Recirculating Sluice Box Build - Please Critique

[maxfuture]

Hello all, long time reader first time poster. The video is of my first recirculating sluice box build. Your constructive criticism is very welcome. This is a 30" box with an 1100 GPH 12v pump. I need 1" of incline per 12" of box, hence the bungee cords that can be slid forward/back or tied in knots to shorten etc to raise and lower pitch. I'll be thrift shopping for a vibrator to attach on the side for extra "settling" power. I've seen people use old massage chair vibrators and they seem to work. I'll be making a PVC magnet bar to catch the metallic black sand soon. I duct taped a DIY mud flap to smooth out the flow and will replace with a piece of carpet or mud flap when I find one. In the last month I have been out to Wickenburg AZ as well as Meadview and brought back a bucket from each. The Wickenburg dirt has a dark red clay color when compared to the light brown color of the Meadview (Dolan Springs area) soil. I simply classified with 8 mesh and got a bucket from each claim. I've recently joined GPAA and GSSN as I currently live in Las Vegas. Thanks for looking! Happy Hunting.

 

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[Lanny in AB]

The best way to tell is to run some tests with either gold-bearing dirt, or small smashed up bits of lead. Count the pieces of either gold or lead before you begin your test and then have at it. The dirt you run should be a good mixture of types: some clay, loam, sand, gravel, etc.

It sure looks like it might do the job.

Let us know how the test turns out.

All the best,

Lanny

http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/metal-detecting-gold/69-bedrock-gold-mysteries.html

 

[maxfuture]

Thanks Lanny, I will definitely make sure it's dialed in before I throw away any concentrates!

 

[Jeff95531]

Hi maxfuture, welcome to TN. What size (GPH) pump are you using? What is on the bottom of the hopper now that you've cut the bottom out (clever btw). You might want to consider a rubber mat at the top of the sluice. I also noticed while the flow looks good, it is "listing" at the end of the sluice. Too much water on one side, not enuf on the other. I have no doubt it is level, just a characteristic that need to be addressed. (same thing happened to me on my build)

I recently read here to try shaving lead fishing weights into shapes and sizes of the gold in your area for testing. I wish I had heard of it sooner as I bought some paydirt to test mine.

Good luck and keep us posted.

 

[maxfuture]

I bought a 1100 GPH 12V pump off ebay. The box is only 30" long by 7" wide so I'm hoping the pump is powerful enough. I can always shorten the water hose to gain a small increase in flow. I noticed it was "listing" and I think it's because of the crappy flap I'm using so perhaps a real piece of rubber or carpet will improve that. I also noticed that changing the hose position in the hopper affects the evenness of the water flow. There's nothing fancy at the bottom of the hopper, I just cut a rectangle in the side of an office trash can. Thanks for the good advise!

 

[Jeff95531]

Well I'm impressed. It's a good idea with a lot of great ingenuity...and even better...it seems to WORK! Very nicely done and would appreciate updates when you get them.

 

[Bejay]

Well it would not work for very long out here in Az.....unless the material being placed in the system were extremely washed and clean. The reason being that material in the dry semi-arid areas of the country are laden with organic plant matter that clogs the pump in short order. With that comes the need to muck out the tub, as the bucket only gets the gravels and the fines quickly fill the tub around the pump and clog it up as well.

My suggestion is to have a minimum of two tubs with the pump in the second (I prefer 3 tubs). Often times 3-4 inch syphon elbows are used to get water from one tub to the next...but I prefer to have a waterfall effect so that I can place a classifier screen in the "fall" to catch the enormous amount of plant material that contaminates the system. If you are working nice clean washed sorted gravels the "plug up issue" diminishes but usualy these nice clean gravels are in areas where there is already nice clean flowing water close by.

The system you have would work for a few runs but you would have to tear it apart often and clean everything. Muck and clean pump often instead of running material non-stop.

Hope this offers you some insight so you can spend more time getting gold and less time struggling to simply run. (take it from someone with a lot of experience out here in the dry country at the moment). I'll run material today and fight the huge amount of crud that enters the system by using screens and a hand held kitchen screen strainer....I just got a new one yesterday after wearing out the old strainer....it finally fell apart after a month of use.

Bejay

 

[Professional Miner]

Good Job MAX... and welcome to TN...

Here is a simple and quick way to remove much of the unwanted heavy black sands (magnetics) from your small testing sluice box. Obtain a piece of magnetic sign material from a sign maker (you know, the kind of mag signs people advertise their company names on trucks with)...cut it loosely, to fit at the top of the riffles, ....you'll need to experiment with position, length and height a bit to get the results you want....but it works rather well on such a small scale as you have built.

Here is how it works...with the mag. sign material covering the upper riffles of the sluice box...it will act as a damper, and collect much of the unwanted magnetics from the slurry...as these unwanted particles build up, with the water splashing on them, addition new particles hitting them, each piece begins to move down the magnetic sign material...eventually dropping off back in the box....while you haven't removed the unwanted heavies from your box, you have removed them from the most important part of your box, that is the first few riffles... which is where you want the majority of your gold to accumulate.

Commercial magnetic separators work on a similar principal, but do remove the unwanted magnetics completely from the material you want to wash....Go to WWW.MAGNETICS.COM.....They have a wide assortment of different types of magnetic separators for the mining industry...maybe something there will give you an idea to modify for your project.

As far as vegetation clogging your system...Bejay is right, you'll need several tubs....another quick fix is to build 2 or 3 rectangular frames, from any material you choose to, slightly taller than you water level of the last tub...but yet fit snuggly, wrap each frame with a single coating of burlap....these work great for filters...you may need to experiment some as to the number of frames and thickness of the burlap. Once your first filter gets clogged, remove it clean it and quickly return it to the tub....the other filters will continue to clean the water while the first filter has been removed...

Just a couple of tips....but you are on the right track...keep up the good work...don't give up...keep going...most importantly, have lots of fun!

Professional Miner

 

[maxfuture]

Thank you guys very much for taking a look at my setup and giving me some of your knowledge. I ran the Wickenburg bucket today and found two very small new friends and i'll be posting a picture as soon as I find my dang phone charger. Monday I'll run my bucket from Meadview which I think might be more promising although I'm certainly not complaining about finding some color in just a half bucket of 8 mesh. Another video and pics coming soon as I'm going to Lowe's Monday for new mod materials. Thanks again!!!!

Max

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[AzViper]

Maxfuture,

Welcome to Tnet. A triple tank system is a must and with you being in Vegas as its a lot like Arizona. If you notice I am using the siphon method as you want to pull your water from the center of the tanks away from the crap floating on top and the crap on the bottom. We use 3" cheap drain pipe from HD to make the siphon tubes. You submerge the entire tube under water and plug one end with a cheap rubber ball from a pet store. Drag the plugged end over into the second tank and remove the ball, the siphon will begin. Repeat for the next tank. This will you get a quick change over and not worry of drain the first tank. Using the siphon method the water will balance out in all three tanks. We use stainless steel wire garbage baskets that you can purchase at Big Lots for cheap and use them as strainers on the end of the siphon tubes, works like a charm. My triple tank will be three of the stock tanks.

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[AzViper]

We are also researching in building a small scale Lamella Clarifier using cooler pads from a Master Cool Evap cooler.

After passing through the inlet zone, water enters the settling zone where water velocity is greatly reduced. This is where the bulk of floc settling occurs and this zone will make up the largest volume of the sedimentation basin. For optimal performance, the settling zone requires a slow, even flow of water. The settling zone may be simply a large expanse of open water. But in some cases, tube settlers and lamella plates, such as those shown below, are included in the settling zone.

Water flows up through slanted tubes or along slanted plates. Floc settles out in the tubes or plates and drifts back down into the lower portions of the sedimentation basin. Clarified water passes through the tubes or between the plates and then flows out of the basin.

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[maxfuture]

This is truly amazing stuff! You just gave me hours upon hours of things to research while the rest of america watches mindless television. I can't thank you enough!

 

[maxfuture]

The red clay soil from Wickenburng AZ ran fairly well this weekend. However the brown soil from Meadview AZ is so thick with clay that it clogged my box within the first few scoops. I even put it at a 3 inch decline with the same result. Question, Can you put the screen in upside down or does it matter? I'd think it matters a lot but I can't remember which way is up! I'm going to have to wash the clay out to run it. Thats not fun. I guess the best part of the weekend was the fun adventure. Plus on the way back home I stopped to see the Grand Canyon for the first time. Awesome...

 

[AzViper]

Yes you can place the screen in upside down and yes it does matter. This should help you... Make sure to expand the photo to its full size... In your photo the screen is in correct based on the screen of the Summit sluice box. I would have to question the water flow and how much water is flowing down the sluice.