How To
Ask The Experts
December 2015 by Chris Ralph
• How do I separate silver from lead ore?Hard Rock 101: Advanced Micro Blasting
They… create negligible fumes and much less fly rock than blasting. Below are some tips on maximizing your effectiveness with these tools.
Pocket Gold
Once a seam is found it can be traced for miles in either direction. While you are tracing a clay line, you are looking for indicators. The indicators that I look for are ironstone, hematite, different color clays intermingled with the clay line, and a very iron-rich, brown gritty soil.
Ask The Experts: Is there a safe DIY alternative to cyanide or mercury for extraction?
Q: With safety as a given, what can the average miner, or Joe-blow greenhorn do to identify and extract some metals or minerals with off-the-shelf products or natural ingredients?
Hunting for Hardrock: The Basics
Exposed veins and outcroppings can be a great source for gathering good gold ore for processing. Veins and outcroppings do require a lot of work to free the ore from its earthen grip, but this labor can be very rewarding.
Route Planning Using GPS
My intention was to end this discussion with waypoints and routes, then I found USGS maps of the Plainfield Quadrangle.
The 10-Ton Boulder: Expanding Grout Demolition
Imagine you have located a source of virgin placer ore containing immense gold value. Now imagine that there is a 10-ton monolith of extremely hard gneiss in between you and payday.
Lode or Placer: What Difference Does It Make?
This explains the large difference in particle sizes between placers and hydrothermal lode deposits, but also means that while the mining may be similar in some cases, the sampling and recovery techniques are usually quite different.
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