Advice on building my first dredge.

[JJYacu]

First of all, hello everyone,

I have been lurking the forum for a little while and recently created an account, I always have wanted to live having my own gold mining little operation.

I recently moved out to South America where I had lived for a good while and left my girlfriend pregnant, as soon as I learned I was to have a kid, I went back to my mother land after a few years away and worked as hard as I could to come back here and be able to start a brand new life with a house and some way to live.

Over here everybody uses 8 inch dredges, sluice size, sluice mats, water flow, everything is more or less calculated and cared about, so lots of gold is lost.

In upper section of the river, where it is very hard to get with equipment, there is some nice sized nuggets, in deep holes. The river holds tons of very fine, flour and tiny flakes of gold, but most dredges here cannot catch any or catch very little of it.

Since taxes are ridiculous for import, I will have to get my equipment done over here, and was wondering where I could get tips, guides, etc.

Thanks for advices,

Will awnser all of your questions,

Good season to everyone,

Pancho

 

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[omnicron]

Welcome to T-net. In the upper right hand part of the T-net page is the search section. Start there. There are several threads on dredge builds so check them out.
A question..
Have you ever ran a dredge?
Do you understand how a dredge works?
http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/dredging-hi-banking/409455-dredge-newbies.html

 

[bill-costa rica]

what part of south america are you in ? there is a good reason for a big dredge. i used to run a 10 inch and if you build it right you won't lose that much gold. yes it will lose more than a 4 inch dredge, at the end of the day a big dredge will have 10 times the gold even with the loss. depends on where you are at if you can get good parts to build a dredge and if you are not a dredger and this is a brand new adventure you need to buddy up with some local that knows what he is doing. plan on you bringing the money and hope you don't get screwed. this sounds like a real risky idea, in my personal opion youn need to give this idea a whole lot of think time. i have lived in central america for 16 years and have ran into a lot of problems. the ball field looks the same, the game is just played different. good luck.

bill/cr

 

[JJYacu]

Omnicron, thanks, yes I understand how the dredge works and also have read your post.

Bill, I am in Ecuador, actually, I am exactly where AA almost died getting thrown off a cliff. I know where it was and know who has investigated on the case, my stepdad is actually one of the two park rangers who helped investigating (Even if not much was done).

Ive been living here for 3 years total, Ive panned here a bit with family members before, uncles of my girlfriend own dredges, but the mats are not so impressive. Some do not have expanded metal or even riffles, woven carpet or moss. Only a jute bag on some entrance carpet with tiny spikes made of rubber.

My step brothers dove before, one of them is pretty experienced, but also lots of people tend to only wash sand and moving rocks, without knowing about bedrock.

Material availible here is not of high quality and I will have to bring some parts in whenever im traveling, but costs of import are important. Im right now building my house on a land that was giving to me by my stepdad, (paperwork done). Dredges over here also seem to have way too much waterflow on the sluice and do not allow material to drop to the bottom well.

Thanks for advices, I dont mind challenges, failures, losses, and would really like to dive into this world head first. Will look forward to reading the forum, it is just way easier for me to print out resources and read later as I have no internet connection at home.

Will take picture of few dredges over here to show you guys.

Pancho

 

[principedeleon]

Wow sounds worst then here in DR even tho i thought it couldnt get any worst then this.

Is it thet they dont know how to set up their dredges or they cant find available the materials needed?

 

[bill-costa rica]

pancho

i have seen a few of the dredges in ecuador , there are some pretty simple ones and some good ones. there seem to be a lot of gringo dredgers in ecuador. you should be able to build a good dredge. don't let the water flow fool you.... there seems to be good pumps for sale there and i think you can get what you need to build a good dredge.
have you talked to stan grist, he can be a good source of info. he taks to a lot of people.

AA had a tuff go, i have not talked with him for a couple of months. i hope you have none of the problems that he had.

bill

 

[Hoser John]

PLEASE listen up to BCR as he's walked the walk. My bud Mad Dog was there for 3 months and lost his arse and then you can't get the gold out to top off all the ills. Having familia rocks,keep it quiet,go slow,trust no one,lotza luck-John

 

[Armchair prospector]

With the flood of illegals, children without their parents coming into our southern border from Ecuador through Mexico by the thousands, you have to wonder if anything is safe down there.

 

[russau]

ALWAYS be ALERT to your suroundings, no matter where you are! even at home in your back yard someone with ideas other than yours may come up on you before you realize whats going on! im not perinoid, but I want all the advance notice I can get to protect myself and my family!