Small Mining Operations
Mining for Gold and Sapphires in Montana
April 2014 by Chris Ralph
Fascinated by the sapphires—and the gold that occured with them—he was soon buying parcels of property and setting up his own commercial-scale gravel processing plants.
Proper Assaying of Placer Samples
The whole purpose of sampling mineralized ground is to measure the values in a small volume of material that would be representative of a much larger volume of similar material. The key word is representative. Chemical and fire assaying will not accurately represent placer deposits by themselves.
Subtle and Not So Subtle Dangers of Hard Rock Mining
I’ve been in enough mines to know better, and I mentally kicked myself several times. That was a close call…
Evolution Of A Desert Wash Plant
The water instantly dropped though the screen, leaving a pile of mud behind! I was so excited that I replaced it with a 150-mesh screen, and the same thing happened!
Fire Assay Finish by Silver Nitrate Fusion for PGMs
…my intent is to distribute this information in layman’s language so that even the “backyard/shade tree/mom & pop” fire assayers can benefit.
Dredging Do's and Don'ts
I’d start the day by crawling out of my dome tent, cooking up some Spam and eggs, and heating water for instant coffee on the Coleman stove.
Small-Scale Processing of Hard Rock Ores
Depending on the ore and if significant sulfides are present, a hard rock miner may be able to get away with simply using a flux to digest the other minerals that may be present.
Principles of Designing Your Mill Production System, Part I: Starting Up
One of the issues that prospectors run into when working to upscale from micro-scale hard rock testing to a greater production output, is that they often confuse individual devices or machines with systems.
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The Bawl Mill
• Ask the Experts
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• Ask the Experts
• Contrary to Rumors, Couple Will Keep the Saddle Ridge Hoard
• Finding Gold with a VLF Detector—Part I
• Creating Your Own Luck
• Over the Divide—Robert Michael “Mike” Corbley
• Continuing Hard Rock Exploration
• Recovering Fine Gold with Oleophilic Adhesion
• Detecting for Gold in Nevada
• Using Structural Clues to Locate Buried Placer Channels
• Gold Deposits of the Ivory Coast
• Melman on Gold & Silver
• Mining Stock Quotes and Mineral & Metal Prices
