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Oh not
another gold pan. This pan certainly looks different,
hmmm, lets see. The Grizzly Gold Pan at first
sight is strange. It has an unusual triangular shape and
has a hole in the bottom and looks like a
miniature sluice box. The construction is of hard
plastic with a number of built-in riffles. These riffles
on either side of the box prevent any gold loss and
forces the heavies into the bottom slot. Once at the
bottom, the concentrates including the gold, can be
taken out by removing a rubber stopper.
After a
recent trip to one of my hot spots I managed to bring
back about 20 l of rich gravels (I was hopeful) for
further concentrating. A good opportunity to test the
Grizzly Gold Pan. Having a "panners back" that
sometimes kills me, I do a lot of my panning and
cleaning up in my back yard in a large water tub. I do
this so that I can sit down on the job, nice and
comfortable, with a beer at a handy distance.
After
reading the instructions, I classified the gravels
through a 1/4 inch (6mm) sieve. The pan works best with
clean screened material. I plugged the hole on the
bottom with the supplied rubber bung, filled the pan
right to the top with the gravel material from my bucket
and proceeded with the next step.
Sitting
there comfy with my elbows resting on my knees, I dipped
the
Grizzly Gold Pan into the water to the top and
level with the lip, letting the water in. I kneaded and
stirred the wet sloppy gravels in the pan with my
fingers, letting off air bubbles. Next I started moving
the pan back and forth, left and right, first slowly
then with an ever increasing tempo. I noticed that a lot
of gravel started to go over either side of the pan,
between my fingers. I hoped I was not losing any gold!
Now and
again I would tilt the pan first to the left and then to
the right, thus removing more waste gravels. When there
was about 1/4 of gravels left in the pan I would tilt
the pan to one side and slowly let the water drain out.
The leftover gravels and gold concentrates remaining in
the pan. Next I filled a small pan with about 20 mm of
water placed the Grizzly Gold Pan over the pan,
removing the rubber plug and dipping the bottom
receiving cavity into the water. Only the gravel
material in the very bottom would wash out and fall into
the pan. After a quick rinse the rubber plug would be
replaced immediately and the Grizzly filled with more
gravels to repeat the process over again.
Second
time around I was getting faster and the suspense was
getting to me, I just had to have a peek. With all this
back and forth movement the gold just had to work its
way to the bottom with the other concentrates, once
more, into the clean-up pan for an inspection.
A couple
of swirls of the clean-up pan revealed some nice specs
of gold with some black sands. Wow! some of the specks
were barely visible. I am impressed. With the next load
of gravels I really went fast, whoosh, whoosh. There was
water splashing everywhere. I had to find out how quick
this Grizzly Gold Pan could fly. It is fast, I
have no doubt that it is far faster than my trusty round
gold pan. The manufacturers claim up to 10 times
faster than a conventional pan. On checking my tailings
in the tub, I was pleased on how little gold I had lost
seeing that I had really tried to go as fast as I could.
Using a
round gold pan, your upper body and rear end moves about
greatly, increasing fatigue and back pain. To use the
Grizzly Gold Pan most movement comes from your
wrists and arms, and it is possible to rest your elbows
on your knees increasing comfort levels, and oh
yes, don’t forget the beer!
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