# Best panning method



## ghettomom (Jul 30, 2013)

Hi everyone I need help so I can figure out the best way to pan out my ore ; is it the trommel , a shaker table , the desert fox, or the good old fashion method. Please miners help Right now I am panning paydirt


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## maynman1751 (Jul 30, 2013)

It depends on the consistency of your 'ore'. Is it rocky, crushed or cons from a sluice? We need to know.


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## galenrog (Jul 31, 2013)

I would suggest you put your question to any of the prospecting and mining forums available. Also look into any clubs that might be local to you.

That said, you need to answer the question put to you by maynman and also let us know how much material you have to process.


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## Pantherlikher (Jul 31, 2013)

Hi ghettomom
Congrats on hopefully alot of paydirt...!
Now, breath....slowly as the gold bug overcomes you like CL fumes...
Ok, I'm not a panner by any means but have a desire to give a go and have researched some.
From my understanding, it's not what works best period. It's what you find works best for you.
I've even seen a set up where there was a small trench and side walls built right in a stream bed. Water slowly poured through the trench which was aggitate and ore was poured into at the mouth. Water moved down the trench dropping smaller and smaller particles giving the panner nice rich panning ore.
The video looked like it worked perfectly for that person. I though by adding a carpet to the bottom of the trench would help to catch any flakes along the way. 
Of course, might not be a good idea if the water is freezing cold...
Give the youtub crap a looking over with searches and see what looks best for your situation.
B.S.
?Why reinvent the whole wheel when you can reuse and maybe make it better...?


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## blueduck (Oct 8, 2013)

Panning simply put is gravity separation by classification, or the heaviest particles sink to the bottom of a pan.

Pay dirt bags that folk purcahse on the internet are what folks in the business call "salted" and usually have a set amount of gold in them and the cost of those bags reflect it. un salted or non tested bags basically have little color if any in them for the most part, other wise the folks who purchase the salted bags would never buy another one......

There is a trick to getting all the gold out of the salted bags, and that is separation of material by various classification screens, none of which are inexpensive. I own a mining supply business and my plastic classifiers with stainless screens are all top quality and run $25 each plus shipping, I suggest to folks that are wanting to recover the most out of the bags they purchase from anyone that they seek out a way to classify their material and make it easier to pan. a #12 sieve will take the biggest particles out to begin with and those are easily panned by themself as a group no matter what the size is. then i recommend having several more screens to use, trying best to "double" the previous number to decrease the size of particle let go through. ergo, double #12 equals a 24... but available to us is either a #20 or #30, bigger holes in this case are better so a #20 it is, and so on. Most mining supply shops like mine sell the same classifiers, so you would end up with a set eventually in 20, 30, 50, 70, and 100 for finish panning. In my many years of mining i have collected sieves in both the "11 inch bucket sieves" which are plastic with stainless screen, and the "tyler equivalent" brass seives in 8 inch, which were designed to lock into a machine to shake similar to a paint shaker using a top lid and a bottom pan... they run more expense, as used they sell for upwards of $40.00 US each. I have made an observation though concerning cleaning, the brass screens will clean out a little easier than the stainless, however, the stainless 11 inch work quite well for most people in those 5 sizes. My brass set runs, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 100, 200, and 235 currently and I could even stand a 400 and maybe one between 100 and 200 [but i am picky]. 

In my experience where i am "sifting sand" and seeking the float gold on beaches locally here in North Cnetral Idaho, I find the bulk of my material ends up in the 50-70 mesh category, and ten pounds of concentrated material from 20-30 gallons i have prescreened thru a #4 or quarter inch mesh screen, will yield only about a table spoon of the 200 and -235 mesh dust [that which flows thru a 200 screen and does not pass thru a 235 is the 200 mesh dust] and from that, only a few are particles of gold, but its fun knowing that its there, waiting to be snuffered up into the pile of yellow gold to be refined.

Once your material is processed through those screens, panning gets really easy because no longer are you fighting specific gravity larger pieces of black sands against smaller pieces of gold and other heavy metals [like the platinum group. When everything is the same size, YELLOW GOLD WINS and sinks to the bottom and stays put, it will not be moved by other particles of the same size due to it being way heavier than what else is in the pan. By using the classification method, and hand panning, you can run through material very fast, and not have to use any mercury to recover the non-visible gold below 100 mesh screen size. for once you start panning that "dust" you will find that the gold shows up quite well to the naked eye even if there is any large quantity in your materials, which, most sellers of "dirt bags" never test for.

You wont get rich with pay dirt bags, but you will get experience in recovering the really fine particles which are more abundant in the wilds than those nuggets are.... and with experience comes the desire to strike out and find the motherlode... and its out there, somewhere waiting for you, or for me.

May you pan smile a bright yellow grin!

William
Idaho
http://www.diggitprospecting.com


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