Suck It Up or Leave It Be?

[socalocmatt]

When you see AU in the flare matting what do you do? Do you suck it up or do you let it be?

Personally, it depends. If its a super tiny piece then I let it be. If it is fly turd size or larger then I usually suck it up.

 

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[B H Prospector]

I've seen too many times when someone tries to suck it up and down and out it goes back to the river gold gods.

 

[KevinInColorado]

I've seen too many times when someone tries to suck it up and down and out it goes back to the river gold gods.

if it really goes right thru the sluice, it seems to me you need a different sluice! ...or at least a change of sluice set up or configuration.

That said, to suck up gold on the slick plate or indicator mat you really need to sneak up on it from downstream so it doesn't see you coming!

Personally, I focus on digging and trust my sluice to catch the gold. Stopping to pull out a sucker bottle is a waste of river time in my view ;-)

 

[Aufisher]

Never saw a piece go down the slick plate, that didn't stay in the trap.

 

[Rdg Sluicer]

I asked this same question about a year ago. Unless it is a picker I leave it alone and let it go into my Bazooka. Trust your equipment.

 

[GrizzlyGremlin]

I leave my sluice sometimes for 8 hours. We dont have a black sand abundance so its fine. HOWEVER. Everyone has a size piece of gold that makes you stop and clean her out. Personally ive only had 1 piece big enough to say Holy S&#$ and snatch up my sluice so fast the roadrunner would be impressed. Other than real good chunks or abundant BS, leave it.

 

[Goodyguy]

I always have an "Add a Trap" (my brother likes to call it the "last Ditch") installed at the end of my high banker sluice so I'm not worried about loosing any gold but if it's a nugget laying in my inspection mat I'll pick it out.




That is unless I'm using a slick plate fluid bed gold trap as a highbanker then a nugget will sit in the nugget trap at the front of the traps classifier and I'll pick it out from there.


If I'm sluicing in the stream I seldom use anything but a FBGT (fluid bed gold trap) and I always pick up any gold that sits in the nugget trap in front of the classifier as soon as I see it. Any gold that goes in the trap I know will still be there when I do a clean up.


Red arrow points to the nugget trap


If I get more than one nugget in the trap I change out the classifier to a larger one a size larger than the biggest nugget that was trapped.
I mostly use it in glacial gold country so anything larger than a picker is extremely rare.


Go for the gold
GG~

 

[KevinInColorado]

GG, impressive gear! ... have you tried running that highbanker with the riffles and mats removed so everything just dumps into the fluid bed?

As it is, how much gold makes it down to the trap?

 

[Goodyguy]

GG, impressive gear! ... have you tried running that highbanker with the riffles and mats removed so everything just dumps into the fluid bed?

No, but early on I did put the FBGT at the end of the highbanker and caught a couple specks.


After that is when I came up with the "Add a Trap" that you see in the above post.
Nowadays when I run a highbanker I mostly just use the FBGT unless there is some clay and mud then I may use the A-52 but if there's lots of clay I use my trommel and Clarkson style riffles in the sluice, with a vortex mat sluice after that.

Old photo, Now I always install an "Add a Trap" after the sluice.

As it is, how much gold makes it down to the trap?

Not very much just a speck or two but the peace of mind knowing you got it all is priceless.
Plus you can run your material a little faster and not be paranoid that you may be running too fast or too steep or feeding too much material or worry about your moss getting loaded up, or flour gold migrating underneath and out the end, too much flow, or an accidental blow out etc. Makes most types of sluices pretty much fool proof. The guys on Gold Rush sure could use one of my commercial designs on the end of their wash plants as much gold as they obviously lose off the end.

I do find quite a bit more "would a been lost" gold in the "Add A Trap" that I designed for the end of my 4" dredge (dredges are known for loosing a small percentage of tiny gold but make up for it in the volume that they do catch) Just tiny stuff mind you but it adds up in a years time.


Here in Indiana the take is usually small so we need every speck we can get!


GG~

 

[goldenIrishman]

Since I rarely if ever have any gold make it past the first third of my box I leave it be. Since I built it, I know and trust my equipment and my setup angles. If your gold is makeing it through the sluice and into the tailings then it's time to rethink your setup.

On the other hand... When you have a nice nugget sitting there pretty much screaming at ya, feel free to grab it out if it makes you feel better. I had one like that in the last batch of materials we brought back from the claim. Fresh water in the recirc system so I could see it and it was large enough to grab out without having to shut off the water so I snagged it out.