the job in 30-45 minutes for me.

Later I crush the remaining super-cons and re-pan but that's just a way to enjoy panning when I'm stuck inside.
 

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fowledup

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Jul 21, 2013
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Northern California
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Whites GMT V/SAT
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I used to use just the blue bowl but more and more I find myself following Mike Pungs method as shown in these videos. I enjoy the whole process, even though I know and trust the ol"blue, I'm a hands on individual who goes nuts waiting for it to finish and get impatient sitting there watching the water in the bowl go round and round.
 

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