Last Post 19 Sep 2019 12:46 AM by  Randy Smith
fine gold recovery
 3 Replies
Author Messages
Randy Smith
Greenhorn
Greenhorn
Posts:10



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16 Sep 2019 10:42 PM
    I have only been in to gold hunting for about a year. I always wanted to try and finally took the leap at the Alabama gold camp. The camp is mostly fine gold in courtesy piles. And a little bigger sometimes in creek but harder digging.

    My question is. I run a high banker and classify to 3/8 thru my header box.
    Would it be best to classify to a little bigger than gold you will find and bypass all the other larger stuff?
    And take a chance of missing that rare nugget.


    Think blasting out of box running high water volumes to.
    Or over thinking it one.

    Stuart Brough
    New Member
    New Member
    Posts:29



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    17 Sep 2019 10:22 AM
    Hi Randy,

    On the rare occasions I am at a water source (I live in Las Vegas), I use a Gold Cube with a trommel, so it's classified at about 1/8". At the end of a run, I will spread out the rocks from the header pile, and run a metal detector over them.

    Not much help for the bulk of your post, but hopefully it will help with a way to make sure you aren't losing nuggets.
    Christopher Satkowski
    Highbanker
    Highbanker
    Posts:112



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    17 Sep 2019 01:59 PM
    Test pans from tailings to see what you're losing at 3/8 would drive me to make the decision about classifying smaller.

    In theory, its always good to classify to bigger than the gold you're getting, but, How exactly would you change form 3/8 to smaller?

    I'm picturing you using a 3/8 expanded metal welded or at least securely attached that will stand up to abuse. I looked into modifying one of my pieces of equipment to 1/4" punch plate, but that would have slowed down production and cost me about $200, which was not worth it for the dollars worth of gold I found. When I tried to do things cheaper with things like wire screen, the screen (chicken wire) would not hold up to abuse.

    In my experience, classifying comes at a huge cost in time for me. I've dug 40 buckets of material by hand in a day, but by the time I got it down to 1/8", there was only 10 buckets left. That is done dry. Maybe wet is quicker.

    As a guy who has spent a lot of money on bad purchases and poor home made mods, I would not spend anything more until after your Alabama trip. If you're tooled up, maybe you can even make the change at the camp.
    Randy Smith
    Greenhorn
    Greenhorn
    Posts:10



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    19 Sep 2019 12:46 AM
    Yea it would be rough to do without starting from scratch on header box. But you are right i run punch plate seem to keep me from raking rocks a lot.


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