Im after a sluice

There's so many on the market. Can anyone recommend a sluice that's fairly priced and not too big please?

These aren't cheap https://highbanker.com.au/collections/sluices/products/8-inch-gold-sluice
But they come with the dream matt which is fantastic.
There wont be a learning curve like there will with riffles/carpet.

There is this type that some don't like http://luckydans.com.au/product/le-trap-gold-sluice/
I have heard some bad things but some good.

Then there is the Mckirk which gets good reviews http://www.prospectingsupplies.com.au/products/337-eldorado-stream-sluice-medium-all-new.aspx

Then there is this cheaper, but way less user friendly sluice http://www.prospectingsupplies.com.au/products/305-eldorado-medium-river-sluice-austmade.aspx

I personally would choose the gold rat one, I recently converted my banker to dream matt and it just makes life so so easy and it's more effective with capturing gold.

I've a bazooka super mini if your looking to buy

Plus one vote for anything with dream mat.

I too believe in the dream mat.
In saying that, the Angus range are great too.
They are light and easy to carry.
And a smaller one will cost you about 100.
If you have a little more coin.
The goldrat, is really good, and you wont be disappointed, clean up in both is really easy, as you don't have to many things to pull apart and put back together.

lukem said:

I've a bazooka super mini if your looking to buy

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Any chance if posting a pic please?

Silly question but how do you keep the bilge pump power running for a day without the battery going flat?

What type of battery do you use?

No silly questions here mate :Y: Just silly people :|

With a sluice you normally rely on the river flow to process the material. Thats why they have a big flare at the front, it's to catch more water going in.
If there isn't a lot of flow where you are you may have to dam up a section to direct as much water as possible into the sluice.
Like this one from gold rats site.


You often use a bilge pump or a petrol pump with a highbanker, but that's run up on the creek bank normally and dirt shovelled into it.

Usually with a sluice you classify the material first and put small shovels in slowly.
A highbanker you can throw raw material into it, but they are bigger and costlier and heavier etc.

But going back to the question on batteries, you just need to bring enough to run it for how long you plan to run.
I use two 40ah batteries and I get about 3 hours out of them. If you carry much more than that you'll struggle through the bush pretty bad.
If you're near the vehicle just keep going back and forth to get fresh batteries. 40ah is a handy size I reckon. Or just get a 1.5 inch petrol transfer pump.

Dont need to classify with the dream mat. One of its many advantages. I try to pick out anything bigger than a golfball however.

itsdw said:

Dont need to classify with the dream mat. One of its many advantages. I try to pick out anything bigger than a golfball however.

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Yeah, that's why I said "usually". Apparently the dream matt doesn't get too much blown out by bigger material going through.
I wouldn't try that with other types though.

You say it's not cheap but at $230 it looks like great value. The couldn't be much profit in there for the guy building it.

Yeah, I should have said not cheap compared to similar looking sluices with riffles.
As that one has the dream matt it makes it far superior, and yes it is good value if you compare it to a riffle/carpet competitor.

itsdw said:

Dont need to classify with the dream mat....

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I would be. Why would the goldrat highbankers classify to the size they do before the mat if it makes no difference?
Jon

I use and can recommend the GoldRat product, as for classifying, usually better if you do, I do it just to save battery power, classify dry/wet stuff for a couple of hours then run through the sluice 9and then repeat), allows use of a smaller battery.

That being said have also just dug and sluiced straight out of the creek ....... check out the video

https://www.facebook.com/Highbankers/videos/731379773676642/

Depends on water flow, wouldn't recommend doing it that way with insufficient water.

Cheers Tom

Oops ...

Just sold this, worked really well and not too tiny like some of the little ebay highbankers.

Welcome goldfreak it'd be great to hear about your travels in the introduce yourself thread https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/viewforum.php?id=18. Your banker looks brand new, why would you sell it?
Jon

yes, I probably should not have sold it. I bought the letrap sluice this is built around of ebay a few years ago, I wired the bilge pump it runs on to plug into a 12v battery pack which was great until The battery pack was stolen from my car :-( The letrap sluice is a great shape for catching tiny to chunky gold but it is very thin abs and flimsy so will twist around in a stream and bend if you try to pin it down with a rock. It would have been a great sluice if they just used thicker plastic. That is what motivated me to convert it into a high banker which worked a lot better than I expected. Most of the gold I found is within a day's drive of Cairns. I will be back up there in a few months.

Never answered your question about why I sold it ? I Live with a hoarder and thought getting rid of one of my few possessions would make my life better. I was wrong lol.

blisters said:

itsdw said:

Dont need to classify with the dream mat....

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I would be. Why would the goldrat highbankers classify to the size they do before the mat if it makes no difference?
Jon

Click to expand...

Hey blisters good question this one. Fact is the dream mat will run unclassified does that mean you want to slow your feed and put more water to move bigger rocks if you dont have to? Heck no classification is still key in volume and recovery. The main reason for classification and why i use perf plate instead of grizzlies is rocks like shale and slate whi h have a large surface area and tend to plonk flat and overburden and system. Whereas with a sluice im working with the sluice getting my hands dirty and will easily move a bit of slate down the system. A hopper on a highbanker isnt so easy to see whats going on.

Additionally perf slows down clay and dirt that may not have got enough time to break down so yoi can push it back up into the spray bars rather than let it tumble through the system and out the end.

Which is another good point just because you find gold in your tailings doesn't mean the sluice lost the gold... it has to be free in the first place and gold can stay stuck ina lump of dirt if not worked properly i always expect to see some gold in my tailings.

Heck its a game of volume and quality ground at the end of the day.