Smallest nugget contest

[Bedrock Bob]

I sat down on a drywash tailing on friday to do some crumbing and had some great luck. I had not fired up the GB2 in several years but was hitting lots of tiny gold.

One piece was loud and clear at 1/4" and I think it is the smallest gold i have actually detected and recovered in an uncontrolled situation.

Why don't we have a contest? The smallest speck detected this summer. Only new gold found between now and October??? November??? The finder of the smallest nugget submitted wins them all.

I can weigh mine on a powder scale to within 1//4800'th. of an ounce. How about we all post a photo and then send the piece to a forum appointed judge who can accurately weigh these tiny things and determine a winner??? If we keep our individual weights a secret the photos will be your only clue to see if your targets are a contender .

Sometimes it is not the big ones that determine a prospector. Especially detecting. It seems that a small nugget contest would be some good fun and all it would take is a postage stamp and a barely visible freckle of gold.

Gotta tell us where you found it, what machine you used and post a photo of the whopper on the head side of a dime.

Who is in???

Edited July 22, 2013 by Bedrock Bob

[Sonoran Dave]

Allright...i'm in.

[Allen in MT]

should be a great contest I'm in if I can get out.

[boulder dash]

If I make it back by Oct, challenge excepted!!! Lets blow peoples minds.

[Bedrock Bob]

Great!

.

We need to select someone to be the final word. Hopefully one of the reespected elders of the forum will step forward to accept the entries, weigh them and mail them all to the winner of the contest.

Whaddya say we get a few more guys to commit over the next week and then i will post my little dot to set the bar. Maybe by then anarbitrator with a very sensitive scale will emerge.

Sorta like penny ante poker.

[homefire]

??? How Small can it be and still called a Nugget?

[grubstake]

I found one, but you can't see it, its an invisible gold nugget! Ha! Grubstake

[Rimshot]

Good question Home....uuuummmm...where do you draw the line between a nugget and a flake?

[Au Seeker]

I believe the contest that Bob has started here is for the smallest piece of gold found with a metal detector, correct me if I'm wrong Bob?

Does it have to be a full size metal detector or could say a Falcon MD20 be in the mix?

[Allen in MT]

Might need a carat scale something like a 50 carat/10g Grad:0.01 carat/0.002g works great for the fly specks

[Bedrock Bob]

I believe the contest that Bob has started here is for the smallest piece of gold found with a metal detector, correct me if I'm wrong Bob?

Does it have to be a full size metal detector or could say a Falcon MD20 be in the mix?

You are correct. The smallest detected piece of gold found in a placer area with any electronic detector.

Not the smallest piece you can hear with your detector or the smallest piece from a test bed...We are talking about a contest between active gold seekers to see how small a nugget can be found in the wild. And that puts the Falcon on just about even footing with the rest IMHO.

[Bedrock Bob]

Might need a carat scale something like a 50 carat/10g Grad:0.01 carat/0.002g works great for the fly specks

Yeah, I figure most will be about .2 g or under. And you know how drastically thickness affects weight and detectability. Sometimes a tiny cubic piece will weigh .3 and not be detectable where a thin flat .17 g flake zips pretty good. So photos will reveal very little and differences in weight will be minuscle... .01 g or less most likely.

Edited July 22, 2013 by Bedrock Bob

[Bedrock Bob]

Homefire is right. Maybe we should not use the word "nugget " so losely. These are definitely NOT nuggets. They are barely detectable specks of gold (BDSG's), or tiny freakin zippers (TFZ's) or tiny insignificant targets (TIT's).

I like TIT's best. We should call it the smallest TIT contest instead.

Edited July 22, 2013 by Bedrock Bob

[Bedrock Bob]

How about "nearly imperceptable placer particles located electronically"???

We could have the first ever Nuggetshooter smallest NIPPLE's contest!

I dare you guys to not laugh about that one the next time you spend four hours going through tailings for a dozen fly specks!!!

[frank c]

If this ends up goin down, that means "happening" it outta be some fun for those involved.

A MAN'S OR WOMEN'S "INTEGRITY" IS "KEY" HERE.

It must be found with a "detector" as per Bob. No sandbaggin a piece from drywashin or wet cleanups.

I can't compete as I don't own a VLF at this time. BUT I will thourally enjoy wacthin the proceedings !!!!!

Sounds like some serious fun can be had with a bunch of Nuggethunters competing.
Great thought Bob.

Edited July 22, 2013 by frank c

[Bedrock Bob]

If this ends up goin down, that means "happening" it outta be some fun for those involved.

A MAN'S OR WOMEN'S "INTEGRITY" IS "KEY" HERE.

It must be found with a "detector" as per Bob. No sandbaggin a piece from drywashin or wet cleanups.

I can't compete as I don't own a VLF at this time. BUT I will thourally enjoy wacthin the proceedings !!!!!

Sounds like some serious fun can be had with a bunch of Nuggethunters competing.

Great thought Bob.

So how about a big nugget competition??

Just a post with a photo, weight, type of detector and general location. No prizes. Just a gentlemans game. The players commit to posting at least one find made between now and November 1. The biggest one wins.

...Any takers? Lets see what we can do over the next few months. How about a best cleanup

contest on the prospecting forum??

Edited July 22, 2013 by Bedrock Bob

[beaudurkee]

Homefire is right. Maybe we should not use the word "nugget " so losely. These are definitely NOT nuggets. They are barely detectable specks of gold (BDSG's), or tiny freakin zippers (TFZ's) or tiny insignificant targets (TIT's).

I like TIT's best. We should call it the smallest TIT contest instead.

Can I submit my wife in the smallest TIT contest... Sorry couldn't resist

[Bedrock Bob]

Can I submit my wife in the smallest TIT contest... Sorry couldn't resist

SURE !!! I think you might want to post the photos over in the "off topic" section though....

[The Found Dutchman]

I don't have a camera adapter for my microscope so I'm going to have to pass on this.

Edited July 22, 2013 by The Found Dutchman

[Hoser John]

Temps running 108-115 so will have to cool a bit to participate. Bet ya it's a Gold Bug 2 that hits the teeny tiny ones. If anyone in the redding area needs to weigh their tiny find/camera I have a pharmacy scale enclosed in glass that weighs down to 0.001 gram,same accuracy too. The problem is finding them once you found them tiny devils,I just pan'm out as soooo much easier to find. John

[Bedrock Bob]

Temps running 108-115 so will have to cool a bit to participate. Bet ya it's a Gold Bug 2 that hits the teeny tiny ones. If anyone in the redding area needs to weigh their tiny find/camera I have a pharmacy scale enclosed in glass that weighs down to 0.001 gram,same accuracy too. The problem is finding them once you found them tiny devils,I just pan'm out as soooo much easier to find. John

JHO hit upon a good point. These NIPPLE's should be recovered electronically and not seperated by concentration. Anyone can get a beep on a handfull of dirt and recover the target with water. We should only submit NIPPLE's found with a detector and recovered using the detector.

The lack of a camera should not be a problem as any digital cam can focus on a target under a 30X loupe. If anyone can actually find gold that small I would genuinely love to see it. From my experience the tiny targets that will be posted will be quite easily photographed with a digital cam. If you simply don't have the technology to photograph your find I can do it for you...simple as that. All it could possibly cost is a postage stamp.

How do we mail them? On a piece of tape? Would they be a pain to remove and weigh?? The prospectors who decide to participate should decide on that with the man who does the weighing???

[Micro Nugget]

A very creative contest, Bedrock. I'm in. About ten years back after I published an article in the ICMJ coining the term "micro-nuggets", Jim Straight got all bent outta shape -- he being old school and all. He bristled at recognizing as a nugget anything that would not pass through a #10. He looked at me in exasperation and blurted, "Martin, don't you know that those are called fines?!!" But that was my point exactly. The term "fines" or "fine gold" was too general to be of use to detectorists for purposes of quantitative exactness and distinction. What we needed was a term to reference those detectable pieces of gold that fall below the classic #10 screen standard. Since #10 screens no longer were popular or commonly available to the average prospector, my focus was to describe pieces that fell between the #12 and #20 mesh sizes, i.e., pieces that would pass through a #12, but not through a #20. I called them micro-nuggets. Extension, of course, is not the only size dimension. Thus, weight appears to be the ultimate means of determining the smallest detectable piece of gold. The problem becomes one of accuracy of weighing. Many electronic jeweler scales only are accurate to within .002g. I suppose NASA or universities have instruments that can measure down to .0001g or .00001g. But actually recovering something so small defies reality and almost defies imagination. So your point is well taken -- in order to qualify as a recovery, not only must the detector actually respond to the tiny target, but the detectorist must actually recover it in the field by isolating and capturing it in a container. Here in my part of Southern California several folks I hang with have found excitement and satisfaction in honing their skills to see "how low they can go." The GB2 is the detector of choice and several personal bests have been recorded in the .002g range. Witnesses help corroborate these remarkable recoveries, but as a practical matter it is not always possible to summon a witness. So I assume we will not insist on witnesses and that is okay with me. Once again, great suggestion Bob!

[Bedrock Bob]

A very creative contest, Bedrock. I'm in. About ten years back after I published an article in the ICMJ coining the term "micro-nuggets", Jim Straight got all bent outta shape -- he being old school and all. He bristled at recognizing as a nugget anything that would not pass through a #10. He looked at me in exasperation and blurted, "Martin, don't you know that those are called fines?!!" But that was my point exactly. The term "fines" or "fine gold" was too general to be of use to detectorists for purposes of quantitative exactness and distinction. What we needed was a term to reference those detectable pieces of gold that fall below the classic #10 screen standard. Since #10 screens no longer were popular or commonly available to the average prospector, my focus was to describe pieces that fell between the #12 and #20 mesh sizes, i.e., pieces that would pass through a #12, but not through a #20. I called them micro-nuggets. Extension, of course, is not the only size dimension. Thus, weight appears to be the ultimate means of determining the smallest detectable piece of gold. The problem becomes one of accuracy of weighing. Many electronic jeweler scales only are accurate to within .002g. I suppose NASA or universities have instruments that can measure down to .0001g or .00001g. But actually recovering something so small defies reality and almost defies imagination. So your point is well taken -- in order to qualify as a recovery, not only must the detector actually respond to the tiny target, but the detectorist must actually recover it in the field by isolating and capturing it in a container. Here in my part of Southern California several folks I hang with have found excitement and satisfaction in honing their skills to see "how low they can go." The GB2 is the detector of choice and several personal bests have been recorded in the .002g range. Witnesses help corroborate these remarkable recoveries, but as a practical matter it is not always possible to summon a witness. So I assume we will not insist on witnesses and that is okay with me. Once again, great suggestion Bob!

Great observations. I don't think we need witnesses. If a man claims he did it and he did not it generally stands out like rat turds on a workbench anyhoo. Also, anyone that would be dishonest in a contest to get a whopping three cents worth of gold from a group of serious prospectors needs his chance at fame and glory.

darn.... .002??? That is mighty small. I could not recover that unless i just happened to let it fall on the coil and then specked it on the coil with a magnifier!!!

I use Nytex precision fabric to screen with. It comes in any size mesh measured in microns and is used in lots of scientific work. It makes excellent drywasher material too. It NEVER wears out and you can wash it or get it wet without ruining it. Available in small pieces at widco.com.

I like the term "TIT" or "NIPPLE" for the little beep farts but I suppose the finder can call them whatever they want. I agree the GB2 is the king of NIPPLES but the Whites machines will really get them small too. I think in mild ground there are several machines that will give the GB2 a run for the money. A whole lot of other factors come into play when crumbing besides raw sensitivity.

The tiny coil of the GB2 is the edge. If Whites made a little coil like that for the GM series it would be equal IMHO. On the flip side GB2 coils are fragile and problematic. I have replaced at least five now and have had only one problem with a Whites coil which was repaired at no cost by the factory. With that being said I will predict that any small nuggets I submit will be located with a GB2.

Edited July 22, 2013 by Bedrock Bob

[Allen in MT]

The tiny coil of the GB2 is the edge. If Whites made a little coil like that for the GM series it would be equal IMHO. On the flip side GB2 coils are fragile and problematic. I have replaced at least five now and have had only one problem with a Whites coil which was repaired at no cost by the factory. With that being said I will predict that any small nuggets I submit will be located with a GB2.

White's makes the little 4x6 GMT Goldmaster Shooter DD coil, same size as little coil on GB2

[Bedrock Bob]

The tiny coil of the GB2 is the edge. If Whites made a little coil like that for the GM series it would be equal IMHO. On the flip side GB2 coils are fragile and problematic. I have replaced at least five now and have had only one problem with a Whites coil which was repaired at no cost by the factory. With that being said I will predict that any small nuggets I submit will be located with a GB2.

White's makes the little 4x6 GMT Goldmaster Shooter DD coil, same size as little coil on GB2

Really? I am not up on the tech end of things I guess.

I have a nice GMT that had seen very little use since I got it. I really don't know what it is capable of.

I would love to have a small coil for that machine. If anyone out there has one let me know.