small scale mining

thought I'd share a few ideas of what I reckon is the best way that I have found of recovering gold out in the paddock for those who have a lease or some other type of arrangement.

if u have a fair bit of material to process then a decent crusher is paramount as this bit of gear will release the gold from its captive state.

couple of options--Keene centerfuge and Armstrong rolls crusher seem to make some nice gear however dust suppression is a problem and recommend u plonk on a dust mask unless u r an old bugger and your stay on this land is short.

I have used the Keene centerfuge crusher to great avail mainly due to the cost factor and I also have a larger setup with a hammer mill driven by a petrol motor which I resurrected from a blokes backyard. The most expensive part was the screen which I had replaced by a company in Perth and it was a complete replica of the original fitted screen--$1300 and worth every cent. U can certainly pump through the material with these machines and crush to whatever size takes your fancy.

from here I take the sample to a smaller dry blower Keene 151 just to take the excess dust out of the concentrate and we will reduce a 20 litre bucket to about a few hundred grams. If u wanted to by pass the dry blower I suggest that u get yahself a Gold Cube, I use the 4 tier version and to date this piece of gear hasn't let me down. simple set up the gold cube on a level platform inside a half 44 gal drum so u can recirculate the water as it uses quiet a bit of water to separate the gold from the dirt.
a few drops of detergent and away u go. U can feed your sample in dry or I prefer wet material. the gold cube will separate the concentrate down as fast as u can feed it into the setup.

once all done its a case of washing out the 3 layers of the cube which have the mats within. This process eliminates panning and saves u a heap of time. Clean up and see the fruits of your labour.

I also have a gold wheel however it takes second place to the Gold Cube. The GW needs to be set up right otherwise u will loose gold -- personally I think that the gold wheel needs a bit more engineering to be completely efficient.

good luck out there.

regards
oneday