Keene Mini Max

[Triplehooked]

Has anyone tried one of these? Looks like a versatile piece of kit! I'm wondering what kind of run time you would get out of the electric pumps on say a 29 series deep cycle battery...

 

https://keeneeng.com/mini-max-power-sluice/

[Steve Herschbach]

Each of those little 500gph bilge pumps draws about 2 amps. A good deep cycle battery should give you about 20 - 25 hours running time.

Great little unit, just a modified A52 sluice. The only catch is with the small GPM delivered by the bilge pumps you have to baby the feed compared to what you can do with the same sluice using a good stream flow to supply the water.

[Triplehooked]

Thanks Steve, 

I've heard everything from 4 to 24 hours run time, but I would imagine the variety of batteries being used are the culprit. I've also heard Keene has changed pumps, opting to increase the flow to around 650 each, but I agree that better flow could be attained using it as a sluice. I've been using the A52 and have been impressed with the rate of feed and fine gold catch in stock form (zero flour gold found in my tailings so far...). I like that there's a port to add a gasoline pump as well.  The cam lock legs are a nice touch. I contacted Keene regarding selling just the rotating leg kit, but their response was that it would be cost prohibitive at this time (around $150)...

[Bryce]

Deep cycle battery or batteries in parallel plus solar panel? 

Wonder how it would work with a 2" Honda transfer pump with a pressure/flow bleeder line on idle.

[Reckter]

They are great.  Here is my video review.

 

 

[sjmpainter]

 Looks to me like it would be an excellent tool for the camp or garage to clean dredge concentrates.

I use a gold cube now for that but I like an open sluice design just so I can see the gold as I process the cons.

[Nuggetmaster]

I'm in need of something like this for my 6" dredge cons. I think i like it better then the cube setup. Do u think the recovery is just as good as the cube?

[sjmpainter]

I bet the recovery is the same, just a new toy to spend money on.

I find my best recovery happens when I classify my cons before I run them. Even at that I still can get a little more if I run a second or third time.

My six produces a lot of cons I have buckets all over the place with gold in it. Kinda lazy when the gold gets really small.

[johnedoe]

On 10/24/2017 at 2:07 AM, sjmpainter said:

 Looks to me like it would be an excellent tool for the camp or garage to clean dredge concentrates.

I use a gold cube now for that but I like an open sluice design just so I can see the gold as I process the cons.

I added "Deep V" mat to the slick plate of my gold cube..... I can see the gold just fine.....

And NO I don't think the little sluice will do as good a job at cleanup.

 

 

[sjmpainter]

I have the trammel on mine. Good for running lots of material fast but have to wait to see the gold.

Really interesting to see all the gold stuck in the first trough.