blackjack

As Jim points out Sniping is a cheap low impact way to find gold, as well as the right wettie this is all you need. Good eye sight is needed so reading glasses lenses taped to my mask was my solution. my partners are half my age so their eyesight is still good. Rivers are dangerous so the only other thing you need is someone to go with.

16 hours ago, Northeast said:

I wonder if at some time in the past, if on a valley floor, the water may have actually run 90 degrees to where it now runs and therefore the parallel crevices were at one time cross crevices?  Not sure if that’s possible on the location of which you speak?  
 

I know the river I intend to work the most has quite a wide valley floor and at some time in the past the river would have flowed right across the floor and at all different angles. 

I think it may be more a case of the amount of time it takes for a crevice to get gold in it. Also I think gold only moves during a flood event, so you need to think about the whirlpools eddies and cross currents that are in a river during a major flood.

9 hours ago, Ridge Runner said:

Northeast  

 It’s more than one way to skin a cat 🐱.

 You can make one yourself are maybe buy one and this a suction pump that’s made out of pvc . Just do a search on what I’m talking about. 
 I’ve never had the need for one but it works fair pulling material out of cracks when a vac is not available.

 We have one of the major gold states you can’t use a dredge anymore. So we can relate to your problem. 
If can find a picture of what I’m talking about I’ll post it for you.

 Chuck 

Hey Chuck, thanks for your interest, I can't speak for others, but in past years I have worked the river we are now in without much success. I've tried panning, sluicing, cleaning out crevices with suction pumps, breaking my back putting as much gravel as I could through a river sluice, with disappointing results, I had moved on. Two years ago I came across a youtuber called Levi Tassie Boys Prospecting, he was sniping, with what appeared to be great success. Levi keeps his locations secret, but I recognized the river he was in, the same one I had worked without success. I was lucky enough to meet two guys that had never done any prospecting but were following Levi. They gave me the chance to snipe in remote locations in company and I fast tracked them onto gold, we were all new to sniping, but in our first season last summer we did better by far than I had ever done using traditional methods. The key to sniping's success is in the name, you can see the gold. It's really surprising how small a piece you can see, for instance last weekend we got 0.15 grams which consisted of 20 pieces of gold, so pretty small. And yes we don't get onto it every time. 

15 hours ago, Northeast said:

Hey RR.  Definitely would be helpful but unfortunately (or fortunately) we are not allowed to use vacs or any sort of dredge in Australia.  

Unfortunately because it would be cool to give it a go and a tiny dredge would not do a great deal of damage.  
 

Fortunately because I am a bit of a greenie and the mess left behind by big suction dredging and whole scale working of rivers is both damaging to flora and fauna and very ugly to look at - often in what should be pristine and protected environments.  

Just my personal opinion, please don’t hang me for it  😉

 

 

 

Tasmania is the same, no power of any sort, even a battery powered mini dredge that moves tiny amounts of gravel. You can however use a stream sluice provided it can be easily carried by one person, a pretty piss poor criteria, is that person my 100 year old grannie or a 17 stone gym junkie. Unfortunately N/E rules have to take into consideration the' dickhead' factor, they are not made for sensible people. I for one won't hang you for being a greenie, I would hope every one on this forum wants to maintain the natural environment.

3 hours ago, delnorter said:

I’m looking forward to more pictures and writings about your sniping blackjack. Also how you make out with the Nox 800. Nice looking country you have to explore and prospect.
 

Mike

Hey Mike, yes we are lucky to have some nice rivers here in Tasmania, even better that some have gold in them. Our first trip this season gave us 9 grams for the day, between three of us, we split what we find. We are limited to weekends and need to travel 550klms./8hrs. Get to our camp friday night snipe all day saturday, then mostly do a recce on sunday morning to work out a camp site and access for the next trip if we aren't going back to the same spot. The river we are working is gorge country and rainforest, where we worked last weekend the camp was at 400mtrs. elevation with the river at 220mtrs. a really steep descent chocked with Horizontal scrub [google it] fortunately we found a clear ascent back, all for 0.15 grams. We were so knackered that we spent sunday morning at a spot were we could park next to the river, no gold but a nice sunny day. Next trip will be back to where we got 9 grams, as Two Toes says you got to be happy with a 2 gram day. I will keep you posted and try to get my head out of the water long enough to take some more photos, thanks for your interest. I'd like to see some photos of Northern California, same latitude as us.

3 hours ago, Northeast said:

Just getting into this myself.  

Interesting point.  Would have thought the cross cut crevices would have held significantly more 👍

Me too.  Considering what the old timers scraped out was laid down over millions of years, I wonder how much is going to get replaced over 1 big flood event or a decade or a hundred years.   

 

Do you use a pinpointer at all?  Less sensitive than an 800 coil but also a lot easier to fit into nooks and crannies.  

Has the water gone down enough to let you get in yet?  Infrequent rain events are just frequent enough and just heavy enough to be a pain in the butt here re: visibility and just a little too much flow.  

Hey N/E, I will revise that, crevices that run across are generally better, but we have worked one area where some of the crevices running parallel were better than some that ran across, they shouldn't be ignored.                                                             As to replenishment I think none of us will live long enough to say for sure, in other words I think it takes a long time. Some crevices that we worked last season had been repacked with dark heavies and compacted by impaction, but no gold. Last winters flood had however moved enough gravel and reduced the overburden to allow us to work some new crevices that were under three feet of gravel and rocks last season, the river is always changing.                                                                                                                          No we don't use a pin pointer, it's all by sight, the ideal ground has a crevice that can be scraped out to a bottom, slate and shale bed rock is sometimes not the best as it can be hard to find a bottom. Bedrock that erodes smooth with no cracks has no gold, obviously. For the river we work the best bedrock is Tillite, which erodes to a rough surface and has small cracks in the bottom of the crevices. The best crevices have cracks that are very tightly packed. No compaction no gold.                                                                                                                                                                                                         Our river is exactly where we want it at the moment high enough to mostly paddle the kayaks, but low enough to work safely. It gets tough when the water gets low, think about trying to drag a kayak while trying walk on rocks the size of watermelons. It could be comical for an onlooker, by the amount of times we fall over, but it's pretty testing on our sense of humour. The river we work by Australian standards is unusual, it flows through rainforest, so very few eucalypts, and therefore no tannin staining, so we are lucky to have clear water to work in.                                                                                            When looking on maps for new areas we look for what we call pinched areas, that is where the river is bounded on both sides by steep country, like a ravine or gorge, this results in a high pressure zone, characterized by deep water, where the river flows from there into an area where the flood water can spread out, the resulting low pressure zone is ideal for a drop out point for the gold. We work a large river so traditional drop out points like inside bends always have too much rock and gravel to get to the bedrock, Sniping is all about working the bedrock. Thanks for your interest N/E stay safe. Don't snipe alone.

4 hours ago, Tmox said:

What kind of abalone do you get?

Black lip abalone, what about you ? And Southern Rock Lobster. 

Great finds, amazing, just every once in a while I wish there was 39 million people in Tasmania instead of 450,000 !

1 hour ago, Gerry in Idaho said:

I still like eating steak and lobster on occasion, so need a few sales here and there.

Customer service = more sales. I get my lobster for free but I have to get wet, I'm getting wet tomorrow, I'll grab a couple of abalone for the entre'  

He's in customer service not consumer sales. 

When I was buying my nox 800 I couldn't decide between it and the GM 1000. I told him I was in Tasmania and therefore not a customer, but would like some unbiased advice, he did just that and answered my enquiries promptly and I think honestly. The answers I got from him and reading Steve Herschbach's excellent reviews, swayed me to the 800, a decision I haven't regretted. 

22 hours ago, geof_junk said:

I don't see any Eastern Brown Snakes, Tiger  Snakes, Crocodiles, Wild Camels, Pack of Dingos, Hoards Files and not the last, the DROP BEAR .... There is always some good points with these Creatures they scare many non Australian Residences away from OUR GOLD.  😁

..................☠️..................Grizzly bear

 

Taipans, Copperheads, Death Adders, Dugites, Box Jellyfish, Funnel Web Spider, Stone Fish, Sharks, Ivan Milat, Bradley John Murdoch..........

4 hours ago, Gerry in Idaho said:

Back in the mid 90's one of my buddies went to Australia to hunt gold nuggets.  He had a few days to site see and decided to swing the local beaches in Perth.  He was amazed at the amount of silver coins, including 3 pence.  No he didn't get any at 2 feet depths, but he did quite well.  It seemed back then everyone was more interested in the gold nuggets and not many people had caught onto the silver and gold at the beaches.  Now, it's a pretty well known thing though.

Yes I do agree a good cut into the sand and old swimming holes will produce.  I think timing is most important as I have done pretty well in Cancun after a storm and or even Lake Tahoe.

Not trying to steal the post, but the pics.. my buddy/I hunt at Lake Tahoe after some serious water movement.

The best coin, we didn't even know at the time was an 1870's US 2 cent piece that my buddy thought was a crusty quarter.  Besides that, a V-nickel, a few Buffaloes, some silvers and a few gold rings.

I always said if I go back to Australia again, I'll take my water detector and try to get some of the gold jewelry and old coins.  I still feel the majority of people there are not as focused on the beaches as the gold fiends.

 

Living in Idaho, I've learned to study old maps and finding the occasional lost or forgotten swimming holes, can be quite productive.

Thanks for the interesting share of the article Erik.

 

As a surfer I know that sandy beaches change after storms, the sand gets washed off the beach and into the water to create banks, the best time to surf. But as pointed out by others on this site, also the best time to beach detect. Tides, low swells and the wind gradually move that sand back onto the beach, given time. I grew up in Perth so I know it well, after moving to Tasmania in the mid 90's, I've made regular visits, always driving to get in a bit of detecting in the Eastern goldfields on the way. On one visit in 2012 my nephew and myself hit City beach in Perth, a well frequented beach by some of the many well healed locals that live in the mansions on that particular piece of coast. We had my Ex-Terra 705 and my Excalibur II so we did a bit of water hunting as well. I had high hopes and we gave it a good crack, spending most of the day, but we found nothing except a few ring pulls and some pieces of wire. I must have been 20 years too late, but probably and more importantly, there was a lot of sand on the beach so all heavies may have been too deep.

It does seem that people do well with coins on the beach, my experience is slightly different, seeing other peoples finds I don't do anywhere near as well. This may be due to location I detect in, Hobart, not known for beach weather. The other thing I have noticed is the large proportion of pre decimals that I find i.e. pre 1966, 25% of my finds are pre decimal, and all of my finds are proportional to the value, that is I find more lower value than higher value. Some sites I detect do have a large percentage of post decimal coins, while others like Sandy Bay beach near the city, have at least 75% pre decimal, what's going on ? I don't do enough beach hunting to say for sure but a pattern is emerging, some sites are throwing up a disproportionate amount of early coins, despite the fact that they are still well used in modern times, probably more so. Is that plastic card we all carry responsible ?  

4 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

Anyone that’s follows my posts knows I have not been evasive on the 6000 Vs Axiom. It’s just not my place to tell people what to decide or think. It's also early days still and not like I know everything there is to know, so people really should wait for more information if they can. That's not being evasive, that's being honest.

All detectors have strengths and weaknesses. There are no one size fits all solutions. None! I can’t stand fan boys and the “my detector is best” attitude. No, it’s not. It just suits that person best. My best might suck for you. What I try to do is clarify what a detector is best at. If you can figure out what a detector does best, you can leverage that strength to your advantage. Most people focus on negatives, but that’s just not me. I focus on positives by nature.

So yeah, depending on the person, the budget, the ground, the gold itself, the hot rocks, the trash, either the Axiom or the 6000 might be the better choice. I can be happy with either. If I could have only one for the next ten years, which to own? I lean 6000 but due to my situation it’s not a slam dunk. It might be for others, no doubt is. Versatility does matter to me however, and I plan on using the Axiom for beach detecting as much as nugget hunting. It is the more versatile detector by far. I’d really not recommend the 6000 for anything other than nugget detecting, though it can be used for other stuff, and Axiom fits the bill far better if you are thinking about anything but nugget detecting. If all you want are gold nuggets a GPX 6000 is a very safe choice.

The Axiom is just getting into customer hands now. Ignore the super fast Tubers just looking to be the first to have a video out, and wait for people who get 50-100 hours on the detector before thinking they have a clue what they are talking about. This will all sort out in the next few months I am sure.

Hey Steve thanks for you interest, I was never suggesting you were evasive, just that your second post to Ethan gave him more of your idea of the two machines, compared to the first answer. I'm also aware that you often comment on detectors like your excellent post on 22nd dec. Is The Axiom Our New King ???? thanks for that, hopefully Ethan read that. DP is a valuable recourse for all of us, your hard work doesn't go unnoticed, thanks.

1 hour ago, Ethan in Adelaide said:

Hey Jack i am probobly going to see second hand next week. 3 hour drive. Gpz 7000 for 6000 dollars built in 2019, just out of warranty. Either or, I think yes to master a machine is more important than thinking of which to buy. Will get back to you soon. 

Thanks, let me know how you go. Yeah that's the idea, do it.

On 8/7/2022 at 6:19 AM, GhostMiner said:

   April 29   1937

 

   We were all anxious to see the results of the weigh. After breakfast we went over to John’s work station and  John placed yesterday’s results on the scale. There was half an ounce which wasn’t too bad for 120 buckets. Not the glory days of last year but at least it held promise. We went back up to the dig site and told John we’d have some buckets down to him in short order. We were all hungry for gold and ready to work. 

   The three of us were getting a good channel going into the base of the hill. The problem will be that when we get in deeper we will need to brace the top to keep it from collapsing or we could just keep cutting laterally across the face without going in to the point of collapse. My way of thinking is that if the gold gets better the deeper in we go then we will cut bracing. We will be ok for a few days and will cross that bridge when we get to it. 

   We had buckets delivered down to John right quick and were building up a head of steam with the picks and shovels. It just felt good to be digging. Along about the third hour I noticed a color change in the gravels from brown to dark brown or dark red. I took a pan of this over to the wash tub and worked it down. I hollered over to Will and Hudson and they came over to get a look. Sitting there in the pan were seven nice pickers and a load of fines. This was rich. I told the boys that now we knew what we needed to follow into that mountain. I had a feeling that Whiskey Jack and Jed  were looking down on that pan with a smile and saying to go after it boys.

   We worked until dark and ended our day’s dig with 312 buckets.  When we got down to camp John said he was seeing lots of gold in the sluice. We were talking about the new dig site until we hit the sack. I can’t wait to get the results from John tomorrow morning. 

   TO BE CONTINUED .....................

As a sniper, as the clay or decaying bed rock in a crevice gets darker as you go down, your heart rate goes up.

So there you go Ethan, a less evasive answer from Steve. My post wasn't to convince you one way or another, I've not used either machine, it was just to point out what I know about the 6000 from a reliable source. I have suggested to you that asking questions is how we learn, the hard part is deciding which answer is correct. I also suggested that the more questions you ask the clearer the answer may become. One of the reasons I have been following your posts is that you said you were 'green' and was looking for advice, well I've been detecting for 45 years but when it comes to P.I. machines, I'm 'greener' than you. So I'm interested in what decision you make and how you go with the machine you choose, because I may be in the same position shortly. As Steve said in his post it does seem to be horses for courses, which would explain why people have a number of detectors. For me personally, the answer is becoming a little clearer, the Axiom does seem to have the edge, it appears to be more versatile.

19 minutes ago, Chase Goldman said:

Subject says it all.  Got a whole 5 minutes of quality run time before I discovered the defect. ML early production QC living down to expectations.  Simon you can add this to your ML quality list of grievances.  🤣  Will let you all know how it goes with warranty service. 🫥  Merry Christmas!

I don't want to start a whole new debate on companies and profit. But I will state my point again, 'when companies sole reason for being, is profit, they lose their way.' I will stand corrected but it seems that Minelab are subcontracting to overseas manufactures, probably to the cheapest. Garrett on the other hand are still making their detectors in the U.S.A. With due respect to the countries in question and I'm only commenting on subcontracting to save money, but ' if you pay peanuts you get monkeys'

9 hours ago, Gone Bush said:

A fair question without an easy answer.

Based on its performance today, at that particular tenement, I would say it’s the best thing since strawberry flavoured lube.
Based on yesterday morning, at that particular location, I would say same same as 6000 but much better on hot rocks.
Based on yesterday afternoon, at that particular location, I would say it’s a boat anchor.
Based on the day before that, at that particular location, I would say I would rather have the clap.

On some ground it certainly appears to be an over full bucket of crap.
On todays patch, I couldn’t have wanted a better detector.

Still have not determined the cause for such varying performance.
This particular unit may have a defect of some kind that, on hot ground, causes it to take a dump.
Have pretty much eliminated the usual suspects like coil, connectors etc.
Assumed from previous days/locations that choosing today’s location, (where 6000 needs constant attention to be stable), would confirm that Axiom is a faulty unit.
End result, as stated, was the exact opposite. 
Now I have to choose another location that I know is hotter than normal and try again.
Fiona has her 4800 that we use to gauge ground conditions so if Axiom has difficulty on ground that is relatively ok with a little bit of tuning on the 4800 I know there is a problem with the Axiom.
Just keep trying different locations and settings in an attempt to narrow down the cause.

Might resolve it tomorrow, might take a week. How long is a piece of string?
 

Keep posting your results, when you sort it out, give us a comparison, with the machines you are familiar with. I understand that christmas can be a frustrating time, when you need a part a or a service and every things closed till after the new year.   My first post was me just being popping my head out of my hole and being a 'Bunny'. For those that don't get the reference it's a term used in cricket by a bowler directed to a batsman who always plays defensively and so is not scoring but is hard to get out and therefore is not contributing to the game. In this situation a fielder may quip to the bowler ' bowl him a piano, see if he can play that.'

I'm finding hard to keep up, is it crap or, or do you have a crush, is it hard work or blowing you away dude.

Hey Ethan I see you're still asking questions, that's great. This is just my opinion so take it as you will, It does appear you are interested in the Axiom, I think a lot people are as well, if for the only reason that it will give Minelab some competition. I'm not going to comment on the Axiom I know nothing about it. But I am going to comment on what I do know about the 6000. This information is from my cousin who was a professional miner all of his working life. He had a dry blowing outfit and did exploration work with it for junior mining companies in Western Australia, when he wasn't driving his front end loader to feed his dry blower he was detecting, so was his wife. They have found a lot of gold and he's owned every Minelab P.I. machine that's been made, as well as running Garretts in the 1980's and early 90's. I spoke to him recently, he is impressed with the 6000 so is his wife. To balance the discussion he has never to my knowledge used an Axiom, and if he had he may be impressed with that as well. My point is someone who has found more gold than most people and has more detecting experience, 45 years, likes the 6000. 

On 12/24/2022 at 5:44 AM, Ethan in Adelaide said:

Hi Steve,

I really appreciate your reply and yes I will wait for while and see. Merry Christmas.

 

Kind regards,
Ethan

12 hours ago, Ethan in Adelaide said:

you are asking my questions Thanks Jack. I have been wondering if Axiom is ok for me, however I am a green hand here I have to say.

Hey Ethan, asking questions is how we learn, my experience is ask questions, the hard part is working out who's giving you the right answer, that's the bit you have to work out. I think most of the time, the more questions you ask, the more obvious the right answer becomes. As far as the Axiom goes if you put it in the search bar on this forum a fair bit of info comes up. A lot depends on where you are going to be doing most of your detecting, as far as I'm aware the areas around Adelaide aren't very mineralized. I have heard from a reliable source that they have had success with a VLF around Adelaide. A good VLF is a great starting point. And if you are going to W.A. in the future a backup detector is pretty handy when you are 2,500 k's from home if you do end up with a 'proper' detector. You did say you went to W.A. and found nothing, you wouldn't be the first even with an expensive P.I. machine. Knowing how to use your machine is important than having the latest bit of gear and not knowing how to use it. This has been stressed by better operators than me on this forum. The most important part on a vehicle is the nut behind the steering wheel. 

On 12/13/2022 at 10:17 AM, Reg Wilson said:

That is the one. I have a copy and have (as in the book) always referred to nuggets as those lumps of gold being 20ozs or better. Not tiny specks that require a scientific set of scales to even measure.

I think at one time, I read at what size a piece of gold has to be to be called a nugget, but 20 oz. ? Sorry Reg but if you are being ironic again, we need to be looking at you when you say it, to know. If you are serious then lets just say the standards may have dropped since 1910 when the book was written.

Ethan is looking for a second hand detector, as someone who's never bought a new vehicle in my life I get it. But there are certain things I may not buy second hand, detectors may be one of them. If I was buying a detector that I was completely familiar with then yes I would, but what happens when you have never used the machine before. There are many factors to consider here, The amount of money involved is one I guess, second hand GPZ 7000's and GPX 6000's are holding their value pretty well in Australia, is the saving worth the risk especially when you consider that if you haven't used the detector how do you know if it's working properly. If you are looking for older or cheaper machines then this becomes less important. As some one who may consider buying an expensive P.I. machine secondhand, I would like to hear how others have approached this and how many would never buy a used machine and why ?