Shoalhaven river

[NickThadik]

Hey everyone, just looking for some tips on panning, sluicing the shoalhaven river. My mate and I have never been there and have basically no experience with looking for gold other then digging a hole and panning it haha.
Looking for some wisdom and knowledge from anyone would be appreciated. Cheers
Nick.

 

[DrDuck]

Hi Nick

go to the search button above (the magnifying glass) , and you can find all the posts about the Shoalhaven. There is a lot of info. Also search for Oallen Ford.

Regards

Chris

 

[Jaros]

Look at all of this mate.Great info.
https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=2113
Cheers

 

[DrDuck]

Also, there are lots of videos on youtube in relation to panning etc, and many focussing on Oallen. On most weekends there are numbers of parties there, and most of them would be happy to answer questions, or even give you some tips re panning. Have a look at the videos to get a feeling for the basic technique, and then try to watch an experienced operator in action. There is ample gold at Oallen, but most of it is very fine. If I were you, I'd not try to clean up you pans completely, but concentrate on getting down to black sands which can be taken home to practice with later. Pan into a tub, and it is surprising how many specks you can find (particularly if the gold is very fine) the second time through.

If you post in the forum that you are going to Oallen on a particular day, some members might tell you they would be there, too.

 

[GaryO]

Hey everyone, just looking for some tips on panning, sluicing the shoalhaven river. My mate and I have never been there and have basically no experience with looking for gold other then digging a hole and panning it haha.
Looking for some wisdom and knowledge from anyone would be appreciated. Cheers
Nick.

Oallen Ford is one place you pretty well can just dig a hole and pan , there is a lot of flour gold spread everywhere there. But as the others suggested read up as finding better spots will improve the amount and also the size.

 

[NickThadik]

Thanks very much guys! This gives me a lot of reading and I have been watching videos on youtube but will continue to do so.

What other areas within 2 1/2 hours of Wollongong could you suggest that I go and try?

 

[jamie]

a little bit more than 2 1/2hrs but tuena is a good spot too, i am contemplating going down to oallen ford tomorrow so if i do i will give you a description of my car if you feel like a chat, will post it here tonight if i do decide to go

 

[NickThadik]

Hi Jamie, thanks! Didn't end up going down today but I will definitely be heading there next weekend. Will be looking for somewhere quiet to dig to china and find some gold with my best mate haha.

 

[jamie]

i didn't end up going either mate, but next weekend is looking like a good option so far.
How did you go with your river sluice you were building?

 

[NickThadik]

All good, yeah next weekend is a definate! Haven't built it yet, that will be a job for Thursday/Friday night
We have the design on paper though so it should be easy to put togeather in a few hours.
Just a 3M length of rectangular 100x50 pvc downpipe $20.88 some 3mm ribbed rubber matting from Clarke rubber $15
A couple $1 brackets from bunnings
Some alloy pop rivets
and some 30x30 right angle alloy larger ripples in the from before the rubber mat. I'm hoping this works for the fine gold at the shoalhaven.

 

[jamie]

i am hoping to test my new high banker this weekend, just hope my little pump is good enough, if not i will have the river sluice with me

 

[NickThadik]

Oh yeah? Good stuff! What size pump have you got? Petrol or electric?
I was bidding on a 4 stroke 208cc water pump last week that went for $65 and I missed out because I forgot to check. Off the top of my head I believe it was a 5.5hp 25000lph pump everything inuded except for the lines.

 

[NickThadik]

And it was brand spanker! There's plenty of auctions for brand new pumps selling cheap on ebay.

 

[jamie]

i cant think of the brand of mine or the HP but its only a 1 inch 2 stroke, worked well on my other sluice but i am not sure how it will go on this one, i think i will be getting a bigger one regardless the small 2 strokes are a pain to deal with, i would prefer a larger 4 stroke that can idle away all day

 

[NickThadik]

http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&alt=web&id=321742443993

 

[jamie]

i ended up buying a thornado 2' pump direct from them got it the next day.
Are you still going down to oallen this weekend?

 

[NickThadik]

G'day Jamie, we are heading downt that way tomorrow morning at around 6am we are gonna hit some of the off-road tracks through bush land in my mates ute to get as close as we can then go on foot down to the river. Try to get to some sort of Virgin ground.
Being in our early 20s we're agile haha.

Just gotta make sure we don't jump onto someone's property by accident haha.

 

[K-Dizzle]

I'm glad I stumbled across this post, I am also from Wollongong and will be heading out the Shoalhaven river in next couple of weeks for the first time, now I have somewhere else to research, this Ollen Ford place

 

[reefer]

K-Dizzle.. i emailed you...i think...flam'n techno logic stuff hehe Reefer

 

[K-Dizzle]

Thanks for the email it was very helpful