6 hours ago, TintedSnow said:

I got an email back from the GPAA just now. They said that they've been working on getting it unclocked. They're not sure on the status so they said to check with Joe Demarre, the head of the AK GPAA. I'm currently tying to find his contact info. Thanks for the help! 

I found this doing a search, it wasn't on the GPAA website and I think it's from 2010 but I also saw the same number on another website dated 2013 so I don't know if it's a current number but hopefully it is.

http://www.goldrushnuggets.com/goprclstdi.html

GPAA Kenai Chapter President – Joe Demaree (907)283-7808

I also found this on the GPAA website, doesn't look like Joe's e-mail but maybe "Debra" can get you in contact.

http://www.goldprospectors.org/Community/Chapter-Map/Chapter-Home/ChapterId/KENAAK

Contact

Chuck,

I agree at 1/10th the cost the paint would be the way to go and you should be able to re-paint several times from the same can as the paint wears off, be sure to lightly sand the shell before painting it for better adhesion of the paint.

2 hours ago, Ridge Runner said:

That Digger Bob is becoming a Movie Star. You'll find him over on MD-Blog showing how easy it is to find one of the new colored pinpointers from White's in the brush.

Chuck

PS When I go to Wal Mart and I don't see a price I say it must be free. Nothing was said about the cost of a new shell so it must be free. haha In my dreams.

Chuck,

If you visited the link for the colored shells at White's website you should've seen the price posted there.....a little steep if you ask me, but such is the price of plastic these days!!

TRX Replacement Shell – COLOR

On 10/9/2016 at 0:11 PM, TAZMAN1972 said:

What I would really like is if I could just accentuate the high ridges of gold that stand out in front of the dark like tiger stripes.  Is Wink like CLR but a bit stronger?  I never heard, does everyone think that it is ironstone covering it?  There is just a little bit of iron stained quarts on it too.

I also realized I put the weight wrong on it.  It is actually 0.69 ounce.  The next smaller one with the quartz is the half ouncer.

15 hours ago, AuWanderer said:

Tazman,

 

Wink has 1 %  Hydrofluoric acid  and works better than CLR...it will clean it up good.Just use precaution......

Here's what the product "Wink Rust Stain Remover" looks like because there are other "Wink" products and you need to get the exact product shown below for the desired results, the other "Wink" products will not do the job and also a link to the product's webpage, wear rubber gloves and don't get it on your skin, eyes, etc., also use a plastic container, Hydrofluoric acid will at least etch glass and after prolong contact it will eat glass, also at the link click on the "SDS" link below the product discription for the Safety Data Sheet, for safety precautions, first aid, etc., it states that it contains 1.5% to 3% Hydrofluoric acid, I have gotten it on my skin once before knowing any better but did know to wash the area well by reading the label before using it and I had no ill affects.

I'm also including a few links on 100% Hydrofluoric acid and what it can do to you, not good at all!!

I not trying to scare you with these other links I just want you to know more about the active ingredient in Wink Rust Stain Remover and how dangerous Hydrofluoric acid is when used in it's purer form which some of us do use to clean some gold specimens but with much greater precautions, Wink is relatively safe using the recommended safety precautions and first aid on the label or they wouldn't be selling it to housewifes to clean rust stains or at all to the general public for that matter.

https://www.whink.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=cEcommerce.Product&ProductID=4328

http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/ershdb/EmergencyResponseCard_29750030.html

http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/773304-overview

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrofluoric_acid

River rat,

The recipe can be scaled down to a portion the sized needed to feed only few people, and easily done in your own kitchen, so maybe you can cook up a pot for you and your family's dinner one evening!

13 hours ago, Rivers rat said:

Talking about crayfish a friend of mine in London (but she is from DC) use to cook tons of crayfish with spices corn and smoked saussages "Cajun Style" every events was packed !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!bottomless on top of that :)so you could eat tons!!!

 

 

RR

River rat,

We do the same thing here in the southeastern USA, only we use shrimp instead of crayfish and toss in some red potatoes, it has several different names depending on location, locally it's called "Frogmore Stew" named after a small fishing community near Beaufort South Carolina, some newcomers here and in most other areas call it "Low-Country Boil", I'm sure down in Louisiana and other Gulf of Mexico coast states they use the crayfish and also the shrimp version.

Try it you will love it!!

Frogmore Stew/Low Country Boil recipe

http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/frogmore-stew

Goldgrabber, 

I watched all 3 parts of your sluicing trip to Tyndrum, and there is gold to be had as your videos prove, good job!

Here in the USA if you find a gold bearing stream you can usually find a good bit of fine gold in the moss on the rocks which acts as a very good "miner's moss" or carpet and most times even better than what is in many regular type riffle sluices, I see in your videos that there's moss all over the rocks in the stream, have you ever gather the moss to see if any gold is getting trapped within the moss?

Here we usually gather a good bit of moss let it dry and then burn it and pan the ashes to get all the gold, but if it has gold you can get a lot of the gold but not all out by just breaking the moss up as fine as possible and agitating the moss in a bucket of water then remove the moss and pan the cons.

4 minutes ago, tboykin said:

As a guy who works at White's, I use this one (in Lime Green) - https://www.whiteselectronics.com/product/bullseye-trx-pinpointer-color/

I will also mention if you own one of the original black TRX pin pointer and not happy with the color you can order just the outer casing in any of the 3 new colors. 

https://www.whiteselectronics.com/product/trx-replacement-shell-color/

6 hours ago, Tom Slick said:

Great! Now we need foil condoms for our pinpointers. Well I guess we should be practicing safe detecting.

Well it only makes sense that that our pin pointers matches our tin foil hats!

The only detector I know of that will do what you want only works on sunbakers, it's the human eye!

19 hours ago, 1515Art said:

Paul, your coin find was very exciting and many people were interested and offered values for an old coin like you found much higher in China than the price listed by the dealers value information you attached... Unfornatuly, the one you found is not real. This info is from a big coin dealer/collector, the crudeness and mistakes in the writing show this as an imitation and probably made for decoration on some jewelry type item, or tassel. This would also likely account for there only having detail on one side and finding in an unlikely location for a coin of that type.

this was a lot of fun, so still a cool find.

clark

I agree that it's a replication, when I was checking around on the coin Paul found, I couldn't find one exactly like it because of the minor differences on a real one and the coin found making me think it was a replication.... but I found the site that Paul posted above and if you read carefully on that site about the real coin like the one Paul found they are indeed blank on the reverse, so the replica coin Paul found does replicate a real one in that regard.

All solid shot has a molding seam, sometimes depending on the finishing work (i.e, filing) done after casting may have made the seam less apparent on some shot.

I guess at some point someone could have milled square slots in some larger cannonballs after they were found to aid in moving them around.

http://www.pochefamily.org/books/SolidShotEssentialsMod.html

Some cannonballs were solid shot, all cannonballs were cast iron with the exception of a few lead balls, none were made of steel, brass or other metals.

https://archive.org/stream/ordnancemanualfo00unitrich#page/n7/mode/2up

All solid shot should be void of indentations other than pitting from corrosion, I have never seen or heard of a solid cannonball with holes in them square or otherwise.  

The ones that had black powder in them would of had a fuse hole, earlier ones had just a round hole for a wooden fuse, later ones would have a threaded hole for a metallic fuse, one such fuse was the Bormann fuse, see attached photos, the last photo shows the hole drilled to disarm/defuse/remove the black powder from the cannonball. 

Bormann fuse.

Bormann fuse in a cannonball

The above Bormann cannonball with a drilled hole to remove the black powder..

 As much as I would like to see that it was defused and saved as the relic it was, it's very very dangerous to do even for the experts which are few and far between, modern Bomb Squads aren't up to the task, or I should say the risk involved in defusing them,that's why they explode these relics instead, IMHO 1000 old cannonballs aren't worth the life of even one person.

The experts that know how to defused or risk defusing these relics aren't modern Bomb Squad personnel but are themselves historians and relic enthusiasts first and foremost, one such expert, Sam White was considered one of if not the best at defusing these old cannonballs, sadly he died in 2008 defusing a Civil War cannonball, this just goes to show how dangerous it is defusing one even for an expert.

http://www.americandigger.com/SamWhiteAccident.htm

http://www.foxnews.com/story/2008/05/02/virginia-man-killed-in-civil-war-cannonball-blast.html

One other expert at defusing these cannonballs that Steve may very well know is Steve Phillips of Southern Skin Divers Supply in Alabama who has gone to Nome for many, many years to dredge for gold both in the ocean and inland, Steve has the best way IMHO to defuse these cannonballs without risking someone getting killed, the risk involved is when one is drilling a hole in the cannonball to remove the black powder, one little spark and BOOM , Steve has build a shed and rigged up a remote controlled drilling press to do the drilling while Steve is safely out of harms way, once the hole is drilled there's no more danger involved, one has to just empty the black powder from the cannonball.

A link to Steve's website..(there's no mention of his cannonball defusing on the website, just diving, dredging, etc.)

http://www.ssdsupply.com/

Art, not meaning to burst your bubble, but you have read the date on the coin incorrectly, the coin you found is from occupied France during WWII and were only minted in the years 1942, 1943, and 1944, it was most likely brought back by a returning soldier, your's appears to me to be a 1943 and may have a mint mark on the reverse but I can't tell because of the dirt still on the coin, the mint mark "B" would be above the wheat to the left of the double headed axe.

Not great deal of value to these coins unless they are uncirculated and then only for the rarer minted ones.

http://coinquest.com/cgi-bin/cq/coins?main_coin=4123

https://www.google.com/search?q=1916+TRAVail+Famille+Patrie+1+franc+coin&sa=X&espv=2&biw=1366&bih=643&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&ved=0ahUKEwitwZjinKjMAhUF4SYKHe0KD3AQsAQIIg#imgrc=Wbvzsf1rvenriM%3A

Very nice nugget, sure paid for your new/used coil!

24 minutes ago, hawkeye said:

When this show started it was interesting to learn about what was going on offshore in Nome.  It showed a lot about the process and the clean up's. Then it became a soap opera starring a inordinate amount of folks with physiological hang up's and mental illness.  Then the looniest were featured in the under the ice version.

Maybe that's why we watched it. ? 

 I agree the first season was great, now it seems that the show only shows us the people with mental and or sociological issues, it's all about the drama for the Discovery Channel, the getting of gold is secondary, IMHO.

 I know a few guys that have been going up there for many years and they are nothing like the ones you see on the show even though they do experience some of the same issues as far as mechanical break downs, etc., but they expect them and are usually ready to fix the issues and get back to business ASAP, most years they do well and some years they are lucky to break even, but that the risk the take when they go there and know that.

On 3/27/2016 at 9:45 PM, Paul (Ca) said:

Thanks AU-Solitude,

Auctally, tomorrow will be it's first hunt. A local dry fresh water river bed, mineralization is extreamly terrible our VLF are gutless. Anything beyond 2-3 inches down IDs as iron with VLF, Pi's show no mercy depth is no problem with a good pi.

I'll post tomorrow's finds whatever they may be.

Thanks again,

Paul

Well how did you fair when testing your new Pi project?

Nice home away from home Fred, may you always park it right next to the gold!!!   

Amazing guitars, I would love to be able to own one of them!!

What i find more amazing is that in the photo of you playing your new guitar you look just like Eddie Cochran    (I pictured you as being older ), no wonder you wanted a guitar like his!!

Happy Birthday Lucky!

I gotta go and dig some bait!!

Your tongue to the Miner's Buckle is an awesome find, it's a very rare buckle, if no one has found the 3 other missing pieces I would be back out trying to find them!!

Here's a video  from Ron and Mark of Ca Relic Adventures of the same Miner's Buckle found by Mark, Mark found 3 of the 4 pieces of the buckle, he sent it to Leonard Short in Virginia to be restored who is a master at his craft!! 

This is the same Ron and Mark in the video posted by Deathray in his topic...  How I Got Poison Oak , Video

The final results of the restore is amazing, especially IMHO because of the patina it has after the restoration, not to mention that it is a perfect complete buckle now!

15 hours ago, Brett said:

Looks nice I'm am still unsure about this one it weighs 86ounces 

13 hours ago, Brett said:

I though it's look similar to this 

Since you are comparing the two photos, your piece and the real deal in the other photo, one thing to note, see the white knuckles and the intense grip the man has on the real gold, it's because that real piece of gold is very heavy, much heavier than one would think before actually holding it themselves, now to your piece, you're holding it very causally and light handed because at 86 troy ounces it only weights 4.3 Troy pounds, it's obliviously is not very heavy, I'm not saying your piece has no weight at all because it's a rock and most rocks are heavy, but they weight 1/8 to 1/2 what gold would weight for the same mass, if that was gold you would not be able to hold it as easily as shown in your photo as it would weight I'm making a wild guess at 15+/- Troy pounds.

Brett,

 Do you own any raw natural gold?

If not I agree that you need to get some gold cons/paydirt as mentioned so you know what to look for when you do actually see real gold in your pan.

I've been following along with Steve's Alaska dredging trips for a number of years via his journal, always a great read, almost like being there!