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My comments had nothing to do with how well Whites detectors work, and I could care less what you choose to own. I’m not selling you on anything. It’s like I insulted your wife or something - get a grip. They are inanimate objects. My comments were about the future of the industry, and detectors made by a company that went out of business because it lost the thread of what most customers are looking for are not relevant to that future. I worked with Whites in many ways for very many years, and tried my best to get them to see reality before it was too late. Arrogant mismanagement ran a once great company into the ground, and I’m more unhappy about that than most.

In a lot of ways VLF detecting maxed out years ago, and all we get now are different flavors. Some things have got lost it seems along the way. Like true unfiltered all metal detection, something the T2 and F75 excel at. The new digital models process and filter everything by the nature of how they work. The result is not the same. I often think about getting a T2 or F75 or even F70 just to have a machine with a real solid VLF all metal mode, but then I realize I’d probably still just grab my PI instead. There is nothing wrong about owning and using old models, nor nothing wrong with the machines themselves. I’m the guy that often makes the case that VLF tech has largely hit a wall when it comes to max depth. But when talking about interest in US detectors I think we are talking about interest in current offerings. That’s where Tesoro and White’s failed, and that’s where FT and Garrett have to survive - on current models. The forums provides a good analogy. Some people still use Tesoro detectors. But when the company failed interest and discussion dropped to almost zero. When White’s went away the same thing happened. If there are lots of users they don’t care to discuss much, but the real truth is most people just moved on. Technology does not advance on the backs of people who keep using their rotary phone when everyone else is getting a cell phone. My rotary phone never got lost, never dropped calls. For just making phone calls I might say it was even superior to cell phones as a hard wired device. But the times and the tech have moved on. But the advantages of mobile far outweigh the advantages of hardwired, so most of us no longer have a landline connection. Like it or not detecting technology is no different.

June 2 2002 Part Four By 2:00 AM everything was still quiet. I walked back down to camp and talked with Vern for a bit. Then Jim took over my watch while Vern and I tried to get some sleep. I was only just starting to fall asleep when I heard a bunch of gunfire up on the mountain. I pulled on my boots and as I jumped out of my camper I saw vern and Jacob coming out as well. All I could think was Jim had been shot and what am I going to tell his family. Jacob had his trusty Thompson ready for business but I talked him into staying at camp and guarding it while Vern and I went up towards the gunfire which was still continuing in spurts. Jacob hollered out for us to kill them all. I had my 9 MM and Vern had the 357 revolver Jim had lent him. Up the mountain we went while making sure to keep an eye out on either side of the trail. Then Jim’s voice came over my walkie talkie. He said he was pinned down behind a big pine tree not far from the pump and afraid to move. I told him to stay put. Jim said he wasn’t exactly sure where the shots were coming from or if anyone was trying to shoot him or maybe just scare the hell out of him. Either way, whoever these guys were, they had now crossed the line and we’d had enough. Vern was fighting mad and so was I. TO BE CONTINUED ..................

You are as entitled to your opinions as I am to mine. What you are not entitled to on this forum is attacking people instead of ideas. I only own the DFX to run the Bigfoot coil, and even then it's not been used in nearly three years. If you think detectors made by a company that is out of business will have any substantial impact on the future of metal detecting you are dead wrong. If my saying so irritates you to the point where you have to make sly comments impugning the character and motivations of people on this forum, then feel free to find the door.

June 2 2002 Part Five As we worked our way up close to where Jim was taking cover the gun fire ceased. They must have seen us coming even though we were not using our flashlights. Jim popped out from behind his tree and came over to where we were taking cover. We decided to head back to camp as it was too dangerous out here in the dark and we were sitting ducks. When we got back to camp Jacob was all wound up. He wanted to organize a hunting party. I told him no, we are not here for that. Jim and I figured the men were not shooting at him but only trying to scare him. He said he had not heard any bullets striking anything around him and they were probably firing in the air. I wanted to go to the sheriff but Jacob was dead set against it. He said there was nothing they could do and we needed to handle our own matters. Jacob said he would sit up outside of camp until daylight and that we should get some sleep. It had been a long night and we were all exhausted. I began to wonder if the gold this was worth all of this. TO BE CONTINUED ...............

From my experience, if there is a iron presence in the ground you will have better luck leaving discrimination at 6.8 and notching from 7-40. This has worked very well for me. For some reason the D2 seems to be more sensitive to co-mingled targets this way. Try it in a spot that you have already covered. You will uncover non-ferrous in very close proximity to iron that you passed over with discrimination set to 40. If you have good soft digging conditions I would investigate any solid vdi number under 08 that gives you a crisp and clear high tone as well. This is coming from a relic Hunter and not a coin shooter. You will dig a little more iron this way but more than make up for it with good finds. If you give this a try on ground that you've already searched with your discrimination set high I would be interested in your feedback and thoughts.

Its nonsense, there cannot be any goldrush if you are not allowed to prospect or mine.

Minelab introduced 4 khz as a feature "upgrade" a few years after release. Minelab stated that it was at the request of Asian "horde hunters". Yes, most were skeptical and scratching their heads regarding the additional frequency given that it was so close to the existing 5 khz setting. I am pretty sure ML was experimenting with SF noise mitigation, ground handling, and signal processing algorithms as many users noted that 4 khz was incrementally more stable and perhaps had incremental improvements in detection depth on high conductors vs. 5 khz. In hindsight, it was probably a stealth field test of single frequency enhancements that ML was considering for incorporation into future detectors such as the Manticore, but more likely, this was a test case for enhancements that were eventually incoporated into the X-Terrra Pro.

There are some great tips in the preveious answers. You mentioned you are running Full Tones, so I would point out that running your Disc at 39 will report any TID 39 and below as an iron tone and Full Tones blanks any iron tone above about 4 for an unknown reason. So your setting basically notches out anything in the Full Tone audio below 40. I think Draun's way of Disc at 6.8 and Notch 7-40 is a more efficent way to do that, although I'd lower the Disc to 4 for Full Tones use. Either way be aware some coins' TID can be dragged below 40 when in a high iron environment depending on size and conductivity.

Back in 1990 I was sharing a house with John Hider Smith and Ian Jacques just out of Maryborough in central Victoria. We were involved in testing a new type of metal detector called pulse induction when Bruce Candy paid us a visit with an experimental system that he had been working on. This involved a large cable that would loop around a patch of ground that was suspected of holding big gold at a depth that conventional detectors would be incapable of hearing. The idea was to have this Tx cable connected to the electronics while an operator would work within the circle of of cable with what appeared to be a conventional hand held detector, but would only be Rx. Hopefully the Tx would be powerful enough to induce a strong electro magnetic field within the loop, while the Rx would pick up the target response when passed over it. My memory is a bit foggy on the results, but for whatever reason it was not a 'goer'. In those days Bruce was always thinking of new ways to achieve results.

I started detecting 53 years ago and was a big White's fan for many many years. That said, your statement that the 5000 (or 5900 or 6000di Pro for that matter) can "run any day with today's detectors" is only true if the targets are relatively shallow, the ground mild, and we're not talking wet salt water sand or ocean. Like the analogy of the '64 Mustang compared with today's vehicles.....sure the Mustang will get you the looks, and it may be fun to drive....at least in fair weather, and nobody stops suddenly in front of you, and you don't have to make emergency turns, and you don't mind the less reliability and extra maintenance, and you don't mind the poorer gas mileage, and the lesser performance, etc. Does that make the '64 Mustang a better overall car than a 2023 Mustang? Not hardly....in any area you wish to choose....except maybe looks! 😁 Would I still drive the '64? Sure, for fun, not as a daily driver or a trip where I wanted reliability, safety, and comfort.

I have two T2's, one of the new Green ones, and an original noisy ratty one, I found the original better but it was bad with EMI, so I improved it's EMI handling without the need for DST by just better shielding it's control box housing. Such a simple act improved it's EMI handling very well, just some EMI conductive paint, in about 5 layers in the end over the top of the factories coat of paint, looked like they had done a pretty thin coat and then instead of just using a bit of dodgy tape to hold the shield wire onto the paint like the factory did I painted the wire on with the EMI paint, this gave a far better connection than the wire just sitting there taped to the paint. Imagine if we just used tape to hold solder joints together with no solder? Sounds crazy right... well that's how they do it, tape! After painting it on I taped over it to give it a bit of extra support, although I probably shouldn't have bothered as after that I decided I'd hot glue it too. My early model T2 now works much better in EMI. This sort of thing would be what you'd expect in a later model T2, an improvement over early models, I haven't popped my new one open to have a look but I'd not be surprised if it was still just a bit of masking tape holding the wire to the shield paint. If they have fixed it, that's why it's often better to get a new model than an old one, as generally things should improve with later model detectors over the old models. Each new model "should" have improvements over the last and more often than not do. It's a real shame that modern detectors often lack the true all metal of the T2, if any brands want to make a good modern multi frequency gold detector that will be a hit with prospectors I hope they think back and add a true all metal mode onto it for the purists 🙂

Before there was a good waterproof wired headphone option available for the D2, I connected a set of older Gray Ghost Amphibians (for Garrett) to the wired headphone output (1 & 2) I found them just loud enough for wading with the volume maxed at 9. I tested them with a sound meter app on my phone and they peaked at 85db in pitch, volume level 9 using a 6g 10K band. Probably not highly accurate, but ballpark. I also tried them in Pitch/PWM but the Square audio was more appealing to my ear. Now I currently use the Gray Ghost Amphibian II's for Deus II (bone phone output 4 & 5) and the volume is crazy loud, I seldom go past volume 6 wading. I haven't tried them underwater but I could see them working well just because of how loud they are. IMHO go with the bone phone output 4 & 5, especially if you're diving with them.

I live in Northern Calif. There is not all that much snow here. Some places farther south may have got more snow, but I don't think it will affect much. It's usually flooding produced by rain that moves gold, and even then it has to be something like a 500 year flood event.

Well you really don't need a scope or battery for that matter, just won't be able to see the frequency or run 🙂 Anyways here are the cad files for the coil frame and housing. Anyone making one will need to drill a hole for what ever switch they choose. I also moved the post away a bit so 9v battery wasn't so tight inside. Units are done in mm, bottom and coil frame can be printed flat, top should be printed with supports on inside that you will need to remove later. This keeps the surface finish a little better for fdm printers. freq sens housing.zip

Plenty of engineering talent right here in the USA. Problem is so many other industries are sucking up engineers from the shrinking talent pool (yes there are fewer people entering into college engineering programs every year) and there is no way someone like Garrett can compete compensation-wise for that talent since we are talking basically about designing toys (that’s right people, toys) vs. multibillion dollar behemoths like Google, Amazon, Meta, Tesla, etc. that are working on deploying the real Skynet from the Terminator series. Foreign talent is not necessarily better and frankly someone is not going to come over here just to work for Garrett when they can work for someone else I just mentioned. Someone earlier talked about eventually hitting a technology wall. Guess what, we basically hit that wall years ago. Induction Balance technology is effective but an ancient and crude way to ascertain the nature of a buried piece of metal and now we are just squeezing drops of performance out of it by upping processing speed (where do you go once you can process a signal as fast as a human can swing a coil) and doing some real backflips with signal processing technology and simultaneous frequencies. But we’re just polishing a cannonball at this point, not really innovating. Furthermore, the noise floor continues to rise with the proliferation of wireless communication and control technology that it is becoming harder for designers to cut through the EMI similar to how light polllution and SpaceX satellite constellations are ruining visual astronomy. As Steve says, now that Axiom is out there and appears to be successful, Garret (the only viable US detecting manufacturer with an active R&D presence) needs to pivot back and build off APEX which was a low risk way for Garrett to dip their toe into SMF (set expectations low by introducing it as part of your entry level ACE lineup) and refresh their mid and flagship level offerings. Also, where is the hobby headed? Relics and gold are not replenished and coinage and jewelry are disappearing as we are now content to buy stuff with our phones and wear non-metallic silicone SafeRingz instead of gold wedding bands. Anyway, it’s pretty obvious why the US is lagging in VLF detector innovation. So the question is whether it’s too late for Garrett to get back into the game. FT is content to continue serving up warmed over pink and purple variants of detectors they designed more than 10 to 15 years earlier. I’m a firm believer that location vice detector technology is key to growing the hobby or facilitating individual success. Harnessing technology and AI to facilitate site research and access as well as for assuring swing coverage my do more to reinvigorate the hobby than incremental improvements in induction balance detector technology (though introducing machine learning into the detector technology mix might be the next game changer). My nonsensical ramblings, FWIW.

Good afternoon. Tell me, who knows what this eagle is from? Presumably, this is a hanging badge from the hood of a car or a decorative ornament from an old clock. Was found in Russia in the Smolensk region. I would appreciate any information about this artifact.

Came across a small circuit for relaying the frequency of a coil to a computer using a microphone jack and some software. I have a scope which will do the same thing but has to be hard wired to the coil or control board of the detector. What I liked about the circuit is it didn't need to be wired to the scope but the scope doesn't supply power to a circuit so I added a battery and then a couple leads to hook to the scope. I printed the little coil on my fdm printer and wound the coil on it. Layed out the part in pcb software and printed the circuit on some silicone transfer paper then transferred and etched my own pcb. Soldered in the parts and tested it. Lastly I was happy how accurate it was with just a small 2hz when powered on which could be the capacitor tolerance. What also is pretty cool is I can move the sensor away from the coil and physically measure the signal drop off. Surprisingly the signal will drop off pretty sharp. This is doesn't necessarily tell you how deep a detector will report an object it senses, just how far the coil goes. On my Multi Kruzer it showed the Superfly coil being a little out of frequency as the frequency was high which means I probably have a bad connection in the cable. The other coils tested fine and between 5,14, and 19khz there was little difference in range. On the Tejon I tested stock coil that came in spot on 17.5khz but the Cors Shrew came in at 16khz not that it matters that much on that machine. Apex was interesting. The Ultimate 9" was 12" and the Reaper 10x14 coil was 14", only 2" more. Now between frequencies and modes. The 20khz was the most followed by MF and MF and range dropped down as frequency was dropped in single freq modes. If I get my hands on a Nox and Legend would like to test those just for kicks. Anyways whole purpose was to make a little test device so I can keep working on my coils and test coils that maybe faulty. Just enjoying other aspects of the hobby. Enjoy!

The comments about build inconsistency remind me of a similar issue with the Etrac that occurred years ago. Some of you may recall there was a supposed difference in Etracs made in Ireland and later models made in Malaysia. I personally had one of each and did not notice a difference. However, I do remember some guys going nuts on insisting they would only own the Irish version and not the Malaysian one. Again, and it has been a long time ago, the issue just sort of faded away. As phrunt said, if a similar situation exists with Mjnelab's current detectors then I should think that they would not want to open that can of worms. I can only imagine the various YouTubers going ballistic with their amateur detective work trying to source detectors if that did occur.

12 CC coil Im using on digs archaeological sites, last year I pic up more than 150 tiny hammered and brakteats with this coil. I was literal walking behind deus and orx usesr with HF coils and picking up those targets.

At this point I am just going to use the Equinox 900 for gold prospecting, for less trashed areas and for those times when I really need depth. I am also just going to go with a low, mid or high conductor dig decision without concerning myself too much with more exact Equinox 800 type target IDs especially on smaller, deeper high conductor coins. For me, speculating about what is causing this wider target ID spread on smaller US coins and multiple coil responses on coins and regularly shaped targets even at 4" depth is out of my league.

I've had the Nox 600, 800, and 900. As well as the Manticore, Deus 2, and Legend. While each one is popular and has its own cult like followers, my #1 goto detector is still the Teknetics T2. The others to me, excel in niche and situational conditions...but not enough to say that one rules them over them all. That's just me though and I'm getting to be an old dinosaur.

If you're looking for coins then "Deep HC" (prog 6) is a good one. Because it uses a lower frequency range than, say, "General (prog 1)" you risk missing out on some smaller items at depth (earring backs, cut quarter/half hammered coins etc.). Raising Disc to 39 will make things sound quieter, but again, increases the risk that you may miss some smaller and/or masked non-ferrous targets. Horses for courses, I think.

That is the worst detecting skills I have seen. The ground that his missed would be more than 50% of the ground that he was swinging over. To me it looked like a setup, and the gold was found elsewhere. 😒

Yep, I expect triple beeping on shallow coins and other regularly shaped targets if they are on the surface or a couple of inches deep. 4 inches deep is a bit much. I got to do a short hunt in the rain today with the new one. The one they sent me is triple beeping on 3 inch deep coins and the IDs are a little tighter on 4” or less clad dimes and copper pennies. I think Minelab are doing a great job of trying to help me. No complaints whatsoever. The 900 is a great detector for sure. It just may need a bit of software tweaking to get it a little more stable.

So the triple beeping is both edges and the center of the coil hitting the coin at shallow depths. Probably due to the nature of both the Manticore and 900 being high gain detectors. I'm guessing the wide variance in the ID on the 4" deep dime is your high mineral dirt. My dirt fills the Deus 2 meter about 70% and I get the up averaging on both the Manticore and 900 on my 6" deep clad dime. But I also saw the same thing on my 800 with a 6" dime. If there is a problem with the 900, it's not real apparent in my soil. In any case hope Minelab gets it sorted out for you Jeff.

Can’t wait to see what goodies the update brings.

That's OK Jeff, you can visit mine, or better yet, Simon's!! I was just saying to someone that I like old, dusty detectors, with no warranty!!🤣👍👍

Without getting into a prolonged back and forth as to whether "...by far, that generalization is empirically and experientially true", I'll simply link to this excellent thread by Steve that addresses that generalization but also discusses exceptions. A deeper dive into the thread's technical references and the complex nature of EMI reveals that it's hard to lean too heavily on a single, convenient truism as the variables that affect the outcome of how a detector responds to the vast variety of EMI sources are also numerous. Nevertheless, some great nuggets about detector EMI susceptibility and what you can do about beyond sensitivity reductions and frequency shift based noise cancellation routines. FWIW, I was still curious and asked an expert a general question about metal detector EMI susceptibility and operating frequency and this is what they said about it: Metal detectors that operate at higher frequencies, typically above 10 kHz, are more susceptible to electromagnetic interference (EMI) than those operating at lower frequencies. This is because higher frequency signals are more prone to interference from other electrical and electronic devices, including power lines, cell phones, radios, and other metal detectors. At higher frequencies, the metal detector's circuitry and coils are more sensitive to changes in the surrounding electromagnetic field, which can cause false signals and reduce the detector's overall performance. In addition, the higher the operating frequency, the more likely the metal detector is to generate EMI, which can interfere with other electronic devices in the vicinity. To minimize the effects of electromagnetic interference, metal detector manufacturers often incorporate features such as ground balancing and sensitivity adjustments, as well as shielding to protect the circuitry from outside interference. However, even with these measures, it is still possible for metal detectors operating at higher frequencies to be affected by EMI, particularly in areas with high levels of electromagnetic activity. That expert...ChatGPT. 🤣 Clears things right up. SMH

First of all, one needs to be careful about generalizing EMI and the impacts based on operating frequency. Different detector operating frequencies have different susceptibilities to different EMI sources like 60 hz power line or florescent light balun noise vs. GHz wireless device noise (cell towers, phones, and wifi) and everything else in between. So its hard to generalize that high frequencies are generally quieter than lower operating frequencies. There are scenarios that I have encountered that are just the opposite of that. Also, EMI can interfere with detector operation from several different avenues and can enter the detector from more than just through the coil acting as an antenna. Operating frequency selection determines how target signals are filtered as they are processed. But the control box can pick up sources of EMI independent of the operating frequency selected and changing the operating frequency (the typical noise cancellation algorithms) doesn't necessarily fix those issues. Regarding the update, ML apparently did something to address EMI and ground handling with the 4 khz "mode" vs. the 5 khz "mode" and it had little to do with the actual operating frequency other than ML probably surmised that if they could make a lower operating frequency mode less susceptible to EMI then whatever they were doing could be used effectively across the board. Furthermore, they also needed to be concerned about unforeseen consequences such as reduced depth or target sensitivity, hence they left 5 khz alone in the event their "experiment" had unintended consequences. True, in general there is nothing that makes 4 khz signficantly less susceptible to EMI than 5 khz, but ML must have incorporated some secret sauce to make the added 4 khz mode to be less susceptible or more stable than the existing 5 khz mode. That extra 4 khz can also make a significant difference on detection depth for large, high conductive targets.

I keep bees and currently have several hives but I can only speak to how honey bees behave here in norcal. In general honey bees will only sting if defending their home or if trapped against your skin (stepped on, caught in hair, etc). When bees are swarming, like dirtman described, again they are very unlikely to sting as they are migrating to set up a new hive and are not in a defensive mode. Swarming bees are also engorged with honey which makes it very difficult for them to bend their bodies to drive in the stinger. This is in part why we "smoke" bees when checking their hives - they load up on honey in case they need to flee, and it also confuses/dampens their defense alarm pheromones. What Deep Beeps describes, "I came on a 4-5' tall creosote bush and was half way under the bush with my coil when I noticed what looked like a dark brown cowboy boot laying near the ground. As I looked a bit closer that boot turned out to be a bee hive", was most likely a swarm that was away from the hive waiting for the scouts to decide on where their new home should be. When honey bees swarm about 10,000+ of the workers and the current queen will leave the hive, find a resting place while scouts come to consensus on which of previously identified potential new homes is the best. This decision process is actually studied in business schools (Honey Bee Democracy). This decision process can take several days so when the bees leave the hive they engorge themselves with enough honey to survive that time. It is very unusual for honey bees to make a hive in the open which is why I suspect that was a swarm, and also why they didn't react when you got close. When capturing swarms I can usually walk up to them and just shake them into a box. Also bees keep their hive temperatures around 95F which is difficult to do in the open, and if you find and watch a swarm it is constantly churning, the outer bees moving inward so everyone stays warm. Now, to where you were detecting. It's been a long time since I did geologic fieldwork down in Arizona so I don't know how things may have changed or progressed. 30+ years ago we were strongly cautioned to be on the lookout for anywhere we saw dead small animals that didn't appear to be predator kills because there was a potential for a killer bee colony nearby. I've never encountered "Killer Bees" (Africanized honey bees) but apparently they are reactive to movement and will sting and kill small animals that venture too close to their hive. Apparently scavengers and predators leave the carcasses or are also chased away. I'd love to hear any killer bee encounter stories you all have to share. Anything I could learn about their behavior to make me safer now that I'm retired and hope to get back to the deserts. Cheers

Yes you need a scope. Here is the circuit and pdf to etch. Single sided copper on bottom. Freq Sensor.pdf

That 1 khz has a big change in EMI, 4 seems much better than 5 Khz. 🙂

That is awsome! What a great little device! When are they gonna be for sale!! "Ken's Coil Frequently Tester" another great tool from KenCo! Made in USA!🇺🇲 Now, if you quit throwing them like a Frisbee, they won't keep breaking!😁👍👍

Should be great to see what you do with it. As usual, genius. 👍

Brands out of Europe often get forgotten such as Rutus, they've made detectors far beyond any US manufacturer and they rarely get talked about, that indeed shows how far the US manufacturers are behind the ball when brands in other parts of the world although far superior aren't even mentioned. If Garrett came out with the Rutus Atrex people would be super impressed. This towers over anything a US manufacturer has released in the VLF space lately. It really does demonstrate how far behind US manufacturers are though when a detector this good is not even on many peoples radar in the US.

White's is long gone as is Tesoro so their models don't matter anymore going forward. All we have left is First Texas (Fisher, Bounty Hunter, Teknetics) and Garrett. In the tech world you either innovate with a constant stream of "new" products, or you get left behind. First Texas seems out of the running at this point. Garrett is doing well with the Axiom, and the Apex fits for what it was intended for, but it is quite obvious their almost their entire VLF lineup needs to be refreshed, and like last year. They simply are not part of any discussion. I will point out that the online world is a bit at odds with reality. Go to any large detector club meeting or hunt here in the U.S. and you will see plenty of Garrett product. But that will change if they don't get with the program soon. GTI 2500 as flagship after over 20 years - embarrassing.

New members now have limited access until they reach Full Member status. There is no ability to include links or to edit their own posts until they have made 10 posts and been a member more than 30 days. There is no access to posting classifieds until after 10 posts and 30 days. They can post in response to an ad however. There is a limit of one Personal Message conversation per day so they can contact people with ads in the Classifieds in private if desired. Any account that has not posted at all in the 30 day period will be deleted. Anyone with more than one but less than 10 posts will simply remain in the regular Member account status indefinitely. The accounts that make at least ten valid posts and have been a member at least 30 days will automatically be promoted to the new Full Member status. This will give access to the Classifieds, remove the PM limit, allow links and post editing, preset "signatures" and more. This does not affect any existing accounts!! Any current members with less than 10 posts etc need not worry as all accounts as of this morning were promoted to Full Member status. Anyone with no posts however should at least post once or lose your account after 30 days have passed. This was done to stop the excessive spammer activity after consulting the current membership over the last month. It should pretty much put a complete halt to that sort of thing, while also encouraging new members to be more active. Lurkers are welcome, but will need to post at least once. Thank you everyone for the valuable feedback on this subject. I will monitor the new setup but if anyone experiences anything odd due to the new setup, please let me know. I changed quite a few forum settings and hopefully got it all right.

It's been a while, I also need to do a wrap up of relic season, but I went to Myrtle Beach for a week. I was hoping to score some high end stuff, but I was in the Southern campground district instead of the hotel strip. Spring break had just ended two days before we got there. The campground is enormous, more than 800 campsites and about 2,000 lease/rental houses. It also has about a mile of beach, and there are two more large campgrounds heading north as well as a couple large condo buildings. Each morning and most afternoons I got to hunt the beach at low tide, the tide is about 5 feet so it goes way out. There were 4 sections, High dry, trough as seen above, mid dry, and wet. The top 3 were all random finds, in the wet you could zigzag for a short time to the surf, and soon you would find a line of good finds. The best stuff was probably in the surf trough but I didn't go in the water, especially after seeing a kid running down the beach with a 3 foot shark in his hands to show his parents. 😀 Tried to get a good shot but all I got was this: I know, what shark? 🤔 You can see the hotel district in the background, never made it there, it was about 4 miles up the beach. Overall it was kinda disappointing, but still fun and I lost over 5 pounds over the week. I met other detectorists who were complaining instead of lying about the dearth of finds, I kinda had to laugh. I was using the Deus 2 with the 13" coil and a modified Beach Sensitive program done sort of like my Relic Reaper program. No disc, no notch, ears for discrimination. I knew from reading others' posts that there would be all kinds of crazy IDs and sometimes no ID, but I dug everything that sounded good. Thing was everything was deep for the most part. I got so I'd scoop at least 5 times not only to beat fill-in, but to get to the find which was usually in the 4th or 5th scoop, anywhere from 8-12" deep. Because using square full tones and turning on a find identifies almost all iron, I had no problem skipping it but dug some randomly either because it was close to the surface and dangerous, or just to check. I did find that low tones with IDs of 5 to 15 were usually bling jewelry. I also blessed the 'no beach tents' signs which kept stakes to a minimum. It was the only thing you couldn't legally do on the beach 🤣 Here's my Day 1 trash getting used to the place: Glad I got rid of that surface trap iron! This is my last days' trash showing that I got better but still watched for surface iron: Ok. Now for the finds: Crap finds Bling finds A small handful of junk jewelry including a tungsten ring, a stainless spinner, 3 earrings, a tiny ankle bracelet chain, and some earring parts. The best one is below, .925 with a big CZ. Big finds: A huge monster truck Hummer that was 2 feet down, a small toy car, sunglasses. An iPhone 13 and case that was about 6" under the surf and vertical, it would have been 6 feet under water at high tide so it is dead. A huge bling buckle found close to the surf about a foot down, I think it took 8 scoops to get it. It has rhinestones or CZs and is some kind of plated zinc. https://www.buckle.com/blazin-roxx-glitz-belt-buckle/prd-5491537906 Coins: 99 coins, oldest was probably 70s. The place was huge and so nice that we booked it again next year before leaving, my wife loves the local shopping and restaurants. Shame I couldn't get her a gold or silver ring. A few more gratuitous photos of the place: Cool spider crab

And there is the predicted response from Mr. Steve!👌I must be psychic!!👳‍♂️🤓 Now if only I could apply that psychic ability to my detecting, I would be posting a lot more!!🤔😂 Life is way to short to sweat the small stuff KD8! On to bigger and better finds, with whatever you choose to swing!!🍀👍👍

Ah bummer... it's no fun to lose something valuable, but losing something with valuable memories is the least fun. After almost 30 years of managing to hold on to the first rock hammer my mom gave me when I was 7 years old (despite losing probably 8 or 9 other newer hammers), I ended up leaving it in Colorado on the Gunnison River. Drove back the next day and it was gone forever. Those items are just so much better with the person that lost them than anyone else. I hope you are able to either find your pack or someone finds it and returns it.

9 Inch works for me in the Big Lake (Michigan). Anything larger would be washed away with the wave action.

There is going to be a lot of dough being made by mining the miners again this time around.They are already showing up from all over creation.

Ya I probably over reacted to Steve's comments on White's. Tough markets out there today, "New and Improved" has been a selling point for every product in the last 50 years. "The latest and greatist" Heard that one before. Again I'm old, Still know how to cook a great beef stew from scratch. Can gut a deer and run a trotline as Hank would say. I put a few videos up on "The youtube" over the last few years. KD8GIS Bruce is my channel. OH yes the early 80's were a time... Pockets full, silver everywhere.

Hmmm. I'm not understanding how 4 is better than 5. Not just because it's only a 1 khz change, but also because both those frequencies are very low, and in general, the lower the frequency, the more suspectable it is to EMI. In my area, anything below around 15 khz is very suspectable to EMI, but still much less suspectable than any SMF mode. 20 khz is significantly better, and 40 khz is more or less dead quite, as it's outside the range of EMI. Well, that's been my experience, and up until this point, the experience of every other hunter that I've discussed it with, or read about. So ya, Dug's post is a surprise to me. Unless I'm missing something, the only way I could see 4 being better than 5, is if the EMI is being emitted by a single strong source at specifically 5 khz.

All I can think of is that a day detecting with both klunker and Sourdough Scott must be like going detecting with the Marx Brothers.

He would have pinned their ears back & parted their hair...... with lead.

I'm afraid to think what Jacob would have done that night if he had been sitting up there with that old Thompson machine gun he lugged around.

In out modern attention media moron atmosphere I wouldn't be a bit surprised if fake finds or channels wouldn't be a real leader in the genre. Integrity be darned if a person could do it with clear conscious it would sure blow by the reality channels of tough world! It's a shame and all we cam do is fight it when we see it I reckon!

Started detecting in the early 70's and was very skilled at old Coins, CW Artifacts, and even found a handful of gold rings . Early 90's (20 yrs after I started detecting for Coin/Relics/Jewelry), I purchased my 1st gold detector (GM-VSAT) and went at least 6 trips to Eastern Oregon trying to find gold. Ended the year with ZERO. Next year I upgraded the detector to GM-III and went to the exact same areas I previously hunted with the VSat. Why? My buddies were finding nuggets with theirs at those same locations. At the end of the year, I have ZERO nuggets. 3rd year of owning a gold detector with ZERO gold nuggets to show for my efforts, I've pretty much written them off and decided to stick with Coin/Relic/Beach detectors. The better half of me (my wife) advised me to attend a class on how to use a gold detector. Say what darling? I've over 20 yrs experience and dug so many coins/relics/rings, even been to England with Jimmy Sierra and killed it on Romans. Why do I need a class? Yes I was a hard-head. That May of about 1994 I paid $100 and attended a half day speaking session at Rye Patch, NV and listened to a gent by the name of Gordan Sahara talk to us about "using gold detectors to find gold". He never did any hands on training with any of us, just stood up and talked and went over the motions with his own VLF detector. I took the guy and his wife out to dinner in Winnemucca that night and listened to him some more. He informed me, I was using my 20+ yrs of success/experience of hunting Coins/Relics/Rings the wrong way and I needed to toss all of that knowledge and thinking out the door. Long story short, I was listening for the wrong things and did not have the right coil control or mindset. How much did I learn from that 1/2 day group session at the burn barrel of Rye Patch? I went home with new hope and fresh mindset and new desires. A couple weeks later, Memorial Weekend I went to Sumpter, OR to the same exact location and dug 13 nuggets in 11 hours. Been hooked ever since. Moral of the story. Get off your hi horse of what you think you know and listen to the folks that are regularly doing it with Success. Watch them, listen to them, study them and hopefully they invite you along some time. Or you can waste so many tanks of gas, flat tires and weekends digging trash. My 20+ yrs of Success...chasing different targets in different conditions and being damn good at it, was my own demise. Along with my upbringing of...I was a young stud Marine USMC back then and so I was taught to have confident in myself and capabilities. You know how the joke goes. - A young bull standing the top of the hill with an older wise bull and they looking down the meadow below at all the cows. The young bull says to the older bull, "hey, lets run down there and have our way with one of those cows". The old bull stretches, sighs and then says to the young bull. "No son, lets leisurely walk down to those cows and have our way... with them all" For gold nugget hunters new to the game, my best advice is find that special person who knows the ropes and continually has success. Become acquainted with that person, buy them breakfast or dinner or etc and get to know them. Maybe, just maybe they might take you under their wing. Be sure to bring them something to the table as many of them are tired of being taken advantage of their knowledge. Good Luck Thanks Mike for posting and hope to see you this summer. Tell Sally I said hello and I'll still impressed to death with that nugget she found at Rye Patch with her GPZ-7000 while we were giving the class.