Compass

Thanks Kobling, Of course the real goal is to find a gold chain but now that seems more doable. I had the other basket rake with me but after 3 hours I had had enough manual labor for the day and just detected.

Thanks Mike, I think that it would work on the dry sand but I'm hoping that there may be more chains in the water.

Yesterday I went to the lake to try out my new "treasure" rake in the water. I pulled it for almost 3 hours and found a very thin silver chain after which I switched to the Nox 800 for the remainder of the hunt. Couple of things I learned about the rake: It did not dig as deep as I expected or wanted it to. It had a tendency to ride on top and took a lot of work to even force it down an inch or two. I may try and add some lead weights to the head to help drive it a little deeper next time. Pulling the rake wasn't as strenuous as I had anticipated but then again it wasn't going very deep. With the detector I managed to find a small silver ring and a hollow gold earring that tests out as 14K. My buddy used his detector the entire hunt and found a nice 5 gram 14K ring so maybe I would have been better off metal detecting the whole time but still, I am encouraged by this first test of the rake and will try again next hunt. It does test one's patience though even more than detecting does. In this last picture you can see how thin this chain is compared to the thickness of a dime. If the rake can find this small sized silver chain it should be able to grab a bigger gold one as well. GL&HH!

Congrats on the find. This may be a first!

Congrats on the gold Mitchel- that's a pretty one! 🙂

Congrats on the ring Mitchel. I can't help you with the markings but I can share that I have found a many misshapened rings at the beach. Some were downright smashed almost beyond recognition. I'm sure it's from years of tumbling in the surf and getting caught between moving rocks.

The good news is that making a replacement tine looks do-able.

Yes, that ebay one looks okay. I almost went for it. The bolts at the tops of the tines look like they could cause some drag if the rake is digging that deep.

Thanks Steve, Here is one of many videos I have found on the rakes: These seem to be more commonplace in Eastern Europe (?) for some reason. A lot of the rakes have treble hooks attached to them so I may try that as well but I'm concerned about the extra drag they would add. I have a rake on it's way to me with parts for another that I will need to put together. Pretty confident that the rakes will be effective in a couple of my areas. The biggest question is how long can I last pulling one of these things?

Wow Seeker what a shame!- I mean congrats on the silver but it looks like you were in the zone with a good possibility of finding some gold. I usually have a backup detector with me for such a situation, especially, since I don't live that close to the beach but I know some hunters aren't comfortable having extra equipment in their vehicles.

"This will possibly be offered as an option to the LTD version as well." If different coil size options are eventually offered on the Limited AQ it may be a difficult decision for some of us. Most of my beach hunting is done in the wet sand and a few inches of water when the surf comes in. My first thought would be to go with the 12.5" coil for the maximum depth but an 8" coil with that short pulse delay could be a dynamic combination for the small gold.

Thank you Willy, I have found all this to be true and that is why I really like using the 6" coil on my Equinox when I lake hunt. However, from everything I've been hearing about the AQ, one of its most attractive features is its extreme depth. Really curious to see how much depth would be lost with an 8" coil and how much smaller targets could be found with it..

Joe, I thought that the main reason you liked the AQ was for its depth. Wouldn't you lose some of that depth with a smaller coil? I just re-read some previous responses and my guess is that one may have to trade off a little depth for less noise and better coil control.

Where I'm from those are called garages.

I find that the same is true for the TDI Beach Hunter with stock headphones. I have to turn the volume way down because it is so loud on shallow targets. I have a hearing impairment so you might think that this is a good thing but I don't want to damage the hearing I have left.

Thank you JohnnyRox, I actually saw this on eBay and had bookmarked it. But, Terry in Hawaii has the exact one in the video and that is the design I prefer so he is working on getting it ready to send me. I really appreciate your response though!

I would think that this would be a great thing. There wouldn't be as many competing junk signals in that range. Unfortunately, with the Nox there seems to be a lot of small trash that also reads in that "3,4,5" range.

It was fun going on that hunt with you and makes me want to get back to my lakes soon. Congrats on the big, beautiful, James Avery, silver ring and the older coins! I imagine that ring would be easy to re-sell.

That's a great story and there's a lesson for all of us. Pretty easy to miss things after a long tiring hunt, especially a night hunt. Dental crowns are easy to miss!

Thanks Seeker, Glad to see that you got in on the fun as well!

Actually, I thought you meant something more like this: The tines could be cut into a long rectangular sheet , then bent down without having to twist 90 degrees. This drawing is just for demonstration purposes. The spacing and tine design would have to be worked out.

What awesome coins and beautiful gold cross Seeker- Well done and congrats!

I really like your idea about a one piece that I then bend down the rake tines. That really sounds like the most cost effective method. Thank you!

Thanks again Got AU, Interesting video as I bent some aluminum when I built a teardrop trailer years ago. I burned off candle soot to let me know that the temp was right before shaping with a rubber mallet. I'm not sure if you are suggesting aluminum for the rake tines but they may have to be thick to be strong enough and therefore would cause more drag.

Thanks Terry, PM sent.