By Richard Doherty

“With the new instruments available today, millions of gold nuggets are within reach of the intelligent, properly equipped, electronic prospector.”

 

Hand full of beautiful gold nuggetsWhen I first heard about picking gold nuggets from the surface, or close to the surface of the ground, I really didn’t think it was feasible.

I made some halfhearted attempts at locating some of the precious yellow beauties with no success and much frustration. Finally, I buried a gold nugget down in the ground and attempted to locate it with my new detector. To my surprise, it wouldn’t detect the nugget, so I moved it closer to the surface and still couldn’t detect the target. It was almost on the surface by the time I was able to receive a very light audible signal. That did it! I quit!

Still, the idea of locating a gold nugget with an instrument really intrigued me, so I stayed in touch with the advances of metal detectors. In the meantime, I continued my more conventional prospecting activities in Arizona, where I was fortunate enough to associate with other prospectors who knew about gold deposition.

Years later, the metal detector industry began to develop detectors that would deal, at least somewhat, with the highly-mineralized ground associated with gold deposits. So I purchased one of the most advanced detectors on the market and went in hot pursuit of the elusive yellow nuggets. Hour after hour, I combed the ground; I searched everywhere the gold “had to be!” If it was there, I wasn’t finding it, so I pressed on.

Scorpion made from gold nuggetsFinally, after many, many frustrating hours, the first nugget succumbed to my detector, minutes later, another. I really got excited, and I decided to share this new-found activity with my friends. I helped them learn what I had learned, and then we developed new methods and techniques. Detectors were getting better, and I purchased the latest equipment, knowing that I needed every edge that I could possibly acquire.

We sorted out which instruments worked best and figured out how to get the most from the ones we decided to work with. Nuggets began to fall on a regular basis, and more friends became interested. We turned them on to the equipment we were using and the techniques we had developed. They began to find gold nuggets almost immediately. This surprised me; because after all the heartache I went through to locate my first nugget, my friends were quick to pick up what we had already learned.

Gold nugget hunting is not like coin hunting at all; it is a specialized field and requires specialized equipment and techniques. Once learned, it is easy. As you do it more and more, nuggets will yield to your detector more consistently.

First, there are three “musts” for any degree of success. Not one of them is any more or any less important than the others, because they are dependent upon each other:

1. The correct instruments must be selected. Selection is based upon the instrument’s performance relative to the size and purity of the gold and type of ground that will be searched.

2. Knowledge regarding the use of your instrument must be thorough.

3. Knowledge about where the gold is located. Most of this information is gathered through research and talking with others who already know.

Your degree of success depends upon how diligently each one of these three “musts” is followed, and it is that simple. If you decide to approach finding gold nuggets in this manner, it is not a matter of, “Will I find a gold nugget?” It is only a matter of when, how big, and how many!

Huge rough nuggetIt has never before been more possible to locate your own gold nuggets with the aid of a metal detector, than it is right now. It is not that there is more gold out there. In fact, each day, there is a little less. However, with the new instruments available today, millions upon millions of beautiful gold nuggets are now within easy reach of the intelligent, properly-equipped electronic prospector. You don’t need tons of equipment to haul around, nor do you need many thousands of dollars to get started. The exercise is mild; the air is fresh; and the pursuit of your own gold nuggets is done at your pace — no one else’s.

I would also like to mention some of the myths surrounding electronic prospecting. It is difficult to place these in any order, so I will just mention them according to the frequency of times I am asked:

“Are there still gold nuggets out there to be found?”

“Will a metal detector really find gold?”

“Didn’t the ‘old-timers’ get all the gold?”

“Why isn’t everybody doing it?”

“Isn’t all the land claimed up?”

“Don’t I need a specialized vehicle or mode of transportation to get to the gold?”

“Isn’t it hard work?”

“How can I find gold nuggets when I know nothing about geology, mining, mineralog, or electronics?”

“Won’t a detector find fool’s gold?”

Please don’t let these questions, objections or myths stop you from gathering your own gold. It’s a whole new exciting, profitable activity, and you can do it!

Public awareness is definitely on the increase, and hundreds are getting into the activity of capturing gold nuggets from the earth. There are pounds of gold being taken daily, and there is no reason why you cannot be taking your share!

Frustration and lack of confidence is the primary cause of failure. The reason most electronic prospectors fail is that they purchase inadequate equipment or don’t learn how to use it properly.

Hunting coins and hunting nuggets with a detector are quite different. Coins are a flat-sided target. Many nuggets are not. Also, many flat nuggets will slip sideways into a crack or crevice in the bedrock, which leaves very little target-area available from the surface. Shape, size, and lack of the “halo” effect can cause a gold nugget to remain a difficult target.

Of course, there are exceptions to this. Not too long ago, I found a 5/8-ounce gold nugget that was about one inch deep, lying flat. It sounded-off like a quarter! I was amazed to retrieve a beautiful nugget which was shaped like an eagle’s head!

Nugget hunters know how important good equipment is. I was speaking with a professional electronic prospector the other day, showing him a new detector. Before I could tell him what the detector cost, he said it didn’t matter anyway; because he was willing to spend any amount of money on the detector if it was significantly better than the one he was using. You see, he knows that good equipment will pay for itself, especially with the price of gold nuggets as they are.

I know coin hunters who dream of finding their first gold coin. Most never do. However, electronic prospectors, who follow the basic guidelines, will find hundreds of gold nuggets.

Where is the gold? This brings us to another reason why now is an excellent time to get started in this fascinating activity. There are clubs and various types of associations which you can join where you will meet other people who prospect. Some of these organizations provide mining properties for their members to prospect. The folks who run clubs are usually quite particular about the mining properties which they own, and they are also knowledgeable about which claims they should stake or purchase. One of the easiest and fastest ways to find gold is to join one of these clubs. Some even provide training programs or organize group mining projects where you can gain immediate, valuable hands-on experience. Talk with other members and the staff to gain information as to where you might begin your prospecting. This is the best way I know of to get started in any type of gold prospecting today.

As you prospect on these claims and talk with others, you will begin to get a “feel” for where the gold is and why it is there. Gold seems to be a lot easier to find if you already know it is there. If you are not sure, it could cause you to search halfheartedly, and that is not conducive for locating nuggets. You must know the gold is there; you must know how to operate your equipment; and you must know that your equipment will get the job done. If you have these three criteria well in hand, you will surely find your own gold. After that, it’s just a matter of spending some time doing it and improving your skills.

In the beginning, it may take you a minute or longer to recover a target you have established; but soon, these targets will be coming out of the ground so quickly that you will surprise yourself. My average recovery time per target is between fifteen and thirty seconds, depending upon digging conditions. I have seen it take as long as 30 minutes to extract a target, but these are more unusual conditions.

In Quartzsite (Arizona) last year, we had occasion to dig in some very old material that was as hard as concrete. This material had been deposited millions of years ago. There was no man-made metal present. But the gold was there! My detector sounded off, and we knew what it was; so we started to excavate. It was hammer and chisel time! You must be very careful not to scar the nugget, so digging has to be carefully-done. Almost 30 minutes later, out came a beauty. It weighed just over ½-ounce. It was detected under 13-inches of highly-mineralized, concreted earth and rock.

As you uncover a valid target, it will usually develop into a clearer signal or stay about the same. If it stays the same, you may also have passed over an area that is highly mineralized. Or perhaps there was some kind of hot fire in that spot during some time in the past. Sometimes, ashes will read very slightly on the detector. But the signal does not develop as you dig down on it.

If the signal disappears altogether, you have either moved the target, or you may have had a piece of rusting ferrous material that fell apart when you moved the soil. A magnet comes in handy to quickly isolate ferrous targets; it can be a real time saver!

Bullets, nails and other foreign metallic targets are some of the items you will learn to deal with. At first, they are nothing but a nuisance. However, let’s take a closer look at this: If you are digging metal of this nature, not only does it hone your recovery skills, but it tells you that the area has not already been searched-out (every smart, responsible detectorist has a container along to remove small metal trash-targets from the playing field).

If there are no previous dig-holes, you may be the first person to detect that area. But if there are dig-holes, and you are still finding metal, it tells you someone else did not do a thorough job. If they left trashy metal in the area because they were using an electronic discrimination mode, they certainly will have left nuggets behind, too! You will pick up the nuggets your predecessor left, because electronic discrimination seldom can be used effectively while nugget hunting. Only under certain conditions would you use discrimination, and that would be after many hours of experience. Even then, you could make costly mistakes. My advice is to not use electronic discrimination while hunting gold nuggets.

Meters, gauges, bells and whistles do not make a good nugget-hunting detector. I personally feel about the only function they serve to the nugget hunter is to add weight to the instrument — which is the last thing you need. Although I will admit that there are other good prospectors around who disagree with my opinion.

The following is a list of recommended reading material which may call for reading and re-reading. This is not a complete list, but the material suggested here is a must:

Willie Merrill wrote a book called, THOSE ELUSIVE NUGGETS; and he not only knows what he is talking about, he shares his knowledge in a very free manner. I have read the book no less than five times. Each time, I learn something new. Our minds are not always ready to accept all information the first or second time through.

Another book of importance is ELECTRONIC PROSPECTING by Roy Lagal and Charles Garrett, which will also require more than one reading. This book goes into the many avenues of electronic prospecting.

Any magazine articles written by successful electronic prospectors are definitely worth reading. Hundreds of articles could be written on the subject of electronic prospecting, and each one of them will have some hot tips for you. .

 
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By Dave McCracken

There can be a lot of gold deposited under and around the boulders located within a pay-streak!

Dave Mack

 

It takes an incredible force of water to move boulders in a river. Once they are moving in a flood storm, they can deposit in low-velocity areas, just like gold does. But, since boulders do not have a higher specific gravity, mass for mass, than most of the other streambed materials, they can be washed downstream just about anywhere in the river during a major storm. So you should not only use the presence of boulders to guide you in sampling. You would be much better advised to focus your attention on the boulders that have been deposited along the common path of gold’s travel.

In shallow streambed material, you can sometimes detect where important bedrock changes are located by noting where the boulders have deposited within the waterway. For a boulder, or a group of boulders, to be found in a specific location along the river’s path, there may be a sudden bedrock drop-off, a large crevice, or some other kind of lower-velocity condition in that area which caused the boulder(s) to be deposited there. Everything in the waterway happens for a reason, even if you cannot always see what it is!

If the boulder(s) is located somewhere along the common gold path, that would be a prime spot to do some sampling. In this situation, I suggest that you do not limit your sampling to the area just behind (downstream) of the boulder, though. Go around to the upstream side of it, as well. Look for any bedrock change which may have caused the boulder to stop there. If gold has moved through that area, that same bedrock change could also have caused gold to concentrate there. Finding the bedrock change that stopped the boulder, and following the bedrock change across the waterway, is a great way to locate the common gold path.

You do not always find boulders with every rich pay-streak deposit. But, it is not uncommon to find many boulders keeping company with a good pay-streak. When you do find them, most of them will probably have to be moved out of your way as you work forward through the deposit.

MOVING BOULDERS BY HAND

There can be a lot of gold deposited under and around the boulders located within a pay-streak. To get most of the gold out from under a boulder and into your suction nozzle, usually the boulder has to be moved at least a little bit.

One of the most useful tools that can help a dredger move boulders is a 5-foot (or longer) steel pry bar. If a boulder is too large to be moved to the rear of the dredge hole by hand, it can sometimes be rotated around to one side so that you can dredge out from under part of it. Then, it can be rotated around the other way to access the remaining gold and material beneath. A long pry bar can be a big help to you in moving boulders around in this way.

The key concern while working around boulders is safety! Loose boulders in and around a dredge hole are the gold dredger’s greatest danger, especially when working alone. Boulders resting up in the streambed material are usually more dangerous than those resting on the bedrock. But, those on the bedrock can cause trouble, too, if they are loose and able to roll – particularly, if the bedrock has any slant to it.

As they are uncovered in a dredge hole, loose boulders should be moved and safely secured as a top priority. They should be placed at the rear of the hole, if possible. But, wherever they are placed, they should be positioned so they no longer pose any threat of rolling into the hole and on top of someone working there. You can place smaller rocks and cobbles under the boulders as necessary, to make certain they will not roll or slide.

If you start to uncover a boulder that is resting up in the streambed material, do not forget about it. Until it has been moved and secured safely, a loose boulder should be foremost in your mind. If it is not yet ready to be moved, and you still need to dredge around it to free it up some more, it can be useful to place an arm or a shoulder against the boulder. This way, you can feel if it starts to loosen up in the material. Do not place your arm, head, or shoulder near the underside of the boulder, however. Because, sometimes a boulder will loosen up and crash down very quickly, without much warning. Physical contact with the boulder is helpful when you cannot keep your eyes on it at every moment. The face mask limits your visual perception underwater – especially when you need to watch what is going up the suction nozzle.

The main concern here is to take all necessary precautions to keep yourself from becoming pinned or crushed beneath a boulder in your dredge hole. If a boulder pins any part of your body to the bottom, it may be difficult or impossible for you to get the necessary leverage to move the boulder enough to get out from under it. And, if you are working by yourself …? I know of two dredgers who ended their careers in just this way.

Also beware of fractured bedrock walls that tower over you. They can fall apart and drop in your dredge hole as you remove the streambed material that holds them in place. I got pinned once by a slab of bedrock that broke free of a wall as I dredged away the material that was holding it there. Luckily for me, it landed on my steel-tipped boot, and that I was dredging with another guy on that day!

The second greatest danger to a dredger usually comes from a cobble falling off the side of the dredge hole and hitting the dredger in some way — like on top of the head. This can finish off a dredger just as surely as a boulder. Or, it may cause some serious pain/injury. Fingers and other body parts can get smashed if you are not careful!

Most trouble with cobbles and boulders can be prevented simply by taking your hole apart with safety in mind. The proper method of taking a dredge hole apart has already been fully covered in my Gold Dredger’s Handbook, so I will not repeat it again here. But, as a point of emphasis, the fastest way to take apart a streambed also happens to be the safest way.

Production dredging goes very smoothly and quickly when you have some area of exposed (dredged) bedrock between the non-dredged material in front of you and the cobbles, boulders and tailings behind you. When you start uncovering a boulder in the material, you should immediately begin planning where you are going to move it, once it is ready.

If you run across an occasional boulder that you cannot move by hand, sometimes you can dredge the material (and gold) out from around and under it without having to move it out of the dredge hole. You accomplish this by moving other, smaller rocks out of the hole to make room for the boulder. In this way, if there are not too many boulders, you can keep moving forward on the pay-streak without the few boulders slowing you down very much.

But, if there are a lot of large boulders down along the bedrock, you will likely discover that at least some of them will need to be completely removed from your excavation if you expect to uncover very much bedrock with your suction nozzle. Some boulders will need to be removed to make room for other boulders as you move forward on the pay-streak. If you cannot remove the boulders from your dredge hole by hand, then you will need some mechanical assistance.

DIFFERENT TYPES OF WINCHES

COME-ALONG: A “come-along” is a portable, hand-operated winching device that can be of considerable help to a small-sized digging program. It can be used to move those boulders that are not huge, but which are too large to be moved by hand. Come-alongs range in size. I recommend a larger version of the better quality, rather than the really cheap, imported models. Come-alongs have a great accessibility factor, because you can carry one just about anywhere. Their operation is somewhat slow. But, they will give you that extra edge when you need to move just a few boulders, and you do not own or want to set up a power winch.

GRIP-PULLER: Several companies make a hand-winching device that rides along on a steel cable. There is a handle that you crank back and forth, similar to a come-along. Each time the handle is cranked in each direction, the device moves an inch or two along the cable. These units also come in different sizes. In my opinion, grip-pullers are a substantial step up from a come-along, both in pulling-power and dependability. I have used these units underwater, but find that the water resistance adds substantial work to the cranking action. Still, when you are working alone, having this device in the hole with you allows you to see what the boulder is doing while you are winching it

Where you can buy winching supplies

USING YOUR TRUCK AS A WINCH: If your vehicle can be driven to a nearby position, you can stretch a cable from the vehicle to the boulder. The proper direction of pull can be rigged up by running the cable through snatch blocks (heavy-duty pulleys) which can be anchored to trees, boulders or whatever is available. Then you can use the pulling-power of your truck to help move the boulders out of the way. Four-wheel drive vehicles work better for this, especially when they are carrying a load to increase tire traction. Suggestion: It is better to connect the cable to something on the vehicle’s frame, rather than just the bumper!

When conditions are right for it, using a vehicle to pull smaller boulders can be much faster than using a come-along. One person operates the vehicle, while a diver is in the water, slinging the boulders. Safety becomes a greater concern when more than one person is involved in the pulling and the slinging of rocks. Communication and coordination between the “puller” and the “slinger” are very important to prevent serious accidents. Suggestion: If you turn the truck around and pull in reverse, you can better-see signals from your partner, and sometimes you get better traction, especially on a 4-wheel drive vehicle. Another suggestion: It is better to keep your vehicle a respectable distance from any drop-offs (like into the waterway), just in case the boulder gets momentum in the wrong direction. I know of guy who got pulled over the side of an embankment by a boulder gone wild!

Larger-sized trucks, tractors, bulldozers, and other heavy equipment can sometimes be used to move bigger rocks with even better results.

AUXILIARY TRUCK WINCHES: Auxiliary automotive winches are also able to move small to mid-sized boulders for a dredging operation with excellent results. Some of those little winching units have a wondrous amount of power. A typical 8,000 or 10,000-pound electric winch will move a surprisingly-large boulder!

If you are going to be using an electric winch, you may want to consider installing dual batteries in your vehicle. It also helps to keep the engine running while you are winching, so the batteries can quickly regain their charge between pulls.

When using a truck-mounted auxiliary winch to pull boulders, it is a good idea to block all four wheels. This precaution helps to keep the vehicle from moving, rather than the rock you are trying to pull. The front tires should be blocked especially well. If there is an embankment to worry about, it is also a good idea to run a safety chain or cable from the vehicle to some additional anchor behind, like a tree or another truck. This will protect against losing your vehicle over the embankment if the boulder happens to roll the wrong way. Sometimes this added measure is necessary just to keep the vehicle from sliding during the pull.

Probably the best kind of auxiliary vehicle winch for dredging purposes is one that can be attached mechanically to the “power take-off unit” on your vehicle’s transfer case, if it has one. With this kind of winch, you can use the full power of your truck’s engine to pull rocks. Not only will this provide you with more pulling power, but you will not have to worry about your batteries running down.

There is also a lot of good to be said for the portable electric and hydraulic winches on today’s market. I know of many smaller-scale and commercial dredgers who use them. They are quite powerful! Portable electric winches can be framed up to (1) attach to a vehicle, (2) be taken out to the dredging site, or (3) even be floated on a platform, where there is deeper water. All that is needed is an automotive battery and a means of keeping it charged up. The portable hydraulic winches can be similarly effective. The winch controls can be extended out on a longer cable and even modified to work underwater, which can be very helpful!

LOG SKIDDERS: Most gold-dredging country is also logging country. So there are quite a few log skidders around that can be leased or hired to pull boulders for you. Log skidders are usually equipped with powerful winches. They can really do a job in pulling the larger boulders! Also, you can drive them into some pretty difficult areas. Hopefully, you can work out a deal that will be ideally suited to your operation; a deal perhaps, where you pay by the hour and have the skidder arrive at a certain time each day, or whenever you are in need of it’s services.

PORTABLE POWER WINCHES: Gasoline-powered, mechanical and hydraulic winches are available in all sizes. Generally, the larger they are, the more winching-power that they produce. But, the added size and weight also makes them more difficult to pack into some of the less accessible areas.

If you find a widespread, rich pay-streak with plenty of large boulders that need to be moved, you should set up on your dredging site the most powerful winch that you are able to haul in there. The more pulling-power you have available, the smoother and faster winching will go.

I never recommend that a dredger buy a portable power winch just because he or she will be dredging. It is probably better to wait until you know exactly what your needs are. I have worked many pay-streaks where no winching was needed at all. And, in many of the pay-streaks that did require winching, a number of the boulders were so large that the small, portable store-bought type of winch would not have been adequate for the job.

You can find some pretty heavy-duty used winches for sale at about the same cost as a lighter-weight, new portable unit. I advise waiting to see what you will need before putting your money into a winch.

Having said that, here is something to consider: Mechanical winches seldom have a control mechanism which can allow the operator to stand away from the machine where all the wrestling is going on (and in the line of fire if a cable breaks). While I have used some wonderful mechanical winches, there was never a time that we were pulling a big rock that I was not worried about something going wrong with all those tons of energy happening right next to me. There is a lot to be said about electric or hydraulic units that will allow you to step away from the danger with the controls in your hand.

WINCHING COBBLES IN DEEP MATERIAL OR SHALLOW WATER

As I have stressed in other articles about dredging, the main limiting factor to progress is in how quickly oversized material (rocks that are too large to be sucked up the nozzle) can be moved out of the ongoing excavation. In deeper streambed material, there can be so many cobbles that there is no longer any room directly behind the dredge hole to throw them. You can run into a similar problem in shallow water, where the cobbles must be lifted out of the water (where they become a lot heavier) to get them behind the dredge hole. In these types of situations, it is common to fill cargo nets with your cobbles and winch them out of your dredge hole in bulk. The following video sequence was taken in an operation where we were removing big lots of cobbles from a deep excavation in just this way:

SETTING UP A HOLE FOR WINCHING

Before you start winching boulders, it is a good idea to first make sure that you have located the lower (downstream) end of the pay-streak. You do not want to winch boulders onto any part of the pay-streak that you will be working at a later time. While the winter storms could possibly move some of the cobbles and dredge tailings which were placed on a pay-streak in error, it takes much more than a winter storm to move boulders from where you winch them. Believe me; it is much better to plan ahead, so you only need to move boulders one time!

BUILDING A RAMP

It takes a tremendous amount of winching-power to pull a boulder up and over another boulder from a dredge hole. The direction of pull is all wrong, and the second boulder will act like a barrier. The winching is much easier, smoother, and far less dangerous, if a ramp is built so the boulders will have an inclined runway to be pulled along. Cobbles can be used to make an effective boulder ramp. Therefore, an important part of setting up your dredge hole for winching is to construct a ramp/runway that can be used to easily remove the boulders, without them encountering difficult obstructions.

It can be really tough to pull a boulder out of a hole without a ramp.

Cobbles can be used to make an effective ramp for winching boulders out of a dredge hole.

One approach to setting up your hole is to dredge around a number of boulders as much as possible to free them up for winching. This way, more boulders can be pulled out of the hole once winching is begun. Then you can come back later to clean up the bedrock with your dredge.

To perform winching effectively, you will need plenty of air line attached to your hookah system. This is because it is necessary for the diver to sling each boulder and follow it to its final destination where he will disconnect it. Then, the sling and cable must be pulled back and attached to the next boulder. Since this process requires a lot of movement, depending upon the distance involved, you may need to attach an extension onto your air line to accomplish this smoothly.

FEASIBILITY OF MOVING BOULDERS

A dredging operation that requires a lot of boulders to be winched is going to move slower than if little or no winching is required. A winching operation almost always requires the involvement of at least one other person, sometimes even two or more. Those “extra hands” will usually expect to get something for their active participation in your dredging project. So you will find that when you need to use a winch, you will be moving slower through the pay-streak, and it will usually cost more to run the operation. Therefore, a pay-streak that has lots of boulders usually needs to pay pretty well to make the additional effort worthwhile.

The following video segment will give you a look at an organized winching program where multiple persons were involved:

Sometimes, you may discover an excellent pay-streak, but find that it lies beneath many boulders that have to be moved. Even though there may be plenty of gold under the boulders, after figuring the time and expense involved in winching, you may conclude that the gold recovery, though excellent, is still not sufficient to make the project economically feasible. Big boulders are not easy to move. Moving them takes time and money; more, sometimes, than the gold is worth. So, to avoid getting bogged down in an unworthy project, keep track of your daily expenses and your daily gold recovery. Then you will have some basis for calculating whether it is financially worthwhile to continue dredging in that specific location.

If your winching helpers are not full-timers on your dredging operation, and if the location is not too remote, you might arrange to have them arrive at a certain time each day to help pull boulders. That way, you can spend the morning setting up the hole to winch as many boulders as possible. Then, when your help arrives, the boulders can all be winched out of the hole at one time. After winching is completed for the day, you can let your winch helpers go, while you go back down and clean up the hole with your dredge. This way, you are not paying helpers to stand around with nothing to do while you are dredging. It can make a difference.

SETTING UP A WINCH FOR OPERATION

When you are using a portable power winch to move boulders in a dredging operation, the winch must be set up on a solid and stable foundation. It takes a tremendous amount of force to move a boulder. Sometimes, the boulder will move quickly. Or, sometimes, the sling will slip off the boulder, causing the cable to suddenly go slack. Maybe the boulder will loosen up and roll the wrong way, causing a sudden, heavy stress on the cable. When these things happen, and they do happen, you do not want your winch bouncing around or sliding off the platform. That could be extremely dangerous! The winch must be stable!

The winch also should be anchored to a solid object behind it which will hold its position much more securely than the boulders that are to be moved. A fair-sized tree, or a large boulder, directly behind the winch platform can work well for this purpose.

Also, the cable or chain being used to anchor the winch must be considerably stronger than the winch’s capability to pull. The last thing you need is your anchor chain or cable breaking while you are pulling a large boulder! This could cause the winch, and the winch operator, to be yanked off the platform, resulting in a serious accident. Undamaged, heavy-duty truck tow chains with the adjustable end-hooks are excellent for anchoring a winch. Make sure you get chains that are strong enough.

Your winch should also be anchored to a point which is lower than it is. If the winch is anchored from a low point, when boulders are being pulled, the winch will be held down more solidly onto the platform. If the winch is anchored to a higher point, during pulling the winch can be lifted off its platform. This can also be dangerous.

Sometimes, you will not be able to find a good location for your winch along the streambank. You prefer a location where the winch can be set up to directly face the boulders to be pulled, and which provides a level, solid foundation with a properly-located, fixed object from which to anchor the winch. But if that is not available, you can almost always find an acceptable foundation somewhere between two large objects along the bank. The platform may require a little concrete work to get it right. The winch can be anchored to one of the objects, while the other object can be used to attach a snatch block (heavy-duty pulley). The cable can then be run from the winch, through the snatch block, to the boulders that need to be moved. One advantage to this rigging setup is that if the cable does happen to break under a great strain, it will be less likely to fly directly at the winch and its operators.

Positioning the winch between two anchors on the bank,
because there is no easier way to get a straight pull with the winch.

When you set up a winch, it is usually best to position it so the boulders will be pulled as much as possible in the desired direction. The boulders will also need to be pulled far enough away from the dredge hole that they will not have to be moved again at a later time. Often, you will not be able to set up the winch in a position where you can directly pull the boulders in the desired direction. For example, you may want to pull them downriver, rather than toward the stream bank. This situation is most commonly corrected by using directional-change snatch blocks. A snatch block (pulley) can be anchored at a point from the exact direction that you want to pull boulders. The cable then runs from the winch, through the snatch block, to the boulder. In this way, you can usually move the boulders in any direction that you desire from a stable winching position along the bank.

Setting up the proper direction of pull by anchoring a snatch block directly downstream in the river.

Directional-change blocks for winching should be very heavy-duty. They need to be stronger than the cable being used, or the capability of the winch to pull. The best pulley is one that can be quick-released from the cable. This way, you do not have to feed all the cable through the block to get rigged for winching. Good winching pulleys are generally available at industrial equipment supply stores and at marine equipment shops. Directional-change blocks can be attached to trees or boulders with the use of additional cable, chokers or heavy-duty chain. You will find that a few extra tow chains (long ones) and chokers will come in very handy when setting up a winching operation. Chains which have the end-hooks on them are best, so you can adjust their length to meet your needs.

To minimize damage to the environment, you can place pieces of wood between the cable or chain and the trunk of any tree that you use as an anchor. When you anchor a directional-change block to a tree or boulder, you are almost always better off anchoring to a low point. This will reduce the chances of rolling the boulder over or pulling down a tree.

When you use a cable to anchor a winch or directional-change block to a boulder, set it up so that the pull will not cause the cable to become pinched (between two boulders or between a boulder and the bedrock) or be pulled into the material underneath the boulder. Otherwise, after the winching, you may have trouble retrieving your cable without having to move the anchoring boulder as well.

At times, you may need to set up a directional-change block, to pull boulders in a desired direction, but cannot find a downstream boulder that is large enough to use as an anchor. In this case, you can run an additional cable out from a fixed object further downstream on the opposite side of the waterway, and attach your directional-change block to the cable. Then, by increasing or decreasing the length of the cable, you can position the block right where you want it.

Setting up a directional-change block by extending it out on a cable from the other side of the waterway.

It is not a good idea to winch boulders with rope, even the smaller boulders being pulled by your truck or a come-along. When you use rope for winching, the rope stretches even if it is doubled-back multiple times for extra strength. And, it stretches. And, it stretches. Then, it breaks. Such breaks can be dangerous when working around boulders. Also, it can quickly exhaust your supply of rope. Rope is just not strong enough for the job. Steel cable is best. You might get a deal on good, used steel cable from the scrap metal yards. Call around to find out who has it when you need it. Scrap yards usually sell it at scrap prices, by the pound, even if it is in good condition.

The cable you use on your winch should always be considerably stronger than your winch’s pulling capacity. The last thing anyone wants to see is a bunch of out-of-control steel cable flying wildly back in his direction. Faulty or worn cable should be replaced immediately and never used thereafter for winching.

Winching boulders involves an incredible amount of force. So does hauling logs by cable. Similar cables are used in logging operations to pull trees to the loading area. I have heard stories of logging cables snapping, flying back, and cutting a man in two. You are dealing with a similar amount of force when winching the larger boulders in a dredging operation.

WINCHING SIGNALS

During a winching operation, it will be necessary to have a diver in the water to set the sling on the boulders. The diver will also need to remove the sling from each boulder after it has been moved, and then return the sling and cable back to the dredge hole for use in moving the next boulder. This process will continue until all the boulders for that stage of the dredging operation have been moved.

Unless the diver is slinging boulders and operating the winch (a very slow way to go, unless the controls to the winch are in the water with the diver), another person must operate the winch, truck or other device that will be doing the pulling. Once you have more than one person involved in the operation, communication becomes a critical part of the process.

If the winch is a smaller one, or if a truck is being used to pull boulders, and the pulling position is in sight of the target boulders, the job might be accomplished with only one winch operator. On the other hand, in a normal two-man operation, if the winch operator is unable to maintain constant eye contact on the area where the winching is taking place, perhaps a third person will be needed to help with the communication. Each situation will be different. Since this need for immediate and accurate communication is a safety matter which requires on-site judgment, you will have to decide how many people are needed to winch safely.

Sometimes a truck can be turned around to pull backwards, and the driver can directly see and simultaneously carry out the diver’s signals. The controls on an electric winch will often allow a second person to be positioned well enough to see what is happening where the rocks are being moved.

While a boulder is being moved, the diver can watch its progress and signal the winch operator to stop pulling and/or give slack on the line so the boulder sling can be adjusted, if necessary, to successfully complete the movement as planned. The main point is that the diver must be able to communicate to the winch operator quickly and without error. The greater the pulling-power and/or speed of the winch, the more important it is that these signals be accurately received and acted upon quickly. Imagine that you are using a powerful winch to pull a large rock with a heavy steel cable and solid anchoring objects. If your boulder gets jammed against something else in the dredge hole so that it will not move, and you continue pulling with great force, something is eventually going to give. And, it might not be the boulder! This uncertainty is what you want to avoid.

If you are using a winch that does not automatically feed the cable evenly onto the drum, the operator will sometimes need to manually guide the cable. Otherwise, on hard pulls, if the cable starts crossing itself and is allowed to pinch itself on the drum, it may become damaged and thereafter be dangerous for further winching. For this reason, the winch operator may need to focus some attention on the winch, rather than on the diver. In this type of situation, it is wise to include an additional person to help relay communication. Someone needs to be watching for the diver’s signals at all times.

Gasoline-powered winches make noise. So does a gasoline-powered hookah-air system supplying air to the diver. The diver also usually has a regulator in his mouth. With all of this noise present, and the diver having his mouth full, verbal signals are usually not very dependable – especially, if there is a substantial distance between the diver and the winch operator. For these reasons, I have often found visual signals to be more trustworthy, particularly when there is a person positioned at the winch to relay the diver’s signals to the winch operator.

In shallow water, hand signals can usually work pretty well. You really only need three of them: “PULL” , “STOP” and “GIVE SLACK ON THE CABLE”. I highly suggest you take a look at the standard set of signals that my partners and I use in our own dredging operation. These can be found in a special video segment included with an article I wrote about teamwork. Otherwise, create your own signals so that they can be quickly and clearly understood, and one signal cannot be confused with another. There is also a section on winching and signals in my video, Advanced Gold Dredging & Sampling Techniques.” You might want to check it out to get some ideas.

At times, you may be faced with the need to winch boulders out of a dredge hole located in deeper water. In this case, the diver will be heavily weighted down to stay on the river-bottom. He may also be some distance from the streambank. In this setting, it may be nearly impossible for the diver to surface to give timely signals to the winch operator. The process of getting up to the surface can simply take too long! When this is your situation, and if the water is not moving too fast, you may consider using a buoy, tied to a rope that is anchored near the dredge hole, to relay your signals. I personally have found the best and safest signals to be: (1) buoy underwater means, “PULL” (2) buoy floating at the surface means, “STOP PULLING” and (3) buoy bobbing up and down in the water means, “GIVE SLACK”.

This method of buoy-signals is relatively safe. If the buoy is anchored a short distance from the boulder, in order to pull the buoy underwater and hold it there, the diver would have to be away from the boulder on the “PULL” signal. If the buoy is floating, the diver can be anywhere, which is why it is the best choice for the “STOP” signal. You need to make certain, however, that nothing is allowed to snag the buoy’s rope (like the pull cable or an air line) which could pull the buoy underwater and cause a false “PULL” signal!

One other safety note:All divers must always watch their own hookah air lines during winching, to make sure an air line (or the signal rope to the buoy) is not snagged up in the cable or rolled over by the boulder as it is moved.

BOULDER SLINGS

When slinging boulders, try to make sure the pull cable will not rub too heavily or get crushed against other boulders. It is always best to protect the pull cable and let the boulder sling take the pounding. The boulder sling is going to be pounded anyway. Because of this rough duty, boulder slings should be replaced or repaired periodically.

One type of boulder sling often used out in the field is a long, heavy-duty tow chain with end-hooks which allow the chain to be quickly and easily adjusted to any length. This system gives you a fast set up. Just wrap the chain around the boulder in the proper place, connect the end-hook to give you the right fit, and she’s ready to go.

Tow chain boulder sling with end hook.

However, some boulders are smoother and rounder, which makes it more difficult to get a good “bite” with a sling made out of chain. Every time you start to pull, the boulder might move just a little and then the chain slips off. You can waste a lot of time working on a single boulder in this way; it can get quite frustrating.

Logging cable-chokers are also useful for making a cable sling that will tighten up on the boulder as you pull. This may improve the situation, but still not work problem-free on smooth, round rocks.

For round and smooth boulders, I have found the best remedy to be an auxiliary “boulder harness.” This homemade boulder harness consists of heavy cable, chain, steel pipe and cable clamps. It is very easy to construct. The sections of steel pipe slide onto the cable to protect it and to keep the cross-chains properly positioned. The harness is set up like a lasso. It pulls tighter around the boulder as stress increases on the line. And, it generally works well in pulling even the most difficult boulders.

How to put together an excellent boulder harness for winching.

PULLING BOULDERS

Some boulders come easy and some do not. A lot of the problem is in breaking the boulder’s initial suction/compaction in the streambed. If your winch does not have the power to pull a boulder the way you have slung it, sometimes you can break the boulder free by using a rolling hitch A “rolling hitch” is rigged by slinging the boulder backwards, then running the chain or cable over top of the boulder. This places the winch’s pulling-power along the most-leveraged position on the boulder. This will sometimes free a stubborn boulder by rolling it.

How to sling a rolling hitch.

When pulling boulders up and out of a dredge hole, you should pull them some distance away from the hole. Otherwise, if there are more boulders to be moved, they may begin backing up along your ramp and block the passage of any more boulders. This could require you to move them all again, which is a time-waster that you can avoid with proper planning in the first place. For example, take a look at the image at the beginning of this article. That is a top view of a winching operation we did on one of our Group Mining Projects a short while ago. See how we were pulling the boulders back well out of our ongoing excavation?

If you are dealing with relatively deep streambed material and a lot of boulders, you may want to set up an adjustable, directional-change block behind the hole. This way, the boulders can be winched out of the hole in several different directions. This will prevent them from backing up so quickly.

Setting up an adjustable directional-change block to pull boulders in several different directions.

Once the dredge hole has been opened enough, some of the boulders can be winched or rolled to the backside of the hole, rather than taking them up the ramp. Winching will start to go faster when you get to this stage. Depending upon the situation, it may be necessary to winch some of the boulders up the ramp and out of the hole to prevent too much jamming. Be sure to keep access to the ramp free and clear. Otherwise, you may get closed in with too many boulders in the rear of your hole. The more boulders that are jammed up, the more difficult it can be to clear them out of the hole.

Sometimes, when you have winched your boulder to its destination, it will end up on top and pin your sling underneath. If you are using a tow chain as your sling, you can usually just unhook it and have the winch pull it out from underneath the boulder. But, if you are using a sling made of cable, you may not be able to pull it out from under the rock without damaging the harness. For this reason, it is a good idea to have a second sling on hand to help move the boulder off the other harness when this happens.

DIVER’S SAFETY

A diver will be safest by staying well away from the area where a boulder is being winched, and the path it will be taking as it is being pulled. The forces involved in winching are more than enough to cause a very serious accident. Since the diver is underwater, the winch operator sometimes cannot see what is happening where the bolder is located.

What can happen down there, though, is when the diver sees the boulder getting hung up on things as it is being pulled along, he wants to move in and help it along with his pry bar. The less power that your winch provides, the more the diver will naturally feel the need to help the boulder along in this way. Never forget that your safety margin is considerably reduced when you get near a boulder while it is being pulled! A safer course of action would be to stop the pulling and reset the harness, or reset the direction of pull, or improve the boulder ramp, or find a stronger winch for the job. Or, you can increase the pulling power of your existing winch by double blocking…

DOUBLE BLOCKING

“Double blocking” is accomplished by attaching a snatch block to the boulder sling, running the pull cable through that block, and then back to the last directional-change anchor. This type of rigging will nearly double the amount of pulling force that can be exerted against the boulder by the winch and pull cable.

Double blocking back to the last directional-change anchor
will nearly double the winch’s pulling power against the boulder.

If even more power is needed, another block can be set up on the line to run the pull cable back to the boulder sling. The pulling force of any winching device can be increased by continuing to double block in this way. There is a disadvantage to all this rigging, however. It takes much more cable to pull boulders any significant distance. Also, it is equally more difficult for the diver to pull the boulder sling and cable back to the dredge hole after each boulder has been moved. With all that cable going back and forth, it can get pretty complicated – especially if you are dealing with a limited amount of visibility. Quick-release snatch blocks are a must when double blocking. This way, you can detach the pulleys from the cable without having to feed it all the way through.

Actually, one double block is not that hard to manage as long as you have enough cable. It is when you double block a second time that it starts getting difficult to keep track of which cable is going to where? But, this alternative is available to you if you need the extra pulling power to move a particularly large boulder.

Directional-change blocks, by themselves, do not give you an increase in pulling power. For a power increase, the cable must be doubled back so that the boulder is moved only half the distance that the winch is pulling on the cable.

 

 
video subscription graphic
This story first appeared in Gold & Treasure Hunter Magazine May/Jun, 1993 on Page 45. This issue is still available! Click here.

By Dave McCracken

Classification is necessary to increase the amount of smaller particles of gold that you will trap in your recovery system.

Dave Mack

 

It takes more water velocity to move larger-sized material than it does to move the smaller-sized material through a sluice box. Yet, to the degree that the water velocity over a sluice box is increased, there may be a loss of fine gold recovery. Or, to the degree the water velocity over a sluice box is slowed down, there is likely to be an increase in fine gold recovery–as long as there is still enough flow over the box to keep the riffles concentrating.

When larger rocks are pushed through a sluice box by water force, they also create greater turbulence behind the riffles as they pass over, which may cause an additional loss of fine gold.

To improve gold recovery, it is common practice to run material through a screen to classify out the larger rocks before running the material through the recovery-portion of a sluice box. In this way, less water velocity is needed through the box, which allows for a more orderly flow, and an increase in fine gold recovery. The action of screening materials is called “classification.” Materials which have been passed through a classification screen are called “classified materials.” The following video segment demonstrates this very important point:

The size and depth of riffles within a sluice box play an important part of this. A slower water flow might not keep a deeper riffle concentrating. A greater water flow can sometimes “boil-out” a lower-profile riffle. So as water flow is slowed down to catch finer-sized gold, it is generally necessary to use shorter riffles.

Half-inch mesh screen is commonly used for primary classification in small and medium-sized sluicing operations, because the screen is large enough to allow classification to take place quickly, yet no materials greater than half-inch in size will get into the sluice. Therefore a slower-velocity of water can be directed through the box, and fine gold recovery will be improved.

Classification for a sluicing operation can be done in any number of ways. One is to place a piece of strong half-inch mesh screen over a bucket, and shovel or pour through the screen into the bucket while sweeping the larger material off to the side. Once the bucket is filled with classified material, it can be poured into the sluice box at a uniform rate. It is better to not dump the whole bucket into the sluice all at once! This is because too much material is likely to overload the riffles and cause a loss of gold recovery.

In a situation where it is necessary to haul material a short distance to the sluice box, sometimes it is easiest to classify the material directly into a wheelbarrow and transfer only the classified material to the sluice.

Perhaps one of the best screening methods is to build a classification device that you can shovel into, and which will stand directly over the top of, and drop the classified materials into, the head of your sluice box.

The device should be built with the screen set at an angle. This way, larger material is helped to roll off of the screen as the pay-dirt is shoveled onto it. Smaller materials should fall through the screen and be directed into the head of your sluice box. This is actually a miniature model of the big classifiers used by large-scale heavy equipment bench-mining operations. A classification device such as this is rather easy and economical to build and will speed up a production-sluicing operation while screening is being done to improve gold recovery.

Any recovery system will only recover gold effectively down to a certain size-range. Most gold particles smaller in size than that will be lost with the tailings. Classification is one effective way of increasing the amount of gold that will be recovered out of the material that will be processed. As demonstrated in this following video segment, this is especially true of suction dredges; because dredges are able to increase the volume of production over other types of hand-mining activity.

Here is a substantial explanation of the system which we have developed to effectively recover more fine gold on our conventional suction dredges. It combines two classification screens to more-effectively separate material-feed into three size-fractions, each which is directed into a different recovery system. The smallest gold particles (which are most difficult to recover) are directed into low-profile riffles along the bottom of the sluice box which have long been proven to be very effective at trapping fine gold.

 

 

By Dave McCracken

As far as I’m concerned, if you are going to spend a lot of time dredging in cold water, a hot water system is definitely the way to go!

Dave Mack

Cold Water 1
“Photo by Tim Cook”

Can you recall ever standing alongside an unheated swimming pool or just next to the water’s edge on the beach, trying intently to muster the nerve to jump into the cold water? Perhaps you even tried to build up to the big leap by counting, “One, two, three.. .jump!” — only to find yourself still standing at the edge of the water after the countdown and feeling like your body is not quite under your control. This can often be the case when you are dredging in cold water. The key to successful cold water dredging is having the proper equipment — particularly those items needed to keep your body from getting too cold and uncomfortable.

Wetsuits

Wet-suits are designed to allow water to get inside the suit. Your body-heat then warms the water up, insulating you from the colder water that remains outside the suit. In really cold water, the main problem with a wet-suit is that initial frigid shock which shocks your body as the initial cold water rushes into your suit when you first enter the water. This happens again every time you re-enter the water after knocking out a plug-up in the jet tube or every time you take a break. This “cold water shock” has an accumulative affect on the body; and even the toughest people often find ourselves going “one, two, three” on the bank and have trouble making our bodies jump back into the water.

Some wet-suit divers lessen the pain of cold water shock by having a hot tub of water on the bank. They pour the hot water into their suits just before re-entering the water to help bring up their body temperature. Hot water systems that provide a steady flow of warm water into a wet-suit are even better — but we will address that topic below.

There are different types of wet-suits, some which are designed especially for cold water use. Cold water wet-suits are usually made of thicker rubber, have few or no zippers, and almost always have the hood directly attached to the wet-suit top. There is also the “shortie,” which is like a pullover wet-suit sleeveless T-shirt with or without a hood attached. A shortie can be worn underneath or over top of a regular wet-suit to create added warmth. In addition to the added thickness of rubber around your upper torso, a hooded-shortie prevents a lot of the cold water shock from running down your neck and back!

Important note: The more rubber you add for insulation from cold water, the more lead you must add to your weight belt(s) so you can remain firmly anchored to the bottom of the waterway when you are dredging. Also: The more rubber that is added around your upper body, arms and shoulders, the more constrained your arms and shoulders will be. Dredge work underwater is mostly stomach, arms and shoulder-work (movement). Therefore, adding more rubber increases the amount of effort required to get the work done. Effort in dredging is like money in your wallet. You only have so much. So it must be managed as efficiently as possible. Because, once you have used it up, your day is over.

Dry-suits

For cold water dredging or diving, dry-suits are definitely a step above wet-suits (when there is not a hot-water system). A dry-suit is designed to keep all of the cold water out. Basically, there are two different types of dry-suits available on the market: Those that use the rubber or nylon shell as insulation, and those that require additional insulation to be worn inside the suit. Both types work well; it is a matter of individual preference as to which kind is best for you.

Dredging activity is very hard on any type of suit. There are many different models and makes of dry-suits available. Some are designed more for sport diving rather than dredging and hard work. Dry-suits generally are quite a bit more expensive than wet-suits. However, you cannot rightfully put a price on comfort and warmth when you are spending many hours underwater working for a living. If you are cold and uncomfortable, you will not get in as much dredging time; and you will not make as much gold (money). So, my advice is to spend the extra money on getting a quality dry-suit if you are going to buy one.

Dry-suits generally require more maintenance than wet-suits. Mainly, the seals at the extremities and the zipper must be properly maintained. Most dry-suits have zippers which should be coated with bees wax every several uses and sprayed with silicone each time the suit is used. The seals should be sprayed just before each use. This allows them to slip on more easily, and prevents unnecessary stretching. The zipper is the heart of a dry-suit and must be handled with care. You have to be careful not to get sand in it, and not to sit on it or rub it heavily while moving rocks around in the dredge hole. I always glue a rubber flap over my dry-suit zippers to further-protect them from dredging wear and tear. Most manufacturers stress having a second person zip it closed rather than doing it yourself. This is because it is difficult to pull the zipper straight when it is behind you, as many dry-suit zippers are. If you damage the zipper, the suit is no good until you get the zipper replaced.

You will find that even the smallest puncture holes in a dry-suit need to be patched when diving or dredging in extremely cold water. Otherwise, you are constantly uncomfortable with cold water entering the suit from that location.

Hot Water Systems

Cold Water 2As far as I’m concerned, if you are going to dredge long hours in cold water, a hot water system is definitely the way to go! Water is usually heated with a heat-exchanging device mounted to the cooling or exhaust system of the dredge motor. The dredge pump is tapped to provide a water supply, which runs through the heat-exchanger, then through a steam trap/mixing tank, and then down through a hose to pour a constant volume of warm water into the dredger’s wet-suit. Some dredgers are using propane continuous-demand hot water heaters, but most use heat exchangers mounted to their engine exhaust systems.

Hot water heat-exchangers are available on the market. They are also reasonably easy to build. Most homemade exchangers are built with a long length of copper tubing which is either wrapped around the existing exhaust system or is coiled inside a separate housing through which the engine’s exhaust is channeled.

Photo By Tim Cook

The key to a hot water system is to provide an abundance of hot water. If you do not have plenty of hot water for all of the divers working on a system, then you will most likely end up pumping cooler water into each diver’s suit, which can be worse than having a wetsuit with no hot water system.

Hint: You can never have too much hot water — because you do not necessarily have to use it all.

Most ordinary wet-suits are adequate as hot water suits — particularly with the addition of a hooded shortie vest. Dry-suits normally do not make good hot water suits, unless they are modified. This is because the seals prevent the hot water from exiting the suit. After a while, all the excess water inside the suit cools down and makes the diver cold. Removal of the seals on a dry-suit would probably make it a good hot water system (as long as it is a tight-fitting dry-suit) — but this seems a waste of money when a far less expensive wet-suit will accomplish the same purpose.

The main problem dredgers can have with a hot water system is being scalded by extreme hot water or steam. This problem can largely be solved by adding a steam trap to the system. Some prefer to call this a “mixing tank.” A mixing container can be made out of PVC plastic tubing. One of the primary purposes of the mixing container is to be a holding tank for water and steam. So, if extreme hot water or steam is created in the system, it will have a chance to mix with the warm water in the tank before being pumped down to the diver. The mixing container should be mounted vertically on your dredge with the input coming from the top, and the output to the diver being on the bottom of the container. This way, steam is prevented from being pumped directly to the diver(s). Some systems contain a low-pressure relief valve at the top of the container to allow air and steam to release.

mixing containerThe mixing container must be large enough to absorb a shot of extremely hot water, but not so large that it allows the water to cool down before it is pumped to the diver. The mixing container allows the diver to feel the rise in water temperature much more slowly, so that the hot water hose can be removed from the wetsuit before it gets uncomfortably hot. Sometimes, the water can be so hot coming out of a heat exchanger, that a special steam hose must be used. In fact, just for safety, I always use heat hose on the connection from the heat exchanger to the mixing tank.

If the water coming out of the heat exchanger is too hot to pump directly to a diver — which is often the case — a source of cold water can also be tapped from the pump and directed into the mixing tank through a valve. By regulating the amount of cold water, you can adjust the temperature of the water being pumped down to the diver. This also increases the volume of warm water available to all of the divers.

Warm water is usually pumped down to the diver through the same kind of hose being used for air line. The hot water line and air line are usually taped together to prevent tangling and additional underwater confusion. The hot water line can be slipped into your wet-suit down through the neck. I usually poke a hole in my wet-suit near my chest where it is easy to slip the hot water line in and out of my suit.

Or, in extremely cold water, you can devise a splitter system which will direct some of the warm water to your chest, hood, each bootie, and each glove. This is the best way to do it if you are dredging in ice cold water. However, sometimes the splitter system can be avoided simply by having a hot water system which provides so much volume, that the warm water is forced out into these same extremities.

When dredging in ice cold water, if you do not have warm water directed to your hands, it is usually necessary to use three-finger wet-suit mittens. Otherwise, your hands can go numb from the cold. Three finger mittens are bulky; they prevent you from picking up larger cobbles with one hand, and they generally slow you down. With a good source of hot water to the hands, you can often get by with a good set of slightly-insulated rubber work gloves with the openings loosely rubber-banded around your wrists to prevent cold water from entering.

Dredge with snow on the decksAuthor was developing some of the early hot-water heaters on his first dredge in 1981 while working in the frigid waters of the Trinity River in Northern California.

It is necessary to warm up your dredge engine to normal operating speed for at least several minutes to properly set the temperature of the water directed to the divers from the mixing container. Once you get the temperature working right for you, you normally do not need to make any further adjustments on subsequent dives, as long as you are running the motor at the same RPM.

If you stand around for a few minutes with hot water pouring into your suit, there is usually no shock at all when entering the cold water. As a matter of fact, it can be a pleasure to enter the cold water after you run your body temperature up to the uncomfortable stage when you begin sweating.

A hot water system should be removed from the dredge when not being used, like during the warm summer months. Otherwise, the heat and vibration will tend to wear the heat-exchanger out unnecessarily. Also, even when not in use, if a hot water system is attached, water should be allowed to flow through it any time the engine is running. This will prevent unnecessary overheating of the heat-exchanger.cold water 3

Photo by Tim Cook

If you are tapping your dredge pump for a supply of water, be sure the water output is either closed off or underwater when priming your pump. Otherwise, there may be an air leak which can prevent priming.

The nice thing about a hot water system is that it will supply a continuous feed of hot water into your suit. This way, your body’s energy reserves are not being constantly used up to keep warm. As a result, you can be comfortable and get in more dredging time.

Important note: You can also be so warm that your body doesn’t want to work — like being in a hot shower. The solution to this lies in the amount of cold water you valve into the mixing tank, or how far down you zip your wet-suit jacket! Believe me, “too warm” is a much easier problem to solve underwater than “too cold.”

A common question people ask is, “Should I get a hot water system, or a dry-suit?” The answer to this lies in what you intend to do. I suggest having both systems available, depending upon your activity. For production dredging and sampling in extremely cold water, I would use a hot water system. For swimming across the river to stretch a rope, or for swimming down the river with mask and snorkel to look at the bottom in extremely cold water, I would recommend a dry-suit.

Other Things To Know About Cold Weather Dredging

If you are working in freezing temperatures above water, there are certain things that should be done on your dredge each day before knocking off. Your pump should have a drain plug tapped into the bottom. This way, you can drain the water at the end of each day to prevent your pump from freezing solid. It is not a bad idea to bring some hot water with you everyday in a thermos, because sometimes the pump will freeze even with the water drained. Be careful not to crack the pump housing by pouring too much scalding water directly over it when it is freezing cold.

Also, in freezing weather, the concentrates and water must be completely cleaned out of your recovery system at the end of each day. Otherwise, they will freeze solid and prevent the system from working until it thaws out the following day — if it thaws!

If you are not going to process them directly, your concentrates from the day should be stored well underwater to prevent them from freezing on the bank. Your mask, hood and gloves should be brought back to camp each evening and kept warm. Otherwise, you have the misery of putting them on when they are ice cold — unless you have a hot water system on your dredge.

Winter Dredging

Eric Bosch and author displaying nuggets pulled while diving together.

Dave and Eric holding nuggetsEven if you are able to handle most of the cold water problems with the use of good equipment, another factor winter dredgers often have to deal with is higher and faster water. While the higher water will allow you to mine further up on the edges of the river, in many areas it will prevent you from mining out in the faster and deeper water areas-which may provide easy mining during the summer months. If, due to the faster, higher water, you are not able to get out and sample in certain sections of the river, you will not be able to run a full testing program on that section of river; and you will miss pay-streaks. So, it can also be more difficult to locate deposits during the faster and higher water months of the year.

On the other hand, if the river edges are paying, the winter months may be the only time they are available for dredging. The location of deposits are going to vary from one place to the next.

While wet-suits, hot water suits and dry-suits do make for good insulation underwater, they generally provide poor insulation to the cold air above water when you are wet. Therefore, it is good to have a warm winter jacket to wear over your diving suit while taking breaks on the surface.

Tents in the snowAs a side note on this, my commercial dredging buddies and I ate many hurried lunches on deck during the winter months (even while it was snowing) while the dredge continued to run at operating speed (with a rock placed over the suction nozzle to slow the water in our recovery system), pumping warm water into our suits.

If you are mining in extremely cold conditions, it really helps to have a warm and comfortable camp. A person can put up with some pretty cold and miserable conditions if he or she knows there is a warm shower and hot meal coming later that evening. There are few things worse than freezing all day and then going back to stay in a wet and cold camp!

Author’s campsite during his first several years as a gold prospector.

How Tough Are You?

It takes a pretty tough person to dredge in extremely cold conditions. Even with the best equipment, there is still a substantial amount of cold water exposure on your hands and face. You spend quite a bit of time working on the dredge, tying off lines, swimming the river, cleaning up concentrates, making repairs, etc. This all adds up to exposure which can be painful or uncomfortable. Some people are gung-ho enough to dredge in extremely cold water on a short-term basis. Few people are willing to do it long-term.

We all have the potential to be tough enough to dredge in extremely cold water. What it always comes down to is whether or not we desire to be that tough! A lot of people think they are, and then realize they are not willing to do it!

Talk is cheap!

I was mining with several guys in 34-degree water one winter. One of the divers and I were sampling for a new deposit while the other two guys were actively dredging out a rich deposit we had already located. They were recovering several ounces of nugget-gold each day, while we were knocking out sample holes. One day, we helped get the production operation started and then headed out to do our sampling. We soon realized we forgot our lunch, turned around and drove back to where our partners were dredging. We had not been gone fifteen minutes, and they had already gotten out of the water and were in the truck with the heat turned on — drinking hot coffee! These were tough guys; that water was cold!

A partner and I were dredging in Alaska in October when things started to freeze. We’d had a very good season, but I wanted to put more ounces into my bottle before returning home. Ice had already formed on the edges of the river, and my partner had been ready to leave weeks before. I was determined to spend one more week dredging, because the gold was good and I had plans for what I was going to do with it. One day, with a week to go, I could not make my body go underwater again. “One, two, three, go!” — but my body refused. So, it just wasn’t worth it, anymore! I walked over and tugged on my partner’s air line and asked him if he was ready to go — home, that is. We were on the road later that afternoon in a warm truck with the heat blasting. In that area of Alaska, three feet of snow fell that night!

There is a point where the body just takes over and says, “No!” And, this is probably the point where it is smart for you to listen.

 

By Dave McCracken

It is important to define for yourself how much gold you need to recover to make the effort worthwhile.

Dave McCracken

 

It is a very good idea for you to define for yourself what amount of gold is minimally acceptable for you to recover on a daily basis. It might be a half-ounce per day. It might be more. Or it might be less, depending upon the size of the dredging or other mining equipment you are using, your operating expenses, and how much gold you need to recover to make the effort worthwhile. The main point here is that you should set some minimum standard. If you are recovering that much gold on a daily basis, you will stick with it. If your daily averages start dropping below that point, you will start sampling around for better ground.

There are several good reasons for doing this. One is that if you do not know about how much gold is acceptable to you, and what is not acceptable, you can waste a lot of time “going on hoping” (for some undefined target) while you continue to dredge in low-grade material, rather than sample around for something better like you should. Another good reason is that you need to determine how far to each side and how far to the rear to dredge into the lower-grade material along the boundaries of a pay-streak. I covered this subject more thoroughly in another article.

Perhaps the best reason that you need to define a minimum acceptable level of daily gold for yourself, is so you can take in the better, and much better, and tremendously-better pay-dirt as a bonus when you find it. This could be on a regular basis if you become good at sampling. If you do not take on the good finds as a bonus, you can find yourself comparing the good finds with the acceptable finds; and pretty soon the acceptable finds may not be acceptable any more! This is especially true when you are dredging up a high-grade pay-streak.

I know of a guy that was new to gold dredging, who was into a very large pay-streak which was paying him a little more than half-ounce per day for every day that he went out and dredged. He was happy with this. That was well more than an average day’s wages in the profit he was making over top of expenses, and gold prices have been going up to make that even better. Everything was going along just fine until one day when he uncovered a bedrock up-cropping and pulled six ounces of beautiful gold out of a single pocket in the bedrock just in that one day. The following day, he was back into the half-ounce amounts again. Only that was no-longer good enough. He quit shortly thereafter. He left the area, never came back, and I have not heard of him since.

What happened? He got spoiled from the incredible feelings generated from uncovering really valuable golden treasure. This causes something which is often referred to as “gold or treasure fever.” Once the extreme high-grade was finished, he could not go back to recovering just half-ounce of gold per day, anymore. It is kind of like losing the person you love. Nobody else will do.

If you stick with gold prospecting long enough to get good at sampling, there will always be greater highs. But if the greater highs are the only thing that is now acceptable pay-dirt, you will find yourself frustrated a lot of the time.

If you define for yourself what is acceptable as pay-dirt, as you continue to get better at sampling, you will find that there is a surplus of acceptable ground available to you. Therefore, you will be able to upgrade your minimum acceptable levels a degree or two as time goes along.

If you are willing to mine every bit of acceptable ground that you can get into, and are willing to accept the bonuses as they are uncovered, and just treat them as a bonus, you will be making more gold more of the time – and you will find more bonuses, too

 

By Dave McCracken

Part Two – Sampling For Paystreaks

Dave Mack

 

There are few things in the world more enjoyable — and more exciting — than finding your own pay-streaks, particularly when they are rich! It is one thing if someone else turns you onto a previously-located deposit — which, by the way, you should always take when it is offered to you. It is much more emotionally satisfying when you locate a rich deposit by following the signs discovered by your own sampling program. Seeing the first flakes of gold uncovered, when you knew they were going to be there even before you saw them, is a wonderful feeling; it is a true thrill to follow those flakes into a rich deposit. There is nothing else like it! Some say there is no cure for gold fever.

The procedure for finding pay-streaks is quite simple, really. The key is having the emotional fortitude to follow through with your sampling procedure, by following up on positive signs if they are there. And remember, you don’t need to find a pay-streak in every sample hole. Otherwise, sampling would not be necessary. You only need to find a pay-streak once in a while to make mining pay off — on any scale.

As we discussed in part one, pay-streaks form in those sections of a riverbed where the water force slows down on a large scale during major flood storms. Because gold is so much heavier than other average streambed material in the river, particles, flakes and nuggets of gold tend to collect in these large, slower-moving sections of river, while the lighter materials continue to be washed downstream.

Pay-streaks can be large or small, depending upon the size of the low pressure (low velocity) area in the river and depending upon how much gold traveled through each particular area during major flood storms.

Here is a location on our mining property at K-15A during the 1997 flood

Here is the very same location at K-15A during normal summer flows.

Pay-streaks always form on the path that gold follows in the river. Sometimes there may be more than one gold path, because the gold may be originating in the river from several different sources.

Pay-streaks are very important to miners because they are larger than single-type deposits, such as those found in a bedrock crevice along the gold path. Therefore, pay-streaks are easier to find. Because they tend to be long and wide, pay-streaks are deposits which can be worked usually for quite some time.

Gold can be recovered from a pay-streak which is located on bedrock; it can also be found throughout the streambed material or on the top of a flood layer.

It is important to understand what flood layers are. They are separate strata of streambed, which were laid down by different storms or perhaps at different periods during the same storm. The various layers are usually very easy to distinguish from one other. Each has different colors and consistency, and the gravels are usually of different compact hardness. If you are looking for it, you can nearly always see the changes in flood layers as you dig or dredge a sample hole deeper into the streambed. Sometimes there is only one layer over the bedrock. Often there are two or more layers.

As we discussed in part one, gold is extremely heavy. Therefore, most gold travels along the bottom of the other suspended streambed material as it is being washed downriver during a major flood storm. If the material is washing down across bedrock, then gold can become trapped in the various irregularities, cracks and holes. Sometimes, if conditions allow, gold may even be deposited on top of smooth bedrock to form a pay-streak in a low pressure area of the river.

Sometimes, because the flood storm is not quite extreme enough to break up pre-existing hard-packed streambeds, material moving during a storm will wash over the top of already-established streambed layers, rather than across the bedrock. Therefore, newly-formed pay-streaks may be found on top of pre-existing streambed layers, rather than on bedrock.

It is very common to find pay-streaks on top of a streambed layer. Sometimes you can find pay-streaks on top of several different layers in the same location. Sometimes, you can find pay-streaks on a layer, but not on the bedrock in the same location.

Most gold-bearing rivers have some amount of gold disbursed throughout the streambed material, so you tend to recover a small amount of gold out of each sample hole. We call this “traces.” This usually is not very much gold; not enough to get very excited about and not enough to support a small-scale mining operation. It only takes a few sample holes to give you an idea of the average amount of gold that is disbursed in the general streambed. You can pretty-much expect to get this small amount of gold from each sample hole that you dredge or dig. If you recover more gold from a sample hole than is showing up in the average streambed, it is important to realize you are onto something — even if it is not exciting, yet.

Remember, sampling is the business of following positive signs into a pay-streak. When you are finding increased amounts of gold in an area, it is likely that you are onto the general gold path, and you are into a low pressure area of some magnitude. You may be very close to an excellent deposit.

So the first thing to do, once you start finding increased amounts of gold in a sample hole, is figure out exactly where it is coming from. Is it coming from a layer? This is really important to know.

Several years ago, I had a friend who was recovering two pennyweights (1/10th of an ounce) of gold per day with a 4-inch dredge, dredging in four feet of streambed material. He had been trained in the old school of thought, which says you always dredge to bedrock, no matter what. I jumped into his hole one day and noticed almost immediately that a lot of his gold was coming off the top of a flood layer which was located about six inches beneath the material’s surface. Investigating further, I found there was some gold coming off the bedrock, but it was not very much. About 95% of his gold was coming off that layer. Once I pointed it out, he began to just skim off the top foot of material, and he started recovering about five times as much gold. This is why it is important it is to establish exactly where the gold is coming from in a sample hole!

If you dig a sample hole through deep material and only find a marginal amount of gold, the location might still be worth working if you discover that the gold is coming from a layer change closer to the surface.

When I am dredging a sample hole and see a change in layers, I always slow down and uncover a section off the top of the new layer while careful1y looking for gold. If there is a substantial amount of gold on the layer, it is never hard to see if you are looking for it. All you have to do is hold the suction nozzle further away from the streambed material so there is just enough suction to pull the gravel, but not enough to pull the gold, which is about six times heavier. Underwater magnification makes the gold very easy to see. But you have to be looking for these changes in layers, and you need to slow down and look on top of them as they are being uncovered.

The gold is more difficult to see if you are digging up on the bank. In this case, layer changes can be sampled separately with the use of your gold pan or other recovery equipment.

Seeing an increase in the amount of gold in a sample hole, even if it is just a small increase, is one of the most important signs to recognize in sampling. You would not see the increase if you were not on the general gold path and on or near a low pressure location in the river. Seeing an increase in gold is always reason to investigate that location further, either by spreading the hole in different directions to see if it gets better, or by digging or dredging more sample holes in the immediate area. You should be acting like a dog who has found a nice, juicy scent!

As mentioned in part one, one of the biggest barriers new miners need to overcome is their own doubtful thoughts about how much gold they are not going to find in a sampling location. Many beginners have themselves talked out of finishing a sampling project long before they have properly completed it! Forget what you think might not be there, and just work hard to see what actually is there. This is what sampling is all about!

Time and time again, I have seen beginning miners start a sampling project, start recovering some gold which is not enough for their minimum requirements, but is far greater than the average amount of gold in the river; and then give the area up because it is not good enough. Afterwards, someone else will open up the same location a little more and find a rich pay-streak. Yet, the original miners are still sampling elsewhere, not having found a pay-streak of their own. Short of finding an acceptable pay-streak, a visible increase in the amount of gold recovered from a sample hole is the best sign you can look for. Don’t walk away from it until you are more than certain it is just a low-grade pay-streak which you have no interest in.

There is something mystical in the way gold affects people. This has been known for a long time. How much gold a person is finding, or not finding, definitely affects his or her emotions. Successful miners have learned to set the negative emotional impact aside and to use effective sampling techniques and hard work instead.

It has been well proven throughout history that gold is much easier to lose than it is to find. And, no doubt, men have walked away from more gold deposits than they have found due to the way they were emotionally affected by the results of their sampling operations.

I know of one man who dredged a sample hole and was recovering four-to-five pennyweights of gold per day. He spent a day pushing the hole towards the bank and discovered that someone had been there with a dredge ahead of him. He spent a day pushing the hole to the right and found the bedrock going deeper, but the gold was getting a little better and the pieces bigger. He decided the area was too difficult and not paying well enough, and went to sample elsewhere before he even came close to defining what kind of pay-streak he had located. What causes a person to give up so easily when the signs are so good? Why walk away from a location with fantastic signs to go sample a new location where you have not yet discovered any positive signs? The answer has to do with the way gold affects people’s emotions, and the fact that it is much easier to lose than it is to find!

There is an excellent lesson to learn from this: Watch for an increase in the amount of gold in your sample holes. Leave your negative emotions out of it. Follow up positive signs when you see them — always. Have some patience, and positive signs will lead you into the pay-streaks.

 

By Dave McCracken

Part Three – Sampling is a never-ending process

Dave McCracken

 

You would think that sampling could end once you’ve found a pay-streak. Because, once you’ve found a pay-streak, you start your production operation to recover the gold. However, sampling continues on, possibly even to a greater degree, even after you’ve located a rich deposit.

When you locate a deposit that you have determined is good enough to work, your next step is to define your deposit’s boundaries. This takes more sampling. It is generally done by dredging or digging more sample holes. The first and most important boundary you should find, especially if you are dredging, is the lower-end, meaning the downstream-end of the pay-streak. This is because you need to find a place to drop your tailings where they will not end up on top of your gold deposit.

In mining activities of any kind, tailings placement is of primary concern right from the beginning of the operation. You generally do not worry about it too much during sampling, because you have not determined there is a deposit in the immediate location as yet. But as soon as you are certain there is a deposit worth developing, where you place your tailings becomes very important!

In dredging, providing you are going to have the time to develop the entire deposit, you usually back your dredge further down river, dredging sample holes as you go, to locate where the deposit plays out. It is then smart to dredge a few more sample holes below this point to make sure the deposit really did play out where you will put your tailings. Then, start dredging from the tail-end of the deposit, dropping your tailings over the area that you have already worked.

As you work the deposit forward, you also must locate the left and right boundaries of the deposit. This also requires your sampling attention, only in a different way. Rather than dredge or dig sample holes, pay close attention to how much gold you are recovering while continuing to move your production hole in the direction of each side of the deposit. In dredging, if you are into a healthy deposit, you will see gold when you uncover the strata of streambed material where it is located.

As I mentioned in the earlier parts of this series, when you find gold in a sample hole, the first thing to do is establish where it is coming from. Is it from the contact zones between streambed layers or is it coming off the bedrock? This also applies to production mining. You need to know where the gold is coming from so you can watch that particular strata of streambed material closely to make sure it is still paying as you move your production hole forward and toward the left and right side boundaries of the deposit.

In dredging, if it is a good pay-streak, when the paying strata is uncovered, you can actually see the gold if you slow down and look. You will also see the gold disappear once you extend beyond the boundaries of your pay-streak. It is standard practice to slow down and watch your pay strata closely when production dredging. By following this procedure, you will continue to dredge up pay-dirt with a minimum of non-paying material. This means that the job of sampling never really ends, even when you are mining a good pay-streak; especially when mining a good pay-streak!

When digging, as in high-banking, you cannot depend as much on seeing your gold as you dig in the pay strata, so it can be necessary to clean-up your recovery system more frequently to make sure you are still mining in a section of the gold deposit. You can also sample the pay strata with a gold pan on a regular basis to make sure it is still paying in sufficient quantities.

The idea behind a production operation is to mine all of the deposit, while mining as little of the non-paying material outside the deposit as possible. However, you cannot always directly see where the deposit plays out. So you must be constantly watching how well the deposit is paying and where it seems to play out. This can sometimes be difficult to do; because some pay-streaks are not entirely consistent. For example, a non-visible obstruction or change in the bedrock upstream can cause an entire section of pay-streak deposit to boil out and give you the false impression of a boundary–when there might be an even richer section of the pay-streak several feet beyond where it apparently plays out! This has happened to me a number of times when I discovered further upstream that the pay-streak was wider than I thought. Then I had to drop back and pick up what I had missed on my first pass.

Keeping these thoughts in mind, just do your best to figure out what the deposit is doing as you follow it. Every once in a while, it is important to devote some time and energy continuing to sample beyond the apparent boundaries of the pay-streak to make sure you are not missing anything important.

Short of actually finding a rich pay-streak, finding an increase in the amount of gold in a sample hole is the best sign to look for while testing. Finding an increase in gold means more sampling is a good idea in the immediate area.

In the same way, finding a rich pay-streak means much more sampling is justified in that immediate area–especially beyond the apparent boundaries of the pay-streak you are working. This sampling is best done as you move forward, before you start dumping your tailings in that location.

Another important thing is to determine for yourself how much gold you actually need to recover on a daily basis to make it worth your while to work the deposit. Sometimes there is a big difference between what a person says he or she must recover and what a person will accept in order to remain in a deposit. You should be honest with yourself about this. If you need to recover five pennyweight a day, then you should not be production mining in a deposit which is paying only one pennyweight a day, unless you have some reason to believe it is going to improve right away. Also, if five pennyweight a day is your acceptable level, you should discipline yourself to mine the lower-grade gravel on the boundary-edge of a pay-streak if it is paying this much or more, no matter how much more the higher-grade section of the gold deposit is paying.

Some pay-streaks have a richer portion in the center or along one edge, and a lower-grade section throughout the remainder, which still may be high-grade enough to work by your own standards. Yet, you will find yourself much more interested in recovering the gold out of the rich section, because it is more exciting as you uncover all that gold. It takes personal discipline to work all of the acceptable portions of the pay-streak, when only one portion is extremely high-grade. I have seen many deposits (some of them my own) wasted by miners moving forward, dredging only the high-grade, while dumping tailings on the lower grade–but still acceptable–portions of the pay-streak. We all learn through hard-won experience just how valuable pay-streaks are once they are located, and how important it is to production-mine them in a disciplined and orderly manner, wasting as little as possible

There is an old maxim which always seems to be true: If you are looking for easy gold, go where others have already found it, and look beneath the area in which they started laying down their tailings! People get so excited when first discovering a deposit, they usually don’t think much about what they are dumping their tailings on top of until it is far too late!

The main point I have been trying to make here is that sampling really never ends. When you are not in a deposit, you will find yourself sampling to find one. When you find one, if you are wise, you will constantly sample to keep yourself within the boundaries of the deposit. Then, you’ll need to sample again to find another pay-streak in the immediate area once the first one runs out. Sampling basically is your procedure to acquire the necessary perception of where the gold is so you can recover as much as possible for your efforts. This is why you want to be good at it.

Don’t quit!

 

By Dave McCracken

I know I’m going to have a great season! How about you?

Dave Mack

Springtime! The days are getting longer and warmer. The birds are chirping. And, there is a magic in the air created by all of the living things waking up for a new start. This is when most of us who live on or near the river start really feeling the gold fever itch. Miners start returning to the river, and you can really feel the excitement about the prospects of the new season. What is it about spring that gives people so much renewed hope and interest? Even people who failed utterly during seasons past, who considered giving up gold mining forever, seem to be rejuvenated at the beginning of a new season!

Spring and early summer is usually the time when most of us are pulling our mining equipment out of storage, wiping off the cobwebs, doing the needed repairs, and ordering the necessary replacement gear and additional equipment to start our new gold mining adventure. We are also spending a lot of time thinking about where we are going to mine.

Having a successful mining season depends on many things. But all of these basically fall into four separate categories: having the right equipment; having the experience and knowledge to do it properly; having a location where recoverable gold deposits are present; and most of all, having good management–meaning the right approach!

Basically, if you have dependable equipment and you have a gold bearing location, and you know how to use the equipment to find and recover gold deposits, then you obviously can be successful. Creating the condition of having the right equipment, knowledge and location will be accomplished by you. You will decide on what equipment to use and how to service it and keep it operational. You will decide how you are going to improve your mining skills–or you will decide you don’t need any improvement. And you will decide where you are going to mine. Therefore, the final category, management, is more important than any of the others.

It is very important to know all of the technical aspects of successful gold mining: what pay-streaks are and how to find them, how to cleanup, the best way to utilize your equipment, etc. The “how-to” is one of the most important categories, but, what good is it go know the technical points if a person is going to approach gold mining with a losing attitude?

There is an emotional scale on which any person or group can be found with regards to any subject or activity. At the top of the scale is enthusiasm; down about halfway is anger and resentment, and at the bottom is total apathy and regret.

A person at the top of the scale, approaching the activity of mining with interest and enthusiasm, would try to do everything the right way. He or she would obtain the best possible equipment within his or her available resources. The equipment would be properly maintained. Communication would be energetically and enthusiastically undertaken to determine new and exciting places to mine, with plenty of new friends and allies being made along the way. And the person would be absolutely willing to learn everything possible about those aspects of mining that would affect his or her type of operation, even though he or she may already know a great deal.

Everybody makes mistakes–especially when learning. A person high on the emotional scale would recover quickly from mistakes, and enthusiastically approach his or her mining operation with the new-found knowledge. The idea of failure or giving up would probably never be considered. Also, at the highest level of responsibility, the person would not be found blaming others or “the world” for his or her momentary setbacks. Instead, the person would confront his or her mining activity with renewed energy and build his or her own success in the world. This is the way that successful people do it! It is the way you win in the game of gold mining.

A person who is further down the emotional scale will not take responsibility for the problems that are occurring in his or her mining operation. The person will feel more like his or her success and destiny are not really self-created, but are more at the effect of other people or the world at large. Most likely, the person will be found resenting others who are succeeding. The person is not as willing to make the extra effort to do things the right way in the first place, and not as willing to confront mining with the necessary perception to be able to predict what things to prepare for. Therefore, more mistakes will be made. In anger and resentment, this person is generally found striking out at the world, and generally is blaming others for his or her “bad luck.”

This type of person, for lack of incentive, and for lack of personal responsibility, will usually approach mining impatiently. If he or she does not have enough money to buy the proper equipment, rather than wait and do it right, the person is likely to buy worn-out gear, or equipment that is not large enough to work efficiently in the person’s operation. He or she is more likely, for lack of personal incentive, to allow damaged or worn equipment to go on without service or repair, which ultimately results in more damage or costly accidents. The

person is more likely to get angry and to give up because he or she is not able to locate an acceptable gold deposit right away. And the inability to find paying deposits is neverbecause the person does not know how. In the person’s “expert opinion,” it is because there simply is no gold left, or someone else already took it all.

A person in the resentment stage is more likely to be seen blaming the dredge because it is in a poor state of repair. He or she generally won’t have very many real friends; and the friends the person does have will generally be found to agree on the same negative viewpoints: “The gold has already been taken.” We already are experts on mining.” “Watch out for others so they don’t steal our gold,” etc. A negative person generally will give little help to others when it comes to passing along useful information about the potential location of valuable gold deposits. Therefore, he or she places little value on the information received from others, because he or she knows “no one would give me real information on the location of gold!”

Also, negative people have difficulty learning new skills. Learning comes from perception–which results from taking the responsibility to take an honest look at the subject or activity. A negative person generally has the idea that he or she is wrong in some way if he or she admits that something can be learned about a subject.

A person at the bottom of the scale has completely given up and is not even blaming anyone else for failure, anymore. Such a person has little or no chance to succeed at gold mining on a continual basis.

All of us can be found somewhere along this scale as regards to how we are approaching gold mining–or life. There are levels between enthusiasm and anger, and between anger and total apathy at the bottom. A person’s basic survival (or success) level is largely determined by his or her volume of positive energy, in comparison to the volume of negative energy. That is what this scale is all about. People having more negative than positive will be found lower on the scale.

Of course, we all have our momentary good and bad moments–those times we sank our dredges, we were ready to give it up altogether. But, when we found the big nugget last year, we felt totally on top of the world!

The question is, how do we approach our gold mining ventures most of the time? Are we willing to stick ourselves way out there to confront every possibility in order to prepare? Do we share and communicate with others in order to improve our chances of success and theirs? Do we try to do everything the right way in the first place? Are we willing to defend our industry when it is in trouble? When we are not enjoying immediate success, do we utilize all of our energy to create success? Or, do we use our energy to complain or justify our failure? Just how are we positioning ourselves around this activity of mining?

When it comes down to it, how well we do in gold mining on the long term always comes back down to how we are approaching the activity. We ARE responsible for how well we do. Isn’t this great?

Just how do you change the way that you are? You do it with personal discipline, by boosting yourself up to a higher level of responsibility.

There is more to success than hard physical work. Success breaks down to the above four categories. Knowing how to do it properly is one of them! If success is continually lacking, then something is definitely lacking in one or more of the four categories.

If, however, an operation is temporarily not recovering very much gold, it does not mean there is a management problem–or even a problem with the other three categories. By the nature of gold mining, there are times when we are not into gold deposits–but rather are looking for them.

If a person is blaming anyone other than himself for the long-term lack of success of his or her operation, there definitely is a problem with management!

But, it is Spring; there is magic in the air, and we all have renewed high expectations about the upcoming season. As a sobering thought, in the renewed excitement, some people seem to forget all of the pain and misery they were experiencing last year–only to recall it again once they get started. Spring cannot change the basic way you approach mining. Only you can do that. To experience the magic of success in any activity, failure and inability has to be overcome by positive energy and personal discipline. True magic cannot be obtained by forgetting failure or justifying it away.

So, if you want to experience excitement, and the true magic feeling of recovering valuable gold deposits continually, you must depend upon and improve your own skill, rather than depend on your luck. Your skill will improve in direct proportion to your correct basic approach to gold mining.

Spring is here, and it is time to work on the dredges. I cannot wait to get into the water! I know I’m going to have a great season! How about you?

 

 

By Dave McCracken

Part One – The Fundamentals

Dave Mack

 

During the Group Mining Projects we conduct each season, I always like to start by discussing the most important and fundamental ingredient in successful gold mining. That basic ingredient is you, yourself!

You are the one who makes decisions for yourself. You decided to get into mining in the first place. You also make the decisions on how you are going to approach gold mining, and how you are going to deal with all of the problems and the barriers to your success. Regardless of suggestions or input you receive from others, you make the final decisions on what you are going to do-no matter what they are.

The main problem in gold mining is in overcoming unknowns. Until you find them, you do not usually know where the good gold deposits are located. If it were really easy, all the gold would already be gone. The fact that so much gold is being recovered by small-scale miners today proves it was not easy to find in the first place. Otherwise, the old-timers would have found it all!

True, it is much easier for us now than it was for them. We have low-cost modern equipment they never even dreamed of! Accessibility to gold-bearing areas is excellent. We have new technology as well as the benefit of the technology developed by the old-timers. We also have historical information that directs us to the proven gold-bearing locations. The old-timers had it much more difficult than we do. But, it is still not that easy. When you get out into the field, you are mainly faced with not knowing where the gold is! And, this is where it comes down to you and your ability to overcome problems and the unknown.

Gold mining procedure is very simple. And there is an enormous amount of gold still accessible to the small-scale miner. The problem you face is not knowing exactly where it is. It can be six inches beneath where you’re standing or where you are digging, and you will have no idea it is there for sure until you find it!

You live by every decision you make. If you decide in your own mind there is no gold in an area or on a claim, you are probably not going to prospect that area, unless you change your mind. It is important to avoid making decisions that are not based upon solid observation. A miner on any scale must be an investigator, a hound dog on a tricky trail. Good investigators never rule out possibilities before their time.

Successful gold mining is generally done in two steps: First is sampling or prospecting, and then, production.

While some gold-bearing creeks and rivers tend to have gold values dispersed throughout their entire streambeds, there is generally not enough gold to make a small-scale mining operation payoff very well. Because we are limited as to how much gravel we can process as small-scale miners, we need to find higher-grade deposits. This means we need to look for them, and this is where sampling comes in.

When my partners and I first started gold dredging, we made the mistake of putting our dredge into a likely spot and dredging in that same location for about 30 days, even though we were not getting very much gold. We had in our minds that we had to keep going because we just might uncover a bonanza at any time. While that may have been possible, we would have had to be very lucky to find a rich deposit this way.

Because gold is so heavy — about six times heavier than other average materials found in a streambed, such as rock, sand and silt –it tends to follow a certain path when being moved in a river. This path generally runs from inside bend to inside bend (when the waterway is running at flood stage), and in a meandering line between the bends. Gold deposits are sometimes found elsewhere, but the statistics of history show that most recovered deposits have been located along these paths.

This is a very important bit of information; it provides you with a good idea of where to start your sampling. You can rule out about 90% of the riverbed at the start, and concentrate your sampling efforts along the path where you are most likely to locate an acceptable gold deposit.

Let’s define a few basics: “Bedrock” is the solid hard rock of the earth’s crust–like a cliff or like the solid rock you see in highway road-cuts through the mountains. “Streambed” consists of all of the rocks, sand, silt, gold, and other sediments that end up in the bottom of a creek or river. Streambed always lies on top of bedrock. A “lode” gold deposit is gold that is still locked up in solid rock, often contained in quartz veins. “Placer” gold deposits are created after erosion has broken the gold away from the lode and deposited it elsewhere. There are different kinds of placer deposits. The difference primarily has to do with how far away from the original lode the gold has traveled.

Hidden irregularities on the bedrock channel of a river can change where the gold path runs. So, until you locate the gold path, you are never certain where it is going to be. But inside bend to inside bend (during flood stage), and a meandering line between inside bends, is a good place to start your sampling. I have seen some gold paths located off this line, so you have to be flexible. But this is what sampling is all about. Sampling is done by digging or dredging test holes in different locations, comparing one against the next, establishing where the better results are coming from, and following those positive signs until you locate an acceptable deposit.

Most gold-bearing rivers have a certain amount of low-grade gold values dispersed throughout the gravel. The general gold path tends to have more gold along it than the average gravel throughout the rest of the river. You also generally find more iron and other heavy elements along the gold path.

When making test holes, keep track of the amount of iron, iron objects, and gold that you recover from each hole. After you have completed a number of holes, you will start to get an idea of the average gold values and other heavy materials in the riverbed. Then, when you turn up more than the average amount in a test hole, it is a sign that you have located the gold path. Sometimes, there is little visible increase in gold, but there is a visible increase in the amount of iron rocks, pieces of lead, and old rusty objects.

There is a certain amount of microscopic-sized gold moving downstream in some rivers at all times. However, gold that is large enough for us to recover with our small-scale mining equipment generally does not move in a riverbed to a large extent, except during major flood storms. Storms of this magnitude are able to generate enough water force and turbulence to get all or most of the streambed material flowing down the riverbed along with the water.

Because gold is so heavy, when being washed downstream, it quickly works its way to the bottom of the other materials being washed along with it. The gold also moves more slowly. Cracks, crevices, holes and barriers in the bedrock can trap the gold out of the flow of water and material. And of course, this happens much more along the general gold path than off of it.

Gold deposits along the general gold path can be small or large, depending upon the size of the gold trap. The most important type of gold trap in river mining is called the “pay-streak”. Pay-streaks always form along the gold path where the river’s flow slows down on a large scale during a major flood storm. One example is the tail end of an inside bend in a river. Centrifugal force places most of the water pressure to the outside of the bend, leaving a low-pressure (low-velocity) area at the tail end of the inside bend. This is a very common location in gold-bearing rivers to find pay-streaks.

Another example is where the river slows down after a long stretch of faster water. Anywhere along the general gold path where the river slows down on a large scale during a major flood storm is a likely spot to find pay-streaks.

Pay-streaks are important because they are large deposits as opposed to smaller, single-type deposits–like what you might find in a bedrock crevice along the general gold path. The size and richness of a pay-streak depends upon the size of the low-pressure (low-velocity) area created in the river, and on how much gold traveled through that section of the river during the flood storms which formed the deposit.

Most pay-streaks have definite left and right outside boundaries, meaning the gold tends to run out quickly once you get outside the pay-streak. Sometimes upstream and downstream boundaries are not so easy to distinguish. Varying water flow turbulence during major storms can sometimes make a pay-streak somewhat inconsistent. It may appear to be good for a while, bad for a while, and then good again, but the outside left and right boundaries tend to hold true most of the time.

Because pay-streaks have some size to them, they are much easier to find than single-type deposits while sampling. Most successful river miners use the following technique to locate and recover pay-streaks: First, locate a proven gold producing section of the river. By digging or dredging sample holes, locate the main gold path. More sample holes are continued along the path until a pay-streak is located.

This method is generally used whether the operation uses gold dredges in the river, sluices, or even heavy equipment up on the bank. Since the bank consists of older streambeds left high and dry, you are just as likely to find pay-streaks on the bank, or in the ancient streambeds further away, as you are in the river itself. If you are able to find acceptable amounts of gold in a riverbed and you want to find more, look upstream and downstream along the same line of flow in the riverbed. Keep in mind the direction water and material would be moving in a major storm. Gold generally will have moved in the same direction as the water flow.

The point about locating a proven gold-producing section of river is really important! You can save yourself a lot of time and energy by finding out where other miners are already doing well. If somebody has located a pay-streak, there will almost always be more pay-streaks in that general area of the river.

Investigation to locate proven areas, and communication with local successful miners to find out where deposits have been located, can save a great deal of sampling time. All of the really successful small-scale miners I know make it their business to stay updated on who is finding deposits and where.

The overall process of successful mining is quite simple. We have it down to a science, having taken most of the chance out of it. Gold travels and deposits along special lines. A knowledgeable, energetic, persistent sampling effort is assured of always finding the next pay-streak.

Sound simple? It isn’t that easy! This is because you never know where the next deposit is or how long it is going to take to find it. And, this is why it always comes back down to that important, fundamental ingredient, which is you!

You are the one who decides where to put your sample holes, how large to make them, and how long to continue them. You are also the one who evaluates the test results and has to decide what to do next. You have to decide, based upon your sampling results and the other information you have collected, whether a certain section of river deserves further sampling activity or if you should move on to another location. Every decision you make is a crossroads that will directly affect the final outcome.

It is important to realize that how much gold you get from your mining activity depends entirely on you and what you decide to do. A good miner is an investigator who tracks down where the gold is coming from, and diligently works his or her way right into it. How good you are does not depend upon how much time you have spent at it in the past. It depends upon how much you really want to succeed and how willing you are to hustle yourself into a deposit.

I know of quite a few people who have discovered rich gold deposits in their first season. I also know a lot of guys who have been at it for years, and still cannot seem to find acceptable deposits for themselves. Why is this? They are not sticking to the right procedure. They are making the wrong decisions, and, a lot of the time, they are (deciding to) giving up too easily.

Again, the main problem is not knowing. So, based on the information you do have, you are constantly being put to the test, having to decide if the gold is likely to be in a certain area or if it is more likely not to be.

People who have the most trouble in gold mining are the ones who give up too easily. You need to give your sample holes a little more time and effort than they deserve, but without overdoing it. This is a matter of judgment which gets a little easier with experience. It’s always going to be a challenge, though; because you don’t know if the gold is going to be there right up until the point when you find it!

Once you find a good deposit, it is easy to see why it is located there, and you will also see how easy it was to find. But when it runs out, you are right back to not knowing where the next one is going to be. Gold mining is always an emotional challenge.

The problem most people have with mining and sampling has little to do with judgment in sampling. It has to do with other basic decisions they have already made concerning their own personal success. It is very difficult to help someone become a successful miner when that person has already decided he or she is not going to do very well at it. Some people work at it just a little bit, and then give up on their sample holes long before they are completed. You cannot find gold deposits this way unless you are awfully lucky. This is good food for thought for everyone.

Some people get into gold mining as a get-rich-quick solution to other problems they have created in their lives. Any person who is giving up or quitting in their personal life hasn’t much chance of succeeding at gold mining!

If you are not finding enough gold, you cannot blame the claim, the river, the club you belong to, or anything else. Blaming an outside source might make your ego feel better, but it will not help you locate more gold. You are either getting it, or you are not. Blaming anyone or anything else is going in the wrong direction. The answer is to become effective, communicate with other miners to find out where the gold is coming from, and then get busy with your sampling. If you want to do well in gold mining, you have to make it happen!

And, if you are not sure if you have given a sample hole everything it deserves, be honest with yourself about it and give it a little more. It takes personal discipline to be a good sampler!

This is not to say that gold mining cannot be fun. It is a great outdoor activity no matter how much gold you find while you are prospecting for high-grade deposits. Once you get involved though, you will find it is more fun if you are finding more gold! If you are looking for challenge in your life, if you want to put yourself to the real test, then gold mining is just the thing for you!

When you are producing sample holes and not finding acceptable amounts of gold, when you are not sure where the gold might be, and you are not sure exactly how to deal with it, that is when you are put to the real personal test. This is when you have the opportunity to see who you really are and where your personal improvement lies. There is not a successful miner alive who does not have to deal with this on a continuing basis! This is why it always comes back to you. If you are strong enough to pull yourself through it, you will learn to sample, enjoy new thrills, and attain personal achievement and growth, not to mention the gold you will find.

There is much, much more to know about the business of sampling, which we will continue to cover in future articles. But we have covered the most important and fundamental ingredient here. If you can get yourself squared away with the right attitude, and approach mining with a stiff upper lip and the eye of a tiger, you will have no trouble figuring out the rest!

Don’t quit!

 

By Ron Wendt

“I Remember Seeing The Miners Coming In With Bags Full Of Gold…”

 

Sluicing in AlaskaThe old man leaned against his shovel and wiped his brow as the hot interior Alaska sun beat down upon him. He was a veteran of the gold rush. He had missed too many boats and never quite made it back out of Alaska. It had been over sixty years since he had walked the streets of Seattle, where he first caught a boat to head north to the Klondike. It was the gold that kept him here, and his sluice box, shovel, and gold pan were an integral part of him.

He looked at me and never said a word. Even at my age in the early 1960’s, I could tell he was not having any fun. It was a tedious job for him. He shafted to bedrock during the winter and sluiced in the summer. As my father used to tell me, “He made enough gold to buy beans.” The old man was content with his life in the wilderness where he answered to no one; only the occasional camp robber or raven would land nearby, begging for a few scraps of food the miner had.

Even in the late 50’s, as a small boy, I remember seeing the miners coming in from the Fortymile River with bags of gold, begging for someone to buy it just so they could feed themselves. One miner had a cake pan full of nuggets he tried to peddle. He wanted $500 for the whole pan, but my father could only afford to buy a few choice nuggets from him at a cheap price.

Sluicing 2My first homemade sluice box was built from old photos, some advice (some poor and some good), a few aged pieces of plywood and two-by-fours, wooden slats for riffles and burlap to catch the gold. At sixteen, I had visions of gold, just like any other person would after reading Jack London’s books and other stories about the gold rush. Having been raised in the gold camps of the Circle Mining district in eastern Alaska, I had watched many miners, including my father, extract gold with sluices and gold pans.

Here I was in the Yentna River area near the Alaska Range, with a water-logged wooden sluice box, trying to make my first big strike. Believe me, there is nothing worse than trying to move around water-soaked wood! With the help of a more seasoned prospector, we located a bench of pay-dirt where a false bedrock of clay rose up out of Twin Creek. Through some trial and error, I figured out that the gold was in the clay. After shoveling tons of dirt and clay into my sluice, I soon discovered that I was not breaking up the clay enough and was losing quite a lot of gold with the tailings.

Between shoveling into the head, and raking rocks through the sluice, just as I watched that old man do years before, I was able to recover six ounces of gold for the two mosquito-infested, rain-soaked months that I worked this bench. Though it wasn’t a fortune, I didn’t care; I felt as happy as that old-timer probably did when he just got started years before. I have learned a lot since then, but I still value all of the early golden lessons taught to me by those old sourdoughs.

Eventually, I graduated to the wonderful world of aluminum. The aluminum sluice has been a great blessing to the modern day prospector. They are great for back-packing and throwing around in the back of the pickup. They don’t break; and if you learn to master them, they will reward you with great recovery results.

Some places in Alaska are pretty remote. Not always can one put a suction dredge in just anywhere. It is so much easier to walk into the hills with a four-foot, fifteen-pound sluice box, than hauling a 200-pound suction dredge over hummocks and through alders. Each piece of equipment has its place.

I have always recommended that if you are going to get into prospecting, start out small. Start with a gold pan, then sluice with pick & shovel, then eventually get into a dredge system. From there, who knows–maybe a D-8 will be your next tool!

I have found that if you are going for the gold, like most everything, unless you are pretty lucky, you will not strike it rich right off. Finding the high-grade gold deposits is something that gradually happens as you learn the right approach.

I have also found out that when new prospectors start off all gung-ho into this business, hauling in big equipment where there is not much gold, they usually lose interest real fast. After two or three outings, a few thousand dollars of investment and no return, they get discouraged and quit.

I suggest it is better to start small and learn the art of prospecting. Shoveling into portable sluice is an excellent, economical way to learn the basics of finding gold.

In the old days, the sluice boxes were usually 12-to-14 inches wide, pieced together in telescoping sections, with pole riffles. The boxes were set at an average grade of six inches to the twelve-foot box. Water was directed to the head of the sluice from a long flume or a canvas hose coming from a dam. As in today’s sluicing operations, the name of the game was production, shoveling the most pay-dirt into the sluice. With long lines of sluice boxes, the kind you see in the old photographs, miners would try to set up the sluices so there would be six feet open on either side of the boxes. The lighter material was shoveled in while the larger rocks were placed on bedrock and washed later on.

During those days, shoveling-duty varied with the nature of the gravel and bedrock, how far pay-dirt had to be lifted to the sluice from the excavation, and the person’s capability to work. Under ideal sluicing conditions, a shoveler could feed as much as 2 ½-to-10 cubic yards of gravel in 10 hours.

In 1905 on Anvil Creek near Nome, there was one elaborate set of sluice boxes set up on bedrock. Five strings of sluices were shoveled into 24 hours a day by 120 shovelers. They were able to process an average of 1,080 cubic yards of pay-dirt per day during this time.

The good thing about prospecting with a sluice box is that you can process a lot of material just using a good No.2 shovel and a sharp pick. A sluice is an excellent way to scout out good future prospects.

I have heard some pretty interesting stories about sluice boxes. One classic story I remember happened up on the Koyokuk River around 1914. A prospector made a big strike; but all he had was a gold pan, shovel and an ax. So he cut down a tree, split-out a four-foot piece, carving out a set of riffles along the bottom edge. Although this was indeed very crude, the prospector found enough gold in two days to party in San Francisco for four months!

When sluicing with a portable aluminum sluice, there are several key factors to be aware of:

1. Water-speed is critical to gold recovery. Some gold can be lost out the end if the water is too swift-flowing through the box. If the water-flow is too slow, the heavy rocks, black sand and/or garnets can clog the riffles and the gold can wash out. So it is critical to learn water-flow. In my own experience, water-flow in the sluice should be no more than three inches deep with a flow that will tumble golf ball-sized rocks out the end.

2. It is important to keep the sluice box raked out after one or two shovelfuls of pay-dirt are fed into the head of the box. Allowing too much material to pile up in the sluice can also cause erratic water flow in the sluice. This can cause a gold loss, too.

3. The sluice should be on a slight slope. Most streams have a natural slope as they flow along. But there are times when the sluice needs to be adjusted to increase water-flow, especially in wider, deeper water. Sometimes, water-flow can be increased through your sluice simply by raising up the head of the sluice; and, whenever needed, using rocks underneath and around the sluice to dirvert more water.

For under $200, a prospector can be outfitted with an aluminum sluice, gold pan, pick and shovel. The sluice is one of the handiest prospecting tools next to the gold pan.

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