Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links and I may earn a small commission if you purchase through these links. Searching for gold can be a thrilling activity but actually finding gold is harder than you might think. This is where sluice boxes can help enormously. Long, narrow, and portable, sluice boxes are tools that water … Read more
The thrill of finding gold is a big rush and can be a highly profitable activity. But locating those shiny nuggets doesn’t come easily. Luckily there are many products on the market to aid your exploration. Having the best metal detector for gold can make the difference between striking rich and finding trash. Not all … Read more
So tonight’s topic of interest is kind of near and dear to me, I’m going to start with the first slide; Rocks and Gold Clues. What rocks tell you about where to find gold, there are clues that they give and those are very important if you’re going to find gold and that’s what we’re … Read more
The dissolution of gold in ammoniacal solutions cannot take place in the absence of oxidants. Cupric ammine can act as an oxidant in this system according to Equation 3. The effect of cupric ammine concentration on the dissolution rate of gold was investigated in a solution of 0.6 M total ammonia concentration (0.1 M (NH4)2SO4 … Read more
One of the more common classes of ores containing gold is when gold is associated with pyrite, pyrrhotite, and arsenopyrite. This is the area of gold recovery that has probably received the most research and plant optimization support especially in light of the long history of South African industrial practice. From a reagent viewpoint, charged … Read more
Flotation The simplest method of treating a carbonaceous ore is the method described by R. W. Nice (1971) at the McIntyre Porcupine Mine where the carbon, which contains very little gold, is floated off and discarded. The remaining ore is then responsive to cyanidation. This does not work at Carlin because the carbonaceous compounds have … Read more
Unlike base metals which are readily soluble in mineral acids, noble metals like gold and silver require the presence of oxidizing and complexing agents for dissolution. Silver approaches base metal behavior in acidic thiourea solutions (Ag + 3Thio ↔ Ag(Thio)3+ + e, E° = 0.025 V) requiring only mild oxidizing conditions for dissolution. Accordingly, the following … Read more
I told you I wanted to do a panning video. So what you’re going to do is, I’m going to break this down a little bit differently. I’m not going to get real scientific on this; I’m just going to put it in plain terminology. Now unfortunately we are probably going to listen to gunshots … Read more
The simplest precipitation equipment for a small mine is what is known as a zinc-box (Fig. 150). This consists of a long, narrow, sloping, wood or painted sheet-iron box divided into wide compartments or cells which are separated by baffle-boards and narrow compartments. The bottom of the box slopes to one side to facilitate the … Read more
Mercury or quicksilver fed into stamp mortar-boxes and riffles or applied to copper plates has been for ages the method of catching free gold. Many millions of ounces of gold have been saved thereby, and the mercury has been returned to circulation with small loss. Amalgamation is still practiced, but the recovery of gold by … Read more
