Hey there Kevin, I don't have a raptor but I built my own version of the viper before the raptor came out. the only difference in my unit and the viper is it is only 10" wide instead of 12", so it is more like the raptor. I used Gold Hog mats and set it up similar to the matting in the raptor, except for the new mats that came after I built mine. I swear by this product, and the way it captures gold and the ease of clean up as compared to the standard riffle and carpet set up. Besides capturing all sizes of gold from pickers down to -150 and -200, stuff you can barely see, the main advantage is the amount of cons you have when you're done. Once you get the mats tuned in you can run 1 ton of material or 5 tons of material, you will have about the same amount of cons to process. I ran about 4 tons of material and had about 1/2 pan of material to process. Here is a vid of my unit when I first tested it at Ala Gold Camp, I was running the water a little too hot that first day, but it still captured a good bit of gold. A side note: a lot of our members in the NW GA chapter of the GPAA, run gold hog mats in their dredges and highbankers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsv7yEE9DsM
Just my honest opinion, for what it's worth. Paul