Dolly Pot

Introduction

When metal detecting on the gold fields it is possible to find gold still encased or attached to quartz. Often a piece of quartz will give off a positive signal on the metal detector, indicating the possible presence of gold. At times the gold will be clearly visible as specks, seams or veins. At other times it will be hidden inside the rock or present as very small gold flecks. A good quality 10x folding loupe will help greatly. The decision to smash up a gold specimen in order to extract the gold will depend on the size and beauty of such a piece. The reason we want to separate the gold from the quartz is that we may want to sell the gold. The gold buyer does not want the worthless quartz component.

What not to smash up
A piece of quartz with lots of gold showing and interesting shape would have to be preserved intact as a valuable collectors piece. Specially if it is snow white quartz, clear or crystal quartz, get advice as it could be quite valuable. The amount of quartz maybe of little importance but sometimes it may even increase its geological collector value.

What to smash in the dolly pot
All suspect quartz pieces with very little gold showing of no interesting shape and colour.

What you need

Quartz specimen  showing colouration

 How to do it

• WEAR SAFETY GLASSES Break up your larger rocks into manageable smaller pieces about (20mm) on a hard surface like a concrete path. On large chunks use a sledge hammer or a smaller heavy crack hammer on the smaller pieces. It helps to cover your rock with a piece of old cloth or hessian bag to contain any flying rock chips. By studying the quartz beforehand look for a weak spot where it might crack more easily. Sweep up your rocks and select suitable pieces for the dolly pot.

After breaking into smaller pieces, richest piece shown

• Place one or two pieces in your dolly pot and start pounding to a small enough grain size to free up the gold from the quartz. Sieve all your fines into a gold pan. Any material left in the sieve must be dollied again. If the gold is very small you will have to pound it even smaller to fit through a smaller sieve. This may require a second pass. If the gold is larger or in seams just pound enough to free from the quartz and pick out by hand. The consistency of your fines would vary between powder and the minimum mesh size of your sieve (about 1mm).

Dolly pot with sieve and gold pan

• Pan off normally into a tub to separate your gold from your quartz material.

After panning off, beautiful gold

Mercury was used in the old days to trap the finest gold that was too difficult to pan. In modern times the use of mercury is frowned upon on environmental and health grounds and not recommended.

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