GotAU?

The forest may and can indefinitely close its system roads in the burn areas for restoration, I wouldn’t be surprised if access to any claims in the burn areas is cut off for awhile. Hopefully, they will get the affected areas mopped up soon and the fires won’t hurt anyone or their homes.

I knew the definition of “recreational mining” and “casual use” only includes the use use of hand and battery powered drywashers, (not gas powered forced air units), but under which legal definition could one legally use gas blower powered drywashers and vacpacs? Under “small-scale mining “ with a “notice of intent” while on a claim, off claim on appropriate federal land for “prospecting” (with or without an NOI), or any combination of these, or are there other conditions? The reason I ask is I just got a 140 and want to use it and a vac for prospecting on open BLM lands not in a claim area, but maybe I can only legally use my puffer and shovels there...

I moved my question to a more appropriate post...

He already sold it, but contact him directly anyways because he always gets other stuff.

Bend them by twisting them 90°, so the thin side hits the sand straight on. Be sure to make them wide enough though so they keep their strength I would think at least an inch or more. Video shows them being wider than that, which would make them stronger. Remember you have to use heat to do this, Ive done cold bends and they broke or cracked like in the video. Another option could be just bend them upwards a little bit, say only 30° towards the handle, but they will be wide that way and may drag a lot in the sand. But that’ll keep them stronger too. Sounds like a fun project, post photos of whatever you end up with or buy.

Not to preempt the one that Terry is offering to sell above, but I just realized you could design a single piece flat head for the rake with a lot of tines on it and then carefully bend each tine 90° to work as a beach rake. Make a straight longer section on the upper part of the tines for the bend. Don’t cold bend aluminum like you can with iron, you have to heat the bend spot up over 400° Before doing it. A torch can do it, but I use one of those Harbor freight $30 heat guns whenever I’m doing it. Those guns can bring it up to melting point, so be careful. This video has a good way of doing it, using a piece of wood as a temperature check . Just a thought.....

You know what though, the rake they show has many cut parts. I would recommend making a base plate across the face of the rake, and put smaller teeth made of stiff wire sticking through them. It will be expensive to cut out multiple parts unless you design them in such a way that you can separate them... the expense for emachineshop.com is really the setup fee.

Draw out your logo and name into the design too and make it personalized. Here’s what I did for my truck, it will be easy for you to draw out those lightning bolt patterns for the rake because you won’t have to use precise measurements- I had to make mine fit predrilled hole patterns for a mountable awning and other hardware on these 34” long rack sides. I decided to use a famous hero for my logo:

Go to emachineshop.com, download their free CAD design program and design your own. Then upload it to them and they will ship your lasercut product back to you. I built my own truck roof rack and the lasercut parts were about $45 each, but you’ll only need one and can bolt it onto the head of a basic rake. Its easy!

Arizona Outback shirt, hmmmm... I am really enjoying reading this.

Rob, count me in for your printing run of Nugget Shooter’s Bible! I had two copies of Jim’s “3 Hours to Gold” book and donated one as a fundraiser for the Randsburg Desert Museum to help them out during these hard times. For anyone reading this, it’s a great book and a must read if someone is ever thinking if going to detect in the Randsburg area. Even though the book is centered around the Rand area, It includes discussions on the geology of the area that produced and concentrated the gold, and some of the things to look for when prospecting which would be useful to know while detecting in other desert areas. The other must read to also get is his ”Avanced Prospecting and Detecting for Hardrock Gold”. It is a treatise about the formation, discovery and recovery of hardrock gold, and even includes a informational section about meteorite detecting as well. I didn’t know Jim, but I wish I met him. He was a prolific writer and published several books about prospecting that are all good reads. The only thing I would recommend for those starting out with geological terms, also keep a dictionary of geological terms, or at least Google nearby while you are reading his work. It’s not highly technical, but you will be learning some new terms and processes that are very useful for those interested in detecting for gold. Thank you Rob, for republishing 3 Hours to Gold and for wanting to keep Jim’s other books alive, and please do let me know when that 8th Edition of Nugget Shooters Bible comes up! Cheers, Anthony

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An interesting read, it may even get more people interested in detecting. Thanks for sharing this. And a somewhat similar fictional story, using a metal detector for finding more than just metalic objects:

A deep hitting coil would be nice for use with some of the work I am doing as a volunteer archaeologist at a WWII internment camp. We’ve been excavating part of it, and they don’t have the funds for GPR and stuff like that, so using something like this may be helpful for mapping out deeper features before doing any ground distance. Some areas have had feet of wind blown sand and dirt covering up the original ground surface, so finding where that happened without having to dig it all out would be useful.

Very nice indeed!