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Gold Jewelry Settings?


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10 hours ago, GB_Amateur said:

Welcome back, Tim!  You've been MIA for quite a while.  Hope you are getting out finding goodies that you can share (by photo) here.

Thanks GBA!  Good to be back.  I moved for work from the moderately weathered Pacific Northwest to Houston Texas, and the transition has taken longer than I had hoped with regards to my detecting.  But happy to start getting back in the "swing" again.  Hopefully some goodies (and pics) to come soon.  

And to take my own advice from above, my gold jewelry setup is Field 2, multi, 50 tone (most of my hunting regardless of intended targets in this setup) and depending on my patience at the time, either wide open (a la horseshoe) or 6 and up.  Just can't swing without stopping for a 28+ (a silver ring isn't gold, but still a good find in park).   I also tend to lower the sens... usually not looking for deep gold in parks.   If I am going deep, its all about old coins, so notch in nickles and either 18+ (IHP) territory, or 24+ to catch the wheat coppers.  

Of course the real trick is going where there's gold.  My gold rings have been on curb strips, and sports fields and a few small child's rings in tot lots.  (BTW gold mode in tot lots is pretty fun, though I didn't realize so many people still wear bobby pins).  Haven't one a lot of beach/surf hunting but obviously a lot of the gold finds we see are beach finds.  Hopefully my new "Gulf" home will change that.  

 

 

 

 

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12 hours ago, Tiftaaft said:

If I am going deep, its all about old coins, so notch in nickles and either 18+ (IHP) territory, or 24+ to catch the wheat coppers.

Good info, Tiftaaft.  BTW, I've been finding old Wheaties (from the 19-Teens) in the low 20's TID's.  That's also where my IHP's have been showing up.  My hypothesis is that they used more tin back then and more zinc as the years progressed.  (Recall 5% of pre-1982 penny composition is some combination of tin and zinc, but the mint never specified how much of each until ~1962 when they did away with tin entirely.)

As most USA coin hunters (using Equinox) know, 20 is a fresh Zincoln (might get some 21 for a just-off-the-press) and they go down from there as they deteriorate.  Thus the Zincolns and IH's aren't typically right on top of each other digital TID-wise but just a narrow overlap.  I say this because if you really hate Zincolns, setting the break at 19-20 (so reject 19 and accept 20), the chance of missing IH's is pretty small in my experience.  You'll still get the recent (last few years?) drop Zincolns.  However, when your ear is trained (and/or you use the strength="depth" meter), *most* IH's will be deeper than recent drop Zincolns.  I usually just dig all Zincolns as they are typically easy/quick recoveries, but when I'm tired I ignore the loud/strong/shallow 19-20-21's, only digging the quieter/weaker/deeper signals.  I'm sure some day this will bite me and I'll miss a shallow IH or Teen Wheatie.  They can, on rare occasions in my area, be just a couple inches down.

Now, for those of you in really hardpack, low organic matter soils where coins are less likely to be deep, forget all that and just dig all Zincoln-ish signals.  That's my advice, anyway, if you don't want to miss Indian Heads.  A lot of sites don't cover enough years so you won't find Zincolns and IHP's in the same site, but many old parks (like the one I'm searching lately) and schools do.

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I tend to hunt just like Steve suggested. When I am at a park or athletic field I usually use one of the Park or Field modes based on trash levels and target spacing. I can often get distracted by or start to zero in on the higher tones (clad dimes and quarters in the US or silver) and sometimes walk over the far more numerous iffy sounding low to mid conductor tones, which is not good when I am specifically looking for gold jewelry. At some parks and playing fields here most of the quality targets are fairly deep unless they were recently dropped. So if my will power to dig pull tabs/canslaw is weakening I notch out everything from 22 up to 40 and from 0 to 7 and just dig everything I can between 8 and 22.

Just for fun, has anyone here found any gold jewelry that has come in at 15 or 16? So far, I haven't. I have found rings and other gold items at every other target ID number between 8 and 22. Unlike some, I ignore the little stuff for the most part in the 4 to 7 range since used diamonds are not that easy to sell and small gold earrings have very little melt value. I have said this before and others have too: most of the gold rings, pendants, broaches etc, that I have found have locked onto one single target ID number and tone (in 50 tones) and not wavered. There have been a few times when I got two numbers that were close together and the odd time when platinum, palladium or silver mixed with gold made for quite a number/tone spread. Gold chains can do that too.

I often read and hear some Equinox 800 users express the possibility that the Gold modes should be better for finding gold jewelry. Is it because they are called the Gold modes??????? In an aluminum trash filled park, at a saltwater beach or in some highly mineralized locations with streams and lakes, I would go absolutely nuts if I used one of the gold modes. Hunting in one tone for gold jewelry is not my idea of a pleasant experience while also digging every flyspeck piece of metal in the first 3" of the ground. The Gold modes are hyper sensitive and have their uses. Hunting in extremely high levels of non-ferrous trash is not one of them in my opinion. They are possible for micro gold jewelry in the right circumstances like bark, gravel or sand tot lots/playgrounds. But I think they were especially intended for small gold nugget/picker prospecting and relic hunting in sparser target environments.

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56 minutes ago, Jeff McClendon said:

I have said this before and others have too: most of the gold rings, pendants, broaches etc, that I have found have locked onto one single target ID number and tone (in 50 tones) and not wavered. There have been a few times when I got two numbers that were close together and the odd time when platinum, palladium or silver mixed with gold made for quite a number/tone spread. Gold chains can do that too.

Good advice is worth repeating.  Although I'm after old coins almost exclusively (in parks and schools, that is -- not the case at old homestead, etc. sites), I do sometimes notice tight tone&DTID in the 14-18 range.  I appreciate you waking me up to the fact that it could be a nice piece of gold jewelry.  Yes, some pulltabs can give a steady single number so it's not like I'm going to be thinking "must be gold!", but I dig pulltabs at 12-13 (USA nickel zone) all the time anyway, so I'm not allergic to them.  😁

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2 hours ago, GB_Amateur said:

I've been finding old Wheaties (from the 19-Teens) in the low 20's TID's.  That's also where my IHP's have been showing up. 

Fair comment GBA.  You are right, I am passing up some potential wheats with more disc.  18+ is my normal disc mode, but wide open is my preference in old parks, and then battle the discrimination between my ears.  Tim

 

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6 hours ago, Jeff McClendon said:

I tend to hunt just like Steve suggested. When I am at a park or athletic field I usually use one of the Park or Field modes based on trash levels and target spacing. I can often get distracted by or start to zero in on the higher tones (clad dimes and quarters in the US or silver) and sometimes walk over the far more numerous iffy sounding low to mid conductor tones, which is not good when I am specifically looking for gold jewelry. At some parks and playing fields here most of the quality targets are fairly deep unless they were recently dropped. So if my will power to dig pull tabs/canslaw is weakening I notch out everything from 22 up to 40 and from 0 to 7 and just dig everything I can between 8 and 22.

Just for fun, has anyone here found any gold jewelry that has come in at 15 or 16? So far, I haven't. I have found rings and other gold items at every other target ID number between 8 and 22. Unlike some, I ignore the little stuff for the most part in the 4 to 7 range since used diamonds are not that easy to sell and small gold earrings have very little melt value. I have said this before and others have too: most of the gold rings, pendants, broaches etc, that I have found have locked onto one single target ID number and tone (in 50 tones) and not wavered. There have been a few times when I got two numbers that were close together and the odd time when platinum, palladium or silver mixed with gold made for quite a number/tone spread. Gold chains can do that too.

I often read and hear some Equinox 800 users express the possibility that the Gold modes should be better for finding gold jewelry. Is it because they are called the Gold modes??????? In an aluminum trash filled park, at a saltwater beach or in some highly mineralized locations with streams and lakes, I would go absolutely nuts if I used one of the gold modes. Hunting in one tone for gold jewelry is not my idea of a pleasant experience while also digging every flyspeck piece of metal in the first 3" of the ground. The Gold modes are hyper sensitive and have their uses. Hunting in extremely high levels of non-ferrous trash is not one of them in my opinion. They are possible for micro gold jewelry in the right circumstances like bark, gravel or sand tot lots/playgrounds. But I think they were especially intended for small gold nugget/picker prospecting and relic hunting in sparser target environments.

A couple of weeks ago, I found an 18K Cartier gold band that read dead on 16. I've found many gold items in all areas from 2 to 25. At the beach, I scoop everything non-ferrous.......and even a few ferrous sounds on occasion. Parks are a different animal in my book. To me it's just not worth the effort to find tiny gold in a modern park. Larger gold reading 10 and up,, sure, as long as the signal doesn't jump around. Gold is usually very stable in I.D. numbers. Even then, some parks I just dig "sex sounds"......screamers and groaners. That would be 12 and 13, and 22-up on my machine. I'll also dig a few others if they sound good enough regardless of number.

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2 hours ago, cudamark said:

Even then, some parks I just dig "sex sounds"......screamers and groaners.

😆

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