Pictures of hard rock ores

[Goldwasher]

This would crush but it's high in sulphide

I wish you could see the colors better.

There's a lot of it

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

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

[gold tramp]

Few more ore shots.
Youall are gettin a freebie today. Youll learn more from these pics than all geo lesson you would pay for.

Heres a few cut pieces. And a couple more random vein pieces.
All samples are differant veins. all are true ores, as there is free millin values in each.
Some are heavier sulfide (pyrites) but run good values.

Gt.....
.View attachment 1600439View attachment 1600438

 

[gold tramp]

This is gold ore. .20 - .25 oz per ton.

View attachment 1600110

90% of the gold mined in the United States is mined from this type of decalcified sedimentary deposit. All of the gold is invisible and can only be proven through chemical testing.

____________________________________

This is a mineral specimen.

View attachment 1600112

Mineral specimens are most often associated with ores. This specimen contains no gold but it could easily bring more money on the market than the gold ore sample above.

____________________________________

This is high grade lead ore.

View attachment 1600114

About 50% lead with no gold or appreciable silver content.

____________________________________

This is very high grade silver ore from the Comstock lode in Nevada.

View attachment 1600130

Courtesy of my friend Chris Ralph. Check out nevada-outback-gems dot something to see the great mineral collections and information Chris has put into his website.

____________________________________

This is a specimen of silver Proustite crystals.

View attachment 1600131

Silver is rare in a pure native form but it can be very valuable as a specimen. Do not use a rotary wire brush on silver nuggets if you find them when prospecting. (ask Silver Dog Doug why ).

____________________________________

Ore is the rock you process to get the valuable minerals from. Specimens are the occasional discoveries of the purest mineral crystal forms desired by collectors. Ore sometimes contains specimen grade mineral crystals that usually have a market value far in excess of the refined metals in the same ore.

This is a fairly modern distinction because 150 years ago a beautiful crystal mineral specimen usually ended up in the crusher along with the regular ore. Today there is such a high demand for good mineral specimens that, even if they are microscopic, crushing ore for the mineral value could lose you most of the market value of your deposit.

Times have changed and confusing collector grade specimen material for common ore can be an expensive mistake.

I have a friend that owns one of the most famous gold mines in American history and despite being a former lead geologist for the worlds largest gold miner he only mines specimen grade material for sale to collectors from that mine. The billion dollar copper camp mines in Jerome have been mined by the owners for 60 years for their collectable minerals only. I'm sure some day they will get back to bulk copper mining but in the meantime specimen collection by a few individuals bring millions of dollars per ton of specimen material.

Heavy Pans

If your like me Clay.
My only $$$ is from gold and i can rarely afford to set on my product till it sells, and days of findin lots of easy gold is over.

The show must go on,
Fuel, reapirs, food n water all cost $$$ only way the tramp gets that is yellow metal.

And that stuff is really hard to find.!!

So it all goes to market these days...

Be easier if i could find a grubstaker share my finds with.

Just my blood, sweat n tears now,
The daily routine i call desert rock prospecting.

Ohwell i chose it.
Dang i love prospectin.
Gt.....

 

[SaltwaterServr]

2.4 ounces per ton



5.7 opt



Next to nothing at all for these.





That's why I cannot stress enough that just because a vein looks good, doesn't mean squat. You can have gold tied up in the rock that will not get liberated with crushing and gravity, and you won't know it until the assay proves it one way or another.

 

[tamrock]

You guys are showin high grade ? Not ore.
Gt....

Great old stamp mill pics.

What do mean? Seems to me I've have heard the term High-Grade Ore before.

 

[tamrock]

I got me a new sample yesterday. Had to go deep and up in the stope of a narrow vein mine to get it. It's got lead in it and so much so the safety lady told me I need to wash my hands some way before I take a pinch a crew. I didn't tell her I use to bite and pull out with my teeth the lead slugs of my .22 shells in order to get the powder out of them when I was a kid, but yeah anymore lead in my system probably wouldn't be all that good. Other elements are copper, zinc, a little gold and a lot of silver within that vein. I had more ore samples from various other operations I picked up over the years, but I gave them to friends with kids that had interest in rocks and other folks. Maybe I'll start gathering more up again when the opportunity permits.

 

[tamrock]

If your like me Clay.
My only $$$ is from gold and i can rarely afford to set on my product till it sells, and days of findin lots of easy gold is over.

The show must go on,
Fuel, reapirs, food n water all cost $$$ only way the tramp gets that is yellow metal.

And that stuff is really hard to find.!!

So it all goes to market these days...

Be easier if i could find a grubstaker share my finds with.

Just my blood, sweat n tears now,
The daily routine i call desert rock prospecting.

Ohwell i chose it.
Dang i love prospectin.
Gt.....

Well here's a little story I'll tell ya about a gold prospector I know that goes by the name Mucker. I've known him for years. He'd call me over time about his new poke hole prospects and wondered about the price of equipment and that, but chasing gold never really did him any real favors. He was out in the west central part of Utah looking over some old gold operations and while there started looking more into the previous short-lived tungsten operations that had been long abandon. He determine that there was value in the ore deposits of those old tungsten mines. He was taking samples to buyer's of tungsten like Kenametal the makers of tungsten-carbide and they said he could go ahead and leave his rock samples and they'll try to get back with him if they're interested. Months later Kenametal contacted this grubby old Prospector called Mucker and said to him they were very interested in his little plans of running this tungsten mine and what could he produce for them. Other investors offered him capital to get him started and he got underway. I'll never forget the day he called me all excited and his exact words was, hey man I hit it big this time. He wanted all kinds of stuff he was saying to mine the project. I didn't believe him at first, until I went out to see his new operation he was telling me about and I will say I was a bit surprised to see that Mucker finally did succeed with a legitimate mining operation. He's now crowned himself president of Scheelite Metals.

Here's a little video he narrated himself and put together using a drone to promote his company.

 

[gold tramp]

What do mean? Seems to me I've have heard the term High-Grade Ore before.

Guess i should of said specimen, i dont have much chance hunt trophy gold , and havnt found any thing close lately. so dont use that term much.

I have a 3 baggin system i use for ore its just the way i do things.

So i calls my first bag highgrade, its the stuff has the yellow hangin out. I can crush n pan get metal and cash same day. I rareley gets one of these.

My second bag is the straight mill run it could be ore of1 to 2 oz a ton. Any thing over 2 oz you can see the stuff in the vein.
i get this stuff it usually never runs a ton rather a few lbs of ore.

Anyways all this chunky stuff i can pick out of the zone
If i dont see the yellow hangin out it goes in the second bag.

I get lots of these if the dig is big!

3rd bag is sweepins n crumbles its straight mill run.
I usually end up with as many as the chunky stuff.


Hope this help, sorry for confusion
Gt.....
.

 

[tamrock]

Guess i should of said specimen, i dont have much chance hunt trophy gold , and havnt found any thing close lately. so dont use that term much.

I have a 3 baggin system i use for ore its just the way i do things.

So i calls my first bag highgrade, its the stuff has the yellow hangin out. I can crush n pan get metal and cash same day. I rareley gets one of these.

My second bag is the straight mill run it could be ore of1 to 2 oz a ton. Any thing over 2 oz you can see the stuff in the vein.
i get this stuff it usually never runs a ton rather a few lbs of ore.

Anyways all this chunky stuff i can pick out of the zone
If i dont see the yellow hangin out it goes in the second bag.

I get lots of these if the dig is big!

3rd bag is sweepins n crumbles its straight mill run.
I usually end up with as many as the chunky stuff.


Hope this help, sorry for confusion
Gt.....
.

Indeed it is an ultra rare mineral specimen. How'd ya like to have been the jippo miner that found that gem? I'll bet the mine owners never even knew that piece was taking out of the mine in some lucky cooches pie can and sold for money to get good and drunk on. The mine it was found in stopped mining in the 1980s I think it was? This mine called Fire Creek in Nevada will run into some visible gold at times. I'm told when that happens only a few trusted employees under close supervision will then take it from there. https://www.google.com/amp/s/elkoda...5541-918a-c69195b3121f.amp.html?source=images

 

[pczim]

This would crush but it's high in sulphide

I wish you could see the colors better.

There's a lot of it

Crush it.... cyanide does not care much ��

 

[AnnaMountain]

Ahem, to get us back on track with the actual subject matter, another ore post

 

[just a gold hunter]

Can you help me identify this ore I'm pretty sure its platinum has no reaction to platinum solution and it has been soaked for almost a week in muriatic acid

 

[arizau]

Can you help me identify this ore I'm pretty sure its platinum has no reaction to platinum solution and it has been soaked for almost a week in muriatic acid

View attachment 1603594View attachment 1603595View attachment 1603595View attachment 1603595

I have no familiarity with platinum ores/specimens but breaking a piece off, then crushing and panning it could confirm whether or not the specks are metal of some type. Eg. If the specks are metal, platinum or whatever, then you should be able to easily separate it from the gangue material just as one can separate gold from crushed ore. Screening to like sized particles before panning is the best way.

Good luck

 

[Mad Machinist]

Crush it.... cyanide does not care much ��

Better study up on your chemistry before you start playing with cyanide. and end up killing yourself or others

https://www.cyanidecode.org/cyanide-facts/cyanide-chemistry

Cyanidation is also adversely affected by the presence of free sulfur or sulfide minerals in the ore. Cyanide will preferentially leach sulfide minerals and will react with sulfur to produce thiocyanate. These reactions will also enhance the oxidation of reduced sulfur species, increasing the requirement for lime addition to control the pH at a sufficient level to avoid the volatilization of hydrogen cyanide (HCN).​

For those that don't know, HCN is the same stuff that was used in gas chambers. Not very nice stuff.

 

[gold tramp]

Nothin ventured, nothing gained.
Gt...

 

[pczim]

Better study up on your chemistry before you start playing with cyanide. and end up killing yourself or others

https://www.cyanidecode.org/cyanide-facts/cyanide-chemistry

Cyanidation is also adversely affected by the presence of free sulfur or sulfide minerals in the ore. Cyanide will preferentially leach sulfide minerals and will react with sulfur to produce thiocyanate. These reactions will also enhance the oxidation of reduced sulfur species, increasing the requirement for lime addition to control the pH at a sufficient level to avoid the volatilization of hydrogen cyanide (HCN).​

For those that don't know, HCN is the same stuff that was used in gas chambers. Not very nice stuff.

Fully agree. Safety first. Dealing with cyanide must be taught, not learned if that makes sense. Very dangerous to people and the environment if not handled correctly.

 

[pczim]

So here are some pictures of some of our ore:
View attachment 1606541




Grades vary between 4g/ton to 16g/ton.

 

[StreamlineGold]

 

[StreamlineGold]

I have a friend who runs a 5 stamp mill for his district in New Mexico. Loud but very effective with a good operator. 1 ton/hour sounds about right depending on the stock. He also insists on running the ore through a jaw crusher first. I can't imagine how long a ton would take if it wasn't already broken down. There is real talent to keeping the grind size mixes right for a productive run.

There is a restored 10 stamp mill running in Cave Creek several times a year. The last run this year was about 3 weeks ago.

They used to run a big 5 stamp mill in downtown Phoenix at the Mining and Mineral Museum.
View attachment 1598938

That was one of the finest mining and mineral museums in the world and it was very popular. It was founded in 1884. They killed the funding in a vicious political free for all and attempted to wipe out the mining history of Arizona in the process. Much like California, Arizona seems intent on destroying their own mining history. Unlike California Arizona has some of the largest and most productive active mines in the world. Not only are we still mining but several very large new mines are being developed as well as a resurgence in small gold and gem mining operations.

Heavy Pans

Thats really cool. Where is this stamp mill in Cave Creek?

 

[Clay Diggins]

Thats really cool. Where is this stamp mill in Cave Creek?

6140 E Skyline Drive
Cave Creek AZ 85327
Phone: (480) 488-2764



It won't be running again until October.

Heavy Pans