Water and recovery are where placer seasons are won or quietly given away. This module treats the wash plant, the ponds and the sluice as one circuit — then traces where gold leaves that circuit.

Students diagnose water-shortage and turbidity scenarios, then follow material through classification, sluice setup and cleanup. The work is practical: if you cannot explain where gold is being lost, you cannot claim to be managing recovery.

What we cover

Water balance, recycle, and what happens when make-up water fails
Turbidity, settling and the operating cost of dirty water
Classification, feed rate and plant configuration
Sluice setup, riffle behaviour and concentrate handling
Recovery test plans you can actually run during a season

Field connection

Field groups look at operating plants, concentrate, and the water system around them. The question is always the same: where is gold being lost, and what would you change this week?

Output: a water checklist and a recovery test plan.

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