tvanwho

I went for DNK hard plastic floats myself, inflatable pontoons and sharp sticks a constant worry otherwise,plus air leaks,hopefully not an issue for Bob? Bob, how did you attach the frame to the pontoons?

I was wondering where he got the coin popper tool? You say it is actually a gasket scraper?

We had 70 and 80 degree temps all week in NE Illinois, now its back to 45 and rain for the weekend...why are the weeekends always so crummy weather wise? Somebody told me they thought it was because of more airplanes flying on the weekends? Am rebuilding my big highbanker in the meantime... Ps, nice gold...sure am glad I am not the only one who digs empty holes...

Are these coyotes or what? Never seen wild dogs in the US? Do they attack people? -Tom

I don't see that chip on my LST circuit board.Here is the best photo I could take:

Hmm, wonder if I should trash my old USGS maps from 40 years ago? What with Google Earth and online topo maps, is there any need for these paper maps anymore unless somebody wants them? NC and Arizona mostly.

I printed off your photo, will take a look this weekend perhaps

And how do you tell the iron from the goodies? -Tom

I have a beater LST..where would I find this chip on the board?

Great writeup Lunk, especially the TIPS you discovered in the field and the PHOTOS. Now, how do I resist another detector purchase? Ignoring magnetite especially appealing. So, after you got the sounds down, did you ignore the meter responses, something I am at fault with on my MXT. Looking at the meter all day can be hard on ones neck after awhile. -Tom

Thanks for sharing that hard won info Steve. Is nice to hear I am not the only 2 fingered typist here. And I look at the keys , bad habit but I can't help it. Now, since gold is not overly abundant where I live, there are basically no mining records of its existence, what to do? Plenty of coal and limestone and gravel deposits, even oil and gas and some galena. All gold so far has been glacial. Makes the search a bit tougher. I do belong to 2 Indiana mining clubs which have regular outings but usually to the same old beaten to death places. Somehow tho, the gold gets replenished every year after heavy rains and subsequent floods plus the dredgers/highbanker operators running their machines too fast or too steep an angle and blowing some of the gold right back into the creek. Is it safe to assume where gold was found before by modern day prospectors, that the floods will redeposit more gold in the same spots year after year then? I've had 2 different parties tell me they got an ounce of gold fines in the same stretch of creek. These 2 people do not know each other. Something I picked up on from chatting with miners and friends. This particular spot is in an S curve with a thick layer of blue clay under the water and creek gravels. The blue clay seems to act like a gold magnet. There is about a 100 feet of it in this stretch of the creek in the main channel from bank to bank. I've seen fines and pickers from these 2 parties that were mining here with homemade machines. -Tom

Can you blast and suck at the same time? I bought a 2 inch suction nozzle with a blaster thing welded on via a short pipe and a butterfly valve to turn it off and on.Somebody in Ca makes it and sells on Ebay. Need to get out and use it this summer. Got any video or photo of you doing the standup dredging thing? We made extension handles from PVC pipe and 2 hose clamps fastened together . -Tom

So, how come gold detectors don't have a bunch of frequencies scanning all at once like the Minelab coin detectors do- Etrac, Explorer, etc? -Tom

Now I can actually understand the punch line on your joke Scott...he he....

I had one of these Troy Shadow X5's and it was HORRIBLE in Hot ground, beeped every other foot , so bad I took it back to my truck and got my 20 year old Tesoro Lobo ST out and that machine was as quiet as a mouse on Iron Mountain in Missouri and got me the Civil War relics I was chasing. I sold the Troy shortly after. Now, there was an older version with a 7 inch loop and that was a killer detector for coins. It is called Iron Mountain cause of the iron mine across the road and a Civil War vintage iron mine on top of the mountain, VERY nasty ground.

Now, if I could only understand Australian lingo? Is a track same as a road? Whats a salty and a brown?

Chuck, I always thought it was a faucet that drips...dunno about a facet....? I have too many machines already, don't need another one ....if I can help it....

Hmm, wonder if I should get going on this Racer 2 I acquired in January with 3 coils or trade for the Impact? I need a liteweight machine to avoid detector elbow, however and somewhat idiot proof/easy to figger out since my 60 year old brain doesn't always work so well lately.

How come I can never find a small town park loaded with any old coins or any coins at all for that matter? Lucky stiff and his targets are not super deep either, just masked by trash I guess? I hate it when I see detector operators using spades in city parks!! Altho, I have to admit, it's getting harder to wield a hand digger with old age aches an pains. I never dig in hard dry ground either, wait till a heavy rain or early springtime to dig. Otherwise, you get big yellow dead grass plugs in dry ground, VERY obvious a detector guy did it.

The 6x9? Platypus coil works on my TDi ,BUT the coil ear holes were too small for the Whites bolt so I had to drill them out. The 9 x 14 Nuggetfinder coil fits just fine tho. They both seem to work ok.I have an original TDi. No nuggets yet. Coils are cheaper to buy in winter so I bought several used larger Nuggetfinder coils to try out . Just need to get my butt to Arizona now...but nervous about potential TSA hassles?

We did a trial run of a homebrew 3 inch dredge down at Lake Michigan one year in Chicago, in JANUARY !! The waves ,as they rolled in, would instantly freeze to solid ice. I don't know how my buddy talked me into going down there with him that day? I think we dredged up a quarter just hit or miss in the swim area by the beach we went to.

Bounty Hunter for me ,cost 90 bucks, a lot of money for a poor high school boy in 1972.I seem to recall it could barely sound off on a coin roll at 2 inches. When they invented discrimination and ground balance, a Tek Mark 1 was somehow acquired, best machine I ever owned as a silver producer.

That's pretty cool Steve. And the Detectnix gets 4 inches air test on coins ,large and small gold and silver rings and waterproof. Working Method: Pulse induction. No falsing in saltwater and black sand environment. I see they are on Ebay for $169 and free shipping from a seller right here in USA, in Michigan. I had the Vibraprobe round coil unit a long ways back, but got rid of it.It could barely see a quarter at 2 inch in the air. This unit might do the trick in swim areas where they don't allow full size detectors. If its impervious to black sand, would it work as a pinpointer for gold nugget hunters in hot dirt? -Tom

I am glad you got the snow that missed us this winter, mostly. Nice color. I have yet to get out and test that 2 inch dredge I built last year. Still waiting for my big toe to heal up.Had the nail removed permanent like , was tired of painful ingrown nails from after prospecting trips. we are having 70's weather and sunny this week, YIPPEE !!!

I remembered to go to the Meteor ID seminar this past Saturday. The speaker has been to Antarctica to collect meteorites and even had astronaut Jim Lovell there with him. He id'ed my one stone as a Canyon Diablo iron meteorite but my other stone I had picked up locally, was just a Leaverite. He suspects it is glacial since the edges are rounded off like water would do altho he had no explanation as to why it has a thin black crust. He was signing books for people but I guess his marker had run out of ink when my turn came. He runs a small Planetary Studies Outfit in Elizabeth, Illinois, out towards Galena in the northwest part of the state. I will have to make a trip out there to see his meteorite collection. this summer. Most of the lecture time was spent on the upcoming solar eclipse for August. Apparently, Carbondale in southern Illinois is where a LOT of folks will be for the event and spots in Nebraska as well. Ps, as a side note, a friend of mine found a loose diamond looking stone in a parking lot. We were all sure it was a fake until another friend tested it with his electronic diamond tester and got a positive hit for diamond. I told him he should take it to a jeweler and see what its worth? Its a good size rock, about 1/4 inch or so in diameter, dunno on carats. Guess eyeballing can pay off at times. Another friend found a 50 dollar bill in some bushes near a theater entrance, just eyeballing. -Tom