Gold Panning

After you end up with around one or two cups of material inside your pan you will now need to grab hold of your pan with one hand and slowly tilt it downwards. When doing this make sure the riffles traps are in the lower part of the pan. You should use the other free hand to slowly hit the top edge of the pan huskily. You should bang it sharply as this will cause the bumping action to make the heavier pieces of metal (the gold or your practice bbs) down to the bottom of the pan. The concentrates that are heavier will also crawl up to the side of the pan as the bumping action takes place.

Little by little increase the way you are tilting the pan (downward) as this will cause the lighter material to gradually slip down and off the lower edge of the pan. However be careful to not tilt the pan too quickly because it will not allow the gold to settle down all the way. You will need to do this very slowly as this will allow the gold to settle all the way and will then cause it to crawl upwards back towards you.

If you do not feel sure while doing this, simply tilt the pan upwards again and group the material back together and start the process over again. You may at times be able to see black sand concentrates that might have settled or gotten trapped in the riffles when you bring the material back to the bottom of the pan. Just continue practicing as this will give you the necessary confidence and little by little you will see that you will get quicker at it.

Keep on bumping the pan and slipping off the unwanted debris until you are left with only a little bit of concentrates. Keep in mind that you should not try to pan the dry concentrates down as cleanly as you would in wet panning. You should be left with around one fourth or one half a cup of pure concentrates in the pan.