Reno Chris

Hope you made it into camp fine before dark. I don't figure you will have internet and phone out at Sawtooth.

Actually drilling from underground workings (in any direction) is pretty standard stuff in the mining industry.

As a whole unit it probably weighs around 50 pounds. Not too heavy to lift but real bulky. When I carry it, I cant see my feet, so a bit awkward on uneven ground if you cant see where you are stepping. It breaks down into components and is then easy to carry, but will take a few loads to carry in.

Supposed to get a bit of rain today, but should be dry again in a couple days. You can't really count on dry conditions this time of year. My dry washer is the Keene puffer with 12V motor to run the puffer. http://www.keeneeng.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=DW212V&Category_Code=DW

It doesn't bother me as I normally don't lay the detector on the ground to sort targets. The may be the same length as others, but because of how its attached, if you don't stretch the cord or do something else, it will tug at the headphones when you lay the detector down. Its really been totally insignificant for me. I use the headphones most of the time, though occasionally have them unplugged for the exterior speaker when I am demonstrating it to some one.

I have a couple pieces at 0.03 grams that I have detected with the SDC and weighed on a very accurate scale. At the place I am working, the ATX can hear the gold if its large enough, but it also sees hundreds of hot rocks and falses on roots and rocks, making it much slower and more difficult to use at that location. Small chunks of magnetite, oxidized pyrite cubes and other high iron rocks are common in the gravels.

Fred, that dry washing is good exercise. If a fat old guy like me can do it, you wouldn't have any problems. The SDC is turning some heads - and Minelab is keeping up with their tradition of cutting edge detectors.

Congrats Bearkat on the nice dredge gold. So I will ask Azblackbird's question: Where are all the fines? (like minus 30 mesh) All in a black sand bucket somewhere? I didn't get much fines as I was dry washing, and dry washers just don't do all that great on recovering real small (like minus 30 mesh) gold - but dredges properly set up do a lot better. Not fully sure I am ready for the videos, but I am interested in your thoughts on the SDC 2300.

Is this a patch that you see yourself spending some considerable time on, or is it just more or less something to fall back on if you have a dry spell and need a gold fix? The patch Steve and I were working on is pretty well beat up, though I am sure there is at least some left. I still think some of the workings located above where we dug the nuggets still need more detecting. A friend who borrowed my SDC found one up there in the time since Steve was last up there detecting with me. The search for the source is a low priority thing, but I will likely devote a day or two to it in the future. I guess what I'm trying to convey is that you basically took your DW concentrates, classified them down, then panned them out and that's what we're seeing. Yep. In fact as the DW unit has its own classifier in the feed hopper, I didn't need to classify the cons, I just panned them out. There was very little fines, but there was some. have you used gold bugs near them working in same area I used one with a gold bug Pro (new gold bug) and there was no cross talk unless you were right next to each other. We tried digging a target I found with the SDC (it was gold) and as we were standing at the same spot, could not have both the GB and the SDC on at the same time. (that was done with Scott Harn of ICMJ, not Steve).

So you need to explain what you mean by "first pan out of your DW concentrates" - its not terminology I am used to using, so I am unsure of what you mean. Do you pan your concentrates over and over? Do you re-run your fine fraction from the Dry washer? 1. What made you select this particular area to detect or drywash? Detect - which I did first - it was because old timers worked it in the 1800s. Dry wash - because I found gold concentrated in small patches, though some nuggets of "scattered gold" were found around the general area. 2. Did you do any research on this area (geology wise), or was it an area that is/was popular among the past/present day gold prospectors? It is not popular among modern prospectors, but was well worked in the past. 3. What are the geological features of the area? Metamorphic rocks of several varieties 4. How would you describe the specific characteristics of the area? Are you on a bench, hilltop, hillside, tertiary channel? Is the gold in your opinion eluvial, or alluvial? There were two patch areas, an upper and lower. The upper was hillside and eluvial, the lower more water washed and alluvial. The source is nearby, but the hills are covered in many places with deep gravel (and that was part of what the miners worked in the upper workings. 5. Are you doing any sampling of the general area to see which direction the source may be? I have done a bit in the past but found nothing. I have not done any recently, but I will do some more in the future, although that may need to wait until next year. We shall see.

I did not re-run the fines through the dry washer a second time if that's what you mean. Generally that is a lot of work for a small amount of gold unless the material is wet or has other problems. I did go over all the DW fines (and coarse too) with my metal detector and got one little flake. Dry washers don't do all that well on fines - like minus 50 mesh. Not that they have zero recovery of minus 50 mesh gold, but that the percentage recovered is not that great. I did not recover a lot of that size - though there was some. I have not tried wet panning some of the fines reject to see how much of that real small stuff is present - mostly because hauling the material to water is just not an option.

Just an update: Been up there some more dry washing and doing a bit more detecting, though 90% of my time this last trip was dry washing. I now have 113 detected nuggets for 20 grams, and 16 grams of dry wash gold - total now is 1.15 ounces. Some of the DW stuff could easily have been heard with the detector, but I am digging up places with depths from 6 inches up to about 18 inches max, and some of it was just deeper than could be heard without removing the gravel material first, and it just got dug and put in the dry washer. The DW stuff is on the left, the detected nuggets on the right.

True, but sometimes too many folks betting the same way is a contrarian indicator to the positive side. When everyone everywhere was betting gold was going down at the end of 2013, it instead went up. See: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/gold-may-be-a-buy-as-investors-turn-ever-more-bearish-2014-09-10?link=mw_home_kiosk

Rob Allison recently made a similar remark about making his SDC 2300 his primary detector. See: http://forums.nuggethunting.com/index.php?/topic/10960-minelab-sdc-2300-continues-to-amaze-me/

It hard to say as there is no exact scale, but all metal detectors have a size and distance limit. The tiniest stuff can only be seen at the shallowest depths. I would guess that a falcon would detect that, but its not a detector you walk around with and scan the ground - its a hand held probe used to test rocks one at a time. The Gold Bug 2 is as sensitive as anything on the market in the way of ground scanning detectors, and I don't think a Gold Bug 2 would detect that tiny stuff, but without a scale I am just guessing. I would take it in to a detector dealer and try sliding the rock over a GB2 coil and see if it reacts. At least a GB2 is set up for scanning the ground. Even if a GB2 does react, it wont see it very deep. It pretty rock, so good luck in your search.

AZBlackbird - I read your references and nothing in them authorizes off road travel. Even the CA off road laws say other authorities ie, BLM, NFS, etc. can restrict travel to designated roadways, which is exactly what they have done. The following is for the Plumas National Forest where I do some of my prospecting, but its pretty much the same on other NFS lands in CA. Please read the following: http://www.fs.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsinternet/!ut/p/c5/04_SB8K8xLLM9MSSzPy8xBz9CP0os3gjAwhwtDDw9_AI8zPwhQoY6IeDdGCqCPOBqwDLG-AAjgb6fh75uan6BdnZaY6OiooA1tkqlQ!!/dl3/d3/L2dJQSEvUUt3QS9ZQnZ3LzZfMjAwMDAwMDBBODBPSEhWTjJNMDAwMDAwMDA!/?navtype=BROWSEBYSUBJECT&cid=stelprdb5322854&navid=360000000000000&pnavid=null&ss=110511&position=Not%20Yet%20Determined.Html&ttype=detail&pname=Plumas%20National%20Forest-%20Maps It says: You may drive on any route designated for use as a motorized travel route. The Motor Vehicle Use Map (MVUM) displays National Forest Transportation routes (roads and trails) or areas so designated. If a route is not shown on the map, it is not open for motorized travel. and If a route is not shown on the MVUM, it remains open for hiking, bicycling and horseback riding but is not open to motorized use. and Cross-country travel is not allowed unless specifically allowed with a permit or other authorization. I agree if you have an approved mining permit from the national forest that allows you off road, cross country access on your claims, then you have been approved to do that and I guarantee that your approval will have conditions you must abide by. However if you have no signed permit, you have no authorization for off road travel in CA national forests.

I would guess you need to talk whoever sold you these detectors.

Your Rockon is a great set up. I'm sure the Rockon is very useful in AZ, and it would be fine in Nevada too, but Taxifornia has another agenda entirely. I believe most national forests and essentially all state lands in CA are motorized on road only. Large chunks of the CA desert too, but there is some where off road is allowed.

AZBlackbird - There are loads of places in California where your Rockon could not be used as motorized transportation is prohibited except on established roads. This is enviro-crazy California we are talking about. I believe Steve is in one of those places where off road travel is prohibited.

Gary - I have done the same, only I have not past testing them in my yard. There is a delay between the transmitter receiving the signal, the wireless transmission and then the headphones receiving the transmission and converting that to sound you can hear. If you swing quickly, the difference is significant. As you slow down to pinpoint, you will see the delay becomes insignificant. I figure its something you have to get used to. Let me know what you think. Chris

Best of luck. I look forward to hearing more when you get back.

Lots to do still in California, and I believe the patches you are considering are in Nevada. It will be a good month before I make it to northern Nevada.

A better photo of the total gold I've taken from this area in the last week or so. 15 grams and 79 nuggets.

JP - I would also be very honored with an opportunity to return to the Lucky Country and spend some time with you. Are you sure you can endure a couple of goofy Yanks hanging around with you for a few weeks? I'm looking forward to chatting with over the details.

I took Steve out to the place where I'd been having some success with my SDC 2300, but the patch I had been working on was petering out. The first morning, I got three tiny nuggets. However there are loads of workings there and Steve headed up the hill and found some spots up there were he was getting some gold. After lunch we went up there and Steve took one small ridge and I took the other. Although we were only about 15 yards apart, there was no cross talk between the detectors. Turns out mine was the more productive of the two, but we didn't know that then, and Steve got some good gold too. Once I got started, it was just one little nugget after the other. I would only be searching a few minutes between finds, and there was very little trash. I think I got a couple square nails and a few bird shot - and 29 nuggets. One of them was a cool kind of arborecent shape that is unlike any nugget I have ever dug, but I have seen some photos of pieces like that. Today we went at it again, and I mostly just kept pounding that same ridge I was working on from one end to the other. Steve found another little slope that yielded some chunky nuggets. The weather was fantastic, just enough clouds to keep the temperature just right, great company, beautiful California scenery. Today I got another 23 nuggets and again just a small hand full of trash items. The total weight for two days with the SDC was 8.8 grams, well over a quarter ounce, almost 6 pennyweight. Hey Steve, that was a great short trip, we'll give it another try again soon.