M-3 GoldenIrishmans Monsoon Mining Thread

Yesterday we decided to take a little trip down to Quartzite for the small gold show they have going on this weekend. Very fun and we ahd a great time. I got quite a few ideas for things to fabricate for the processing arsenal. One guy was showing off his custom trommel/drywasher setup that mounts to the back of a quad. Five minute setup on it when he gets to an area and he can run a yard an hour through it. Now Jan want us to get a quad and set it up like his. Well far be it from me to argue with her on that one!!!!

We also picked up a small battery powered shortwave U.V. light for hunting fluorescent minerals while we were there and got a great price on it. I've been wanting to get a shortwave unit for a long time since only about 10% of the minerals that will fluoresce will do so under a longwave light. Now I'll be able to hunt for the other 90% of them! We also got Jan a bag of drywasher cons to practice her panning with.

One group that was at the show that really caught my attention was the "Military Veterans Gold Prospecting Assoc." They are a small startup group with the goal of getting Vets that suffer from PTSD and other problems out into the field prospecting in an effort to help them learn about prospecting and the benefits it can bring to their lives. They are looking for claim owners that would be willing to allow them to use their claims for this outreach program. They are currently only in Arizona but plan on expanding the program in the future. Being a vet myself as well as knowing several fellow vets that have PTSD and seeing how it effects their lives, I think this is a program that is worthy of a lot of support from the mining community. They can be found on FaceBook under the name above if you are interested in learning more about their goals. I will also be approaching our group with the information to see if we can help them out.
 

Now the re-training begins

I finally got off my duff and made up some training targets for the new detector. I did the old poker chip trick and made up three different targets using a small nugget for one, a medium one for the next and one of my "California Corn Flakes" for the third one. (Never know... I might be detecting with Sample Pan Dan or Jeff95561 later this summer)

Each of the targets had the gold glued to the poker chips using that glue that people use to put "bling" on clothes, shoes etc. Once the glue had dried I covered the area with a layer of heavy clear packing tape as extra insurance to keep the gold in place. These should last me for a very long time and do a good job of getting my ears used to the tones that the Gold Bug makes when it hits a golden target. I can bury them at different depths to learn the limitations of the machine and how the tones change with depth. I've always had pretty good ears but the tones on this machine are greatly different than the X-Terra 705 I was using before so it's re-training time.
 

You should throw in a silver coin, a clad coin, a trash lead and a brass casing with your targets. Hearing what other common non targets sound like should help you as well.
 

Already in the works Dan! I'm not all that worried about the coins (not many people with holes in their pockets where we are nugget shooting) but I've got .22 and 9MM brass ready to mount up on chips. Might have to scrounge up a 30.06 as well. I'm also thinking of picking up one of those cheap kiddie pools and making a "detector garden" with it. That would give me enough room to put both good and trash targets in it with having them interfere with each other.
 

You are doing what 99% of coil swingers fail to accomplish. When I got my coin shooter I practiced, and practiced with every kind of lead, casings, crushed cans, brass screws, and real deal silver, gold, and clad. I even buried trashy stuff over and right next to coins. I spent much of my college time swinging my detector. In one semester I found $130 in clad plus a few Rosie's, a pocket spill of 9 Wheaties, and a silver ring. I would have missed the Wheaties, and ring if not for PRACTICE. However these days I prefer panning infinite single shovel dirt samples until I find the juice!
 

I figure that detecting is like most other things... Practice makes perfect. Having practice targets mounted on poker chips will make it easier to recover them and I can stack them (Trash over gold or gold over trash) to learn what that situation sounds like. I've already gotten the hot rocks sound down pretty well. TONS of them in this area! Need to save a few of them and use them with other targets as well. I've got to start finding some nuggets with this Gold Bug. They're going to pay for the new detector in time. (The power of positive thinking in action here)
 

We Survived!

.... Our first GPAA Gold Show. We left from the homestead about 9AM our time and arrived in Lost Wages at the venue about 10 minutes after the door opened. Spent some time wandering around to see what was where and do a little shopping. Since Jan and I are pretty flush on gear we didn't really buy all that much. We did pick up a gold cube banjo pan to use for testing sites quickly. It's small enough that it can live behind the seat in the truck and effective enough to do the job of testing. It can be used wet or dry but I kind of doubt it will see much water around here. We also picked up a little 12volt vac that's small enough to go behind the seat. This will hold us over until I can make up one of Keiths "Viper-Vac" units. Jan found a little pan that she really liked. It's only about 9" diameter and reminds me of an over-sized beer bottle cap. Told Jan that's what happens when you leave a couple of pans unsupervised and got smacked for my efforts at humor. I did a little panning at the free panning booth and walked away with a couple gains worth of free gold. I used one of those strange combo pans that's like a regular pan crossed with a rectangular one. I wasn't impressed with the feel of it but I have to admit that it did catch gold pretty well.

We met up with Hard Prospector and got to know him. Tried finding Kevin from Colorado and ended up talking to him for a few seconds without even knowing it was him! Dude!!!!! You don't look a thing like your picture on here!!!! We kind of met by some of the drywashers and you mentioned that yours only weighed 15 pounds. I asked if you were talking about the Whippet and you told me you had gotten one as a retirement gift from the company. I was the long haired bearded guy wearing the safety orange T-shirt with our mining logo on the pocket and blue baseball cap.

All in all it was a fun day trip. I you're going to go to one of these shows, try to do better than I did and don't get asked to step away from the MineLab detectors because you keep drooling over them!
 

M-3 GoldenIrishman's Monsoon Mining Thread

Yes that was me and I do remember that short chat! Wish we had realized and talked more!! Next time...
Oh and I got my hair cut so, yeah, I look a little different. Maybe I'm smiling more too now that I'm retired ;)

PS Red and Megan did tell me later that you were looking for me...good try!
 

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I did enjoy talking with Red and Mike while there Kev. Nice guys for sure. We also picked up a banjopan which Paul(?) demoed for us. I'm thinking that it's something that Jan can use easier than a "normal" pan and would also be good for quick sampling. Her wrists and small hands make using a regular pan tough for her unless it's really small, so the two handed style it uses might be better for her. We're going to go out to the Griffith claim a little later today to give it a good test run. It's something that can be kept in the truck easily and doesn't require any classifying other than grabbing any fist sized rocks out. Once we've had a chance to test it out I'll render my opinion on it.
 

Cool! I've only used my (prototype) Banjo Pan for wet processing but Red tells me it works quite well for dry panning too!
 

Glad you guys enjoyed it. I volunteered both days and did tear down on Sunday. Nothing like mucking the panning booth after a long day HAHA!
 

The usual start of the month stuff has been keeping us running but tomorrow we will finally be going out to do some detecting and testing on the new BanjoPan. Our neighbor may or may not be joining us but we got him to attend the MPAs monthly meeting and he's now ready to join up. Next step is to turn him into another T-Netter!

Thanks to the training targets I made up, I'm feeling more confident with the Gold Bug so with a little luck I just might find my first "wild gold" with it tomorrow. Since the BanjoPan can be used dry, I'm thinking of detecting until I hit a target and then scoop the dirt into the Banjo and run it through. Between the trap and the mat section I feel this could be a much faster way of getting rid of the excess dirt and isolating the target. Will it work? I've not sure but I figure it's well worth a try.
 

Sounds like a great use of the Banjo Pan and very innovative! When it works (not if!), you'll have something to share with Red and Mike :-D
 

Man.... What a day! Between beeping and digging I'm about worn to a frazzle! WE hit one of the MPA claims today and while Jan worked with the Banjo pan, I crawled over the hill side swinging the Gold Bug. While I didn't find any "Wild Gold" I have to admit that the hill side had a amazing lack of trash targets as well. No tin cans, pull tabs shot or spent bullets!

AS far as the BanjoPan goes, it worked better in the courser soil but when we hit some silty stuff the mat section clogged up pretty quick resulting in a "Flat Boarding" condition. I tried running smaller batches and as soon as the super fine stuff made it to the end of the sluice section, I'd tap everything back to the pan and run it again. After a couple time of doing this, I'd dump the contents of the pan into a bucket which I'll run through the sluice later. I was getting some very VERY faint signals from GB in the area before we started so I'm hoping there's some gold in the bucket. Wind came up about 3:30 so we called it a day and headed back to the homestead. Now I've just got to figure out what to cook for dinner..... :dontknow:
 

They shoot.... THEY SCORE!!!!! AGAIN!!!!!

Jan and I decided to go do some more digging out by the MPA claim in Griffith today and ran into another member as he was leaving the claim. We got to talking and during the course of the discussion he told us that he had a drywasher for sell. He hadn't been using it for some time due to health reasons and his wife pretty much told him that "It goes or you do". It's a smallish blower style and is wood construction. (We don't need no stinkin carbon fiber Kev! We has a truck!!!) The blower unit is an Echo so I can set it up to pull double duty as a crack-vac as well. A few fittings and a shop-vac accessory pack and we'll be set on that modification. The washer itself needs a few minor repairs but since it's wood that's no problem for me. The guy even threw in a small miller table as well as a Trinity Bowl type of pan for free. I hesitate to tell you guys how much we paid for it. Just make sure that you're sitting down for this. Wait a minute here!!!! You're reading this on your computer screen so more than likely you're already sitting down. We scored all this stuff for the paltry sum of $75!!!! Ok.... So it's not a Keene or a Thompson or any of the fancy store bought brands. BUT, it came with the blower and it works well so we're happy with it as a starter unit. Now I can be testing much easier and with a little luck and a lot of perseverance the gold take will be up to where we want it pretty soon.
 

2 Grams will be much easier to do now too! I wonder how long it will take to get enough to buy a frickin back hoe to do the digging with! The area we're in is rock city! Good looking but the proof is in the pudding which will be made up in the sluice tomorrow. We've got three buckets classified to 1/8 from one area and another classified to 1/2 from the other end of the claim. The 1/2 inch stuff will need to soak for a bit to loosen up the clay balls, but it's nice and red. Reminds me of the materials I was digging at Kentucky Camp and that was pretty rich.
 

I went and picked up the parts I need to do the rehab on the plenum/riffle box today. Unfortunately Jan also decided it is time to get the garden put in. Any of you that are into gardening and living in the desert know that means only one thing. Lots and LOTS of soil amendments have to be added. In other words, I spent a good part of the day hauling B.S. to mix into the garden area. Now we all know that I'd much rather have been working on getting the drywasher fixed up and ready to go. I've decided that a fitting punishment for Jan would be to skip the shower tonight and go to bed in my current aromatic state..... Yes... I'm a cruel person at times! Muhahahahahaaha!!!!!!
 

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