The Perfect Swing

[LowTide]

OK I admit that I am a coil control snob.  I have always concentrated on maintaining a perfect 1 inch above the ground elevation and with the coil perfectly parallel to the surface.  Having spent many years hunting on ocean beaches with very gradual slopes and close to tidal flat characteristics, I strove for perfection.  I developed a gait where if my right foot was forward the coil was 90 degrees to the left. As the left foot came forward and even with the right foot the coil would be straight in front, and as the left foot moved forward the coil 90 degrees to the right.  I was very efficient and could cover a lane about 7ft wide over wet/flat sand.  

So being the snob that I was.  I observed other detector users with golf swings or scythe mode murder the weeds methods, and I was constantly saying tsk..tsk..tsk.  If only they could achieve my higher plane of enlightenment and skill they would be much more successful.  Pride doth cometh before the fall!

When beach hunting I always arrived at the crack of dawn and most of the time there was a fog or mist still in place leaving a light coating of moisture on the dry sand. As I always had single and multi-freq detectors this never concerned me much as I could adapt to the conditions. Usually very early in the morning you see the runners and dog walkers out, and only occasionally another detector user.  But there was one old codger that I saw quite often working the dry sand for recent drops, and he moved along the beach at warp speed stopping briefly to retrieve a target.

I had observed him a couple of times from a distance and could tell he knew very little about metal detecting or how to swing a coil.  His big mistake was that he was holding the coil at a 45 degree angle with the left side about an inch above the sand and the right side up about 8 inches high.  He looked to be sporting a Tesoro Compadre from the shape of the control box and the coil design.  He was whipping that coil back and forth and flying down the beach as if he was making a run for the porta-potty.

About the third time that I saw him light shown through my snob fog.  The dry sand had a thin layer of moisture on it in the morning and if he held the coil parallel to the surface it would chatter and false.  So he had adapted to the situation with the equipment he had on hand.  By only exposing the outer edge to the sand no false-ing.  But only shallow targets(recent drops) would  be found and he was only covering about a 3 inch wide swath side to side.  That explained the rapid swing and foot speed to cover ground.  Also iron was easily rejected because the signal was on the edge of the coil.  And he wasn’t carrying a digger or sifter with him, he would just kick the sand to find the target.  He was probably looking at me and thinking that I was sporting enough gear to make a moon landing.  

The arrogant Master had become the Grasshopper.

[schoolofhardNox]

I try hard not to watch others because I think the same way. I have been hitting silver coins at 14" in one spot on a certain beach. Almost 100 silvers in a 20' x 120' span. I watch this older couple do an area I see as very sanded in and I have written off that area as boring and unproductive. As they grid back and forth in a frenzy, I did silver  How dumb are they? Not very dumb at all, as that area that I wrote off actually has been producing silver and gold for them for months....all shallow. Apparently the tides rip this section apart and expose these coins and then lightly sand it in so it looks like a deep sanded-in area. I had to hit it the other day since I wanted to look for chains with the Equinox and that should be a clean area, just micro jewelry and chains since the clean out all the junk for me.  I couldn't believe the Mercury dimes at 3" that I found, along with 4 gold items.........Yep they were the smart ones. Time to eat crow for a while