Types Of Sluice Boxes Jungle Gold vs Gold Rush

[fishing8046 258]

I notice in the gold shows they are using diffrent types of sluices. The Jungle Gold sluices does not have any riffles just what looks like artificial turf. The Gold Rush sluice have miners moss and riffles more like we use. Why the two diffrent types and what benifits would either box have?

[Uncle Ron 1,407]

I noticed that too ... Only thing I can figure out is the Jungle Gold guys, by law, can only keep 10% of the gold they run through their sluice box????

[FlakMagnet 239]

Since I haven't watched the shows, the only think I can think of is

the guys working in the jungle may be picking up finer gold than the guys to the far north.

I know we used to use grass mat-like material under our riffles

and it did really well catching the fines.

[JasonG 28]

I haven't seen the Jungle Gold one, but are they like local miners using mercury in their sluices? Might explain why their design is different.

[fishing8046 258]

It appears that they do not use the Mercury until they begin working with the concentrates?

FlakMagnet

I could see there set up if the grass was under riffles. It does appear to be small fine gold in very muddy conditions?

[GlennM 93]

The jungle gold guys likely don't have a riffle system because there wasn't one available. I would expect they would get a lot more of the gold if they did use some sort of riffles.

What I'm not getting is why the Gold Rush guys are predominately using only expanded metal for riffles.

[JasonG 28]

Expanded is cheaper, it clogs up less if you run it correctly (excessive black sand areas it may suffer though), and in my experience it has better gold retention than riffles with gold in the -100 mesh to 1/2 gram range which is usually the bread and butter of most commercial operations.

I run my dredge with only expanded these days and I won't go back to hungarians unless I'm in a spot with lots of bigger gold. I'll probably install a small set of 2 or 3 riffles at the end of the box at some point though as a nugget catch.

[azaware 4]

Funny I was thinking about posting something about this. Reason why JG don't have riffles is all the gold is fine gold. I believe that is the best way to recover fine gold and I would say they know too. I myself might go with both just in case. This is something GR should look at doing as well. I worked at Gold King in the good old days(25 yrs ago) and dredge for many years so I know alittle bit about it. Where they are really messing up the box is angle way to steep. I would have it almost level depending on the water flow. With riffles it has to be angle just right but coming up with the right angle you never know. All those guys are losing so much fine gold and alots of flour gold I believe. It could be for every oz of gold they get they could be losing 3 oz of flour gold. Flour gold you can't even see it but you do need mercury to recover it. Another thing I'm not sure I wouldn't uses a gold table for flour gold. Best way pan concentrates lightly get a rock tumbler add mercury and caustic soda, tumble 12 to 24 hours.

[Hoser John 1,230]

Jungle junk purt' near worthless. Same as rv shoe cleaner mats as they are using 3 kinds. Good rolling trommel but box with no riffles,expanded metals and funny fellas walking through the box ,recovery can't be above 20% max. Real question is---they gonna end up fried in a wok or stewed in a jungle pot??

Gold rush==as proven season after season- recovery runs about 40-50% max. BUT equipment is only as good as the man running it. They had a great fines recovery unit last year to clean cons--even them idjets couldn't screw it up too bad. Massive ops run on a % of recovery vs tons moved and in some HUGE ones 70% recovery is fine as long as your run 80% more. Go back 1 season to the Swedes op. Just like the oldtimers--hydro down hill--then use road graders to keep moving downhill so you do NOT need to pick up-load-and haul to dump to pickup yet again to run. Hydroblast-push-load and Miners moss impacts like cement and plugs up when feed is interupted or shut off. Mandatory cleanup everytime as after that maybe 50-60% recovery. Little ops mandate much higher recovery but for $10 a day in gas vs Todds $5,000 or so I'll take 10-8-6-5" dredge anyday and in every way. A zillion times less in cost,parts and maintence..and the gold is mine allllll mine What can I say rain,cold and wind so nuttn' better to do---John