John-Edmonton

Ha! My larger fuel tank came in the mail today. This one allows me to run my Geo Highbanker for about 12 hours. This new battery is rated at 100 Ah. My current battery is 60 Ah. Both of them will give me about 19 hours run time with the Geo Sluice and 53 hours with the California Mini. And, the new battery only ways 24 LBS. If I add a solar panel, it will be even more run time.

A cold NW wind today, however, had a good deep river valley today to protect me. Even got some snow......adds to the adventure. I used the Geo Highbanker. Being that I run it with a battery, I added some tips today. Enjoy the pics. It all fits in a plastic fishing sled, that will float for easy transportation. Got my highbanker up and running. Tune your machine like a concert piano, and it will capture most of the gold in the first couple of drop riffles. The lithium ion batteries manual says you could damage the battery if you short it out. I use an electric control to manage the flow, and it has a fuse in case it does short out. The PVC plastic units are light, making it easy to move to a new location. After my first cleanup, I was happy to see some gold in the pan. I added some miner's moss with backing into the hopper to protect it from all the abuse I give it and to catch a bit of gold. And that pretty well wraps up today's adventure!

What a day, what a day, what a day. It was a gamble. Very strong winds forecast, the river at a iffy depth with the potential of it rising even more. 30% showers. Assessed 3 different locations. I chose one, the gravel to dig was about the same square footage as my bathroom. Heck......if you don't take risks, you can't win. Well, the river dropped about 5 inches for the first 3 hours, then started rising again. The ice was breaking upstream, so I had to monitor a possible ice-flow attack on shore. I even had all my supplies stored on high ground, with a trail to quickly evacuate the area, just in case. Well, nothing happened, and it turned out to be an uneventful day. Except, getting some nice shiny.

There is a tiny bit of platinum that shows up occasionally. Not enough to really go after it. Thanks for your kind words.

Too late. I threw that platinum in the garbage. It's ugly, so little of it too. Damned if I am going to spend hours with a set of tweezers picking out $00.50 worth. For safety, I always carry my cell phone and about 50 feet of rope for those challenging steep trails. I spent the last 15 years working with folks with hip, shoulder and knee replacements. I do my best not to become a patient on my unit. And, I most certainly don;t want to see me butt naked either. 🤣

Looks like a lot of team spirit at the Garrett factory. Lots of employees too. Charlie has sure built up a nice empire from the ground up. I sure do miss him. I still have some correspondence from him at home. He often times used to answer questions himself. RIP Charlie!

I was lucky.....I got the last one.

If I was still using my gas pump for highbanking,, I would not be getting out very often. Going light with equipment and not using a gas pump anymore, has really opened up a lot of territory, which previously was just too much to hull around long distances, especially at this time of year. Even a boat is of no use right now. Anyhow, I tried a new spot in Alberta and was surprised to find a lot of platinum. I don't really like finding it, as it slows me down back-panning for my final cleanup. Anyhow, here is a what took place today. The gold is a total of 5 hours with of digging, total from yesterday and today. More snow for the forecast tomorrow. Here are the grey bits of platinum. Platinum is easy to distinguish from other particulates in the pan. And, the "shiny."

It was supposed to get up to at or above freezing temperatures today. That never happened, however, fresh air, exercise, appetite, good food and a good night's sleep. What is there not to like? Made a quick, short video of the Easter Hunt.

Depends on the width of the drop riffles. Up to an 8" wide, the 1100 GPH should do fine. 10" to 12" works well with the 2000 GPH and the Le'Trap runs with a 2200GPH pump, although, I sometimes add another 500 GPH pump to to run the Letrap.

I was using the California mini highbanker. I shovelled fresh gravel into the hopper for about 2 hours, including gravel containing a lot of roots. It's flour gold in the pan.

There are lots of bilge pumps for sale at Amazon and Ebay. A lot of prospecting places sell them too, as do marinas if you happen to live near water. Did you purchase a Lithium ion battery? Below is an article about lithium ion batteries and a comparison chart to simplify things. https://tritekbattery.com/choosing-between-lithium-ion-and-lead-acid-batteries-for-e-bikes/

A couple of things to bring to your attention. Drop riffle highbankers require less water flow then your standard riffles. Drop riffles allow the gold to drop out of the water flow, like it happens in nature. Standard riffles require more water flow, to create a low pressure zone, hopefully capturing gold. Larger stones can knock flour gold out of standard riffles, but just roll over drop riffles, where the gold has already dropped out of sight. Because of less water flow, drop riffles run very well on bilge pumps. The California Mini runs nicely using a 1100 gallons per hour pump. The Geo Sluice runs well on a 2000 gallons per hour pump. 12 volt lithium ion batteries are really coming down in prices, and bilge pumps are not a great expense. The lithium ion batteries can purchaced on Amazon or Ebay. I did the math and pricing for running either the Californiaa Mini or the Geo Highbanker with different batteries. You could also run a 6" standard riffle unit on a 1100gallons per hour unit. These are in Canadian prices. US prices will be less. Using a bilge pump is quiet, no gasoline, no oil, no tune-ups, no oil changes and the whole complete system is so light that you can carry it on your back and go just about anywhere. And drop riffles have excellent retention rates for flour gold.

Thanks! You too!👊

Well Chuck, full retirement end of May. At 69 I feel blessed that I still have the body that allows me to prospect. I can't comment on the grey matter in my head. I do love the photography part of prospecting, and enjoy putting together the posts. We ALL need to keep our bodies moving and our brains challenged to get the most of our senior years. "When we are young, we should exercise. When we get old, we GOT-TO!"

Too much of that stuff and you will go color blind.👀

You bet! Much easier then shovelling gravel. You can literally pull up a chair, wash some roots and drink a cold beer too!🍺

I would say an easy 60-70%.

15 °C/59.0 °F was what it was today. (probably even hotter in the valley, south facing slope) I got out this morning and had some serious gold getting in mind. I drove to an area which sometimes opens up early in the spring. Good karma today! I brought along my climbing rope along. I work healing people with broken bones at a hospital for a living. I don't want to be a patient on my unit. It's nice to have a unit that runs on a 12 volt battery. The highbanker is ABS plastic, strong and light. No gas pump, heavy hoses or gasoline to tag along. My unit runs quiet all day, and allows me to hear all the bird's sounds with spring mating in mind. I safely made it to the river's edge. A thick layer of ice was still intact in most places on the banks. I did manage to find a small open, exposed area. Hacked another 10 feet more with my shovel to expose some more gravel. The gravel had a lot of sticky silt mixed with it and little gold, so I dug up a lot of dead vegetation and washed the roots in my hopper. That got me more gold then just the gravel. Here's the flour gold after my final clean-up. I might head down again tomorrow if the weather is suitable.

Took my California Mini highbanker back to the chunky-flour-gold river, and did mostly free digging, as the frost is starting to thaw out. I managed to move a lot more material, as I wasn't screening it into buckets for feeding the mini. And, the results speak for themselves. I have done quite well with this little unit. The whole system fits in a 5 gallon plastic bucket, and my 12 volt 60 amp/hr lithium ion battery (very light) fits in my back pack. I can either pack it in my sled or just carry it in a bucket to get to those far away places. I dug down to about 18 inches below these old gravel beds. Beyond that, the ground was still frozen. I dug for a bout 3 hours, which is plenty for me. Filled in my holes, went home and ran my concentrates through my micro sluices in the basement. Here's the shiny from today! I should sleep well tonite.🥱

Sometimes half the fun is searching for those places.

Well, the little river turned out to be a bigger river, as the temperature was rising and the snow was melting. I had to find a new river crossing to get home where the river was more shallow. I haven't tried this location.....so, that's what I dug. Adding water to my 1/2" screened gravel turned it into a sticky cement. I prefer feeding dry material. I just drop the material from a greater height to make that flour gold punch through the water's surface tension so that it doesn't float away. And.....here's todays shiny fly poop. Gonna sleep well tonite!🛏️

Just remeber, it's flour gold. I enlarge the flakes with my camera, because they look so much nicer.

Thanks. My grandfarher's saying was that "where there's a will, there's a away." I never understood what he meant untl I was grown man!

Except, he could do without wearing his underware using that pan.🤣