My First Gold Found With A Garrett Axiom

[Az_Ed]

   I've been detecting for gold nuggets for several years without finding any Au.  As many of you know, almost everything else is found:  bullets, fragments of bullets, fragments of fragments of bullets, bullet casings, nails, hob-nails, foil, lead sinkers, lead shot, and the list goes on-and-on.
   We'll I finally found some Au!  The first time out with my new Garrett Axiom after some backyard and nearby gulch practice I went to a southern Arizona location with a local detecting buddy.  We have both been on a quest to find some gold.  On a steep rocky hillside and after finding several lead bullets and a big jacketed rifle bullet I thought I found another when a large signal was heard.  About three inches down was a flat dark dirt covered rock that was unusually heavy.  My first thought was "that's a funny piece of lead."  I called my buddy over to take a look at it.  He hollered and identified it as a specimen piece of a gold vein!  After all of our searches we were finally on the gold!
   After hundreds of hours of detecting my only hope was to find some small or tiny piece of a nugget....anything.  What I found was about 3.6 ounces of specimen.  I'm not certain how much Au is inside but I'd guess about one-half of it.  I've scrubbed it with dish soap and also liquid Bar Keeper's cleaner but the gold is not clearly visible except on the edges.  The piece is about 2.2" long, 2" wide and 1/2" thick, so it clearly is a piece of mineralized vein.  I may consider cleaning it with Muriatic or hydrofluoric acid to remove everything except the Au and quartz, but it is such a nice example of a thin gold vein it I'd rather not damage it.
   I'm most impressed with the Axiom.  I was using the 11" mono coil on a steep brushy and rocky hillside.  The detector is well balanced and easy to use with only a little practice.  My detector settings were Fine, Slow, and Manual ground balance.  Unlike my past VLF detectors the Axiom virtually ignored the mineralization and hot rocks.  This meant I could detect almost continuously with only an occasional manual ground balance.  I'd guess compared to using a VLF machine I covered twice as much ground with far more confidence in hearing targets.
   For all of you still searching for your first gold detect I say stick with it.  Perseverance pays off.  One of the best suggestions I've heard from an experienced detectorist was to first be sure I was detecting in an area of known gold.
   Good luck and keep detecting.  Az_Ed

[phrunt]

That's awesome, and an incredible first ever gold find!  Where there is one there is more! Good luck.

 

[matt]

What a great find! Hope you go out to that spot and find the vein it came from!

[mn90403]

Just what the doctor ordered!  All of your missed gold put into a nice chunk of a specimen.  There are some formulas for weighing the rock in and out of water.  When you do that you can determine the amount of AU!

Congratulations.

You stuck with it and got a reward.

Was your buddy using an Axiom also?

[Az_Ed]

Thank you for the comments.  My buddy is using a new Equinox 900 which appears to be a very good VLF detector.  I have some graduated cylinders, beakers and a precision scale on-the-way.  I hope to calculate the amount of Au.  I'm planning to fill one beaker completely full of water.  Place the specimen in the beaker and capture the water over-flow.  I'll then measure the over-flowed water in graduated cylinder.   With this data I can calculated weight of quartz for that volume.  The difference between calculated weight and measured weight should be the approximate weight of the Au.

[rvpopeye]

Nice first yellah !👍

So now....When are you going back ?

Live long and prospect .🖖

 

[dirtman]

Beautiful find you detected Congrats ! 🤠

[beatup]

well done 

[Steve Herschbach]

Congratulations on a fabulous first gold find!

 

[GB_Amateur]

10 hours ago, Az_Ed said:

I'm planning to fill one beaker completely full of water.  Place the specimen in the beaker and capture the water over-flow.  I'll then measure the over-flowed water in graduated cylinder.

There's a more accurate way to get specific gravity (S.G.).  The problem with direct volume measurement (e.g. with graduated cylinder) is that it seldom is sufficiently accurate.

See this video for the Archimedes S.G. determination method.  There's another similar way which works for scales that have insufficient dynamic range to handle a beaker full of water.  When I get some time (gotta run right now) I'll show how to do that.

Nice find!