Gold in Sand and Gravel pits

[GoldReport]

Hi everyone!

Novice prospector here. I work for an aggregates mining company and have talked with the company geologist about gold in our s&g deposits. At my last site visits in Southern NY + NW PA I took my gold pan. I grabbed about a gallon of material from the sand screws and panned them. I would have done more material but was time limited. I did indeed find some glacial gold, really small stuff. What I am having a tough time figuring out is what processing this would look like. In my head I would set up a sluice box where the chute that feeds the sand screw is located. It would need to be something as low cost as possible and would not need to be cleaned out very often. Anyone have any pics of their setup they would be willing to share?

Still trying to determine the concentration in these deposits. If they could recover at least 0.01g per ton of sand, I think it could be profitable as an additional revenue stream.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Treasure of Victoria Peak - Grab it through Amazon!

[Gold Maven]

In Northern locations , S & G plants usually dump these hoppers when the temp looks like it may drop to freezing temps ! that's when you need to be ready to clean them out and NOT dump them !! You'll need lots of help and some trucks/bucket's to haul this material quickly ! a small pump and hose's it would be nice to reach in the hopper to suck out that material and squirt it into your bucket's that are already in your truck . make it EZ on your self !

that's right, the best time to clean the screw, is before the first draining. The gold has built up all summer, after the last freeze in the spring. After it gets cold, it may be drained every day.
The ground under the screw can be good too.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Cry Of The Eagle: History And Legends Of The Cherokee Indians And Their Buried Treasure - Grab it through Amazon!

[DizzyDigger]

that's right, the best time to clean the screw, is before the first draining. The gold has built up all summer, after the last freeze in the spring. After it gets cold, it may be drained every day.
The ground under the screw can be good too.

Has anybody got a pic of what this screw looks like, or where it is in the processing system? Trying to picture this in my brain, and not finding much..

 

[russau]

I don't have any picture's of the setup BUT it consists of a large square metal box(hopper) maybe about 4 or 5 foot square and about 6 foot deep and a supply of wet sands is dumped into this container from a overhead belt system and obviously it has a lot of water in it while all the time there is a 36 inch diameter incline sand screw (@ a 30 or 45 degree angle) turning at a certain RPM to pickup the sand out of the slurry . The sand is in a constant slurry to help drop out the heavies (gold in our case) and it stays in the bottom of the hopper all Summer until the operation see's a freeze forecast and then when the day is done they shut down the feed and leave the water on and open the hatch on the hopper so that the sand slurry can pour out into a sump that flows back into the original sand supply. The S c& G plant we went to is on the ancient Mississippi River channel . they use a clam shell bucket to go down and grab up a bucket load and dump it in another big sump close to where they are digging and it has a hi- pressure water that moves the sand where they want it and it gets classified into several size's of the grains for different needs of the customer's. I hope this will give you a better picture of what is going on ! WHEWWW I need a drink after all that !

 

[Gold Maven]

Has anybody got a pic of what this screw looks like, or where it is in the processing system? Trying to picture this in my brain, and not finding much..View attachment 2176172