sweathog1 Posted January 4, 2016 Posted January 4, 2016 I live close to the Arctic circle, am semi-retired, was once a communications technician in the army at the height of the cold war, travelled alot, then went mining both (placer gold, and underground) Was self-employed most of my life and pay my own way. Made some money and lost some money 3 or 4 times. Been reading, and listening to the podcasts and youtubes, the body gets old and wore out, the memory is not what it used to be, so forgive me if I'm not as quick as the educated spring chickens on this media. 1
Lykourgos Posted January 4, 2016 Posted January 4, 2016 Welcome to the site! Do you agree with the libertarian ideas that you've been reading? 1 2
sweathog1 Posted January 4, 2016 Author Posted January 4, 2016 Thank you. I was very disappointed that Ron Paul didn't win the presidency down south. In our neck of the woods I do not see many differences between our political parties, be it liberals,conservatives or ndp. The differences are minute and all are engaged in vote buying in exchange for votes. As an old miner I believe we are extremely over regulated and that the majority of citizens are dependant on the government teat. The money has to come from somewhere and there are less an less of us producing and are gainfully employed. In short even the squirrels, bluejays and mice know enough to gather and produce during the summers to survive the winters. I feel sorry for our young people. 1
Stephen Jennings Posted January 5, 2016 Posted January 5, 2016 Hi and welcome. avid gold rush fan, you lived it, i'm so jealous.
sweathog1 Posted January 6, 2016 Author Posted January 6, 2016 Hi and welcome. avid gold rush fan, you lived it, i'm so jealous. Thanks, but you do realize that is a reality show. They once wanted to film some barging of heavy equipment across a lake. Several of us refused. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, imagine what a video would do. 5000 bureaucrats,25 departments,10 to 20 site inspectors would descent upon you including the coastguard with a magnifying glass. Anyways you don't get paid by the hour but by the yard, 16 hours a day sluicing to make up for the winter months when the creeks are froze. A lot of suffering too. Breaking through ice at -30 below, etc. Be careful what your jealous of, when you've done well for a few seasons you walk on water, if you've done bad for a few seasons your the dumbest thing that walks the earth. 1 1
Stephen Jennings Posted January 6, 2016 Posted January 6, 2016 I know how tv works.... that's why i'm jealous, because you get to live it.. But it's the closest i can get here in the U.K, they are pulling 300 yards an hr 24/7 atm on gold rush. BTW when you spend a winter crab fishing in the North sea you know what hard work is, i find plant machinery quite easy in comparison. People call me a Shire horse here, because of the graft i put in, i love hard graft. P.S if you think regulations are bad where you are you should come to the U.K, we aren't even allowed to fart without safety masks.
sweathog1 Posted January 6, 2016 Author Posted January 6, 2016 I'd say 300 yards per hour sounds good when your mining the investors or fooling yourself. (; Yes when your sluicing, and processing gold bearing gravels. But what about perma frost, stripping off 25~ 150 feet of overburden on the pay gravels, building settling ponds, digging them back out (when over the settable solid standard). repairs to machines. someone tells you 300 yards an hour, is really saying 600 yards an hour. The waste rock has to be put somewhere AFTER it's processed. Yes there are a few large enough to do that and pockets deep enough, but not many. Discovery Channel tv profits are 3 times the amount of the entire placer industry. Imagine a breakdown in equipment shown on the show, say a final drive failure, they will film it at least 3 times, taking it in an out, from 4 or 5 angles and take the best shots. Heard some of these guys DEPEND on this film industry, for equipment and o & m. No private self-sufficient operation could do that. Ref. regulations, For the last hundred years, meagre gold paying gravels were ground sluiced first before been moved. This is no longer possible if the gravels contain a lot of clay. Where there was once 50 mom and pop enterprises in particular areas there are now one or two left if any. 1 1
Stephen Jennings Posted January 7, 2016 Posted January 7, 2016 Again, i know how tv works, that's why i keep reiterating how jealous i am that you live the real deal. I'm not fooling myself i'm just watching a program about something i like, it's the closest i can get. As for the 300 yards per hr, the overburden is only 10ft and they have opened a "supercut" approximately 18 football fields in size, the settling ponds are still in place from the season before and they are aiming for 2700oz and well on track. They have had to rent 3 extra conveyors to move the tailings far enough away from the plant. I get it, these guys come in with all their funding and take claim rights from real miners, i can see why you would dislike the program. However it is entertaining to watch, and they don't mine anyway near the amount these guys do http://alaskaminers.org/major-mines/, neither do they have anyway near the funding. Discovery Channel tv profits are 3 times the amount of the entire placer industry. Just in Red Dog, Greens Creek, Fort Knox, Pogo, Kensington, Nixon Fork and Usibelli placer mines alone, they grossed 3 billion in 2011, a mere triple of what the Discovery channel makes off all it's programs per year, which is 1 billion gross. The real housewives of Atlanta make 2 million per season each, whereas the cast of gold rush make 500k per season, a drop in the pond compared to the profits of 2700oz. Jeez all i said was i was jealous of your lifestyle, and i enjoy the entertaining program called gold rush, what's your problem man? If it hadn't been for the capital letters in your last post coming across as condescending, i wouldn't have thought you had a PROBLEM.
sweathog1 Posted January 9, 2016 Author Posted January 9, 2016 Well, I see what is written will not be deleted, from the first post that you have made. I did respond, been shot before serving my country and have several children who graduated with more than a 3.5 average. Don't know if they will post this, if not It is not surprising.
fezjones Posted January 9, 2016 Posted January 9, 2016 welcome buddy. and what do you see that makes you so eager to join this discussion. do you have grandchildren that you dont know what the future holds for them?
sweathog1 Posted January 9, 2016 Author Posted January 9, 2016 welcome buddy. and what do you see that makes you so eager to join this discussion. do you have grandchildren that you dont know what the future holds for them? It surely doesn't look good. Yes I have grandchildren, I find it surprising to see them jump up and down all excited to see you as you pull into their yard. I wonder how they know your on the same side? They must be hard wired for it. I didn't have that, my grandparents were dead when I was at that young age. From what I've read, these discussions give me hope for the future...thinking people are rare what ever their opinion and worldview. From my own experience I know some professors have a captive audience and your papers had better reflect their viewpoint in the soft subjects if you want to advance. So I'm very interested with logic. Gold mining... sold some claims to one fellow, very rich property but deep, I couldn't get it with my machinery and knew it, he scoffed at me spent 7 million got back 1 million. Was just trying to be trufthful.
Stephen Jennings Posted January 9, 2016 Posted January 9, 2016 Gold mining... sold some claims to one fellow, very rich property but deep, I couldn't get it with my machinery and knew it, he scoffed at me spent 7 million got back 1 million. Was just trying to be trufthful. Did he use machinery?.... would using a water jet on the overburden been a cheaper way to get to the pay? I saw on the show, a little valley owned by the Schnabel's, it had 125ft of overburden. Parker Schnabel, Johns Schnabel's grandson used water jets, i don't think he made much profit but he didn't lose. He did it because John Schnabel hasn't got long left in life, and he always wondered what was in the pay below. The grandfather grandson relationship between them is amazing to watch, and surely warms the heart. They have been a family run operation for over 70 years, and to be honest after Parker took over from his grandfather he would have gone bankrupt if not for Tony Beets and the discovery channel. It's the same with the Hoffmans, another family mining business being propped up by the show. I can see why family run operations are suffering out there without the capital and good ground. Sorry to hear about you being shot, what war was this?.... if you don't mind me asking, i don't want to be intrusive too much.
sweathog1 Posted January 9, 2016 Author Posted January 9, 2016 It comes down to the amount of clay content in the gravels, how much clay is on top of the pay streak, alot in heavily glaciated areas, how much room you have for settling pond facilities, what the settling standards are(suspended solids as well) salmoniod stream classifications are much stricter, how much water is available for hydraulic mining. Know one fellow that has an entire mile of settling ponds below him Btw entire gold production in the Yukon was roughly 60,000 ounces, 50,000 ounces came from the Dawson area. (last years figures) Didn't know discovery channel grossed that much, had heard 3 times as much.
Stephen Jennings Posted January 10, 2016 Posted January 10, 2016 Yeah i looked it up, it's worth watching for me because of the family bonds in the show, especially the Schnabel family. I'm not sure about the Dawson area... is that part of the Klondike? In the last episode they mentioned how they needed permits to pump water from the creek to the settling ponds, because of the dry summer this past year Hoffman lake was evaporating. Do you have any experience with sea dredging? BTW with regards to permafrost, i saw in a series years ago that the pay was frozen solid, they took the trees which had been taken down from the overburden, and made a massive fire on top of the pay, the next day it was good to mine. Did they break any rules here because since then i have seen people with the same problem, yet they never repeated that solution?
sweathog1 Posted January 10, 2016 Author Posted January 10, 2016 Yes, the Klondike River flows into the Yukon River, this is where the town of Dawson is located. The famed gold creeks flowed into the Klondike River within 10 miles of the mouth where these two rivers meet. Perma frost. the old timers when digging prospecting holes would build fires in their pits overnight ....advance 6 inches downwards each night. Building fires is useless unless prospecting. Generally you must strip 2 to 3 years in advance before mining and let the sun do the work. If you have very deep pockets and are inexperienced, some wear out several pallets of bucket teeth and cutting edges. (They paint them yellow for a reason) Dredging with high pressure pumps only works good in sand. In coarse gravel they tend to plug up.
bschu Posted January 10, 2016 Posted January 10, 2016 Hi! I am new to the board too. I'm curious where you traveled as you say you traveled after the army? I was in the US Navy from 95' to 98', I did a minimum serve time to get the GI Bill then went to college. Worst years of my life the Navy I mean.
Stephen Jennings Posted January 10, 2016 Posted January 10, 2016 LOL yes i have seen them wear a few teeth on the d10's ripping up the perma. With the dredging i was on about sea, e.g Nome. You every had any experience with that?
sweathog1 Posted January 11, 2016 Author Posted January 11, 2016 Hi! I am new to the board too. I'm curious where you traveled as you say you traveled after the army? I was in the US Navy from 95' to 98', I did a minimum serve time to get the GI Bill then went to college. Worst years of my life the Navy I mean. Saw some of your country, Oregon, Washington, Montana,Dakota, Nevada, Alaska,Hawaii most of the European countries, liked Italy the best, drove by car down the Mediterranean coast up the Adriatic coast, Rome and all the wild cats, Switzerland, Cypress un stuff, France, trained with the French commandos. English stout beer in the pub , Belgium,Holland, stationed in Lahr Germany Just not the east bloc. All across Canada . Army some real good people but also some real assholes. Mostly good people still communicate with a couple of them. Did the traveling both while serving and afterwards. You guys ask to many questions and I've said enough about myself. LOL yes i have seen them wear a few teeth on the d10's ripping up the perma. With the dredging i was on about sea, e.g Nome. You every had any experience with that? Nope, but have used one in streams.
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