- 10 hours ago
Gold Rush- Mine Rescue with Freddy & Juan Season 6 Episode 10
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00:03it's what you get when you play outside on this episode of mine rescue looks like more rain's
00:10coming it's all hands on deck to save a veteran run dry mine running a dry plant it's got to
00:17be
00:17100 dry he's losing gold all over the place overrun by monsoon rains it keeps doing this
00:25every day we're in deep trouble but with crew tensions high listen let me handle it anything
00:34that he's brought up here is none of the flattened out stuff that was to dry we really need freddy
00:39and
00:39one's help freddy and one must devise new tactics look how hot this is we've never built anything
00:46like this to even the odds fire her up oh look at that that's a beautiful piece
00:54they're our final hope
01:07what kind of figures how long we're going to work on a dry plant and now a monsoon's supposed to
01:14be
01:14coming in on us dry mining it's a tough game they're saying we could get three to five inches of
01:21rain
01:23deep in arizona freddy and juan respond to a desperate call for help at a claim run by a
01:32group of military veterans with a great cause
01:39how's it going guys good good good larry yeah nice to meet you how are you all right larry pleasure
01:44larry freddy here's your mine huh it's the dust bowl there you go yeah dry plant yeah not so much
01:50today though a lot of rain yeah so larry do you own part of the operation then yeah i'm full
01:55-time
01:56mining with them so how long have you guys been mining here for about a year now okay how much
02:00gold have you been able to collect about 10 ounces 10 ounces 10 ounces what's your best day 13 grams
02:05out of how many yards 130 that's not real good we know yeah what's your goal this year 80 ounces
02:12and where are you at right now uh we're not even over an ounce
02:17do you have any gold we can look at yeah i got some right here
02:21yeah it's fine gold we know we lose a lot especially on fine gold yeah
02:26and there's definitely an acceptable loss but when it comes to dry mining that loss is huge
02:30with gold prices the way they are now every spec counts every time we pan our tailings we find gold
02:37i'm a navy vet i was an operation specialist did two trips to vietnam but gold it always fascinated me
02:47after 10 years in the navy and four decades running a successful business larry walked away from retirement
02:56for one last mission my dream for veterans is that they have a safe place to integrate back into
03:06the civilian life to learn new skills i've learned as i did in the military that teamwork is so important
03:15to make his dream real larry poured his retirement fund into this 20 acre claim the cost to keep the
03:23equipment uh the rentals is quite scary we really need freddy and juan's help now we've borrowed to our
03:32limits soon uh it's going to be more on the break it in than to make it in you have
03:39a group of guys
03:39that you're helping out are those the vets you're talking about yes uh we got about five veterans the
03:43end dream is veterans can come out here and learn heavy equipment operation learn mining we have to
03:49get the gold right first to be able to do that how much do you have invested in this operation
03:53a little
03:53over 120 000 personally and uh 160 000 worth of equipment and loans okay that's substantial rentals
04:04alone costs us 16 000 a month and our fuel bill is well above eight grand each month the vets
04:11need to
04:11pull 24 000 worth of gold each month just to break even so you got a lot of people's money
04:18on the line
04:19yeah not only money but potentially a lot of people's future you know what do you think before
04:24it rains let's do a two-hour test huh sounds good yeah you got people out here that have their
04:30life
04:30savings tied up in this and uh they're trying to help people and help themselves at the same time
04:36but if you go broke in that process you're helping nobody there we are got a nice little dry wash
04:42plant
04:42huh yeah we got a five box plant we can only run about 10 to 15 yards an hour desert
04:49mining is synonymous
04:51with dry washers which rely on a process of air and vibration to separate gold from the material a dry
04:59plant is up to 15 percent less efficient than a wash plant but allows mining in places with little to
05:08no
05:08water so you guys going to start hauling paint uh larry basically runs the whole pit operation well
05:16let's run it before the rain hits the forecast for today is showers and then downpours always rain
05:23on the worst possible times every time we try to run the planet wants to rain let's get running let's
05:29go
05:38first bucket line
05:39a noisy little guy kaden feeds pay onto a five and a half foot vibrating screen where material drops into
05:56five blow boxes which use air and vibration to force tailings out leaving the heavier gold behind
06:08the tough situation here see the little dust storm that's pay dirt blowing he's losing gold all over
06:15the place we don't get this working a lot better for us everything's at stake we're going to lose the
06:23mine and we're never going to be able to help the other veterans out i come from a long line
06:30of
06:30military my grandfather was drafted into vietnam my great-grandfather was in world war ii and my
06:37father was special forces and i was in fort gordon georgia and fort hood texas after leaving the army
06:45caden teamed up with larry and formed the veteran mining company focused on making a difference i've lost
06:53military friends due to ptsd and what i've seen work is getting a group of guys together and doing
07:01something to give them a sense of purpose once again but if we don't get our plant functioning a lot
07:07better i don't think we're going to be around another month there's quite a few issues that i'm seeing
07:16you know one of them is the feed uh secondary you know the way it's distributed to the sluices
07:22and then breathe the sluices themselves another day in the neighborhood
07:34500 yards away in the pit the crew stockpiled pay led by larry in the 440 excavator
07:44i worked my whole adult life saved money for retirement and once i got
07:51creating something for the veterans i decided to go all in on it
07:59larry's team in the pit are army vet jim porcho on the skid steer and navy mechanic turned miner
08:07tim searson on the loader you know larry any way you look at it this is still better than a
08:12good day on the flight deck you know what i mean yeah army's used to dirt so every day is
08:19a good day
08:20in the dirt for them roger that i've got about 35 000 invested and that's a significant sum of money
08:29for my wife and i tim moves the freshly dug pay across the pit we can bring veterans on the
08:37ground
08:37out here and man i can face my creator and say yep i helped do that but you know an
08:43operation like this
08:44we've got our share of problems
08:48i wish i had a nickel for every load that i ran through this thing
08:52jim screens material through the grizzly
08:58i've always liked running equipment i did not anticipate eating quite as much dirt though
09:08next he lays out the painter in hopes of drying it before it's screened
09:14he can pick up and move it over to the plant roger that once screened tim picks the pay up
09:21again
09:21taking the material to the plant for caden to feed
10:04the material is just damp enough that as it's rolling in there then it gets stuck in those doors
10:08i keep having to get in there with a screwdriver to break it apart
10:15did you not have any other stuff that we flattened out yesterday despite best laid plans
10:23so none of that material that's been flattened out is up here right now no that was all was classified
10:28what pay has been mixed in and taken to the plant it's all soaked he told me to say i
10:35just just let me
10:37handle it larry can you come with me on this one anything that he's brought up here is none of
10:45the
10:45flattened out stuff that was to dry he's got that still stacked all the time you're saying how this
10:51guy's incompetent this guy can't do this this guy because it's because it's what i see
10:58today's day none of this stuff is dry we don't always see eye to eye we butt heads on a
11:09lot of
11:09things but i try to take as much pressure off as i can i wonder if the front might be
11:15a little drier
11:21it's probably still holding that moisture from that monsoon yeah it's dry here okay i'll start
11:28pulling right here you know you would think out here in the desert we wouldn't have a problem with
11:31moisture but with a pile like this that moisture gets locked inside so uh yeah it's a massive problem
11:45right now why the heck is that thing not shaking
11:56at the dry plant there's another snag
12:03vibrators overheated
12:07the vibrator that clears tailings from the screen keeps cutting out
12:15we're at an hour and 45 right now well let's call it i guess
12:29uh we got rain coming in we got to get the plant cleaned out and we got to get this
12:33pay covered
12:33before it starts pouring down you know looking at the equipment that he has around here it's easily
12:38twenty thousand dollars a month well here don't let me spill that let's keep the gold
12:45they haven't made enough money to be able to really cover even one month of rental
12:49my opinion this operation is just days away from going broke
13:08how's it going guys good morning good morning after a stormy night at the veteran mining company's claim in
13:16Arizona well it was nice earlier than a rainstorm now it looks like more rains
13:22coming that unpredictability causes us a lot of problems the crew weighs the
13:28gold from the abandoned to our test well let's see your gold well that's what we
13:34got well that won't pay the bills that's for sure 0.02 guys that's not good
13:56you can call it $60 in gold he probably burnt $200 in fuel in that two hours yesterday after
14:04expenses this way leaves a monthly loss of $16,000 if we don't have better results we're not gonna be
14:14around much longer I wouldn't be discouraged though you guys want to do this to be able to
14:19help vets we love the idea you know I think there there could be a possibility here to do that
14:24but
14:25I think it's gonna be a whole change of process we'll go put our heads together and yeah try to
14:30figure some stuff out here better days ahead let's do it we'll see you guys back in the day
14:35thank you okay thank you we're not gonna survive if we keep getting clean outs like this we can't
14:42even pay for our fuel yeah there's a whole lot riding on this but we're not a group that it
14:48takes
14:49failure lightly the reality is they're our final hope to keep this thing alive well they got a lot of
14:57bad
14:57things going on here the whole operation needs revamped doesn't have near the eccentric in it
15:04to get that material going down right well that dry wash box that screen on a lot of those is
15:10actually wore out holes in them there's a good chance we're losing a lot of that fine gold exactly
15:14that material is too wet you know especially right now yeah if it's gonna be a dry plant you're gonna
15:18run pay has to be dry 100% dry not damp not moist dry so what I'm thinking it's gonna
15:26require planning
15:27but build a heating pad in order to be able to dry that material you know we're gonna have to
15:31heat it
15:32from the inside out it's gonna be on a pile and heat rises yeah I think the biggest thing is
15:37damp
15:37material well let's go talk to them let's do it we just got an ancient rain last night well if
15:44it
15:44keeps doing this every day we're in deep trouble from mid-June to September in Arizona intense summer
15:52heat creates low pressure that pulls in moist tropical air over the Gulf of California creating
15:59heavy monsoonal thunderstorms this year late season heat has brought even heavier rains onto bone dry ground
16:09creating disastrous conditions for dry washing how's it going guys it's going genuinely there's a lot to
16:22do a lot every step of your process needs help okay the damp materials really got us worried you know
16:28because you know you're running a dry plant it's got to be 100% dry yeah we've been fighting yes
16:34we
16:34want to build a heating grid to be able to store your material yeah it's going to be pretty intricate
16:39and basically all the material that's stacked on top of it's going to get heated from the bottom up
16:44it's going to be a learning experience we've never done it before we want to work on your plant itself
16:49on
16:49that screen that eccentric isn't really doing anything underneath there yeah your dry boxes they're
16:54actually torn so we got to work on those as well okay we actually drove by your cut just a
16:58minute ago
16:58and it's underwater right now is there any way we could pump that water out of there yeah we have
17:02a pump for
17:03it before it keeps soaking in yeah but uh as far as material roughly eight thousand dollars and then
17:09labor we both decided that we don't want to charge anything for labor yeah appreciate the military
17:13absolutely you know they keep this country where we can go out gold mining yeah so we appreciate that
17:19thank you for your service so if you guys are good with it we're good with it
17:25my opinion is we're out of options uh we're all in well deal then yeah deal absolutely
17:31deal thank you sir to give this veteran run mine a fighting chance
17:40one will build a unique heating pad to dry wet pay hot air from a diesel burner will blow into
17:49a central
17:49manifold then through a network of pipes while retaining walls hold the material as it dries to
17:59increase recovery on the plant custom adjustable eccentrics will allow more paid to feed through the screen
18:07the blow boxes will be upgraded with new mesh and aluminum back plates to prevent fine gold from being lost
18:18finally Freddy will examine their cut to locate the best gold bearing pay
18:27so this is the beginning of the heating grid one kicks off the fixes with his one-of-a-kind
18:34pay dryer
18:40we've never built anything like this so we had to kind of design it on the fly we're building a
18:45manifold heat's gonna radiate from tubes up and into the pile of material on top the idea that we have
18:53here it should work but ultimately we don't know until the test run when we get pay on there to
18:58dry it
18:59out we'll see how it does Freddy asked us to get the pump set up to get the water out
19:12of the pit
19:13usually monsoon season is way earlier in the year so we don't have to really worry about the water issue
19:18of filling the pit as much it's just getting worse and worse this season down in the cut okay let's
19:27do
19:28it all right I'm gonna start it Kaden and Larry pump out the flood water all our material and the
19:38cuts just gonna be wet and we can't run that through the plant the sudden monsoons that come up are
19:44just a
19:44nightmare it's what you get when you play outside so your cut management you're most important as
20:02far as what to dig and what not to dig okay at the veteran mining company claim in Arizona it'll
20:10make
20:10you or break you the cut is now dry enough for Freddy to examine I want to get in there
20:17and look at
20:17what they've been pulling out it may take 10 pounds to find a color but if you find a color
20:22it should be
20:23decent pay this stuff right here you can actually see the layers in it yeah so that's lake bed silt
20:30gold
20:31doesn't travel in silt beds that stuff won't even grow potatoes let alone catch gold you're digging it
20:38all at one shot right yeah sure you might think there's gold because that top layer is going to have
20:44some gold in it
20:45yeah and then you're mixing it all together all you're doing is watering down your your pay yeah and it
20:51costs just as
20:51much to run that as it does stuff with gold in it yeah let's go have a look at that
20:57hole over there okay
21:06what's your average day then uh with the plant continuously breaking we're sitting at about two
21:11three grams a day yeah not enough the materials definitely shingled in here so an old river channel
21:22probably you know during the ice ages when this would have been a lot wetter area the rocks tell you
21:28a
21:28story see how these rocks are laid flat when it's in flowing and moving material it's not going to stand
21:34up
21:34right millions of years ago powerful rivers cut through the bradshaw mountains washing gold from
21:43hard rock veins into the basin below as the water slows and dries up the heavy gold settles into the
21:51gravel left behind
21:58this is the best looking stuff to me okay by far you know you can tell all this was put
22:05down by a
22:06stream bed so nature's sluice box right yep you got that clay layer on the bottom that wouldn't allow
22:11gold to pass through it clay layers act as false bedrock stopping heavy gold from sinking any deeper
22:19water let's get some of those gravels here and have a look okay
22:32how many people help out here five most of the guys in the navy my dad was in the navy
22:38in world war ii
22:40he got to fight kamikazes in the pacific
22:43mm-hmm his ship never got hit though he's on a destroyer yeah awesome there you go
22:54you like it out here in the desert i like being in the middle of nowhere don't have to deal
22:58with people
23:01no there's three colors fine gold there's one there one there one there
23:06mm-hmm a lot of what we've been finding though is that fine stuff yeah there's gold in it i'd
23:14say uh
23:15get in there and get that material okay if we can get a bunch of that out get it up
23:19here sounds good
23:21to me so it's one of those situations where if you don't high grade your material and take the best
23:27of
23:27the best you go broke
23:36so we got all the pieces cut out for the manifold
23:41at the cut trailer one welds together the manifolds for the heating grid
23:48there's going to be one of these sections on each side so it's going to be a total of 16
23:52feet long
23:53by four feet deep and uh we're going to have three sides of this there will be the center section
23:58where the heat's going to get forced in and then from there it'll distribute across the tubes so it's
24:03just wanting to go
24:11all good
24:23swing that way at the plant freddie rallies the troops to begin work on the dry plant's screen and
24:33shaker boom up
24:38track back
24:44it'll work yep
24:49so i'm going to design and build a whole new setup it's a design that i did years ago on
24:54some of my own
24:55stuff freddie's first mission upgrade the eccentric system for a more violent shake this is going to be
25:03the new shaft so their old one was only half length if everything works out like it should on this
25:10eccentric it'll uh make that machine work a heck of a lot better
25:20yeah it's not good so uh we got to get the rust off here so it'll go through the bearings
25:25we'll start
25:26at that end i'm going to do a bush lathe here yep okay and then back to you need more
25:33tape you need more tape
25:34easy i'm sorry
25:41sanding off the rust will help ease the shaft through the new bearings
25:52push her on through look at that she's going now that's almost too pretty for our plant
26:00we're out of the military too then yes sir in the navy 80 to 90. okay aircraft carrier jet engine
26:07mechanic okay worked the flight deck come from georgia um went in the military at 17. saw the world
26:14but i have always enjoyed prospecting always wanted to prospect out west after retiring in 2003
26:23tim was a hobby prospect when he found the veteran mining company as far as being a vet myself coming
26:30out here has been awesome it's renewed my sense of what we fought for i can't imagine what this could
26:37mean some of our hardest hit combat vets the severe ptsd sufferers it makes your heart swell like it's a
26:46good deal if this mine works out just got to be enough gold here you know we're looking forward to
26:51getting gold in the pan yep well thank you for your help guys i can get her from here
27:01we've only got so much time here and uh you know look at the puffy clouds starting to fire back
27:07up in
27:07the sky now the dry plant cannot run material with any moisture in it so i am extremely worried juan
27:15well he's still working on that heater hopefully we can get material on there and knock the moisture out of
27:21it
27:34ready one last push it's the final day of fixes at the veteran mining company's claim we needed a
27:42more work area so we moved the manifold onto the trailer and with more monsoon rains on the horizon
27:49one tests out the heating grid the heat's going to be introduced right in the center and then from
27:55there it's going to distribute six to the left six to the right and then it'll go to the next
27:59one
28:11the burner generates 5000 btu's of heat but it's not transferring properly through the grid we're not
28:19having really good combustion in there we need more draw through that's what i wanted to check before we
28:24got too carried away we're going to have to put another tube in here we'll do it right here in
28:30the
28:30center originally the burner that i had anticipated had a little bit less cfm this one has more so we
28:37need to add more ventilation there isn't enough air flow to fully heat the grid we're gonna have to
28:43mark the center put the tube in get it in weld it but at least we know now you know
28:50running a dry plant
28:51you have to have completely dry material and right now during the raining season it's almost impossible
28:56this is going to be essential for him to keep on running i still have a lot to do here
29:05what they had before was just some welded pieces on there that you couldn't adjust anything on at the
29:11wash plant freddy installs the new eccentric weights to the shaker screen now i can make it exactly
29:18balanced where there's no vibration so the farther i move this around the more out of balance it
29:24becomes so it'll shake harder the weights can be adjusted to a shake that best suits the material
29:31being run it's going to make the plant more efficient it's going to clean the material better it'll help
29:37out a bunch eccentrics in place the screen is lifted back into position you good i'm good
29:51okay that's a fit there you go
30:00real good fix looks good freddy has one final finishing touch so i just built this damper guys
30:08a toolbox liner turned dampener to slow down material
30:14there you go so when that material comes down yeah it's going to help push that material through
30:19that screen but it's going to help keep dust down and help more gold get into your boxes
30:28something that costs you know 20 bucks to make but it'll help save gold every time you run
30:36you got a crescent wrench and a hammer i got all kind of stuff i don't have a hammer screen
30:42fix complete
30:43tim and jim set to work upgrading the blow boxes with 200 mesh fabric and aluminum frames
30:51not looking good for the home team look like they were all glued in here the new mesh will help
30:57prevent
30:57fine gold from being lost don't want to get any on where it doesn't belong
31:04oh no i should have combed my eyelid shut i wouldn't doubt that last one in got that one done
31:13good job
31:14all right a number of years ago i enlisted in the army security agency i had top secret clearance so
31:22i was able to work for nasa for a little while all of that sort of led me to be
31:27out here to do this
31:29a lifelong interest in prospecting led jim to the veteran mining company my investment is one of labor
31:38i start the day uh 3 30 in the morning and usually before daylight i try to have the machines
31:44grease
31:45sustaining this operation is a challenge different fun different day
31:50equipment breaks weather disagrees with us what i'm getting out of it is the satisfaction of doing
31:57something for the veterans long term by enabling this mind to be a success
32:08this is number two and them too
32:12we've relined them put new backing plates on i can't wait to see them full of shiny
32:26that's a wrap these are in
32:36you know if we don't have drive pay for this final run we won't be able to run so we
32:39have to use this
32:40by adding this orange tube in the center we should be able to get that extra heat back at the
32:45cut
32:45trailer one adds an extra tube the full length of the grid to improve the airflow and fix the heating
32:52issue let me run it look how hot this is the heat's traveling we wanted to make sure we had
33:01enough
33:01airflow so it would burn properly and be able to heat up the grid it's actually working really good now
33:07okay perfect yeah right now genuinely we're out of time we'll get the sides on we got to get this
33:14down
33:14to the to the plant so we get it set up get it fired off so we can start drying
33:18some pay
33:27yeah it's well built ready to see it go to work
33:34heating grid complete it's put into position ready to dry pay
33:43that's a beautiful piece yeah let's get some tailings bury it keeps it from moving but also it'll kind
33:52of insulate it we could probably cook eggs on that
34:07it's pretty was right on the mark on this in preparation for the second test larry and the vets
34:14stockpile high-grade pay for the dryer this pay looks really really good he's a gold guru
34:27we get this material up to the heat pad do our second run on this
34:34it's good to see how much we've improved and how much more gold we have
34:43we got a lot of high hopes for this thing show us what our future is going to hold up
34:47here
34:52all in all it's been a pretty good day hopefully this mine's sustainable
34:57so you can't run the material wet it's got to be dry or it will not recover the gold in
35:03the plant
35:03time will tell
35:28well this is the last piece of the puzzle this vibrates to be able to clear out the tailing chute
35:35in western arizona it's a little tiny fix but it's a big deal juan installs one last fix on the
35:42veteran mining company's operation we should be able to run a little longer and uh more importantly
35:48get more gold well there it is we should be able to fire this thing up now let's run
36:00the fixes we're hoping is going to make a huge difference we were right on the edge of make or
36:07break newly upgraded dry plant and bespoke pay dryer at the ready freddy and one kick off the second test
36:17fire her up oh she's going awesome it's been a long road but i can't wait and see how much
36:29gold we get
36:32well two hour test let's do it
36:39get some of this dry material all right let's get this first bucket in
36:56the green's working good juan you guys can see that it's moving now good work fred nice
37:07the eccentric's working perfect the dampers doing its job and keeping that stuff for bouncing up
37:16pretty warm up wano yeah that's good that's hot right that orange is hot too
37:23the plant's running a lot better we got the material classifying through really well
37:32the boxes are doing really good we put a new vibrator on the discharge chute so it seems to be
37:39working good
37:40now dry pay and a dialed in eccentric material flows cleanly through the plant and into the upgraded flow boxes
37:58i'm hoping this uh second test run delivers more gold
38:05in the cut larry and the rest of the crew focus on high graded pay
38:11material we're getting up to the heater pad looks like this is going to be some good thing
38:23look how dry this material is now it's a lot drier than we had in four
38:29well that's two hours one last bucket
38:45hey larry can you uh head up here to the plant
38:53everything was smoothed down in the pit i had to go up here with the plant
38:59that dryer works fantastic and then the top screen
39:03runs a heck of a lot better hopefully we'll have a better cleaning
39:07uh
39:19hey guys hey how's it going let's put it on the scale
39:25some super fine gold and some a little bit bigger gold yeah
39:31looks better than the first run
39:37there we go
39:390.08 going from 0.02 to 0.08 that's huge 300 increase yeah running a full day would recover
39:47just under sixteen hundred dollars in gold
39:51enough to cover costs and keep the veteran mining dream alive at gold the price it is right now it's
39:58viable you can actually run the mine on that and get your buddies out here with those numbers it's
40:03sustainable you know i know this is really important to you guys so please keep us posted
40:07we're going to give it our best shot well gentlemen we better get on the road thank you guys coming
40:10out here and working with you guys great meeting you guys thank you pleasure likewise thank you gentlemen
40:16thank you freddy and juan the improvements you made uh help us move forward we're not going to give up
40:23we're
40:24going to be here this time next year going from 0.02 to 0.08 it goes from not being
40:30viable to now
40:32they have a chance to run this mine with the vets the dryer's working they're being able to recover a
40:36lot
40:37more of the gold so honestly i couldn't be happier i'm more than pleased with that not only you know
40:44is it a gold mine it's a good cause right to help these vets to be able to come out
40:49here and to work
40:51and maybe make a dime you know means more than the gold itself
41:00having freddy and juan out here uh you know they're incredible in what they do
41:05the plants running absolutely wonderful the boxes with the frames and mats and the vibrators
41:11and they fix the shaker deck the efficiency was tremendous where to find the gold what to look for
41:17was immensely valuable to us thank you for your efforts out here the the knowledge you bestowed on
41:26us and i hope to see you again down the road
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