Gold rush

Author
Discussion

youngsyr

14,742 posts

191 months

Friday 27th October 2017
quotequote all
Anyone catch the Dave Turin special?

Didn't realise he was such a religious man and the programme really highlighted how he was dead against (and made it clear at the time) some of the worst decisions Todd made, e.g. Guyana, Colorado and the Turbo Trommel.

Hopefully he'll be back on the show next season with his own crew though.

Sway

26,070 posts

193 months

Friday 27th October 2017
quotequote all
youngsyr said:
Anyone catch the Dave Turin special?

Didn't realise he was such a religious man and the programme really highlighted how he was dead against (and made it clear at the time) some of the worst decisions Todd made, e.g. Guyana, Colorado and the Turbo Trommel.

Hopefully he'll be back on the show next season with his own crew though.
I haven't, but will.

All the Hoffman lot are massively religious. Hugely so, including Dave T

Not sure why Freddie Dodge is still hanging around - last season he was there to help out a bit, but made it clear he had his own business to look after. Now it seems he's a regular on the crew, but not a shareholder? Seems very odd considering his background/interests/brother...

Beyond Rational

3,524 posts

214 months

Thursday 2nd November 2017
quotequote all
I'm convinced Freddy is on Discovery channel payroll to put the operation in place on their behalf in order to provide a background for them to film the Hoffman's flailing around. As a business, the Hoffman's haven't made sense for a long time.

P-Jay

10,551 posts

190 months

Thursday 2nd November 2017
quotequote all
How’s it this year? After years of being glued to it I couldn’t face another year of the same old “ShUt Er DOWN!!” Antics

Condi

17,089 posts

170 months

Thursday 2nd November 2017
quotequote all
was there an episode this week? nothing recorded on my box

TTmonkey

20,911 posts

246 months

Thursday 2nd November 2017
quotequote all
Condi said:
was there an episode this week? nothing recorded on my box
Yep

Condi

17,089 posts

170 months

Thursday 2nd November 2017
quotequote all
TTmonkey said:
Condi said:
was there an episode this week? nothing recorded on my box
Yep
Ahhhhh feck. Stupid series record.

Ructions

4,705 posts

120 months

Thursday 2nd November 2017
quotequote all
Condi said:
TTmonkey said:
Condi said:
was there an episode this week? nothing recorded on my box
Yep
Ahhhhh feck. Stupid series record.
It gets repeated a lot.

TTmonkey

20,911 posts

246 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
poor episode in my opinion. Lots of ;set up' stuff showing Todd and his son falling out. Very predictable.

One thing that got me though - the way that tony Beets spoke to that bloke having a coffee - I'd have rammed that steam lance up Tony's ass. Utter twunt.

youngsyr

14,742 posts

191 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
TTmonkey said:
poor episode in my opinion. Lots of ;set up' stuff showing Todd and his son falling out. Very predictable.

One thing that got me though - the way that tony Beets spoke to that bloke having a coffee - I'd have rammed that steam lance up Tony's ass. Utter twunt.
We've seen hints of that behaviour from Tony with Parker over the years. I get the feeling Tony is a "nice guy" on camera and a total asshole of a boss off of it.

Notice Gene Cheeseman isn't back after his season with Tony last year? "Pursuing other opportunities" is how the narrator put it, from memory.

Tony also absolutely screwed those two older guys who disassembled and reassembled the first dredge.

youngsyr

14,742 posts

191 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
P-Jay said:
How’s it this year? After years of being glued to it I couldn’t face another year of the same old “ShUt Er DOWN!!” Antics
That was my concern too (see my post above), but it's different enough to make it worth viewing so far at least, IMO.

youngsyr

14,742 posts

191 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
Beyond Rational said:
I'm convinced Freddy is on Discovery channel payroll to put the operation in place on their behalf in order to provide a background for them to film the Hoffman's flailing around. As a business, the Hoffman's haven't made sense for a long time.
There's no doubt in my mind that the Hoffmans get a huge amount more support than the other crews.

Todd Hoffman has made poor decision after poor decision, completely against the advice of some of the experienced members of his crew.

For me, Todd's aim is to make interesting TV and make his and his crew's money that way, not necessarily set up a successful mining company.

That's why he went to Guyana and to Colorado, to add variety to the programme, not strike it rich (from gold anyway).

It's also why the Dakota boys aren't on the programme anymore - they were too focused on mining rather than making good TV.

Sway

26,070 posts

193 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
Tony's son had it on the money - when you look at staff turnover, minus family, it tells a sorry picture...

Parker seems to be maturing into a pretty decent boss, although he still has his moments, they seem to coincide with things like a gum abscess so perhaps forgivable. He clearly cares a lot for Dumit (who I was staggered to find out is properly bloody old!). Good to see his Aussie girlie come back.

One thing that always seems odd - the Hofmanns are the only ones who show nothing of the cleanup or weighing process. Jack's in his closed off shed, then comes out with a jar. They're also the only crew where everyone is on a percentage... I know there's lots of rumours and speculation, but they don't seem remotely interested in addressing it, and are consistently coming up with very light cleanups...

R8Steve

4,150 posts

174 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
youngsyr said:
It's also why the Dakota boys aren't on the programme anymore - they were too focused on mining rather than making good TV.
They left because they felt they weren't getting paid as much as the other crews. They didn't really strike me as particularly good miners either.

I never took to them after they came in and stole the claim from underneath the Hoffmans, irrespective of how bad at mining they were at the time.

chrisga

2,087 posts

186 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
R8Steve said:
They left because they felt they weren't getting paid as much as the other crews. They didn't really strike me as particularly good miners either.

I never took to them after they came in and stole the claim from underneath the Hoffmans, irrespective of how bad at mining they were at the time.
Agree.

anonymous-user

53 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
I'm sure I saw the lady who used to work with the Dakota's driving a rock truck for Parker last ep?

Agree about Parker, to be fair it did seem as if matey was being very careless with the machinery, old parker would have held a grudge though, him giving him his salvation was nice smile

I am sure Todd is involved in the whole idea/concept of the program hence he continues?

youngsyr

14,742 posts

191 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
R8Steve said:
youngsyr said:
It's also why the Dakota boys aren't on the programme anymore - they were too focused on mining rather than making good TV.
They left because they felt they weren't getting paid as much as the other crews. They didn't really strike me as particularly good miners either.

I never took to them after they came in and stole the claim from underneath the Hoffmans, irrespective of how bad at mining they were at the time.
The way the older Dakota boy (Freddy?) put it was something like, "If you want a miner, come and see me. If you want a TV star, pay me like one."

I took that to mean: either get out of my way and let me mine, or pay me to act up for the camera.

As for how good they were, don't forget where Parker and Todd were at that stage, they were pretty much on a par with, if not behind the Dakota boys.

I honestly can't remember much about the claim issue, so I won't comment on it.



R8Steve

4,150 posts

174 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
youngsyr said:
R8Steve said:
youngsyr said:
It's also why the Dakota boys aren't on the programme anymore - they were too focused on mining rather than making good TV.
They left because they felt they weren't getting paid as much as the other crews. They didn't really strike me as particularly good miners either.

I never took to them after they came in and stole the claim from underneath the Hoffmans, irrespective of how bad at mining they were at the time.
The way the older Dakota boy (Freddy?) put it was something like, "If you want a miner, come and see me. If you want a TV star, pay me like one."

I took that to mean: either get out of my way and let me mine, or pay me to act up for the camera.

As for how good they were, don't forget where Parker and Todd were at that stage, they were pretty much on a par with, if not behind the Dakota boys.

I honestly can't remember much about the claim issue, so I won't comment on it.
Apart from the Guyana disaster the Hoffmans were always well ahead of the Dakota boys in gold collection.

Season 2
Porcupine Creek (Hurt et al.): 80.4 oz (2,280 g) $125,000
Big Nugget Mine (Schnabel et al.): 34 oz (960 g) $55,000
Quartz Creek (Hoffman et al.): 93.5 oz (2,650 g) $150,000

Season 3
(Hurt et al.): 191 oz
(Schnabel et al.): 163 oz
(Hoffman et al.): 803oz

Season 4
(Hurt et al.): 280 oz
(Schnabel et al.): 163 oz
(Hoffman et al.): next to nothing, about 2oz

Season 5 he was off in the huff because the Hoffmans were getting paid more than him.

I think what he was forgetting is that without the Hoffmans there would be no show. The shows format was about complete novices to gold mining trying to strike it rich, not pro miners running an operation so he should of been thankful for any payment towards operating expenses IMO. I certainly don't miss him as you can probably tell. hehe


youngsyr

14,742 posts

191 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
R8Steve said:
youngsyr said:
R8Steve said:
youngsyr said:
It's also why the Dakota boys aren't on the programme anymore - they were too focused on mining rather than making good TV.
They left because they felt they weren't getting paid as much as the other crews. They didn't really strike me as particularly good miners either.

I never took to them after they came in and stole the claim from underneath the Hoffmans, irrespective of how bad at mining they were at the time.
The way the older Dakota boy (Freddy?) put it was something like, "If you want a miner, come and see me. If you want a TV star, pay me like one."

I took that to mean: either get out of my way and let me mine, or pay me to act up for the camera.

As for how good they were, don't forget where Parker and Todd were at that stage, they were pretty much on a par with, if not behind the Dakota boys.

I honestly can't remember much about the claim issue, so I won't comment on it.
Apart from the Guyana disaster the Hoffmans were always well ahead of the Dakota boys in gold collection.

Season 2
Porcupine Creek (Hurt et al.): 80.4 oz (2,280 g) $125,000
Big Nugget Mine (Schnabel et al.): 34 oz (960 g) $55,000
Quartz Creek (Hoffman et al.): 93.5 oz (2,650 g) $150,000

Season 3
(Hurt et al.): 191 oz
(Schnabel et al.): 163 oz
(Hoffman et al.): 803oz

Season 4
(Hurt et al.): 280 oz
(Schnabel et al.): 163 oz
(Hoffman et al.): next to nothing, about 2oz

Season 5 he was off in the huff because the Hoffmans were getting paid more than him.

I think what he was forgetting is that without the Hoffmans there would be no show. The shows format was about complete novices to gold mining trying to strike it rich, not pro miners running an operation so he should of been thankful for any payment towards operating expenses IMO. I certainly don't miss him as you can probably tell. hehe
Again though, that comes down to how much support the Hoffmans had - they have always had by far the largest crew and often the most and biggest machinery. Comparing total haul between crews isn't really the whole story.

Also, none of the teams were professional miners, Parker and his Grandpa did it as a summer hobby and I believe the Dakota boys only did it as a summer job.

Prior to around season 3, I would say that out of all of them only Tony Beets was a professional miner.

P-Jay

10,551 posts

190 months

Friday 3rd November 2017
quotequote all
R8Steve said:
youngsyr said:
R8Steve said:
youngsyr said:
It's also why the Dakota boys aren't on the programme anymore - they were too focused on mining rather than making good TV.
They left because they felt they weren't getting paid as much as the other crews. They didn't really strike me as particularly good miners either.

I never took to them after they came in and stole the claim from underneath the Hoffmans, irrespective of how bad at mining they were at the time.
The way the older Dakota boy (Freddy?) put it was something like, "If you want a miner, come and see me. If you want a TV star, pay me like one."

I took that to mean: either get out of my way and let me mine, or pay me to act up for the camera.

As for how good they were, don't forget where Parker and Todd were at that stage, they were pretty much on a par with, if not behind the Dakota boys.

I honestly can't remember much about the claim issue, so I won't comment on it.
Apart from the Guyana disaster the Hoffmans were always well ahead of the Dakota boys in gold collection.

Season 2
Porcupine Creek (Hurt et al.): 80.4 oz (2,280 g) $125,000
Big Nugget Mine (Schnabel et al.): 34 oz (960 g) $55,000
Quartz Creek (Hoffman et al.): 93.5 oz (2,650 g) $150,000

Season 3
(Hurt et al.): 191 oz
(Schnabel et al.): 163 oz
(Hoffman et al.): 803oz

Season 4
(Hurt et al.): 280 oz
(Schnabel et al.): 163 oz
(Hoffman et al.): next to nothing, about 2oz

Season 5 he was off in the huff because the Hoffmans were getting paid more than him.

I think what he was forgetting is that without the Hoffmans there would be no show. The shows format was about complete novices to gold mining trying to strike it rich, not pro miners running an operation so he should of been thankful for any payment towards operating expenses IMO. I certainly don't miss him as you can probably tell. hehe
I'm sure there's an Reddit AMA with Dekota Fred I've read, but I can't find it now, anyway, as I remember it.

He was hired by Discovery to act as an advisor / mentor for Todd in series 1 on a salary befitting a contractor.

The Claim they were using was fairly useless, it was / is an abandoned mine, that others gave up on as it was hard to mine and had poor gold, despite that the fact that based solely on it's geography it possibly could have. Due to the surprise popularity of the show, it was moved to another, larger claim (but still not what would be considered a 'proper' claim by people who actually work in the industry) and Discovery asked Fred to continue to mine the original claim - it was supposed to be almost an instructional thing - 'here's how it's meant to be done' but Discovery had long shifted from making documentaries into "Stylised Reality Shows" so wanted lots of drama - including the supposed stealing of the claim by Fred.

The mine was wasn't big enough to mine on an industrial scale, nor was is rich enough in gold or easy enough to mine profitably - Fred couldn't make any money from mining it, and he knew that, and Discovery wouldn't pay him the same appearance fees as Todd and his band of Merry fkwits so what's the point? I think it came to a head when they wanted him to mine the top of a mountain with a wooden micro-plant and no water supply.