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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Wed Oct 28, 2015 10:52 pm 
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Location: Central Queensland, Australia
Good to hear! I would love to do what you and QLDBarry do at that level of seriousness but unless I find that big stone that we prospecting types never stop dreaming of :D I think the more serious venture will have to wait some years yet.

I have a couple of small miners claims not too far from where Barry has his set-up. Our family had been out of chasing sapphires for a long time and I decided to get back into it a number of years ago. But pretty much everything that can go wrong has gone wrong and I have been forced to watch my little pieces of machinery sit in a shed gathering dust for several years. The secretary of the local small sapphire miners association tells me he is hopeful that the legal issue that has been holding up my claim approval (and many others) will be resolved by Christmas. Of course, the climate does not make working the claims practical or really even possible before about next Easter (extreme heat, torrential rain). After that there'll be no stopping me!

Good to see Sally accompanies you on your prospecting ventures - Mrs Lefty is basically allergic to dirt :lol: She loves the sparkly things that come out of the dirt, but won't put a finger in the stuff nor go anywhere near a dusty old mining field in the bush. And Lefty Junior's idea of mining stops at "Minecraft online".

Good to hear you got some colour there. Are you mining in Montana?


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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Thu Oct 29, 2015 11:34 am 
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Joined: Wed Jan 14, 2015 3:52 pm
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Location: N Dakota
So far my prospects have been in Montana's rock creek area for sapphire. But I've had placer and hard rock gold claims in California. Finding more interest and value in gems lately so switching gears a bit and using some of my gold equipment in different set ups. Finding it works quite well for gems too.

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Thu Oct 29, 2015 4:12 pm 
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Location: Central Queensland, Australia
Yeah, your pulsator should capture anything with a reasonable SG I would think. The screen in mine captures stones as small as match head size but there is a finer one, I should give it a run for gold. You'd lose the fine stuff into the bottom of the tank though you'd just pan that or something.

My father was into gold before getting into sapphires. The sapphire field is a bit over four hours drive from where we live but our local area is coverd in old gold fields.

Actually, my belief is that our local area probably holds a lot of prospect for Gemmy things. For hundred of miles around, anything that sticks up out of the ground higher than a hill is in some way the remains of old igneous formations, our geology is dominated by granite masses and volcanic plugs.

But the region (whole state of Queensland really) has seen almost no exploration for any such things. The last time people did much serious looking in the ground was during the 1800's and those people were interested in one thing alone -gold! They had almost no interest in gemstones.

You never know what's out there :)


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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Fri Oct 30, 2015 12:01 am 
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Location: N Dakota
You know thats funny, gems for the most part out value gold by weight.
An ounce of gold runs roughly $1000. Whats an ounce of sapphire, 140ct
or so. Even the green low value stones would double that per oz. So I say mine for gems and process the tailings for the gold byproduct.

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Fri Oct 30, 2015 1:51 am 
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Location: Central Queensland, Australia
Dan&Sally wrote:
You know thats funny, gems for the most part out value gold by weight.
An ounce of gold runs roughly $1000. Whats an ounce of sapphire, 140ct
or so. Even the green low value stones would double that per oz. So I say mine for gems and process the tailings for the gold byproduct.


A damn good idea I reckon. Might as well anyway, you've already gone to the trouble of digging the dirt up and running it through the machine.


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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Tue Dec 29, 2015 1:23 pm 
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Location: N Dakota
Still running into issues with sand in the jig. When removing the trap box sand gets between the side of the box and the wall of the pulse chamber. So trying to determine if sand is washing in from above as the gravel moves through the box or if its being pushed up with the pulse of water from below. Either way it builds up and locks the trap box in place. I'm thinking if I extend the height of the trap box walls it will eliminate any material from flowing over the edge when I run materials too fast and over load the trap. It happens. The other possibility is some kind of seal or gasket at the bottom so when the trap is inserted it has no plase for the water pulse to go but into the trap through the punch plate.
I hate the second option, it requires a major mod to the machine and/or may require rebuilding the entire pulse chamber. An added pre wash of the gravel still won't remove all the sand and it doesn't take much to lock it up. Perhaps an o ring that I can compress the box onto at the bottom? It's the little things that make a good machine great.

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Tue Dec 29, 2015 6:49 pm 
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Location: Central Queensland, Australia
Yeah, I can see that being a problem with mine as well. I haven't been able to use it seriously yet ie, run tonnes of material through in one sitting, I've only put small amounts through and scooped it out of the trap box with a little hand scoop.

Do you reckon a second lift-out mesh basket inside the main box would work?

My trommel is a converted cement mixer which allows me to pour water into it after the fines have run through the screen since everything you put into it bigger than the screen stays in there tumbling around until you tip it out - if you have plenty of water, you can get the gravel very clean before tipping it into the pulsator. In fact, I made the last test lot so clean that if I didn't have a pulsator, I could have just spread out what came out of the trommel on a large table and looked through it without any further washing.

But concentrating it down in a pulsator saves a lot of eye strain :)


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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Tue Dec 29, 2015 9:14 pm 
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I think I figured it out, and its way simpler than I was thinking before. If I just use a door gasket and attach it to the shelf my box sits on when I push it down and lock it in place it should seal out the sand. I have a tendency to over think things. Its usually much more simple than I anticipate at the start. #-o

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Mon Jan 18, 2016 12:24 am 
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Location: N Dakota
results of the run

Image

Image

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Mon Jan 18, 2016 4:31 am 
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Nice little collection there Dan :) Lighter in colour than most I find. I particularly like the pinks.


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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Mon Jan 18, 2016 4:26 pm 
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The largest of the group was a white about 8mm x 10mm. With lots of silk. I'm told when heated these turn blue as well. If it wasn't so cloudy a bright clear/white natural would be great.

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Thu Apr 28, 2016 12:49 am 
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Image
finally figuring photobucket out. side view of the pulse jig
Image
view of the back with motor and pump
Image
top view of the trap and discharge. all built out of ABS plastic

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Thu Apr 28, 2016 4:13 pm 
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Neat-looking setup Dan. Do you just pump a continuous water feed to the sluice box out of a creek or something? Water is our problem here and most pulse jigs are built to recycle - this makes them damn heavy contraptions!


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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Thu Apr 28, 2016 5:22 pm 
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I run 10 gallons of water. It runs on an 1100 gph bilge pump from the discharge bucket to the hopper and it takes about 5 gallons to fill the body. When my discharge bucket fill with tailings I stop. Dump the water into another pail and toss the tailings. Repeat as often as needed. It will run on a deep cycle battery all day but it slows down as the battery goes down. A small DC generator is better or at the house I run off the battery charger and switch amps settings for different speeds.

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 Post subject: Re: mineral pulsating jig
PostPosted: Thu Apr 28, 2016 6:23 pm 
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My goal with this machine was to be lite enough and small enough to fit in a back pack and still have room to carry your other basic tools. Shovel, screens, pans, and batteries. Leaves hands free or able to carry buckets. If you have help, they can carry food. Bears will always chase down the food :twisted:

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