I did some cleanup yesterday and thought I'd share some pics.
I plan on adding a recirculating cleanup sluice to the system (probably the new Keene Super Recirc.) this spring for the #20+ mesh stuff.... for now I'm panning that. Mesh #30 and smaller go into the Blue Bowl .
I ran two separate batches of concentrate through the system, both from our very own CP!
Each were 2lb dry bags.
The first was concentrate was sent by Dan & Denise from the shavings and grindings (panning sample) included in the incredible gold/quartz cab that I won in the CP drawing (1st item down): http://www.coloradoprospector.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=2686
The second 2lb cons bag that I ran through was a special bag that Dan & Denise put together (which I requested) for Colorado gold (to be included in a project I'm working on). I am very grateful, exactly what I needed.
If you've got the cabin fever or just want to stay sharp with your cleanup techniques I highly recommend picking up some CP cons and gettin' busy. Me.... I'm still learnin'. I had a blast!
Here's how it went:
My indoor system is very tidy. As you can see I'm setting up shop on my nice area rug with no worries. Well, that and.... since my last girlfriend moved out there are no more rules here . I'll also be wearing a tuxedo during the entire process (the umbrella in the pic is for camera lighting)
Some of my cleanup tools:
This is my basic recirculating setup The 36 gal Rubbermaid tub contains all of the splashback. I'll be attaching the spray nozzle (for rinsing classifying screens, etc.) and the Blue Bowl to the end of the recirc hose for each process.
This is the first stack of screens - #2 mesh down to #30. Since I know I have a tendency to get these screens mixed up (and the magic marker will eventually wear off) I've taken the liberty of burning the mesh numbers into each screen rim with a rounded attachment on my woobuning tool.
Dirt
Rinsing it down trough the stack one screen at a time
Starting to see colors in the #20 mesh
#20 - #2 mesh goes to the pan. Here's the #30 mesh and smaller that went to the bottom of the bucket. It will be classified in the next stack of screens:
Next stack of screens #30 - #100. Each mesh class will be Blue-Bowled separately at different speeds.
continued....
I've marked the inside of the Blue Bowl with individual level indicators for each mesh:
Working like a charm:
Eureka!
Here are the results from the gold/quartz cab pannings:
Bag 2; I haven't had time to dry and sort it yet but these are some of the larger pieces that will go into my project. Many thanks Dan & Denise!
Saddle-up boys, we's a goin' inta town for sum vittles and a hot shower tonight!
Awesome Swizz! That is a spectacular report and display of the process!
You've sure got the blue bowl down to a science too, very nice! The whole system you set up sure looks it works very well. Thanks for sharing the tips and information with everyone.
Glad those grindings from the gold in quartz cabochon worked wo well with it too. I had one heckuva' time pannin' those out of the rock dusts mushy soup. Some of them are very fine and light weight!
The new Colorado gold project is gonna' sure be cool with the history you're creating for it. Can't wait to see and hear about that soon too when completed.
Thank you for the compliments on the Colorado Prospector placer dirts too, we hope everyone finds them to be the closest thing to really panning creek side available anywhere.
Hey! I didn't see any pics of a panner in a tux though!?
Nice setup, swizz. Thanks for posting those pics - I need to get as organized as you are to get through some of my old cons.
I have a BB, Swizz, and I never can get it to run at a constant level. I have to watch it like a hawk and keep adjusting the water flow it seems.
Any advice?
Carl, surging in the water levels of the BB can be cause by spoon feeding to much material at one time. solution. make a autofeeder to maintain a constant slow feed and use a battery charger for power when cleaning up at home. plus make sure your bilge pump has a clean intake all the time. ive seen mud get into the pump and cause binding of the pump.
Great set up Swizz! I dont think I have ever seen the blue bowl work that good.
I dont use one myself, I have just seen them used. I like to pan, keeps the wrists good and strong. Good idea to use a woodburner on the classifiers, I have seen and heard of many people mixing them up for the same reasons.
On a side note.........Love the art work on the wall!! Just a few questions......
Whos the artist?
Those water colors?
And why do you have a woodburner?
Im thinking someone is holding back on talents here.
Thanks for the cleanup demonstration and walk through. You did a great job!!
She does fantastic work! I would love to see some of your fathers work also.
Im a big fan of woodburning and carving.
Ok Ok....Im done hijacking this thread. Sorry guys, curiosity gets the best of me.
That's okay dear, you didn't highjack it too bad. Besides, that work in the background is very noticable! Killer stuff.
We added this demonstrational to the http://www.coloradoprospector.com/EquipmentPlans/PlansAndTips.html a few days ago, it's a great thread for anyone wishing to use the blue bowls.
Thanks again to Swizz for taking the time to put it together so well and with so much information everyone can use.
Another thought on change of flows during the running time. We've noticed in the past when running on battery power for the recirculating pumps, the change of flow begins rather quickly after running for a bit even with a fully charged batt, and then continues to slow as the battery power is used. To over come that change/slow down on the flow, we use a constant 12v power supply (battery charger) directly to the pump when possible. The charger will supply a more constant flow over the running period if you have power available like say at home, or in the field via a genny or an inverter?
CP
swizz could you please give the exact measurements that you have marked on your Blue Bowl? I would really love to have that to help out with my clean up! thanks!!!!!!
Great post! Bookmarking this one for future reference.
Hey Swizz - Thanks for posting the water line indications for each classification - those levels were spot-on. I broke down and bought my blue bowl yesterday, even paid RETAIL! Wish I had gotten it a couple years ago when I started doing this gold getting stuff. Worked through some unworked -100 cons and was amazed at the amount of gold which was recovered. Also worked through the unworked -100 and -30 magnetic material I previously pulled and found a decent amount of color in those. Still have quite a bit of -30 cons which I panned through 2x by hand - now I'm curious to see jsut how much gold my fantastic panning skills left behind. This may be a fairly humbling experience.
Got me thinking of how much color I may have tossed in the past thinking there was not enough fine fine gold to mess with. So much for sorry hindsight - lesson learned for the future is to sort though every bit, no matter how fine - it all adds up in the mayonnaise jar.
Thanks for speeding up the learning curve for the blue bowl quite a bit -
Hi Rich,
That is great news, I'm glad it's 'panning' out for you! I've been giving mine a workout this summer and almost wish they made a larger version of it. Definitely reduces the time-consuming panning process.... one sluice-load of cons is a lot of material to work thoroughly with a pan. I bought a small and very powerful rare earth magnet (not pictured) that I've been using in the Bowl now and it really speeds up the process. I pause the Bowl about halfway through a session to remove magnetic heavies and then resume. I was using the standard 'spring-style' (Jobe) miner's magnet pictured in this thread, but it just wasn't powerful enough.
Another thing I have done since then is replaced the cheapo plastic recirculation hoses and valves (pictured) included with the Bowl Kit. Those things were eventually shooting water from every connection. I went to the hardware store and picked up a much better flow regulator and a 6ft section of quality garden hose to replace those items. The hose was sold as "connection hose for hose reel", or something of that nature and there was probably a whole isle devoted to flow regulators. The pump motor that they give you with the Bowl kit is top notch though, mine has been working flawlessly and I also power a recirculating sluice with it.
Now.... if they'd only invent some kind of super-magnet to extract micro-quartz.
Swizz,
Just came across this thread, doing some research on picking up a blue bowl myself. Quick question: would you advocate getting the "leg levelers" that are advertised alongside the BB? Seems a bit steep at ~$21...
Thanks
Jake,
I'm big bowl fan, so I'm definitely the type who's gonna recommend it.
It does have a bit of a learning curve but really not too bad. Their instructions SUCK and are inaccurate. Go to prospectorchannel.com and watch this vid: http://prospectingchannel.com/process-gold-concentrate.html
It will take ALL of the pain out of learning the nuances of the Blue Bowl.
Brilliant thread! I was trying to wrap my brain around how I was going to process the 12 (1/2 - 3/4 full) buckets of 1/4" classified material from this weekend and now I've got it! I know the classifiers are stackable, but seeing the photos made it all clear... must be that 6.5 years I spent in the "Show Me" state; I need a visual.
I did order a blue bowl, it'll be here Friday. Unfortunately, starting Wed, I'm going to be tied up working 16-ish hour days at the Warrior Games (http://www.teamusa.org/warriorgames/) for the next 2 weeks, so I'm not going to get to dedicate any time to it anytime soon. :(
So for the blue bowl kit parts, I assume I just take all the kit plumbing parts and go find the higher quality equivalents at the hardware store?
Thanks for sharing your smarts Chris!!
With that much material to run don't get in a hurry when you're classifying. If you try to run too much material the screens will fill up and not allow all of the smaller stuff through. I have a small cup that I use when I'm classifying, one scoop at a time and I make sure all of the cons are washed before I put another scoop in.
So I got a little recirculating area to classify set up. Still trying to get in to a groove on how to most efficiently work. Ran 4 rounds through the 8, 12, 20s. Panned one of the 12s & 20s with no sign of color :( Grabbed a couple of handfuls of the 20- and panned it, no color :(
Swapped the water out in the tub when I got done; quite a bit of muck bottom, guessing mostly the stuff that was light enough to suspend in the water and come out of the bucket drains. Should I bother to pan most of that or just skim off the light stuff and save the last little bit of heavier stuff in the bottom?
"Quality time with my cons." Sounds romantic! Perhaps by candlelight and a nice bottle of wine to ease the gold out of its iron coverings?
Jessie, that's very sweet, but bright lights and beer work much better - seems that raw gold runs to the "Redneck" side of the tracks! Crusty, I do like the 12 mesh classifier for panning, too. I needed something between -8 and -20, and -12 works great. I would take a 16 mesh too, but that's overkill. I also bought a black sand magnet to make things easier (yes, I pan/run that too!). I like what you are doing with your set-up, and would like to get with you on that this weekend so I can put together a station, too.
Well in that case bring whisky, moonshine and light up the room with a string of Christmas lights and Chevy brights!
Now yer talkin' our language! You go, girl!
oh ya! lol
How's the clean up going, Crusty?
Bummer.
Holy hell, I'm in over my head.
Donny, no you are not..... some of us are just really into this, and like to show others how to do some of the more advanced collection of fines properly. We have a great set of members who will gladly help answer any questions, and "pull you to shore" if you do get in a little over your head. We have members in all stages - from those who just bought their first pan, or picked up their first interesting rock, to working claim holders. Please do not get discouraged, and hang in there and ask questions - we are glad to answer, and have you stick around!
He's right! I'm in the "just bought a new pan + one season" I feel perfectly at home here with a GREAT group of folks that I know will listen to my endless stupid questions. I also know when I decide to upgrade or attempt to be "creative" with design prototypes, I trust these guys to be objectively honest with ne. Do not fret, we ALL started somewhere!
I really appreciate both of your comments caveman and fenix. Honestly I just ended my career in the service after ten years and I'm not quite sure where to go next but I love the outdoors and I've always been intrigued by prospecting. I have kinda studied up my towards gems and minerals but I want to learn more. I actually took a hike yesterday and I'm not sure but I think I found some amanzonite. Well from what it looks like on the web and the show prospectors. Lol.. and if I did, it's kinda like what do I do with it now? Lol thanks again for the warm welcome.
Welcome to the CP forums Donny and thank you for your service!! That definitely looks like some Amazonite, nice find! I would just display it where you can admire it. We have several cool finds around in our yard that are too large to display in the house. You will find that several here look for many different kinds of minerals, some even in the same week. So there is plenty of info to learn from here.
Make yourself at home around the website!
Denise
Welcome Donny! It is indeed Amazonite! It was a very similar piece that infected me with the Colorado Rockhounding bug, which led me to this fine group of folks! As stated above, there are members of all skill levels who are happy to share what they know!
Donny, thank you for your service! SALUTE!
Donny, welcome to CP and thank you for your service!
It looks like Amazonite to me as well, nice!
Welcome aboard Donny! Thank you very much for your service!
There is a mountain of information here to sink your teeth into. Whether you just want to do a bit of rock collecting or you wish to make it a profitable adventure, you have came to the right place! Feel free to ask any questions.
Wow, I'd like to say thank you too everyone on multiple levels. It's an awesome vibe joining guys as your all very welcoming. It was an honor to serve, thank you all very much! Getting out and in a sense "having my leash taken off," lol It feels like a great area of freedom and exploitation. I look forward to getting to know all of you better and learning from you all. I'll keep the questions down a minimum of 50 per blog. Lol jp. Thanks again all
Got in 8 hours of classifying today. Did 3.5 buckets down to 8, 12, 20. I've got 2 full buckets of -20, waiting to get 30, 50, 100 classified.
Only saw some really small gold, but I did pull a nice garnet out of the 8 and 2 out of the 12!
OK, in my recirculating tub there is a lot of sediment, from the light sand that is suspended in the water. Is the fine gold light enough to get caught up in this stuff as it floats about and should I be panning it or saving it for the blue bowl? Or is it pretty safe to assume it is all just waste?
Knocked out another bucket... only 7 to go!
Since this is from Chris's claim, I would not worry about the sediment as there are very little fines in his area. You might find a speck of -100, but I doubt it. Also, if you are properly using a surfactant (like "Jet-Dry", and producing no foam), fine gold will not get caught up in the fine sediment. I'd toss it - Try as you might, Crusty, no matter what, you can't catch it all. Some will get away for whatever reason, and it's just not worth the time/effort to try and catch it.
I agree that most of the Gold from that latest hole is +50.... not much in the minus 100 class. I'm never too excited about processing minus 100 from up there, takes longer and doesn't yield as much... but has to be done.
When I get down to the -100 cons I run the bowl really slow for a few minutes, roughly 1 1/2 down from the lip. That slowly pulls the light blondes off the top, then I stop the flow and spread out what has built up around the cone and push it to the outside. I keep doing that while slowly ramping up the speed until all I can see is a little bit of black sand left. I'll pan that slowly and watch for color trying to move with the black sand. The hard part is getting it out of the pan, I have an insulin syringe that I filed the point off of that works pretty good, but I have to check the rubber piece inside because the gold loves to stick to it. It really is more trouble than it's worth for the super fine stuff, Chris is right that most of the gold is 50+ up there from what I've seen in both of my cleanups.
copy, thanks fellas!
There is no sleeping in! We have gold to find!!!!! Donny you are more than welcome to join us.
That is very cool of you EMac and Jessie! Have fun and stay safe out there............ and I hope the gold lines your pans!
Revisiting this thread, FINALLY setting up my blue bowl!
OK, I'm definitely a blue bowl convert. Had fun working though my 2 coffee cans of cons from 3 trips to Swizz's claim and one trip to Clear Creek.
Got all set up, and of course it started raining, so I had to move closer to the house and break out my raincoat.
Found one flake in the 30 mesh and 5 little bits in the 50 mesh. Tomorrow I'll run the 70 and 100.
Thanks for the great tips Swizz; made doing this for the first time a breeze!
Got my 70 & 100 screens mixed up, so it was all 100... let's just say I just THOUGHT I was sold in the blue bowl, now that I ran the 100 and the -100, I KNOW I am sold! This is material I've panned the heck out of and I am shocked at the amount of color I got.
Pics in the morning; bed time for now!
I forgot in addition to 3 trips to Swizz's and a Clear Creek trip, there are cons from a bag of pay I bought over the winter to play with.
Amazed at the amount of stuff I missed panning (and wondering how much I've thrown away after panning and throwing away material I though was color free )
Here's the 100 mesh
I'm cornfused.... that can't be your grand total from our last trip. If so, somethin ain't right.... or we need to move on to another hole. That's not a lot.
Oh... I get it. I might suggest that you organize and tag your con samples? I use Ziplocs to organize my samples but the coffee can containers are a good idea too, just take up too much space for me.
Reading about ye olde blue bowl, it seems some folks like to move the supplied valve back a bit from bowl; perhaps it provides a more laminar water flow. Did any of you do any mods? I saw that Chris was considering replacing the valve.
Yes, for sure. This thread is about 5yrs old now.... a few years ago I retrofitted a good spigot about 8 or 10 inches back from the bowl. It helps for sure. I also recommend a small pump like a 250. Anything larger gets a workout when you choke the flow with the spigot or whatever regulator. A solution to that (too big of pump) would be to run it full blast and add a "Y" connector to bleed off the excess (back into the tub).... which also can help control the bowl flow.
My current setup.... (15gal) Small submerged pump and no bleeder.
https://flic.kr/p/DFshC7https://flic.kr/p/DFshC7 by https://www.flickr.com/photos/121086004@N07/, on Flickr
Excellent! I suspect I'll have to do something similar. It should be here tomorrow, so I'm pretty stoked.
In the pics, water is pumped (submersible) from the bigger 25-gallon bucket into the blue bowl setting up a vortex. The water level is adjusted for the mesh size being processed, and the theory is to set the water just high enough to lift the black sands up the center cone, while the heavier gold settles around the bottom of the cone. Swizz linked a video in post 18 of this thread that shows it in action.
Silky, Eric is correct. The white hose in the pic leads into the tub. At the bottom there is a small 12 volt bilge pump exactly like the ones used in boats.... it can't electrocute you, it's only 12V and fully sealed. The Blue Bowl is essentially a centrifuge and works similar to a toilet. Water is pumped into the bowl and swirls clockwise. Slowly add material. The light material finds it's way to the cone first. It climbs the cone and exits the center (flushed down the toilet).... into the waste bucket that the bowl is perched on. The Gold is way too heavy to climb the cone and get flushed. It stays at the base of the cone and elsewhere throughout the bowl during the process. It's kinda fun to watch.
Mine should arrive today, and I'm wondering about what Chris said earlier about bleeding off excess pressure. The pump in the kit is a 750, and the other pumps I have are bigger than that. Considering moving the valve back and bleeding off pressure, I think I'll try using a Y-split. My thought process is to be able to switch quickly from classifying to running the BB. I'm thinking put a nozzle on the other side of the split. Any thoughts on the utility or wisdom of that?
Eric, I just checked and I'm running a 500 pump, it is just right. I used to run a 750 but it gave up the ghost last year. I would recommend a Y for the 750. Most garden variety Y splitters have a built-in lever style regulator on each outlet. Combine that with a good spigot valve on the main bowl feed and regulating flow will be much easier.
Looks like the links to the pics at the beginning of the thread are dead.
Powered by Invision Power Board (http://www.invisionboard.com)
© Invision Power Services (http://www.invisionpower.com)