most frustrating gold dig

We all dig some deep holes at times with the hope of pulling a big lump of gold but at least when the target is out of the hole the letdown is usually quick.
The story of this find in the pic below goes like this, I heard of a guy from a reliable source that this local had found some diggings in the Adelaide hills and had infact pulled some nice gold nuggets from, I researched this area and it was true that there was some lower grade gold found in that area in the late 1800s so I headded off for a look being a few KM away from Echunga it all added up.
The area only covered a few hundred yards in thick scrub and sure enough there were diggings, I detected this area for half a day only finding metal scrap, spoons, badge ect when I got a nice deep signal about 20 yards from the closest digging.
I must have spent a good half an hour to get it out of hard packed ground when I finally felt the weight of the target in my hand as i was scraping the bottom of the hole.
When I wiped the dirt off and gave it a bit of a wash, gold colour started showing through, I sat down thinking I finally nailed a multi OZ nugget but after a while released the colour was wrong, I think it has been smelted and is a brass or bronze lump, but has an iron coating and is slightly magnetic.
All other brass I have found is tarnished but this piece looks the same today as the day I found it.
I don't think it is a practical joke as the ground wasn't disturbed and not a well know spot.
Now it just sits in my finds bucket in the shed and reminds me of what could have been.
Cheers Mark

bugger MS it does look like gold it's a pitty...next time
cheers
stoppsy

Hi MS,

Interesting.

Cheers DINGO

The small bumps on it were from pouring the metal into a plaster mold (the air bubbles in the plaster were then filled with molten metal). It's possible that it was a fake used to salt the area by a claim seller. It's possible that it was a prank between friends. It's also possible that it's just a poor mixture of metal when they poured it (though the signs are there to show it was intentionally poured into a nugget-shaped mold. But it was certainly man-made. The Chinese were caught faking nuggets - which were identified by their poor color - back in the 1870s. Hard to say why it was there but it appears to be interesting. I'm sorry it didn't turn out to be solid gold for you. Perhaps do some tests to see if it's of any worth.

MS wrote:We all dig some deep holes at times with the hope of pulling a big lump of gold but at least when the target is out of the hole the letdown is usually quick.
The story of this find in the pic below goes like this, I heard of a guy from a reliable source that this local had found some diggings in the Adelaide hills and had infact pulled some nice gold nuggets from, I researched this area and it was true that there was some lower grade gold found in that area in the late 1800s so I headded off for a look being a few KM away from Echunga it all added up.
The area only covered a few hundred yards in thick scrub and sure enough there were diggings, I detected this area for half a day only finding metal scrap, spoons, badge ect when I got a nice deep signal about 20 yards from the closest digging.
I must have spent a good half an hour to get it out of hard packed ground when I finally felt the weight of the target in my hand as i was scraping the bottom of the hole.
When I wiped the dirt off and gave it a bit of a wash, gold colour started showing through, I sat down thinking I finally nailed a multi OZ nugget but after a while released the colour was wrong, I think it has been smelted and is a brass or bronze lump, but has an iron coating and is slightly magnetic.
All other brass I have found is tarnished but this piece looks the same today as the day I found it.
I don't think it is a practical joke as the ground wasn't disturbed and not a well know spot.
Now it just sits in my finds bucket in the shed and reminds me of what could have been.
Cheers Mark

Great read MS can relate to the sinking feeling when you recon the grd is undistrubed and it has to be gold.
Still an interesting find.

It's possible that it was a fake used to salt the area by a claim seller. It's possible that it was a prank between friends.

It does look like that might be the case, it could also have been used as a test target and by using a small bore drill the grd would have not looked distrubed.....but a lot of effort to go to for this.
Regrads
John

I fully agree it's man made but how very odd , I would have thought you would need a foundry to melt something like that, so whoever made it and put it there, sure put in a lot of effort ,it looks to it have been in the ground a long time and well before detectors came along.
Just one of those things we will never know and most times the history behind the things we find whilst detecting are interesting and part of the experience but that's not quite how I feel about this find.
Mark

You said the area produced low grade gold, well that looks just like some low grade (60% gold) I saw that was also found in SA but further north. If you haven't had it tested I would suggest you do so. Peter W Beck could test it for you.

Cheers, Jim

hhhmmmmmm! electrum is 70% gold+silver and that looks very light gold colour -- yours is darker than what ive seen at 70% but I would have it assayed first before you chuck it lol!

Hi , take it to one of those gold buying booths in the malls . they should be able to tell you if there is any gold in it . if its not gold it still is worth keeping . it looks like a couple of little balls

Murachu wrote:hhhmmmmmm! electrum is 70% gold+silver and that looks very light gold colour -- yours is darker than what ive seen at 70% but I would have it assayed first before you chuck it lol!

I didn't think of that, and I guess it could also be possible that a low grade ore smelted could be a mix of copper,silver with gold and was simply lost, I will get it tested.
I saw on the ebay you can get gold testers from the US that do 9,14,18 and 22K they show the listings can be sold to Aust but not sure with the customs here as the kits have acid, anyway will follow this up.
Cheers Mark

Mark

You need to hunt down a gold dealer that has a XLF scanner, that will give ya a readout in % of gold,
give peter w becks a call at ottoway near rosewater a call they will help ya...


Pete in WA

BTW sounds like you went for a hike into "seamanspoint'
PM me if need to on other good areas around that way

beepinpete wrote:Mark

You need to hunt down a gold dealer that has a XLF scanner, that will give ya a readout in % of gold,
give peter w becks a call at ottoway near rosewater a call they will help ya...


Pete in WA

BTW sounds like you went for a hike into "seamanspoint'
PM me if need to on other good areas around that way

Thanks I will do that Pete, you are very close , that took me back for a second , you do know your SA areas.
Cheers Mark

Looking at it age I would do a SG test. any thing above 11.3 (Pb lead) would have a gold percentage.

No problems mark
Cut my gold teeth in sth oz mate and have clambered many a hard mile thru the thick scrub round abouts,
you had much luck up at the my crawfy area by chance ??
once pulled a nice 7oz bit up that way back in 98.


Pete in WA

beepinpete wrote:No problems mark
Cut my gold teeth in sth oz mate and have clambered many a hard mile thru the thick scrub round abouts,
you had much luck up at the my crawfy area by chance ??
once pulled a nice 7oz bit up that way back in 98.


Pete in WA

Hi Pete
I have done quite a few trips out there but haven't come close to anything like what you found, mostly small stuff with a few over a GM, was working a slope near avenue gully and did well there for a while but when it's gone it's gone, also the usual spots like watts, speck gully.
I live over the other side of town {Blackwood} so Jup , and Echunga ect is heaps closer, The last 2 years I found it better to take off when work goes quiet and head over to Vic, always do heaps better over there and much more areas to work.
Mark

geof_junk wrote:Looking at it age I would do a SG test. any thing above 11.3 (Pb lead) would have a gold percentage.

I have done that with Quartz speci's , but with this piece did a displacement test verses weight per ml in water against brass , it did show up heavier but I put that down to the iron content as a rare earth magnet has slight attraction.
Thanks for the tip but I will get it tested just to make sure, I doubt it's anything but you never know.
Cheers Mark

Hate to get your hopes up with out good cause, but it does look like nuggets i have seen from Alaska (high silver content)

Took the piece with me this week to the Adelaide Exchange as was going there to buy some silver, asked if they could do a test on this lump to check for any gold content, they took it away were I couldn't see and came back and said they could only do a test for 22K and above and the result was negative but it took a while for the test colour to show up, she said due to the delay on this test it is likely that there is a gold content but it is below 22K and all they can do is send it off to be assayed which comes at a cost, I didn't bother and will try somewhere else who has the test kits that cover the full range, anyway I feel a bit more positive as there is a good chance I found something after all.
Will post the final result and thanks for all the advice which encouraged me to get this checked out as I wouldn't have thought it was anything of value.
Cheers Mark

Mark, Thanks for the update, it certainly would've fooled you when picking that out from the earth.

I would drop it in some acid and see what happens, if it all dissapears then nothing lost and then I would know my answer......unless you wanted to keep it of course for show and tell.

Cheers

Mark 22K is 91.66% gold. So things are looking good as WA gold is between 88 and 92% from most areas, where as a lot of USA gold is below 80% gold.

MS wrote:We all dig some deep holes at times with the hope of pulling a big lump of gold but at least when the target is out of the hole the letdown is usually quick.
The story of this find in the pic below goes like this, I heard of a guy from a reliable source that this local had found some diggings in the Adelaide hills and had infact pulled some nice gold nuggets from, I researched this area and it was true that there was some lower grade gold found in that area in the late 1800s so I headded off for a look being a few KM away from Echunga it all added up.
The area only covered a few hundred yards in thick scrub and sure enough there were diggings, I detected this area for half a day only finding metal scrap, spoons, badge ect when I got a nice deep signal about 20 yards from the closest digging.
I must have spent a good half an hour to get it out of hard packed ground when I finally felt the weight of the target in my hand as i was scraping the bottom of the hole.
When I wiped the dirt off and gave it a bit of a wash, gold colour started showing through, I sat down thinking I finally nailed a multi OZ nugget but after a while released the colour was wrong, I think it has been smelted and is a brass or bronze lump, but has an iron coating and is slightly magnetic.
All other brass I have found is tarnished but this piece looks the same today as the day I found it.
I don't think it is a practical joke as the ground wasn't disturbed and not a well know spot.
Now it just sits in my finds bucket in the shed and reminds me of what could have been.
Cheers Mark

This is an old post but finally got the answer to this old find, took some gold in today to P W becks to refine and also brought this piece in to be tested at the same time, No Gold content so I guess it must have been planted as a joke for someone to find.
Cheers Mark