Clean up!

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Muley
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Re: Clean up!

Post by Muley » Fri Feb 17, 2023 4:12 am

I have followed this for all 6 pages, and I don't see a single mention of the "Gold Cube". I know allot of the miners in Nome use these for there cleanups. Any opinions? And how do they fall in line with the other opions?
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Re: Clean up!

Post by Joe S (AK) » Fri Feb 17, 2023 8:44 am

My time in Nome came about before The Cube came along --- however --- I now own 2 full sets of 'em and have a little experience with them on beach sand. Not much right now - but hope springs eternal.

Now the cube is a powerful tool - specializing and shining brightly in working tiny beach sand sized Gold. My experience with them came about on the Oregon Coast deposits which are VERY similar to Nome. When set up correctly (the specific fine tuning come from experience) they can catch almost, almost, almost 100% of the Nome sized tiny Gold. There is one sort'a setback and that is the quantity of black sands caught with the Gold in the concentrates. Not great quantities as with Moss, Carpet, Expanded & Riffles but with multi clean outs enough to get your attention at the end of the day.

I found that multiple clean outs during the day did add up but, as in Nome, gently re-running the day's accumulation of cons (after finally stopping the shoveling of regular black beach sands) straight over top of the final run took the entire day's cons and reduced everything to just the volume of one cleanout --- while still retaining all the Gold for the day.

Then the Gold Hog mats and the subsequent equipment using those mats came along. The Multi-Sluice is a prime concentrate clean up tool which also whisks through concentrates at the speed of light. Based on my use of the Multi-Sluice it can retain all the Gold that the Cube does only do it faster and with a lot higher volume of concentrates than the cube. It's really fast too!

Now the Boar Box (a vertical zig-zag highbanker with Hog mats) showed up this fall and now THAT needs to be evaluated as well. I see both the Multi-Sluice and The Hog Box fighting for my attention this coming summer with The Cube in reserve. Maybe the Boar Box to make concentrates and the Multi-Sluice to work them down to almost all Gold. Both should work well and in the context of Nome should do really well there. (Gold Hog mats in various pieces of equipment on the beaches of Nome would do quite well to make concentrates with maybe a Multi-Sluice or the Cube to finish 'em off.)

Great to see you posting, Muley, nice to see you still up and about.

Joe
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Re: Clean up!

Post by Geowizard » Sun Feb 19, 2023 6:27 am

Here's the scoop;

"instead of using a tablespoon, you can now use a large scoop of classified (1/8th) concentrates at a rate of 1,000 pound of material and reduce it to less than a coffee cup on highly concentrated gold and black sand!"

"A good demonstration of this recently produced on a TV show called “Gold Trails” has Kevin Hoagland Panning a bucket of concentrates which took over an hour compared to the Gold Cube processing in less than 6 minutes."

link to the video:

https://goldcube.net/2015/11/22/epic-gold-challenge/

Mike is an obviously unbiased co-inventor of the GOLD cube. Mike sets up the challenge and spiked the bucket with 241 grains of GOLD. Note also, the bucket was actually "One quarter of a bucket".

Kevin took an hour and 10 minutes to pan the bucket and recovered 180 grains. "After only 5 minutes and 22 seconds Mike is ready to weigh the gold collected by the Cube."

In YouTube fashion, you have watch the whole video.

At 15:54 in the video:

The Gold Cube recovered 357 grains of GOLD (including a visible amount of black sand).

The GOLD CUBE DEFIES GRAVITY; :o

It was 60 mesh GOLD that was spiked in the sand.

Conclusion: The Gold Cube can process 60 mesh GOLD in sand that is classified to 8 mesh "1/8th"? This is NOT possible! I explained WHY in an earlier post "Ratio of the Masses", the fifth post on this thread.

A slight of hand?

In summary, the GOLD Cube pitch confuses the requirement to classify to 8 mesh which requires added resources in the form of TIME and SCREENS with "FAST" recovery of FINE GOLD with old school panning that naturally takes MORE TIME and "only recovers 75 percent of the GOLD" and a fast twist of the numbers while defying gravity!

https://goldcube.net/how-it-works-2/

Epilogue:

The rate that isn't a rate: :geek:

Gold cube will run at a rate of "1000 pounds of material"?

A one cubic yard perspective:

What is Mikes rate of production per cubic yard?

If Mike takes 5 minutes and 22 seconds to run 1/4 of a bucket with the GOLD CUBE, how long would it take Mike to run one cubic yard?

Based on one cubic yard = 200 buckets by volume.

Answer: 200 x 4 x 5 minutes, 22 seconds = 4293.33 minutes = 71.6 hours. Almost 2 work weeks!

VERY high grade GOLD in the sand;

Using 200 x 4 x 11.66 grams = 9328 grams = 300 troy ounces per cubic yard. Kevin recovered 180/241 by old school panning = 75 percent recovery. In one cubic yard perspective; 0.75 x 300 = 225 ounces recovered and 75 ounces per cubic yard was lost.

If Beach sand runs 20 bucks a cubic yard, one Gold Cube will make 20 bucks every two weeks!


The biggest limitation is you can't dump a shovel full of unclassified beach sand into it and walk away.

For the money, a Nome "Beach Box" is the tool of choice! :)

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Re: Clean up!

Post by Geowizard » Sun Feb 19, 2023 2:48 pm

Product marketing;

As NEW cleanup products enter into the market, the products should not require confusing and misleading tactics.

We have seen TWO products lately that are marketed in the cleanup category AND marketed in the production category to BROADEN the market.

You can't have it BOTH ways! :o

Production requires capacity. Capacity translates to VOLUME of material of all types from large rocks to small rocks including brush and small trees. The grade of GOLD found in mining today on any level is LOW GRADE GOLD. The term "FAST" means getter done quickly and NOT fussy. If you happen to be a recreational miner, then "production" is defined on a small scale and the GOLD in the bottle at the end of the day is modest to nonexistent.

Cleanup;

Cleanup is a completely different place! It's a "NICE AND EASY" place where the flow is measured in 5 gallon buckets per hour. A smart miner does not RUSH the cleanup process. As found under previous discussion on this thread, a VERY DELIBERATE process of classification is the order of the day! Screening is often a slow deliberate process with numerous cleanups - one at each level of screening as you descend into smaller GOLD.

An objective:

Cleanup is called "cleanup" because the objective is different than production. The cleanup process involves separating GOLD from a long list of other "heavies" that want to hang in there with the GOLD. It requires exacting attention to detail to properly classify concentrates into equal particle sizes at each graduation to keep GOLD in competition with other particles of almost equal mass. The smaller the GOLD, the MORE time needed.

A "production" system cannot serve as a "cleanup" system! Cleanup goes in some cases to almost laboratory conditions. The cleanup environment is more subtle, quiet, and controlled without wind, rain, and mosquitoes! The equipment is located on solid, level footing indoors and in a stable work area.

Marketing is simple. The product sells its self! GOLD miners are above average. They wouldn't be in this business if they weren't!

Don't go away! There's more! :)

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Re: Clean up!

Post by Geowizard » Sun Feb 19, 2023 4:15 pm

Neodymium magnets;

For those ambitious miners that have MORE than their fair share of black sand, I would like to offer a relatively well known solution.

With the recent trend in Boar Boxes, Gold Cubes and even the Nome beach box, relatively abundant, low cost neodymium magnets can be glued to the bottom of the sluice box. The majority of black sand will stick to the bed above the magnet(s) providing a fine GOLD filter of sorts as well as giving a means of helping catch much of the black sand. Gentle flushing will rinse the GOLD out, leaving the black sand collected by the magnets.
Lifting the mat will free the black sand from the magnets.

Every locality is different. Ultimately, the solution is screening and classification of particle sizes to match the desired size of the GOLD. If your objective is 100 mesh GOLD, then screen to pass 100 minus. You can EXPECT to lose the 200 minus GOLD. If you want the 200 mesh, the process continues. It is a deliberate process that requires time, patience and an uncommon resolve to do the additional work. Every miner will decide where the point of diminishing return is for their operation.

Don't go away. There's more! :)

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Re: Clean up!

Post by Joe S (AK) » Sun Feb 19, 2023 8:51 pm

Actually, the universally known practicality is to not use Neo (or any other) magnets in the sluicebox, unless under extremely controlled circumstances and for a specific reason.

For those who haven't mined the beaches of Nome or other beaches in the US, the miners' prime intent (to maximize Gold recovery) is simply accomplished by processing a high a percentage of Gold, Hematite and Magnetite bearing sands through the sluices as practical. Natural lenses or layers of those two lron minerals (along with solder, an occasional grain of Platinum and garnet are found in what is locally called "Ruby Sand". Usually those minerals (and the solder in Nome from 1900 soldered food tins) are concentrated during storms in sheltered eddies and are actively searched for because the piece count is so high. The bottom line procedure is to process just the "Ruby Sands" on the beaches and process them in specialized sluices which are specifically designed to work the heavy sands, passing the non Gold through and out of the boxes.

The simple objective is to differentially process the materials by Specific Gravity (density or "weight" to the less scientifically inclined) to allow the lighter Ruby sand components to wash through while only the Gold, Platinum and some) incidental minerals remain.

A Neodymium magnet is incredibly strong, currently as strong as a N52 classification. Because of that attribute they will STRONGLY draw Ferris minerals to itself, quickly building a natural dike or mound of the magnetically packed Iron sands --- or --- pulling the magnetics to surround the Neo. This attribute, to me, is the LAST thing of any practical use in a sluice box is a Neo magnet. One manufacturer a few years ago attempted to use sheets of moderately weak magnetic material inside an Aluminum trough, claiming that the captured Black Sand made it's own riffles from the Magnetite - which were then scraped, collected and stored until later processing in a controlled environment. Yes, that sort-a worked but still left many hours of ultra careful panning every few days. A later inventor used fixed magnets under a vinyl sluice floor to try to preemptively catch the black sands BEFORE processing the slurry for it's Gold. I could only imagine the lumps of Black Sand under and inside the sluice.

I, personally, found those attempts be not to be to my liking although some other miners did.

My use for Neo Magnets is in the final clean up phase of the operation.
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Re: Clean up!

Post by Geowizard » Sun Feb 19, 2023 9:24 pm

Magnetic separation;

Thanks for sticking around! I promised more. There's more! :)

This thread is about cleanup! If you are interested in cleanup - you are in the right place!

Most prospectors are familiar with various magnetic separators on the market used for separating magnetic black sand from GOLD in the pan. In the most basic terms, a permanent magnet exerts a force called magnetic attraction to metals that have magnetic "susceptibility". Magnetite has high susceptibility!

But that's not the whole story! There are 97 other heavies that remain in the pan. Yup! There's still heavies, they all have names, and we can pull them out and fractionalize each of them - red garnet included!

Metals and minerals included all have different well known and understood behavioral problems! Each of them behave different than others in a magnetic field. The property of magnetic susceptibility is an interesting behavior because we can sort out different metals and minerals according to their susceptibility!

Exposure to a magnetic field will polarize "magnetic domains" in metal and mineral particles.

You can learn MORE about it here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_ ... 0direction.

Alaska has a University called UAF, the University of Alaska - Fairbanks. Back in 1969, research was done at the MIRL. A paper was published by MIRL.

HEAVY MINERALS IN ALASKAN BEACH SAND DEPOSITS

Here's a link: Page 69 is the section on Nome.

https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/162573729.pdf

As it turns out, the researchers used magnetic separators to split the minerals in fractions! Because different minerals have different magnetic susceptibility, they can be separated into fractions of the total minerals present. It's an interesting study that requires specialized tools.

Fortunately, as might be expected, there are companies that capitalize on people that have scientific curiosity. We can go out and look at the various apparatus used and the companies that make them.

One excellent example is S.G. Frantz:

Frantz separators

https://www.sgfrantz.com/

The process of magnetic separation is a science that focuses on paramagnetic or diamagnetic susceptibility. It is a science that uses the properties of magnetic domains to be charged differently, in different directions and different intensities, remnant, residual magnetization measured as it decays, magnetic fields are reversed with alternating electromagnetic fields and the effect measured and documented.

Is there more? You betcha! :)

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Re: Clean up!

Post by Geowizard » Mon Feb 27, 2023 12:50 am

The GOLD standard;

Disclaimer: I ain't no promoter. I don't have any investment in nor do I have any personal affiliation with any product or persons shown or depicted in this post.

That having been said;

The Alaska Gold Prospecting Forum is fast becoming the "go-to" resource for information on cleanups. When will the cleanup be finished? This is the answer! In keeping with our high standard of completeness, accuracy and understanding of all things related to GOLD here on the forum, I could only hand this off to a GOLD miner we all know and recognize!

Please note the emphasis on "Classification".

MSI Gold Shaker Table- MSI Xtruder Table;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kKgp8dAPr8

That's what "I'm talkin' about!"

Stick around! There's more! :)

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Re: Clean up!

Post by Geowizard » Mon Feb 27, 2023 8:26 pm

Fun with machines and desert prospecting;

For those on a limited budget, the "make or buy" decision often comes down to the "make" option. Making machines from rudimentary, readily available, off-the-shelf materials into a product that helps recover GOLD can be a very rewarding and fun experience. GOLD is a nice reward! With basic tools and a few skills, a "do-it-yourself" prospector can make a useful machine without the expense of hard earned dollars. It can also be fun, interesting and satisfying!

Among the list of cleanup tools that most prospectors have entertained making is a shaker table! I came across an interesting video that does an excellent job of illustrating the details of a DIY shaker table in an understandable yet not oversimplified way. I thought I might share it!

Portable DIY Shaker Table for Gold Prospecting and Extraction

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64WM3J2dEAY

The build:

Building the Mini Gold Shaker Table

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQkJuBdH3Cc&t=7s

I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did! It really hits home and shows elegance in simplicity!

Don't go away! There's more! :)

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Re: Clean up!

Post by Geowizard » Wed Mar 01, 2023 8:20 pm

It's classified;

The subject of classification is often met with consternation! :o

Why?

The reason is because it consumes valuable TIME and involves WORK. Multiply the time and work by the number of different levels of screening and the cleanup operation gets to be a challenge aka PITA to the most patient prospector or miner. I recently came across a well hidden, possibly classified solution that I thought I might share;

Power Classifier for Gold Prospecting and Extraction

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_GE64J9hoc&t=3s

The interesting aspect of this is the fact that it is scalable! For the cleanup room where screening of concentrates is a large scale operation, you can setup as many of these "shakers" as you need!

Less time spent on cleanups equals more time prospecting and mining.

Stick around! There's more! :)

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