What’s in the box??? (w/pics)

[Yukon99669]

So, I have this little “Husky” rolling tool box that contains something you might not expect.
I’ll give you guys a little while to kick around your thoughts.
….I’ll give you a hint. It’s not a big pile of gold.

 

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[Yukon99669]

Here are all the dimensions:

 

[Clay Diggins]

cats?

 

[Yukon99669]

No Sir…not cats

 

[Yukon99669]

 

[southfork]

A blue Bowl or something like a desert fox spiral wheel. I can see riffles?

 

[villagenut]

Why don't you just show or tell us?

 

[Ohiogoldfever]

I don’t recall the name but I came across a recovery system that the fella packs up neat in a box like that.

I’m gonna guess it’s a concentrator

 

[Jorgeke]

I goma go with

A metal detector

 

[Yukon99669]

Ok, I’ll quit the game….I was gonna keep spoon feeding ya for awhile, but if you guys are at all like me you probably have a short attention span.

So anyway, this is my “sort of” version of a gold hog mat multi-sluice mini highbanker that can function very well on (1) 1500 GPH bilge pump and w/ Gold Cube capability with mat swap to Vortex mats and smaller pump or 1500 tuned way down.

Kind of a long back-story on how I ended up at this, but I can elaborate more in a bit.


….anyway, here are a few pics. I can post more details if anyone is interested.

 

[Yukon99669]

When I moved to Colorado from Alaska a cpl years ago I tried really really hard to make my gear work here. 2, 3, and 4 inch dredges. 3 snd 4 inch gas pumps, and pretty big and fast high bankers. I tuned things down a lot, played with lower flow mats.
Ultimately, I found myself using my Gold Cube as a production tool half the time and I’ve only used cubes for dredge cons in the past. I have always had great success w/ gold hog mats and I consider myself a master at tuning them. Hog mats and Cubes don’t play well together since even the tamer Hog mats take quite a bit of flow and the width of the Cube is gonna put you in a pretty substantial pump.
So my little solution is using the lower flow hog mats in a narrow 4 inch sluice, and using the Cubes over/under configuration to keep the footprint down. I’m getting 900GPH out of the 1500 pump so the 4” mats are getting 225 GPH/inch which works good at a 9 or 10 degree pitch. I have a 6 inch flare section at the end w/ Vortex mat and a damper that runs at 15 degrees like the Cube…..so I get pretty much everything in the one unit….and the way the rack system sets up I can adjust all kinds of ways.

I have a bigger version of this w/ a trommel that I use when I have more time to run a lot.

I’ll throw up some pics of that in a few…

 

[Yukon99669]

Here is the bigger version.

It uses a 3000 GPH pump (that I see about half of).

The trommel screen is 1/8”.
The Hog mat sluice is 5.75” wide.
The Bottom box is 10” wide w/ damper and Vortex mat.

….I set up all my flair sections to mimic Gold Cube specs In terms of pitch (~15 degrees) and flow (~100 - 120GPH/inch…or a bit more). With the damper and proper classification I know that it catches everything a Cube will.

 

[Reed Lukens]

It doesn't look like you're recirculating the water, so why use the small pumps? I love my little recirculating system, with 4000gph, but when I am running in a stream, I ramp it up with my Honda WX15

 

[russau]

I like your thinking on this piece of equipment ! I have just about all the material to build this in my garage right now BUT I'm not in a good enough health to bring this to a stream and use it ! Sure wish I saw this 30 years ago when I could handle it !

 

[Yukon99669]

I like your thinking on this piece of equipment ! I have just about all the material to build this in my garage right now BUT I'm not in a good enough health to bring this to a stream and use it ! Sure wish I saw this 30 years ago when I could handle it !

I’m actually finishing up an even smaller, almost “micro” version. I’ll post some pics in the next few days.
I’ve always wanted one of those “tranquility fountains” that was an operational wash plant. This one uses a couple 18 inch long X 1.5 inch sluice boxes. Same type rack configuration, and several different interchangeable mat options (Gold Hog, Vortex, dream…etc…). It’ll have sufficient water flow to be very effective. I’d like to cobble together a trommel out of an rc car motor just for authenticity sake, but realistically just throwing pre-classified, rinsed paydirt at it and operating like a dining table power sluice is probably easiest.
It could be tuned to replace a panning operation.
My sons science teacher wants me to show their class how gold mining actually works…it would be great for that. …and for killing time in the camper on rainy days.

Here is a pic from yesterday of this one set up on Missouri Creek in Gilpin County. I ran about 10 buckets and got a bit over 2 grams in 3 hours.

 

[russau]

Several years back I wanted to build a 10 inch dredge and pull it up the Missouri River behind a house boat BUT those days are long passed for me ! I still think of it A LOT ! It's real hard to stop doing something that you REALLY LIKE and watch other's doing so !