Mining Lead


Hi everyone, welcome back to Cody's Lab.
So today I'm going to show you how I got these twenty pound lead blocks that I've used as weights in a few of my videos.
Now many of you may be surprised that I'm actually standing in a limestone quarry.
Wouldn't you expect me to get the lead out of one of my many mines on the property? Well, actually, I find it's much easier to get lead that's already been refined, and in this case, it's going to come from bullets.
Because you see, out here, people are shooting all the time.
I came out here on a weekday, so there's not very many people right now, But usually on weekends, there's just constant gunfire going on.
And, as such, there's quite a bit of lead in the ground.
Which is an ecological disaster, but I'm going to take advantage of it.
As you can see over here, there's piles of shotgun shells, and all kinds of things that people have been shooting up.
Including a frying pan, by the looks of it.
So let's pick a spot over here, and get a scoop of the ground, and see what I can get.
So the technique I'm going to use today for getting the lead out of the ground is actually going to be dry panning.
So I've got me here this [taps pan] rusty iron gold pan.
Iron's good because it's stiffer than the plastic, so I can shake it harder with heavier stuff and it's not going to flex.
Let's, uh - also I can dig with it.
Get a nice big scoop of material here, ok? Now you shake it, just like this so that some of the material goes over the edge, it's exactly what I want.
Throw away the bigger rocks, and after just a couple seconds of doing that, you'll notice that I have here a concentration of lead bullets.
Isn't that awesome? Now in the past I've brought a blower rig out here so I can shovel dirt into a little path of an air stream to blow away the dirt and keep the bullets.
But I find that when I've got the rhythm going, I can process more material just with a gold pan than I could with that.
So, this is what I'm going to use today.
And I'm just going to concentrate it down to about like this, and then I'm gonna throw it into a bucket.
And then I'll process it using wet panning later to extract most of the dirt from the lead.
Let me actually show you that again from a slightly different angle, so you can see what's going on here.
So I'm shaking the material to get it kind of fluidized So the heavier materials will sink to the bottom.
And then I got a little circular motion going here I just kind of let the material fly off the edge, using like almost centrifugal force Let's get rid of the bigger rocks, as they kinda mess things up.
As you can see here, I'm just throwing material off, and you can actually hear the bullets scraping the bottom of the pan.
Then here, throw away some more rocks, and that's about a far as I can go without loosing the little pieces of lead shot.
And as you can see, there's lead bullets here.
Now this process could be used for panning gold, but you're gonna only be able to find large nuggets, Y'know, fine flakes, forget about it.
But it is a good way to process material down when you don't have water and you really are just looking for big heavy things, like bullets.
One thing I should mention, is that you want to kinda stand up wind from this.
Because the dust in the ground could contain lead, and you probably don't want to breathe too much of that.
Here, let's see how fast I can do this.
There ya go.
Throw it in a bucket, ready to scoop again.
And you do lose the occasional bullet over the lip, just like there.
But, really considering how much there is here, it's not that big of a deal.
Now that I'm back home and can process my concentrates in peace, The first thing I'm going to do is run it through a screen, to separate the larger bullets from the fine shot and the dust.
Now all I have to do with these large lead bullets is give them a rinse in some water to remove the last of the mud, and to clean them so I can determine which are rocks and which are actually bullets, and then lay them out on a sheet of tin to dry.
And they're pretty much good to go.
Ready to be melted down.
The fine dust containing the lead shot is gonna take a little bit more washing to get it separated.
But, I'm just gonna pan it out just like I would pan out any other pan of dirt to collect any heavy materials.
And there we go! It's mostly lead now, there's still a little bit of dirt trapped between the lead particles But, for the most part, this is good enough that I could melt it down.
So I'm just set this out to dry, and then I'll process the rest of the material that I've got.
So here's what I've collected today.
About half a bucket worth of lead bullets, and about this much of the finer pieces of lead and lead shot.
Let's see how much that is exactly It's right about - I'm gonna call that five pounds.
It's not very much.
Okay.
Bucket's on the scale, and the weight looks like right about a hundred and ten pounds.
I'll call that about a hundred pounds worth of bullets.
Y'know, factoring in the bucket and everything.
Let's melt down some of it and see what we get.
So I'm not going to melt the lead shot in with the lead bullets because the lead shot contains lots of antimony and tin to make it hard, as well as some arsenic.
Which makes for some lead that's really hard to work with.
Which isn't a problem if I'm using it for lead weights, but, I kinda like to keep them separated just in case I wanted to make bullets out of these eventually.
So.
Here's the bullets Think I got just over twenty five pounds of them in this can.
Let's see if I can melt them down.
I know, tin can's a terrible way to melt it down but, It'll work once or twice.
So I've got a little furnace here set up to melt the lead.
A little thing to set the can on, there we go, just like that.
First, gotta put some fuel in there.
So I'm gonna stuff in some rags, some honeycomb, Just like that.
Maybe some pieces of coal, alright.
Now let's light it up.
[Yelling]So while this is cooking I thought I'd mention that first of all this is a good idea, because occasionally there's a live round in there that explodes.
And second, here's this mold I'm gonna use.
I've just warmed it up to get rid of any water, so the lead doesn't splatter when I put it in here.
This is a thing I made a while ago, so it's exactly the dimensions needed to have a twenty pound chunk of lead.
You can see down in here that the lead is just starting to melt.
Looks like all the bullets are melted, you can see the copper casings are floating to the top of the lead And it's just about time to do our first pour.
[Speaking normally]So here it is: a twenty pound block of lead It's still cooling off.
You can see there's some more lead here.
That's stuff that I wasn't able to put inside the mold and I just dumped out on the ground, so that I can re-melt it later.
And, also some of the bullets that still contained lead in them, just like this.
I'll put these into the next melt and just melt them down again.
As for the bullet jackets, they are made out of copper, but they've got quite a bit of lead mixed with them.
There is a place in Salt Lake that takes them for recycling though.
And they'll give me like fifty cents for every pound for em'.
But that's a pretty good deal considering that there's really not much else I can do with these.
Perhaps if I had a hotter furnace I could melt them down into an ingot and then electro-refine it.
But, This works for now.
[Hissing] Now that it's completely cooled, I can tip it over, and knock it out of the mold.
Just like that.
Nice, square, chunk of lead.
Let's see what it weighs.
Let's see if I was accurate on the twenty pound thing.
I'd say it's right on the spot! Excellent.
Twenty pounds of lead.
And now I've got something like eighty more pounds to go through.
Hope you all enjoyed, and I'll see ya next time! [Music].

Fools Gold Nuggets and Railroad Treasure Adventure


I think he's got it loose!!! Show it inthe light. Back up a bit. We're on our way to a creek spot that runs off or perpendicular to a old railroad track that has a limestone or chalk and you can find iron pyrite there in the creek So, we're on the IRON PYRITE hunt.

Optimising maintenance shutdowns in the mining industry | Curtin University


In the world of multi-billion dollar mining enterprises, maintenance shut downs are inevitable… and costly. Just one hour of maintenance down time can result in hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost revenue.

Working in close collaboration with market-leading mining services firm Link force Engineering, Ryan Loxton and his research team have developed cutting-edge algorithms, that reduce maintenance down time cost sand optimise resource use in shut downs.

These algorithms are powering a new purpose-built shut down scheduling software that is unrivalled in the marketplace. It’s able to analyse the mass of complex,often conflicting, operational factors that go into shutdown planning.

From minimising resource use and prioritising high-value activities,to reducing personnel travel times and satisfying safety requirements.

Where manual scheduling takes weeks and introduces human error, this system generates an optimal schedule in less than a second,making for a smoother shutdown with less risk of costly overruns. Rigorously tested against actual shutdown scenarios, the system consistently delivered shorter and crucially always feasible schedules, resulting in significant customer savings.

This exciting new technology is ready to impactthe multi-billion dollar Australian mine maintenance market, with strong prospects for quick expansioninto other industries.

The Devastating Effects Of Gold Mining


Gold is one of the most precious metals inthe world, and has run the gamut from its use as currency, to jewelry, and even to electronicplating, and infrared shielding.
But for many people the cost far outweighsits intrinsic value.
Seeker Stories went to South America to learnabout some of the worst exploitation, both human and environmental.
Check it out.
Gold is maybe the most universal shorthandthere is for value, and for greed.
The ancient Egyptians were obsessed with it.
European explorers marauded through SouthAmerica in search of it.
And American cities like San Francisco andSeattle rose to prominence because of it.
It’s a big part of our history as humans.
Looking at all that, our obsession with goldalso seems historical, sort of old timey - but that’s not at all true.
There’s still huge demand for it today - therecession of 2008 helped gold quadruple in value.
And a full half of all the gold mined in theworld has been mined in the past 50 years.
But what is different about gold today ishow we get it.
What happens in gold producing areas is notwhat we imagine where somebodies in a cave, using a chisel and a hammer to get these biggolden nuggets.
That’s Diego, a photojournalist who spentsome time in Cajamarca, Peru near a modern gold mine.
Actually, not just any gold mine.
The largestin all of Latin America.
And modern mining looks very different thanit used to.
most of the gold that we are mining now comesin the forms of little specks of sand, little flakes mixed in with dirt.
a lot of these companies are using open pitmines to grab as much dirt as possible and then they process it with different chemicals Those chemicals are cyanide, arsenic, andmercury.
Basically a laundry list of things you want to keep far away from people.
But the mining process creates a lot of wastewater laced with those pollutants.
And up in the Andes mountains, the water doesn’tstay put.
when you take a mining operation and you putit on top of a mountain, the water as we all know, only follows gravity, it goes down inevery direction, And therein lies the problem.
According to Diego, poisoned water has seepedthroughout the region, causing stomach cancer in people, illnesses in livestock, and decimatedfish populations.
And the people of Cajamarca, who were promisednew wealth from the mining economy, haven’t all seen a benefit.
they see water that is contaminated and economicopportunities that haven't really changed for them.
[0:30] quality of life has remained the samefor many of these people without any of the profits you would assume a gold mine wouldbring to a region And so the people have done the one thingthey’re able to do about the mines: protest.
They’re pushing back against foreign corporateinfluence, ruined natural resources.
And a history that somehow never has seemed tochange for them.
they've been exploited for about 500 yearsnow, ever since the spanish arrived and started taking the Incan’s gold.
the same story happens wherever you have resourceextraction projects.
it's a dirty industry which makes privateprofits and public disasters.
For Diego, it all comes back to the valueof gold.
As expensive as gold is right now, after visitingCahamarca Diego sees it as undervalued.
Dangerously so.
i realized that gold is cheap because we payto it through the lives of people who live in gold producing areas, through the livesof people who live in Cajamarca.
This is video’s part of a short series we’redoing on protest movements around the world.
To get a peek behind the front lines of amovement called black bloc, click now.
If you want to see more in depth content likethis, check out Seeker Stories.
They’ll take you around the world sharingthe stories that surprise, challenge and inspire you - like this one about a company that isrevolutionizing sustainable energy with an unexpected resource.
Please make sure to like and subscribe toSeeker Stories for more webdocs.

Gold mining ship


Video Gold mining ship

Artisanal Gold Mining - Problems Solutions and Opportunities


Province Loba 50 meters underground Since 2001, artisanal gold mining communities have sprung up around West Africa, In many respect it resembles the gold rush of the nine teenth century. These cities were mere fields before they came artisanal miners. His arrival created wealth and a flourishing secondary economy that drove the development of regulations, systems of land tenure, infrastructure and economic diversification.

It is fascinating to see that almost the same phenomena that occurred in the gold rush are happening again today. Although artisanal gold mining has been active since antiquity, the sector in West Africa has grown dramatically since 2001, driven by rising gold price and the lack of alternative opportunities. Many farmers and herdsmen have entered the sector of artisanal gold mining and now they use their profits to improve their farming activities.

In artisanal gold mining we see a direct transfer of wealth which it is unique to other products sold on the international market. For most agricultural products, for example, those who buy in the grocery store, only a small fraction of that profit back to the small original producer, often less than 20%. Even for social brand products, the percentage is only moderately higher.

For example, the banana cooperatives receive about a dollar for 18 kilos of bananas, less than 20%. On the other hand, artisanal miners earn a minimum of 70% to 80% of the international price. This is unheard of in other goods.

Artisanal gold mining is a massive and download wealth from rich to poor, but also has an amplification effect. The local secondary economy is typically five or six times larger than the primary economy, the value of gold.

Miners use their profits to pay for hardware products, mining supplies, food, clothing, transportation, communications, medicine, all things that sell local businesses and people of that service sector, in turn do the same.

Thus they are circulating gold profits, building a large and diverse local economy. Motorcycle dealers, home improvement, telecommunications, health services, infrastructure and schools often appear in cities in connection artisanal gold mines. One of the great problems of artisanal gold mining is mercury.

Mercury is cheap and therefore affordable means for processing the gold, but it is also a deadly neurotoxin that can cause permanent damage to the nervous system, and even death. It is also a poor extraction method, which normally gets about 40% of the gold that is in the mineral, therefore wasting resource.

Although problems like mercury poisoning, exposure to silica dust, child labor and other criminal activity may be present in artisanal mining sites around West Africa, governments often overlook the positive benefits.

Governments and the media have a history of condemnation and demonization of artisanal gold mining without really properly understand the sector without offering solutions. However, artisanal gold mining is now universally recognized by international agencies like the UN as a development opportunity and a huge source of rural employment and wealth generation.

The modern sector of artisanal gold mining has been strong for some 40 years and because of the jobs it provides poor rural areas, it is clear that it will continue. In fact, it is probably stronger than the industrial sector of gold mining, which it is much more susceptible to fluctuations in gold prices.

In this context, the government and industry should help artisanal gold mining to improve their environmental and social performance to allow maximize its role of reducing poverty.

Need help and support to enter the formal economy, where you can become a responsible sector and help finance a diverse and sustainable rural economy. And this is where comes the Artisanal Gold Council (AGC).

The Artisanal Gold Council is a non-profit organization dedicated to improving opportunities, the environment and health of the millions of people involved in artisanal mining and small-scale gold in the developing world, and in doing so, we are helping to improve the integrity of the entire gold sector, from small to large.

Our strength is in the deep knowledge of the field. Using that knowledge, we work under three main themes: best practices, policies and market development. We focus on improving technology, business practices, governance, health and environmental performance.

For example, we offer seminars to local health professionals on how to identify and treat health problems that are specific to artisanal gold mining sector such as exposure to dust or mercury poisoning.

We create business models for mining with the banking sector which it is increasingly interested in using artisanal gold responsible. For example, we are developing the first mechanism of investment in gold bullion socially responsible, the so-called Artisanal Gold Fund.

We work with local governments nationwide to help them make informed policy decisions about the artisanal gold mining sector. We work with buyers to help them get gold artisanal gold mining responsibly for the international market. And one of our most important roles is to help artisanal miners to improve their processing techniques to eliminate the use of mercury.

In Burkina Faso, Senegal and Nicaragua have established a system of processing and training Mercury that is very intuitive for miners. It consists of technology with which they are already familiar.

It has improved crushing, grinding, hosing and a shaking table separating gold from other minerals. And the system improves the recovery of gold by 30%, giving miners a great economic incentive to stop using mercury.

By wet processing another major health hazard is also reduced, exposure to silica dust. Silica dust is produced in large volumes by dry grinding and damages lung tissue and causes lung disease. Our wet system eliminates this health hazard while using little water.

It has a recycling rate of approximately 90% which is important in most areas of the world, but especially in the dry climate of West Africa. Improved techniques put more money in the pockets of the miners and at the same time reducing environmental and occupational hazards.

The system was not designed to be at the forefront with respect to mining engineering. Rather, it is designed to be affordable, intuitive, easy maintenance, safe and free of chemicals. A system is owned and managed by a Burkinabe businessman soon produce a type of gold desperately needed for the reputation of the artisanal sector, responsibly producing artisanal gold for socially responsible consumers.

Despite the benefits of the gold artisanal mining sector Governments have often sought to eliminate the sector for industrial mining. The problem is that the industrial sector uses a different demographic, few local inhabitants and fewer people in general.

However, both sectors play an important role in developing countries. Industrial mining provides governments with tax revenues and artisanal gold mining provides a large number of rural jobs for the poor.

Developing countries need both sectors. There is no doubt to be made serious improvements in the artisanal sector, but with such a large number of people being supported, It is almost impossible to close the sector.

What can you do with hundreds of thousands of unemployed people? And an even greater number of people are supported by them. The sector has been strengthening for more than 40 years and attempts to close have essentially failed.

When the authorities closed mines, miners always come back for a simple reason, It is so much more profitable a chance to work. And remarkably, these resilient people have developed this sector essentially on their own with little government assistance.

We have reached the tipping point where it is time for governments to recognize this and support the development of this important economy base. The mining industry is capital intensive and requires large deposits, typically deposits million ounces, and these are deep underground soil.

Artisanal miners alone have the means to extract up to 30, 50, and sometimes up to 100 meters. But they exploit much smaller than industrial miners can not deposits. And their capital investment is smaller. Therefore, the two sectors rarely compete for the same resource. The artisanal mining sector can continue slowly sapping small and numerous deposits for a long time in the future. In fact, it is likely that when large gold deposits have been exhausted, there will still be artisanal gold mines.

Rida Gold Mining Plant Operation

Rida  Gold Mining Plant Operation JINPENG MINING MACHINERY. ,LTD JINPENG MINING MACHINERY.
,LTD.