Drop riffle sluice from your junk yard

[ncclaymaker]

A good friend of mine repairs Toyota PU's and has a sizeable inventory of trucks and parts in his yard... including plenty of bedliners. He sells them for about $20 each or gives them away, if they are bashed up. He was cutting one up when it dawned on me that they were shaped like drop riffles. Actually they are like two different shaped riffles. The top side was larger then the bottom. If you throw together a simple wood sluice and just fasten the bedliner to the frame... voila! a drop riffle sluice. Check out the images of the liner profiles, and you'll see what I mean. Your next drop riffle sluice may be waiting for you at your local junk/salvage yard.

 

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[RELICDUDE07]

HAve you tried it?Looks like a easy fix if it works

 

[MRBeyer]

If you want to flatten out the top of the ridges (for more turbulence) and to catch more stuff (in my way of thinking). Why not run an old iron across the top? You'll ruin the iron but you'll get the ridges you want.

I'll try it this summer.

Thanks for the great idea BTW.

 

[Edson]

I have used this in my dip box (cross between a sluice box and a rocker box) and it works great. It's a 6"x48" box with 20" of the bed liner with the round side up and 20" of door mat with 1/4" drop riffles with expanded metal on top of the mat. I also have about 4" of 3M pad between the two. I only pour water into it (hence the name - dip box) and it catches everything. Some of the gold is microscopic. I have tested the tailings and there's almost nothing in it. It gets 98% of the gold. Most stream sluices will lose half of your fines.
I can set it up between two buckets and reuse the same water in dry areas or if there's plenty of water around just let it run off. I'm goind to try to post a picture of it.
Later. Edson

 

[Hefty1]

YUP I used mine this spring and it works great!
Was my wifes idea

 

[Edson]

It works much better in very slow water, like a dip box. With a drop riffle design, gravity is whats doing the work not the vortex created by a Hungarian riffle. But like any stream sluice (with the exception of the Keene miracle mat $$$) with the constant flow of water the fines get stirred up and right out the end. The back of the bedliner is a good trap and the gold works it's way under it and stays put. I use a terry cloth towel under it to hold the gold better.
Here in my area that's all I get is fines and small flakes. I get 3 times the yield with my dip box than when I run my stream sluice with the same amount of material.

Here's a picture of how fine my gold is here. Some of the dots you can't see cause they are microscopic.

Edson

 

[Hefty1]

This is one of my runs and was left in the river overnight.

 

[Edson]

Hey Hefty1, nice gold and stud. I wish I had chunky gold like that in my area. Where are you located?
I find more gold jewelry with my detector than prospecting.
This is what I usually get for 3 hrs of digging

Edson

 

[Lanny in AB]

Interesting thread--thanks!

All the best,

Lanny