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Showing content with the highest reputation on 10/16/2018 in all areas

  1. Years ago, when I started to hunt Rye Patch I knew it was well past it’s hey days! Yet, I continued to see nuggets being found there by others Prospectors! Our group, finally started to pop some gold after wearing out several sets of boots and skid plates on our old trusty GPX’s. With the new generation of Minelab Detectors, SDC 2300 and the GPZ 7000, it was a new game. Having cut our teeth on the learning curve of both new detectors on the California side of the hill, we set our sites to Northern Nevada. Multitude of hours by our group to establish productive ground and techniques with our GPX’s, lead our new detectors to what seemed like brand new patches of gold. This last outing was no different! One of our hunting members had a moment of Total Recall and remembered a few years back that we found a few nuggets in a spot with our old GPX’s. Well we hit the spot swinging and soon our detector’s started to sing back to us! Now remember, I was out there a couple weeks ago, trying to track down a couple new spots for this group hunt trip. I didn’t find any new spots on that trip and we didn’t even hunt the old spots on this trip, which I did good on. Now, there is only one way to run the SDC and that’s turn it on, it’s and incredible detector and the operators of it on this trip pulled teens of nuggets with it. But, you have to know the variable sounds of the SDC when you run the coil over a target that set you apart from others swinging the same machine over the same dirt. It’s the same with the GPZ 7000, you really can’t run it wrong, just turn it on! You make it run for you and your inner self. Sure I have settings, I like and so does everyone in our group of Prospectors. You have to know what it’s telling you if it’s a target or not, there isn’t many Duck nuggets left in any old gold field(s). Air testing or burying a test nugget does not reproduce any of these nugget signals (tones). I’m still learning tones of the GPZ and will never be and expert of them. The sweet tones of a nugget, I do have lock in my mind is what keeps me and boot makers happy! Lucky...No - spend the time in your local gold field, might take a few pairs of boots, skid plates and multitudes of digging holes in hot ground and rocks to learn the tones of your settings of your detector. We had a great time, even though the wind was crazy windy and made Detecting a challenge - Persevere, press on regardless! Until the next hunt Here’s Robin’s and my 2 1/4 day hunt total in dwts
    12 points
  2. After a fairly lean summer (90 hours hunting from early June to late September), surprisingly that included five permissions, things have picked up over the last three weeks. Here are the details: Hunt 1 in Schoolyard: 4 1/2 hour hunt on my favorite (one of only two) schoolyard, running Park 1, ground balanced, custom 5 tones, Iron Bias 3, recovery speed 6, I got a clean 25-27 signal at moderate tone depth (turned out to be 4 inches) and was very surprised to see a 1912 (common issue) Barber dime. 'Surprised' because 1) this schoolyard was a pasture prior to 1955, 2) (when I got it home and cleaned) the condition graded out AU-53 meaning this coin had seen very little wear/circulation in its lifetime, and 3) I thought I had been over this area previously (obviously not). Does this make sense? It certainly is possible that a coin minted 40+ years previously and in near mint condition could get dropped. For example, a previous recent hunt produced a fresh drop (surface) 1980 near mint Lincoln. Now having searched this schoolyard for nearly 100 hours I've theorized backfill was brought in 26 years ago when the original school was replaced with a modern one. So this is my best theory -- I'm occasionally finding coins that were relocated to this site from a considerably earlier drop zone. No matter, gotta love that silver and the outstanding condition is a bonus. Hunt 2 (3.5 hours) in city park established 1948 (previously industrial site first occupied in the 1890's): This is my EMI noisiest site, one I've had a lot of trouble with in the past with multiple detectors but particularly the Eqx 800 in multifrequency. Besides buried power lines along the street there is a hospital with helipad across the street. As I neared the street I encountered serious EMI and checking the individual frequencies saw that the problem was at 40 kHz. In my experience this is the exception -- most of the time (from underground powerlines, I think) it's 5 kHz that suffers worst. So..., since I'm looking for coins I chose to run at 5 kHz with gain of 19 (custom 5 tones, iron bias of 0, ground balanced, recovery speed 6). Hunting in a spot I had never previously searched (thinking it was modern fill) I got a strong copper-penny / dime type signal, thinking likely a copper Memorial or clad dime. Nope, only about 2 inches down: silver!! After cleaning it in water at home it showed a 1928 plain (common) date with the reverse in no better than VG condition, but a reasonably attractive, strong obverse. Always thrilled to find silver and this time no exception. Note: the ID's I was seeing at 5 kHz were consistent with multi-frequency ID's. This is reassuring, that when forced to hunt in single frequency the detector acts as expected. Hunt 3 (3.5 hours) in same city park: While out on hunt 2 I recalled that my new, long-awaited 6 inch coil was to be delivered that afternoon while I was actually on the hunt. Sure enough, there it was in the mailbox when I arrived home. Next day was my chance to try it out. I chose a part of the park I had hunted many times in the past with great success, both with the F75 originally and later with the Eqx 800. This area had previously accomodated a 1920's home, so quite a bit of iron (nails). Park 1, gain of 20, custom 5 tones, iron bias at 2, recovery speed 6. Searching a spot I know I've been over at least once with the F75 and probably twice with the Eqx 11" coil I got a decent (but with neighboring iron hits) nickel zone signal. Expecting junk (pulltab, canslaw, pencil ferrule, crown cap to name just some of the imposters) out popped a Jefferson 'nickel'. It seemed to have the typical dark toning characteristic of this kind of coin after being in the ground for a few years, but it wasn't orange color which tend to represent the worst examples of alkali corrosion. Still, didn't think it was anything special. Turns out it was my 3rd Warnick (this one 1943-S) of the summer! Next I searched an area which (based upon the density of trash) I had previously concluded was the house's trash dump. Running a small coil gives me confidence in such an environment and under a bush I got a very strong penny/dime signal which turned out to be a near-surface Wheat penny (1945-D)! 40+ years lying there waiting for my new 6 inch coil. My last old find I'm still unsure of depth/location since I didn't remember much about its recovery. When in old sites I dig anything above 17, even though that means pulling up the hated Stinkin' Zincolns, since Indian Heads and long buried Wheaties can give signals in this low. I do remember excavating a copper penny which showed no detail at all based upon the amount of dirt/crud it had accumlated over decades in the ground, but at the time I didn't expect anything more than a 1940's Wheatie at best. Thus I was quite surprised after getting home and soaking it that the reverse wreath of an Indian Head (1896 so over 120 years old) -- my second IH of the year. Summary/Conclusion: Although the Eqx has been an excellent producer for me in 183 hours of hunting, I'm pretty sure any decent detector would have found the two silver dimes. Neither was particularly masked nor deep. However, given that I was covering previously well-searched ground on Hunt 3 it sure seems likely that the combination of the 6 inch coil and the unmasking ability of the Eqx 800 pulled those 3 oldies out where other searches have failed. To add an extra note to those latter finds, over those 3 1/2 hours I only found two other coins -- a clad dime and a Zincoln. 60% of the coins I found that hunt were oldies. As can be seen in the photo, the dimes are characteristically (for my soil) as nice as the day they were dropped, but the two pennies and even the Warnick suffer from staining and (in the case of the pennies) scaling. I hope to be able to clean those up in the future. P.S. all of the hunts were 'all metal' (no discrimination or notching).
    7 points
  3. I recently returned from a Beach Hunt and was able to put some time on my new White's TDI Beach Hunter. I'll be posting photos of some of the finds as time permits. This interesting discovery had me laughing all the way home. Not exactly sure what it is, but about 5" long and looks to be a snorkel with a 2 headed and 8 legged octopus on the side. One end has a breathing mouth hole piece and the other has a small hole with brown stain around her rim. I'm sure you can't go down vary far with such a short snorkel, but I'm no expert either. Anyone have any clues?
    6 points
  4. I took the new GM24K into the hills this past weekend for its maiden nugget hunt. Although my first time out with it was actually a week prior, it really wasn’t a hunt since I was mainly just familiarizing myself with the features and functionality of the machine and trying out different settings on a small buried test nugget. But after finally getting the 24k dialed in, I did happen to find a subgrainer a mere foot away from the test nugget that day; an obvious zippy target at an inch and a half deep.? This little yellow speck won’t even register on my grain scale! So fast forward to Saturday: I was digging every target or nuance of a target and noting the VID numbers. The occasional hot rocks in the area seemed to lock in at a solid 1 or 2 on the display screen, without deviation, but even the smallest of the subgrain nuggets I found would bounce around into higher registers, sometimes in the 70s or 80s, making it easy to differentiate the gold from the hot rocks. Slow and careful searching yielded 5 of the little yellow blighters. Sunday I continued on where I left off on Saturday, and although I was finding tiny bits of foil and lead, the gold eluded me all day until just an hour before quitting time. I was in a trashy area littered with small remnants of old timers boot tacks that just screamed on the 24k; they were shallow enough so that a quick dig and poke with the super magnet took care of them. One of the screamers however stood out from the others because it was reading much higher on the VID. First thought was something sizeable like a 22 bullet or casing, but it turned out to be a chunk of bedrock. A quick rinse with water revealed it was actually lithified ancient riverbed sediment containing a partially exposed nugget.? Definitely a nice surprise. The 24k sniffed out a couple of subgrainers nearby to round out the day. I’m really liking the new Goldmaster 24k, a very versatile VLF gold machine with innovative ground balancing technology. It’s lightweight, well balanced, very stable at high sensitivity with minimal coil bump falsing, has a pleasant tone, and won’t easily tip over when sitting on the ground. Good work, White’s! ?
    3 points
  5. Obviously a larger coil will not be quite as hot on tiny objects as a smaller coil. That said the Equinox has remarkable small item capability such that even with the larger coil it is hotter than many machines. This is honestly one of the best larger VLF coils I have used. I am certain it will become the standard coil for many Equinox users.
    3 points
  6. I can hit sub-grain gold with the DD coil but the smaller concentric gives sharper signals that are more easily pinpointed. As far as hot rock and gold target id numbers I do not have enough time at enough locations with both coils to comment on that with any degree of confidence. I don’t rely much on target id numbers when nugget detecting beyond wanting to sort out non-ferrous from ferrous, and even that carries risks when dealing with the tiniest gold in mineralized ground. My goal with hot rocks is to either tune them out or at least get the machine set up to where they sound audibly different than the gold. I prefer to hunt by ear.
    3 points
  7. Installment #2 to my hunts and review thread for the 6" coil. Back out at the pounded park today at lunch. about 45 minutes hunt time, bookended by the V Nickel within my first few targets, and the Merc on the last target before turning off the machine. I give the credit for both these finds to the 6" coil. The V Nickel was about 5" around some roots and around the 11-12 tone I received, were some other mid conductor trash (can slaw, a pop top, and some deeper iron that I left in the ground). But in between all those competing tones, the 6" coil narrowed in on a quieter but solid nickel tone. This is my second V and the ground is really hard on nickels in my area, but at least I can make out the date on this one. 1907. The merc was only a few inches down, and no doubt I (and others) have been over the top of this coin many times. It was surrounded by all kinds of iron tones... a few pieces I dug out were a few rusted nails, and a two wire fence nails, the ones that are "u" shaped to capture the fence against a wooden post. But between all those grunting iron tones, a solid 25-26-27 tone kept ringing through. 1916 Mercury dime. (And my 2nd Quest for Silver completed... about a week after it started :)). I am really learning to love this coil. I was running the E600 with original firmware in Park 1/50 tones/sensitivity 20/recovery 2 (4 on the 800) and IB 0. And I was making an effort to swing slower than I normally do (though this was probably faster than others... I have a bad habit of swinging too fast). Tim.
    3 points
  8. I'm just bumping this final vid to the new page Yeah Reg. I'm not ashamed to admit I teared up a few times while transcribing this tape. I owe a lot to Jim. Naturally I've edited out an awful lot of repetitive, boring footage. For instance, en route to WA we travelled in convoy and chatted away on CB radio. There were some delightful accidentally recorded dialogues between us (because I had set down the camera whilst still running) but visually, a half hour close up of seat upholstery :)
    3 points
  9. The first control airtests indicate that the 15x12 coil is equally sensitive to small items like gold earrings, or small 13mm -0.50 gram silver coin Denar ... the middle, and the big coins are deeper - programs Park1, Park2 for recovery speed 2 and 4 and sensitivity 20... The impression of the big coil has more than the same reach of these two recovery speeds 2 and 4-as compared to the standard 11 "spools there were more differences .. tomorrow I will make a test for the smallest items ... and then tests in the ground...
    3 points
  10. I'll never write Rye Patch off, as I have fond memories and many stories of Success for customers and myself back in the day. In fact, I still enjoy offering Field Training there as the few pieces of gold the new customers recover are well earned. The folks who think they can go out there and clean house, missed the boat by at least 10 years. But even today (just as you said) the newer GPZ and SDC technologies are winners and good gold can be dug up. My last year hunt produced 43 nuggets with the trusty Zed from Rye Patch proper and some of my customers just found a few more 2 weeks ago. Yes the new technologies will allow old patches to give that soft golden feeling again in the palm of the hand. The up and coming GPZ-7500 with small 8" coil will get a few more and the GPZ-8000 with Disc Mode will certainly open up some of the trashy sites. I can't wait to get my hands on those 2019 new models...if they ever make them? Those are fine chunks you and the Mrs found and a few with Chevron patterns too. Words well spoken Lundy and thanks for sharing.
    2 points
  11. short-coil airtest for small things, program Park2- sensitivity 20, recovery speed -4 ...,weight in grams,diameter items in milimeters, distanse in centimeters..
    2 points
  12. 11 "standard coil-506 grams, .. 15X12" coil-660 grams, 6 "coil -303 grams .. -15v12 coil-is of its size, very light., that sounds very solid .. I have measured the weight of the coils...now test for very tiny items...
    2 points
  13. I think this is an ancient snorkel used by shamans to travel to distant lands, circa 1978AD. Legend has it that these travelers often suffered extreme hunger, paranoia, and appreciation for a local musical troupe called Los Muertos Agradecidos.
    2 points
  14. I can see the merit in adjusting the mid level zone from a high of 19 down to 18 with the high zone set at 19 and above instead of 20 and above. Good call Alluminati...I just might have to give that a shot.?
    2 points
  15. From one angle I'd say it was a CRACK pipe.
    2 points
  16. Hi GB_Amateur… thanks for sharing your recent coin hunt with us. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this presentation and particularly appreciated that you provided a detailed description of your observations and thoughts at the time, and the settings utilized with operating your detector. It was such an informative and interesting read, thankyou. Congratulations on your coin recoveries, the silver coins are always a welcome addition to our collections, and especially that handsome Barber dime. It appears to be in remarkable shape, not bad for a coin that is 106 years old and has likely spent most of those years in the ground. I would think the war nickel ought to clean up nicely too. I’ve found a few over the years, and have been quite pleased with how easily the stains were removed using a brief (mild solution) electrolysis followed by a very light finger application of a silver cleaner (Goddard's Long Shine Silver Foam) / water paste followed by a warm water rinse. Of course I’m not at all concerned about any associated value when employing such methods, but just want the coin to look nice. Below is a photo of a very ordinary but fairly representative dug example that I've cleaned using the described technique. Thanks again for putting together this excellent post, including the nicely illustrative photo of your coin finds………………………Jim.
    2 points
  17. Wow GBA! Congratulations. I was just getting ready to post my head scratching 6" coil finds, but you definitely bested my few coins (see my thread here ? ? I am going back now to study your notes. I am intrigued by the all metal. I haven't yet got enough confidence to try that, but your results are compelling. I love the detail of your hunts and the settings you are using. Thanks for taking the time to share your hunts and your amazing finds!! Tim.
    2 points
  18. I have been trying my best to let folks know how much I really like the 24K and posted quite a few finds with it. But because I'm a dealer and sell them, most folks write it off. Nothing I can do about that but get it in the hands of other well known nugget hunters. You are doing great on the small gold, which is one thing I never went after as I've yet to get to NV with it. Nice recoveries Lunk and that specimen is a stunner too. Keep it up and hope to see you soon.
    2 points
  19. o I finally have some production models of the New dual adjustment bungee I designed. I think I am going to call this one the QWEEGLE. Sort of a combination of Quick Bungee and Double for Double adjustment. I know a lot of you use your own harness, which in a lot of instances is a modified Camel Back. Camel Backs are great because they provide hydration and give you a great place to hook a bungee cord up to. Well I have thought long and hard about now to improve the QWEEGEE bungee which allowed you to adjust the length of the bungee where it attached to the rod. The BOOMERANG bungee which I also invented allowed you to adjust the length of the bungee at the "D" ring. The big issue with the QWEEGEE, was that you could only detach the bungee at the "D" ring, so when you laid your detector down the bungee was lying in the dirt. There was no way to detach the bungee from the shaft of the detector. Also where the bungee snapped onto the "D" ring it was pretty clumsy to get it on and off. I wear gloves, and when you wear gloves, small pieces of plastic are hard to deal with. So here was my challenge. 1. Design a bungee that could be adjusted with at the "D" ring or where the bungee attached to the rod. 2. Design a bungee that could easily be detached from the detector. or the "D" ring. 3. Make the process of detaching the bungee really easy and effortless. 4. Provide an optional attachment ring that would be similar to a "D" ring but be more durable, easier to attach to, allow the user to stitch it onto their own harness, and not turn around in the webbing you use to attach it. Standard "D" rings, always manage to wiggle around in the webbing and end up looking just like this "D" running vertical instead of like a U where the curved part of the "D" stays at the bottom. First part: Easy on and off attachment snap that attaches to "D" ring. Nice and hefty and durable. A thumb tab, to allow you to remove the bungee from the adjustment groove using one hand. Second Picture: Adjustment groove in snap. Lift or lower your detector while the bungee is out of the adjustment groove to find the right length, give a slight tug down to seat the bungee in the groove and lock the bungee to a perfect length for detecting comfort. SHAFT ATTACHMENT ADJUSTMENT Point. Long non-slip strap that will accommodate all known detector shafts, even the Garret ATX Deep Seeker that has a rod the size of a baseball bat. • Easily attach or detach bungee by pulling the bungee in or out of the SLIDE SLOT. Picture 3 • Easily adjust the length of the bungee by lifting your detector up or down, and then tugging the bungee up into the adjustment groove when you find the proper length. Picture 4 • Use the shaft attachment point only as an attachment point, and don't use the adjustment feature. Simply put the loop at the end on the bungee onto the shaft attachment point. Then you can use the snap at the "D" ring to make adjustments Picture 5 PICTURE 3 PICTURE 4 PICTURE 5 Then we have the optional non-slip "O" ring that I designed . Supplied with a piece of webbing for you to attach to your favorite harness system. I designed all of these pieces. I had to have injection molds made (not cheap) and had the parts molded out of Nyglass, which is a darn near bulletproof material. That "O" ring is 2 1/4 inside diameter. A blind drunk monkey could attach the snap to this "O" ring without ever worrying about having to see it. So I would love to hear your input. I have just 10 from the first production run. The rest will be sent by boat. Only the plastic parts and the strap are being shipped, we assemble the parts with the bungee here in Henderson. Some things are OK to have made in China, but bungee cord is not one of them. We use a very expensive high quality marine grade bungee. Doc
    1 point
  20. It's been a very busy summer/fall, so I was dying to get out to the beaches to see if the Equinox would still be kind to me. These pictures are from 5 of the 6 beach hunts. It's early in the season and the beaches are not shedding sand yet, so the finds are slimmer than last season. I did include a picture of one clad hunt that yielded over $17.00 in change in a 5 hour period. Most other clad amounts were much lower. Total clad after 6 hunts is $31.54 (average of $5.25 per hunt). It's going to be a long season and I hope to get out more often than once a week, but time will tell. So far I'm thrilled with 4 pieces of gold and the decent amount of silver I've found. I have been experimenting with Gold 2 mode, but so far with only a one tone option, all signals (including falsing from wet and mineralized sand) make a audible response. Can't figure out how to stop that. Wish it had 2 tones. I even ran a tight disc pattern, but the falsing was still reading in the low gold range. Anyone having success with the Gold 2 on wet sand??
    1 point
  21. As I mentioned in the below thread, I received my 6 inch coil yesterday and couldn't wait to take it through the paces: Today, during a lunch break from work, I headed out to a local old and pounded park I have hunted countless hours with countless machines. I have been amazed the life my Equinox brought back into this park. My early year success is outlined here: So, with an hour to hunt, my E600 in hand, loaded with the 6 inch coil and original firmware (I am still testing old vs. new firmware using my E600 with original and E800 with new firmware), I set out. I was running Park 1, 50 tone, Sensitivity 22 (pretty stable), Recovery 3 (6 on 800) and IB 1 (2 on 800) and walked into the area of the park I have hunted hardest to see if this rig could uncover anything I missed with all my other machines, including the E600 and E800 using stock coils. My first target was a series of bouncy tones across about 4" of ground. As I narrowed my swings, concentrating on the different tones, I was able to hear one solid mid tone that was 11-12 ID, but a couple of high tones that were more scratchy and not repeatable an inch or two away in two directions. I pinpointed and it was evident that I had 2, maybe 3 targets there. I chose to circle the mid-tone first. While the depth meter on the 600 with old firmware isn't exact, the modulation on the pinpoint told me it was in the 4"-5" range. So I dug. I was expecting a pull tab, or beaver tail. Both notorious for bouncing into the 12-13 range in my ground, but also occasionally giving off 11's and 14's. My intent was to clear the trash, so I could better hone in on the higher tones sitting near this target. A little over 4" down: I think it is a 1935... our ground is hard on nickels. Only my 3rd Buffalo since I started detecting and my previous two were no-dates. I refilled my hole, stood up and swept the coil over the area again... the high tones were still there, and equally as iffy as before, giving me numbers in the 21 to 26 range, and on every other pass or so. But they pinpointed pretty tight.. I estimated 5"-6" based on the pinpoint tone on both. A little ground excavating later and out popped: Looks like a 40's and a 50's wheatie. I have a little cleaning to do on all three of these coins, and they aren't ground breaking by numismatic standards, but I am thrilled. And here is why: Three old coins that by all rights, should have been found previously, but weren't. I have a suspicion that the closeness of these coins would have given larger coils, even with fast recovery like the Equinox, troubles. So the 6 inch coil came through in my opinion (I would bet that I was getting some type of blended tone previously... like a 15 or 16 on the Equinox as an example, which I chose not to dig thinking it was trash). In my soil, with the settings I was using, I think I was at the limit of detecting depth with these Wheaties... about 6". So that is really good information for me. Not that depth is everything, because I was able to separate between these three targets at depth. Had I been thinking more scientifically, I would have tried to clean up the tones by dropping the recovery down to 2 (4 on the 800), or boosting the sensitivity up to 24 or 25. Or I would have walked back to my car and grabbed the 800 with the stock 11" and documented what these targets read, and why I hadn't investigated them before. Heat of the hunt and a lesche in my hand got the better of me. All three of these targets were dead center in my plug. Which is somewhat expected when the coil itself is only 6", but just verification that the coil with this rig was pinpointing accurately. Hopefully more results and finds to follow. HEH (Happy Equinox Hunting) to all, ~Tim.
    1 point
  22. Wow, what an awesome story. I think I want the coil now. I might think about parting with my TDI coils to fund one.
    1 point
  23. Very Nice, Lucky! Your advise is always excellent, on point and too true. I wish I had been there...next time! fred
    1 point
  24. That look like a pipe to me. Now I know where they get the expression Blowing smoke up your butt. Chuck
    1 point
  25. Cipher, What did you find out? I have had both V3i models and V3 models. I currently only run the non-updated V3 just because of the ground cancelling. I can ground cancel the V3 in two or three pumps, where the V3i might take 12 or more pumps to ground balance. Of course I'd like to have the other features of the V3i.....but I hate standing around pumping the coil. HH Mike
    1 point
  26. Did a 3 tone hunt at the old fairgrounds the other day and came away quite pleased with the Nox. In the past I was hunting low and fairly slow (for me) with sens in the 21-24 range and lower recovery settings here. This time I set recovery at 6 sensitivity 24 in park 2 and hunted with a slightly fast sweep. The machine behaved beautifully over the ground (2 bar 81 ground on Fisher/Tek machines). Both coins hit solidly in my setup range reading 12-13 for nickel and 19-20 on the IH penny from 9"+ depths. It's been a long time since I have recovered 2 old coins in one hunt from this site and they were the only coins found during the hunt.?
    1 point
  27. Appreciate the details on your hunts including settings I haven't give the 6" much time yet Congrats on the great finds!
    1 point
  28. Thanks! for your input Steve. I just found it interesting that Lunk was listening to target responses in addition to how the VDI numbers were coming up on the VDI scale and I guess they were somewhat consistent. I never paid attention to the meter on the GMT just went by sound only. In fact some targets sounded more like iron, but turned out to be gold. I was curious if the Goldmaster 24k meter and target ID is a improvement over the GMT. Then again what works in one area may not work in another area because of other factors influencing the detector. I guess to satisfy my curiosity I'm going to have to purchase one.
    1 point
  29. Only if your interesting discovery could talk, what adventures and stories it could tell! ?
    1 point
  30. Boy, that barber is in great condition!! you were right in your comments about how nice that is.!! Tim.
    1 point
  31. What an interesting thread. Great work and attention to detail. If you ever get to the point of selling them, let me know. But for now I have inadvertently solved the problem of a wobbly shaft and the adjustment problem as well. You see if you do not clean your stock shaft after each beach use, it seizes up and you will never get it to come apart....ask me I know …...
    1 point
  32. No problem, keep up the good work.
    1 point
  33. I think some native pipes were quite naughty. Is it carved or made out of glass?
    1 point
  34. I prefer the small coil on the 24K for tiny bits and specimens. It is a fine machine and I give White's a big thumbs up on this one. Good luck to you.
    1 point
  35. 1 point
  36. Hey JP No offense taken and no magic either. I fully respect you as a prospector and would love to do a training day with you. My electronics background is working with, repairing and designing audio electronics so I know by using a form of audio compression you can put an edge on any signal. Although its labeled 'filter' it doesn't really filter as such. It selects a band of frequencies to compress. Unfortunately I should have called it 'mode' rather than filter, but it is what it is. It is primarily designed for headphone use as I feel with using speakers I lose a little sensitivity due to background noise. The B&Z would be as good (maybe even a little louder) when using speakers. Be great to catch up one day in person regards Pat
    1 point
  37. The coil pinpoints very shallow targets beautifully if you tip the coil and nose around with it.
    1 point
  38. I'd be very interested to read how the sP booster manages to magically do that? No offence Pat but this kind of rhetoric seems more akin to devining with a forky stick than amplified audio. Folks because I make a competing product I've kept away from this type of discussion, at the end of the day they are all audio amplifiers. A good one increases the loudness of the audio with minimal distortion and clipping giving the user a finer resolution of control via the volume pot. The volume control on the Minelab units are very coarse, once you get above certain point they clip, a good booster helps a lot to avoid this. I have a sP booster and it has a nice mellow sound but is heavily filtered, I've used it with headphones and speakers and preferred it for headphone use. I'm not a fan of the aluminium box because the GPZ can smack it at a great distance, but all in all it's a really nice booster. Steve I know this post is a little inflammatory but felt it needed to be said, especially on here. JP
    1 point
  39. I couldn't agree more. So far 95% of my detecting has been with old coins as my goal. If I get jewelry (occasionally) and relics (often) then I'll take those, too. Old coins are in old sites. I don't have the situation some do hunting 'cleaned out' old sites and I'm fine with that. So my old sites have lots of trash -- majority of which are nails. The masking is often extreme, even for the fast response Equinox with 11 inch coil. Even more so the case with my previous detectors which don't have as good of separation and/or target ID in high density trash. The smaller coils may have been a crutch for me and for this reason I'm glad I spent 175 hours with the Eqx 11 inch coil, even in my trashy hunting grounds. But it's always better to have options. As far as the Eqx big coil, I haven't decided and I'll be reading the reviews here, as always, before making my decision. Who knows, there might be some 3rd party aftermarket manufactured coils ? out by the time I need a large one.
    1 point
  40. Here is the polyethylene version finished. I am happy with how it turned out. Now that I have a benchmark, I may revisit the Nylon version in the future with a bit of cooling, but that is neither here nor there, this version is very serviceable IMO. Tonight after work I think I'll start working on the end caps.
    1 point
  41. Right on Gibson. Former Xterra user here, nice to see the 705 bag some big nuggets. Good going.
    1 point
  42. Yes I do, I’ve never used any type of booster before but a couple of things changed my mind. First was a post by Scott about buying his and that got me thinking and put the thing on my radar, second my youngest got me playing a little “Pubg” on Xbox an increadibly immersive battle royal not for the faint of heart and I upgraded my ear buds to a boosted audio enhanced gaming headset looking for some advantage against my opponent and the difference in the gameplay was profound over using the Bose earbuds, so I thought hmmm perhaps I should reconsider with the 7000. I was a preorder with the gpz and never swung the gpx and have become comfortable with the chatty zed, that and the fact I paid an ungodly sum for that piece of kit (lol yes, kit... I like my zed) and kind of felt it should have pretty darn good audio on its own, that and it has no trouble finding tiny tiny trash and gold so I’ve resisted. I am a convert and now realize my folly and regret not getting a signal booster years ago as it made a difference for me. Battery life was also good, I started day one with fully charged batteries in the 7000 and the sP01 and halfway into the second day my battery indicator on the gpz changed color with one bar so I quit for lunch. I put the batteries on chargers, the sP01 was full charge hooked to a small old iPhone usb charger in under 45 minutes, I’m guessing in the day and a half I used less than half the available battery life. Rained the day before my trip and conditions in the gold fields were less than ideal with the soil spotty damp going down a couple of inches and an abundance of hot rocks as well. I’d read the links you posted and kept my settings conservative on the advice of others, the tips were right on and my detector was as stable as it has ever run filtering the chatter and tightening targets so I spent less time going back and forth scraping the ground and kicking hot rocks. The end result it was nice to get a little bit of color, but really the big advantage for me was in the increased ground I covered and not being as fatigued mentally filtering by ear, physically was another story... a lot of those little rusted chunks I was hitting were fairly deep the cramps in my arms a painful reminder I’d befrinded my prospecting pick far too long. No, you’ve too much gold now, lol. Really, I doubt you’ll regret, I waited for a lot of reasons that turned out not to be issues.
    1 point
  43. Today I went to another spot. I went here in particular because this place owes me some gold lol. It started off tough, it's really not that big of an area and it was almost full of soft sand on the move. There was some sand starting to pile up though, so I thought I would stick around and look for some low spots. There is a river that drains dark organic material into this area, the wind held it against the shore so the visibility was essentially zero, I had to walk around to find any low spots. The first important indicator target was a dog tag from 1979. This is a little different then a coin in the sense that the dog tag had to have been lost around 1979 or shortly after. A few minutes later I had my first pice of jewelry, a copper ring. I got my first cache today. I've found many coins, many bits of of tin, but never a coin in a tin. It's a "Murrays Erinmore" flake tobacco tin with a Zincoln in it. I know you're jealous. The tobacco tin rang up in the 30s, not long after I got a couple more 30s side by side, turned out to be a fairly hefty one ounce sterling silver bracelet. Nice blue tarnish. Yoink. After that, i got another good hit in the 30s. This one was a big target but the numbers were good, it's fairly easy to avoid iron using the Gold 2 mode, so what the heck lets just see what all the racket is about....a antique fire extinguisher at almost 18 inches. You know how sometimes you leave a huge deep target thinking it sounded like a high conductor, well I guess sometimes they are. This site has quite the eclectic finds. I have to be careful about being too greedy, this place can fill my pouch with junk in no time lol. It's full of soup can rings, caps etc. so I have to focus on coin sized objects and unfortunately blow off some of the single digits on account of excessive foil and fly-by-foil.
    1 point
  44. Smack bang on the money mate! A machine such as this has been needed for a long time, but no manufacturer has delivered.
    1 point
  45. Minelab must finally be opening the spigot. Mine arrived yesterday and I got in 3 hours today (with success -- more details on Sunday when I have time to post them). I gotta say that this is the first detector I've owned where I've used an 11 inch coil (compared to 6 inchers) a majority of the time, because I had no choice. It was a great learning experience. Do I wish to repeat that with my next detector? No.
    1 point
  46. I finally received mine too thanks to a heads up of from a fellow forumite. Planning a little trip in a couple of weekends to try some tough but productive spots, cannot wait to see how the Equinox and my Multi Kruzer does at these sites
    1 point
  47. 1 point
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