Newbie mistake... too funny

[Floristweb]

In my excitement to learn the ropes of finding gold... I decided to roast a little bit (1.5 TBLSP) of thouroughly searched black sand... I added 2 TBLSP of salt and a 1/2 cup of water and put it in a pan on our new gas grill.... After about 20 minutes I checked on it and the concoction had exploded all over the inside of the poor grill ..... Apparently you're not supposed to use water... LOL I took the pan out, dunked it in ice water and panned what remained...I found a few small pieces of gold.. woo-hoo Maybe I better read up on roasting black sands... Don't worry, you aren't laughing at me, you're laughing with me....

 

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[SchoolOfHardRocks]

hey at least you tried! I have a crapload of black sand I'm waiting to do something with..just havent done the research to know what the hell i'm doin..keep us posted!

 

[enamel7]

Yeah, you don't us water, must be dry.

 

[Floristweb]

hey at least you tried! I have a crapload of black sand I'm waiting to do something with..just havent done the research to know what the hell i'm doin..keep us posted!

I am by no means a person who knows what to do but I definitely "now" know to do it safer ""OUTSIDE"" and """""NO WATER"""...... Thank goodness it was a small amount.... Too funny.... I just had to try it to see.... oddly I somehow ended up with a bit AU anyway.... probably not worth the mess in the grill except in the learning by experience aspect... Add that I now have a funny story to share about learning the ropes. Yes, this is fun.... We've spent under two hours total on the ground (many online) and have this to add to our take... Might have done it wrong, but we learned a lot. BTW use cast iron... I ruined a stainless pan...

 

[KevinInColorado]

Stainless steel and heat and gold are a risky combination. I've read reports of gold "melting into" a red hot stainless steel pan. "Bye bye gold!" I suspect it alloyed with the pan metal somehow...bummer. Stick with mild steel or cast iron

 

[Remnar]

I used dry black sands and a small cast iron frying pan (old crusty pan bought at a yard sale. Not for use with food. ...). I did this during the winter. Placed pan in BBQ grill with sand and heat it up. I took a half bucket of water and added snow to chill the water. Once the sand was really good and hot I took the pan and dumped the sand into the ice water bucket. Some care is needed here due to splashing and the reaction of the hot sand hitting the water. Some pretty good sizzling going on for sure. I had adequate safety gear on. Insulated bibs, boots and gloves, mostly due to it being the middle of a pretty good snowstorm.

I did find a little extra gold but nothing near the time investment to do the roasting. But in the dead of winter it wasn't like I was going to be doing any highbanking.

 

[goldenIrishman]

Roasting black sands (aka "Shake and Bake") is a very viable way to recover some extra gold from your black sands. There are a few steps you can add to the process that will make it more effective as well as a couple of safety items to keep yourself safe while doing it.

1. Crush your sands as fine as you can get them. Somewhere in the -50 to 100 mesh size works well. The crushing process can also flatten small pieces of gold and give them more surface area which makes the easier to see in the pan.

2. Cast iron is the best type of skillet to use. It heats up quickly and will give you an even heat. Just use an oven mitt to handle the pan once its heated up.

3. Heat the sands as hot as you can but keep the temp BELOW 600 degrees. The reason you don't want to go any higher is because if there is any mercury in the sands you don't want it to vaporize. Mercury vapor is very nasty on the body and you don't want that!!!!

4. Have your quenching water as cold as you can. Floating bags of ice in it will help a lot. You don't want ice cubes floating in your water because the sands can and often will stick to them and then you have to wait for them to melt and drop the sands. The greater the difference between the temp of the sands and that of the water the more effective the process is. Eye protection while pouring the sands into the water is highly recommended. They like to go snap, crackle and pop like rice crispies on steroids.

5. For safety reasons do all this outside of course and never NEVER use a pan that you would like to cook in later! There can and often are other substances in the sands that you don't want in your body.

I often start with the sands wet because after the crushing process i Like to rinse the sand to get more of the junk out of them. If the sands are wet, put a sheet of foil over them with the shiny side down. This will keep the splatters from happening as well as help the sands to heat up faster. The shiny side will reflect heat back down into the pan while the dull side will trap heat away from the sands.

There are several threads on here that cover this subject in depth. Do a search for Shake & Bake to find them.

As a rule, I don't get into doing this process until I have a large quantity of sands built up and have nothing else to do. It is a lot of work for just a little return but it can be fun and will help pass the down time.

 

[Floristweb]

Roasting black sands (aka "Shake and Bake") is a very viable way to recover some extra gold from your black sands. There are a few steps you can add to the process that will make it more effective as well as a couple of safety items to keep yourself safe while doing it.

1. Crush your sands as fine as you can get them. Somewhere in the -50 to 100 mesh size works well. The crushing process can also flatten small pieces of gold and give them more surface area which makes the easier to see in the pan.

2. Cast iron is the best type of skillet to use. It heats up quickly and will give you an even heat. Just use an oven mitt to handle the pan once its heated up.

3. Heat the sands as hot as you can but keep the temp BELOW 600 degrees. The reason you don't want to go any higher is because if there is any mercury in the sands you don't want it to vaporize. Mercury vapor is very nasty on the body and you don't want that!!!!

4. Have your quenching water as cold as you can. Floating bags of ice in it will help a lot. You don't want ice cubes floating in your water because the sands can and often will stick to them and then you have to wait for them to melt and drop the sands. The greater the difference between the temp of the sands and that of the water the more effective the process is. Eye protection while pouring the sands into the water is highly recommended. They like to go snap, crackle and pop like rice crispies on steroids.

5. For safety reasons do all this outside of course and never NEVER use a pan that you would like to cook in later! There can and often are other substances in the sands that you don't want in your body.

I often start with the sands wet because after the crushing process i Like to rinse the sand to get more of the junk out of them. If the sands are wet, put a sheet of foil over them with the shiny side down. This will keep the splatters from happening as well as help the sands to heat up faster. The shiny side will reflect heat back down into the pan while the dull side will trap heat away from the sands.

There are several threads on here that cover this subject in depth. Do a search for Shake & Bake to find them.

As a rule, I don't get into doing this process until I have a large quantity of sands built up and have nothing else to do. It is a lot of work for just a little return but it can be fun and will help pass the down time.

Thanks for the info on how to do Shake and Bake... I'll sure be using it.

 

[goldenIrishman]

Not a problem Floristweb. I was taught these processes by others and not to share them would be a poor way to pay them back for their kindness. Just remember to pass it on to others looking to learn.