Bushranger said:
Tested it out in Nundle over the weekend. Clogged up even with the river raging. Got through about 2/3 of a bucket before having to clean out. Captured some gold though!
mate that shouldn't happen with your design even if you haven't cut out any more sections you should be able to get 5 buckets through with no problems.
Have you dialed a sluice in before? if not here's a few simple tips that make it easy for me when i setup a sluice box
- Find an area where you can allow 2-4 inches or drop- sometimes water flow dictates more of less [/*]
- Once you've got your drop create a level platform for your sluice box at the top end - no point sending all of your material to one side[/*]
- Hopefully you've got good depth of water to wash your rocks, a good height is your riffle height + 2-3 times - (in your case crate pattern 2 inches works well)[/*]
- When you have your flat platform and you think you've got the above all correct you need to pivot your sluice to conform with the water flow - You are looking for a V shape that is uniform and creates a line straight down the middle of your box. (see picture below)[/*]
- You will want to anchor your sluice down and make sure it doesn't move around whilst processing material so plonk a big flat rock on top or use your V flare by wedging rocks in each side.[/*]
- Throw some soft material into your box and watch what is does... did it move through the box or go straight down, did it move backwards towards the riffles and hold or spread out. All things that can be adjust by water volume. [/*]
- From here you should be able to adjust your water flow by adding rocks to the underside of your flair which will cause water to jump into the box rather than go underneath it, also adding more rocks channeling water into the sluice box from the sides works wonders. [/*]
- With a riffle design sluice box you want to see your material move up the box with a crate pattern the same applies accept you shuld see material dancing in between your squares if its not active then it wont catch your gold. [/*]
Everything is trial and error until you've got it nailed with a bit of tweaking pitch and water volume you'll work out what works in thick water and what works in a trickle then you can feed with confidence. now go get some GolD!
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