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Sluice boxes: where to buy

A sluice box is the simplest machine for washing more gravel than a pan can handle, and it needs no engine: you set it in the creek and the current does the work. You shovel gravel in at the head, the water carries it down the open trough, and the riffles across the floor create small eddies where the heavy gold drops out while light sand and pebbles wash away. Under the riffles, most modern boxes have a mat, such as miner's moss or ribbed V-matting, that holds the fine gold.

Riffles come in several styles, such as expanded metal, Hungarian riffles and drop riffles cut into the floor, and builders mix them to suit fine or coarse gold. The box sits at a gentle slope, usually somewhere between one and two inches of drop for each foot of length, and you adjust slope and water until the gravel keeps moving without white water: too slow and the riffles pack with sand and stop catching anything, too fast and fine gold washes straight through.

A sluice has no hopper and no pump, so it only works where the creek has enough current, and it runs best on gravel screened beforehand, usually to 1/4 or 1/2 inch. When black sand builds up behind the riffles, it is time to clean up and pan out what the box caught. Sluices are made in aluminum, steel and plastic, and many come from small shops whose builders can tell you which riffles and mats suit your gold.

4 shops across the US that sell sluice boxes, 1 of them building their own. Each one links to its own website, so you can compare them one by one.

AllShips nationwideArizona

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