Your Pick Of Any Nugget Detector For High Trash Areas?

[argyle]

On March 23, 2016 at 3:57 PM, Roughwater said:

If you could choose just one detector in search of gold nuggets in High trash areas what would it be and with what coil?  

Let me put this question another way.  You have an opportunity to go to a new Pay to play gold mine like Ganes Creek Ak.  Of course you will take your favorite PI detector and if money were not object and you could bring a second detector for the trashy areas given all the new and old detectors available what would you bring to the hunt?

 

Thanks, 

 

Terry

Discounting general un-dug hardened ground, and concentrating on the type of 'pushed material in the form of broken up tailings you mention like Ganes Creek (I've never been there of course) and detecting the big un-pushed high tailing piles (we call them mullock heaps)...

I wouldn't take my PI at all. No advantage over VLF's in these scenarios whatsoever. Simply leave it at home, and take your pick from from any VLF unit that can really punch the gain through tailings, and run an 11" round and up, preferably 13" and larger.

Many to choose from, F19's/G2's GMT and 14" elliptical coil are beaut, as are nearly all the Euro units. They all put much more gain through than say a Bug2 and you won't be missing out on anything.

You could use any of the Makro Nokta units as they run larger coils and the ground will not be hot.

As Chris has pointed out the Makro's are 5/8ths useless on fair dinkum hot ground, and some types will have them on permanent overload, whereas other VLF's handle that same ground extremely well.

But you will not have to worry about that when working Tailings.

Personally I'd be happy taking an F19 or Fors CoRe or an EDS unit, and use no discrimination whatsoever, and dig endless iron and junk to get at the gold.

(Every unit you use with disc, will at some stage degrade a nugget to Iron, and Murphy's Law clearly states it will be the largest deepest nugget in the heap)

The 3030 and all BBS/FBS units are vastly overrated as discriminating gold digging units. On hot ground they are useless, even though they'll hit and give nice response to gold near surface, and plenty of people have hit gold with them including myself with Sovereigns and a Quattro, they will degrade a nugget response to Iron more often and shallower than other other disc'ing vlf's. Regardless of anyone's special settings.

And on tailing piles, nowhere near as deep as the higher gain units.

The only thing you need do, is clearly by ear, define Cold Rock and Hot Rock responses as accurately as you can without losing a dig.

Good luck Terry...

[Roughwater]

Thanks Argyle,

You comments are much appreciated.  Maybe the reason I ask the question is obvious not sure but the reason is that I have a good PI machine but feel I should get a VLF machine as well that would offer some discrimination.  I don't have buckets of money so I would like to make my first choice a good one.  

On March 25, 2016 at 8:04 PM, argyle said:

Personally I'd be happy taking an F19 or Fors CoRe or an EDS unit, and use no discrimination whatsoever, and dig endless iron and junk to get at the gold.

I'm not as educated as I would like at nugget shooting but if I were to use no discrimination on a VLF machine and dig everything would it not be best to just use my GPX 5000 instead of a VLF and dig everything? It would certainly go deeper than any VLF would it not? Or by no discrimination do you mean to just go by the tones on the VLF to pick your targets?

Thanks again,

Terry

[argyle]

Hi Terry...

The only depth advantage the 5000, or any Minelab PI from the SD2000 onwards, has over good VLF on benign ground like tailing/mullock/queit gully's, be it one in the Minelab VLF platform range to the current high gain output VLF's we see today from America and Europe, is the ability to run large Mono coils.

Coil size pound for pound on good even ground types, a good example being 14"DD as the were typically the largest we could get that were any good, but not that it mattered as 14.5" round on a VLF DD is the largest you can go for depth as signal response degrades and splay's from then on up.

In benign ground and with a good VLF unit running a 14"DD, and any PI running a 14"DD ....no difference in depth period.

Even if the tailings contain heavy mineralization, because the ground has been broken up, it does not hinder the VLF's like it would in hardened un-dug ground.

As for hot rocks/cold rocks, they affect our PI's as well, sometimes for the better regarding judgement, sometimes worse.

As for discrimination ... a heck of a lot of guys use it on VLF's nugget hunting. Personally I'd rather put a little bit more work in. All units will degrade gold with any discriminating unit, and at any level of iron reject setting, depending on shape, size and depth of the nugget or specimen. Also the actual gold content versus silver/copper and manganese, ironstone ect.

I don't trust them and never have. Far too much 7"gold can sound out like 2" tin when disc is brought in to bare.

We've got to get down and dig at some stage, may as well be more often than not I reckon.

Picture yourself on a large mullock heap, sorry Tailing Pile, with your 5000 hooked up with a big or even medium sized Mono. The weight of it, even bungied up, and the balance of it versus your stance.

Now picture yourself with a superlight VLF with 13"-14" coil on it, working at three times the speed....and punching that gain deep.

Make a pleasurable day for you Terry...

[Roughwater]

2 hours ago, argyle said:

Picture yourself on a large mullock heap, sorry Tailing Pile, with your 5000 hooked up with a big or even medium sized Mono. The weight of it, even bungied up, and the balance of it versus your stance.

 

Now picture yourself with a superlight VLF with 13"-14" coil on it, working at three times the speed....and punching that gain deep.

Thanks again argyle,

As they say here in the southern US "I hear ya", meaning I understand.   

I hadn't previously thought of a mullock heap being different in composition from normal ground but in thinking about it I guess it is different.  Kinda like testing in air VS testing in soil.  That being said, maybe using Ganes Creek might have been a bad example for me to use.  And from what I have heard about Ganes Creek, you got it right about it being full of mullock piles as you all call them.

A lot of our gold bearing areas over here I don't believe are as mineralized as yours.  There are some few however that maybe are and I would prefer of course having a detector that can still function in those areas if need be.  There is some ground that just has too many tiny bits of iron.  If I know there is history of huge gold nuggets I might dig or if I find a patch but otherwise I sure would like a detector that can eliminate at least some of the digging as some of the ground here is like concrete.  You want to be able to cover some ground as well.

I've heard good things about 2 of the detectors you mention, the Fores Core and the F19.  Some of the other's here also like the 19 and Steve wrote a positive review of the Fores Gold / Fores Core.  They aren't nearly as expensive as most of the multifrequency machines like the 3030.     Gotta get ready for work.  The real gold fields in the US or more than 1500 miles from me but I plan to visit some in late June and July so I have some time left to figure out what I want.  

Make a pleasurable day for you as well Argyle.  

[argyle]

No worries at all and thanks Terry...

I think they are only not as mineralized across the board. But... I have a couple of friends that are Cal natives and they hit both California and Arizona, and in no uncertain terms they let me know that they have more than enough nasty ground types to deal with. Just no getting away from that in on any country's goldfield's I guess.

I wish there were a magic bullet amongst the discriminating units.
But... they are much more refined now in where you can set your Tone breaks. So that benefit is there to at least get a slight 'cackle' from a shallow piece of iron/tin instead of our old full-on grunt.
Probably the worst part of shallow small iron in gold-bearing ground, is the halo from degradation causing a much larger signal response for its size, having the unit thereby leaving adjacent or deeper whispers un-heard.

But you're right, for quickness and necessity it can still be a rewarding session using disc.
Just remember, the harder more compact sun-hardend hotter ground will negate the use of discrimination to near surface only. You will get a bit more play and disc at better depth in the Wash type gully's though.

Good luck with your 5000 too out on the gold, you may just find you won't want to use anything else, especially if you have a small coil like a detech 8"DD or one of coiltek/minelab/nuggetfinder smaller coils. 

June/July, that's your summer isn't it? Take it slow the first couple of days Terry. I made a huge mistake early in this summer and very nearly got the body-meltdown full on headache hallucination thing happening by not watching my water versus coffee intake. 

Oh and just by and by, do you use a VLF at the moment for coins/relics or whatever, and what model is it?

[Steve Herschbach]

Hi Roughwater,

argyle has covered it extremely well - thanks argyle! Really not a lot I can add, and I have spent more time hunting tailing piles than anything else. Just to reiterate a couple of his key points. For overall efficiency a VLF is hard to beat in trash infested tailings. If you can hunt without the discrimination, great, but the option is there for really bad areas or just when you are tired. However, when a tailing area has been beat to death with VLF detectors to the point of seeming hunted out, a PI and a big coil still ends up being useful.

Truly any good single frequency VLF can excel in tailings with a proficient operator. I do tend to recommend a Gold Bug Pro as a safe choice with the F19 as an upgrade option. That does not take away from the others at all, just a safe very popular well proven option.

argyles assessment of the Nokta/Makro units is also pretty spot on. In Oz and really bad ground in the U.S. the early units in particular can overload incessantly. However, in far more areas in the U.S. at least they run exceptionally well. I would be very happy to run the Nokta units in particular with the 15" x 13" DD coil hunting tailing piles. I do hunt over 90% of the time with a GPZ 7000 these days but the only VLF I am inclined to use is my Makro Gold Racer. The Noktas though have better balance running a large coil and so if I was doing a lot of tailings again I would be tempted to get another Nokta.

For whatever it is worth the White's MXT produced over 1000 ounces of gold at Ganes Creek. Pretty hard to argue with that.

[Roughwater]

Thanks again Argyle, I trust your judgement.  I am presently in the market for a Joey coil for the 5000.  Thought about the 6" mono but like the narrower shape of the joey.  I know you are correct about some us ground being mineralized such as in Arizona but I haven't encountered it yet.  Even so I would prefer to be prepared for it if I do.  

No, I don't presently have anything but the 5K.  Years ago I had a whites Eagle and used it for a long time mostly coin hunting in parks and at homes off and on. 

  Before I went on my last cross country prospecting trip I had bought a lobo, an old gold bug and the GP 3500.  I never used the Lobo much or even the Gold Bug.  I would usually grab my 3500 with the 8" Commander Mono.  That was my favorite combo even though I had purchased several other coils for the GP.  The small mono was usually pretty quiet and I could get close to and between most brush with the 8" mono.  I had used it several times at the beach as well but the North Carolina beaches are pretty trashy under the sand and I mostly found new coins and very deep junk.  I sold all my detectors to buy a home.  Later on I did miss my GP so I bought a White Ti detector.  I had it for a couple years and even built 3 coils for it including a 3 meter coil (3X3ft) but it actually came out more rectangular.  I could detect a 1 lb piece of Iron at 6 ft air test.  I had to get on a ladder to test it.  I later sold it however to buy a hunting rifle as I wasn't using it much.  

Ideally I would like a detector that would do it all well but not sure there is any such thing.  The dealer I usually buy from is doing some training in June here in North Carolina at a local beach and I would like to attend. I will also be attending his class July Nugget Shooting class in Oregon. His top choices for beach hunting are the CTX 3030, the Excaliber II and the Fisher CZ21 in that order.  I am an Ex-Marine so I am told I can get a 15% discount on the minelabs but even so the CTX is pretty costly and the Excal would be best used only at the beach and they don't come cheap either.

  I am also about to retire for the 2nd time and trying to pay off my cards and paying them off and buying a $$$$ machine isn't real compatible.  It does appear though that the CTX could be a great beach machine as well as a coin machine and maybe useful in moderate ground for prospecting.  I have an electronics background so  

My present inclination is to buy a moderate priced detector that can be used as a beach detector for coins and for nugget shooting.  There are several that seemed to maybe fit my need.  However the Fores Core sounded pretty good as well as the F19 or maybe even the F21 hip mounted could maybe work.  Thought about the AT Pro as it is waterproof but it don't appear to get great depth, not sure about it's salt use and am thinking the features of the Core might be better?  I do know that if I pay off my small debts I will stand a better chance of staying retired and being about to use my detector toys pretty regular.  Anyway that's where I am at present. 

Good day 

Terry

 

 

[Roughwater]

Thanks a bunch Steve for your input.  I get to rambling sometime and loose sight of where I was going.  Guess it's part of getting older. 

 

Terry 

[goldbrick]

On 3/25/2016 at 8:04 PM, argyle said:

Discounting general un-dug hardened ground, and concentrating on the type of 'pushed material in the form of broken up tailings you mention like Ganes Creek (I've never been there of course) and detecting the big un-pushed high tailing piles (we call them mullock heaps)...

I wouldn't take my PI at all. No advantage over VLF's in these scenarios whatsoever. Simply leave it at home, and take your pick from from any VLF unit that can really punch the gain through tailings, and run an 11" round and up, preferably 13" and larger.

 

I wonder if there is a difference in performance in tailings depending on the type of tailings. Do we need to differentiate between hard rock tailings and placer tailings when talking about the relative merits of PI versus VLF. For instance tailings from ancient river deposits as opposed to a hard rock tailings deposit consisting of iron rich ultra-mafic rocks. Or is it a moot point in all ground types of hard rock tailings due to no electrical conductivity in hard rock tailings because they are busted up? I think quartz tailings can be very benign almost to the point of an inability to GB on them.

In regard to depth on tailings  between PI/VLF being basically equal, is that true in all instances except for say a GPX or GPZ due to the battery power enabling a much higher level of gain? Like VLF = TDI but VLF < GPX?

HH,

Merton

[argyle]

There would have be changes in performance that knock signal response around with different type of matrix on piles. Some would disadvantage VLF's, some would disadvantage PI's.

Only coil size and type being exactly the same I think Merton.

 

And not sure if 'battery power advantages on later units actually place more, or push more gain through broken mild ground than say a Detech Relic Striker with 6 aa's can. Or other types of high gain 8 aa machines.