2 1/2" header box wanted

[bugg]

Does anyone have a 2 1/2" header box for a 10" sluice they dont need....

[Hoser John]

Frank at Pioneer Mining in Auburn Kalif has'm for sale--John

[Reno badboy]

I don't quite understand. You just want a header box right? What width? And your putting this on a 10' sluice? I may have one. Contact me. Al

[russau]

its a 10 inch wide sluice he says.

[dickb]

Will a 10" sluice handle the water flow that a 2 1/2" dredge nozzle will produce? I would think the flow would blow all the material right out of the sluice.

I'm running a A51a as my highbanker and all I need to do is idle my pump to get enough flow to run it.



Dickb

[russau]

dick that depends on several factors. riffel size, riffel spaceing,water flow, material amounts being feed in, slope of sluice,and sluice width. i have a 2 inch venturi nozzel and use a trash pump and if i keep the eng. speed down and dont hog the material itll work ok and thats across a DFS sluice with an additional slick plate and a homemade flair.....and the height of the sluice off the ground.its hard to pump that material up hill without blowing it out/across the sluice.for best results ,you want to keep it nomore than 1 foot above the water.and less height is better!ill bet that creek isnt running that low right now!!

[dickb]

You can see I'm using a keene a51a sluice that is standard from keene. I added a RDH header box that is set up for a 1 1/8" hose from the pump. You can see the flow that is running through the sluice and if you look at the tub you can see the blonde sands being caught down in the tub. I'm classifing with a 1/4" screen removing all the big rocks from TC by hand after they are washed off. The picture doesn't show it but I have a 3/4" garden hose with sprayer attached that I use to wash the dirt through the classifier. I dump the classifier after all the - 1/4" gangue falls into the sluice stream, into a seperate bucket that I save to process at home. The tub washes all the mica, leaves, twigs, clay and other light stuff back into the creek and I same all the blonde, black sands and heavies to take back with me to process. I'm reducing about a ton of raw dirt to about 25% to take home. I'm saving both the 1" down gravel and the gold cons.

With a sluice thats only 10" wide, I don't think that the flow from a 2" dredge nozzle would be a slow enough flow to process in that small a sluice and still be able to produce sufficient vacuum to draw the dirt into the nozzle.

Dickb

[russau]

With a sluice thats only 10" wide, I don't think that the flow from a 2" dredge nozzle would be a slow enough flow to process in that small a sluice and still be able to produce sufficient vacuum to draw the dirt into the nozzle.

Dickb[/quote]
it will work if you slow the pump down and keep the sluice low to the ground to keep the pump from having to push the material up to the sluice,causeing the material to overload the sluice riffels.and with the nozzel you CANT hog material or it will load up quickly!

[Hoser John]

Both the keene 2" and 2 1/2 share the same 10" wide sluice box but bigger a foot longer. You must change your riffles to a high flow modified hungarian and remove all expanded metal from the box to prevent huge losses from under the knife edged riffles vs the flat style. tons a au 2 u 2 -John

[dickb]

Hi Hoser and Russ:

I can see how the larger riffles would handle the increased flow and the extra length would give added settling time for the fines to drop out.

I built a 1 1/2" suction nozzle for my highbanker but haven't had the chance to use it yet. Want to see how well it works and I suspect that it will require me to alter the riffle design. I may just build a 16" wide sluice to use instead though. That project is for further down the road.

I still believe that it's more cost effective to just buy a used dredge than monkey around trying to re invent the wheel. There are so may used ones for sale out west, just to bad that shipping east is so expensive. I'm a tinkerer at heart and enjoy the learning curve. If I had the money to just go out and buy new, it would probably be Keene's new 4" Mini. I think for what we have in the Carolinas, that it is about the best you can buy for fine gold recovery.

Lots of color in your pans and I'm saying my prayers that the rain will stop.

Dickb