jasong

A used Garrett green machine (I don't know what model) in 1996 that a friend's dad sold me for $5 and I used until it broke. Owned 9 detectors total in this order - Old Garrett, Ace 250, GMT, Explorer II, 4500, GB2, Fors Core, 7000 (or maybe vice versa), Antique Fisher. All I want is 1 more revolutionary gold machine and I'm good on detectors.

I'm not sure what forum to post this, many of us use Google Earth though so here it is, the new version which I just saw released. https://www.google.com/earth/ Kinda let down personally... Cloud storage of my KMZ's...not going to ever happen with me. Also, looks like they eliminated most of the actual useful tools from the desktop version, bummer. There does appear to be some previously unreleased high res imagery in at least some locations anyways though so that's cool. Haven't really had time to look through it a lot yet, maybe I'm missing something new that is actually useful, dunno.

Nice! Love how they even left a little thin white film over the yolk of the eggs...pretty accurate.

Has anyone out there in NNV been running the Z19 much yet? Just curious how it does on the alkali there when its dry, there were some places I couldn't even run the Z14 if it was damp out due to the salt. Your coil spacer idea is probably not bad really. A swivel wheeled platform with nylon hardware and a windshield wiper motor on a stick to swing the detector.

Nice stuff Dave, you and Chris are killin it!

Haven't run a Z19, but you'll still pick up birdshot with an 18" standard mono coil so I'm guessing the Z19 will hit it hard. You can use Salt Coarse to ignore birdshot and tiny wire bits (like around Franconia for instance) on the GPX without losing a whole lot on 1/2 gram+ stuff if you are in some area that you really need that sort of functionality. Or, maybe if they come out with an update that helps the GPZ deal with salt that might be an experiment to try out.

Were they the 5.11 ATAC 8" CST Sage's? I just discovered they discontinued those and my heart sank...took me forever to find a good replacement after Reebok ruined the Converse boots... Now it's back to Bates again for a cst, side zip, metal free, non-black boot. 5.11 recommends a boot with metal eyelets as the direct replacement. I asked them to pass on a word to the management team and bring those boots back (they said they had similar requests), everyone should call. Yeah for sure, if anyone finds a good detecting boot, buy 3 pairs because they companies sure don't seem fond of keeping them around.

I know this has changed since I sold my GPZ and moved back home, but I didn't meet a single owner who wasn't a dealer, related to a dealer, friends with a dealer, or related to Minelab in some way for almost 4 months after the US release here. At the time people were getting dealer discounts far below the veteran discount just for being friends with dealers. The only people I ever met - ever - in the field who were my age or younger all were friends with or employees of dealers. I know at the time when the GPZ's were $10,700, people were buying them for $6900 or something around there. For guys like me who have no savings or retirement funds and have to take loans to buy something like this, that's all the difference in the world. Here's my point: If the new machine is some new company without a US presence and without a bunch of discounting for the "friend network" then I bet you will see a lot less of people in my generation or younger buying one. So, I'd guess the major chunk of the market really boils down to what the people nearing retirement, or already retired can afford to pay, or want to pay. I know there are guys out there who would pay $20k for a wizbang detector and probably wouldn't even think twice to find a few ounces of gold because it's just for fun and the "bass fishing boat" argument comes into full play, where that argument is meaningless for guys like me. There are really 2 different markets in the high end metal detector world it seems like, so I bet there are probably 2 different types of answers to this question. Edit: What would I pay for such a detector as described in the original post? $1500. Trash isn't much of a problem for me, I'd be just about as happy with a Deus. Make a detector that detects huge areas quickly at a low resolution (square miles in a day) while being automated so I can go back with a normal PI and I'll take another loan out to buy that one.

Interesting article. I read a week ago that one of the largest lithium deposits in the US may actually be in Wyoming and not Nevada, it's 12,000ft underground though, discovered by finding lithium in injection well returns. Which is one way a person could prospect for lithium (and other minerals/elements) I suppose, just test a bunch of water or springs whenever you find them. I know there is at least one guy in NV prospecting for commercial gold deposits with this method, a drill mounted on a truck and testing the ground water returns for gold ions or something along that line.

That copper in matrix piece is awesome, never seen anything like that before, just the nuggets.

I don't change my tone much, mostly because I run my detector pretty quiet and I like having the targets have the same tone every time since they are generally far between.

I agree, I also talked about this a few years ago, I think it was posted here. It's called sensory adaptation, the same way we get used to strong smells and then don't notice them anymore after an hour of exposure - same happens with our hearing. I have the same general philosophy as you do with minimizing extraneous noise and just trying to concentrate on the targets. I get plenty of ground info still that way because all I need are subtle indicators when it's changing. The ideal detector to me is one that's entirely quiet on everything except actual targets, as with radio telescopes it's always a noise problem, get rid of noise and we are left with perfect resolution and can see a galaxy over. Another potentially interesting thing I mentioned a few years ago too involving settings is that our hearing is non-linear, which is something that is almost never discussed in terms of detecting but should be. This fact was semi-exploitable on the GPX series by emulating a compressor with audio controls. We can dynamically expand the range of volumes and hone in on those tiny mouse sqeeks. Kinda like you can expand the VDI range on a VLF by changing frequencies (well, conceptually anyways but different). However on the GPZ I was not able to replicate it, my theory being that they were analog controls on the GPX and digital audio on the GPZ, but I really have no idea since I'm not sure how they are built so just guessing there. The audio controls are different between the two though for sure, I know I've seen you mention that a couple times here JP in reference to other things too. I saw a forum member in Australia was building a compressor for the GPZ last year but not sure how it turned out. If I ever get around to building my own booster pack I'm going to incorporate one in it though, even on the GPX I think it'd work better than trying to fiddle with the volume limit and volume controls and would give true expansion. I think we can all really take detecting to the next level in places where the competition is high by thinking about concepts such as these and how/when they can be put to good use, and it will often be the difference between a guy that finds something every day and the guy who wonders what kind of voodoo the other guy is using. Although I have to say - I used to sweat over settings and efficiency a lot more when I was mostly hitting old gold fields where you have to find the crumbs that others missed. It's much smoother sailing when going out exploring and finding new places where it really doesn't matter if a few are left behind and it's more just about getting in the zone out there and enjoying it. In places like that I have no problem running in Low Smoothing (I know, blasphemy) just because its more enjoyable to me. It's too bad that's getting harder every day but that's the nature of gold I guess.

Nice work! Little dude is already officially a much more succesfull diamond prospector than I am and he's only just begun.

I think in lake beds it will be in the form of lithium carbonate or lithium sulfate (or sulfide?). But I have no idea, that's just what I was assuming since the deposits came from evaporation and lithium is unstable in water alone, a carbonate seems a likely stable product. I'm not real great with chemistry and I don't know by which process the lithium ended up in water to start with or where it came from so I'm just guessing and could be totally wrong. Maybe Reno Chris knows? I believe the carbonate form is what is actually sold on the market though so I assumed if it wasn't in that form already that I would have to convert to it in order to sell it or if I wanted to prove the claim and so that was the point I chose to start looking at it the whole box of worms. That's part of why I was thinking about Raman spectroscopy, you can ID molecules and figure things like that out instead of just looking at atomic fingerprints. Curious not just with lithium but with all kinds of stuff, would be useful and fun to have. If I ever get the time, energy, and money to build 1% of the projects I think of at 4am I'd be happy. Reality is most will remain ideas unless I find one that I'm confident will make me money.

Best thing to do is test it and see how the settings change the target, ground noise, and EMI. Here's how I do it: Find some typical ground similar to what you normally run in and bury a couple different nuggets down just past the point which the default settings no longer hear your targets. Now spend a few hours tweaking settings, first individually to see how each affects the target response, then in combinations to see how each setting interacts with the other settings and how the combo changes target, ground, and EMI response. Find what you think is the best combination, then again dig up and rebury your nuggets to the point you can just barely hear them and then try to tweak the detector again to see if you can brighten up the signal even more if you feel like really maximizing your performance. It may take a few hours, but trust me, it will save you weeks, or months of wasted time in the end. And you won't be left wondering if you left gold in the ground due to running inefficiently and thinking you need to drive back and redetect again. It instantly builds confidence in your machine too because you know exactly how it's performing on measured and controlled targets instead of always guessing on in-situ targets or waiting for one that just happens to be at the extent of your detection range. People will insist you can't gain useful info from reburied targets, but I absolutely disagree, give it a try yourself and see. Now you have a good combo of settings that work for your particular area, you can use these as a starting point and then adjust as needed throughout the day as the environment changes and you will have your testing experience to rely on now to make those judgement calls rather than guessing. Something like this should be done with every new machine before actually looking for nuggets IMO. It gives a good understanding of how the settings work, what they represent in physical terms. But better yet it helps you develop a "feel" for the detector way quicker, and that's important. Running the GPZ too conservative will render it equal to the GPX in some aspects, or in some cases even less deep, know when this happens and why it does otherwise there is no point in owning a $10k detector instead of a $2.5k one. Testing it will show you where it's better to cut back and where you absolutely never should if the conditions allow it.

The notch filters I was looking at were like $250 (I happened to be looking at them already but for a different purpose coincidentally), at which point I could just buy a cheap spectrophotometer instead. Which is what I did. Should be able to see all the elemental lines in it. Looking ahead to potentially experimenting with building a Raman spectrometer (hence the notch filter) or maybe even LIBS if I can find a cheap portable laser powerful enough to ablate any kind of rock or metal. It's something I've always wanted but never had enough reason to buy, so I figured why not. This is for general use. Concentrating on all sorts of minerals, not just lithium. For lithium prospecting in particular, I see that lithium carbonate is inversely soluable (if that's a term), it drops out in high temperatures. My idea to "pan" for lithium is to mix a soil sample in water just below freezing to saturation, filter, then heat to just below boiling and filter again since it should be mostly the carbonate dropping out of solution at that point. Then test that filtrate. If nothing precipitates out, then move on to the next sample. Not sure how big the sample size would have to be though, it might be infeasable, or require a microscope. The flame test with the notch filter sounds reasonable too, I hadn't thought about using the filter like that. But it sounds like the boom is on for lithium already, I was wondering about stuff that is underappreciated right now. There is enough competition from paper stakers in gold prospecting already. I still think REE's are where I'm going to concentrate. They contribute to the same green economy that is driving lithium, and there are zero claims on them in the areas I'm interested in right now.

What technique do people employ to prospect for or test for lithium in the field? A handheld XRF probably won't work on the low atomic number elements. Flame test probably won't work since I'm guessing there is a lot of sodium evaporites on the lake beds in much higher quantities than lithium. I guess you could just sample every lake bed and send each sample in for lab analysis, but that seems pretty slow and unaffordable, especially hard to do in a "rush". Or are people just paper staking with no discoveries? I'm not able to find a good test sample of lithium carbonate to experiment with, because it is of course a controlled drug.

Side note on spoked/solid - the 19" spoked Evo weighs the same as the unspoked 17x13. Almost enough motivation for me to make a trip west and re detect patches with that 19. Almost. There is remarkably little testing or really any videos on that coil for some reason. I wonder if it's not available in the US?

Just logically speaking, wouldn't you want 10x the information for only slightly more than 2x the cost by going with the coring program? Then you can more wisely place your $20,000 production shafts later. Assuming you can afford the coring program at least, and suspect your deposit will pay far more. Otherwise, you've spent $20,000 to sink one shaft and what if it comes up barren? Then you spend another $20,000 to sink another shaft, and maybe it comes up barren too...and now you have to keep sinking $20,000 shafts and hope to get lucky. I guess it depends if your deposits are lens-like, or continuous veins, how faulted the area is, etc. I really don't know, just thought it was an interesting topic that you don't see much here and I enjoyed reading your report.

Do you use a wireless mouse/keyboard and is there any other USB device in a slot adjacent to the rx/tx unit if so? I just ran into that problem, both my wireless ethernet and my new USB 3.0 stick caused problems with the wireless mouse/keyboard. Solved by moving them to the back of the computer.

Thanks, it's nice when I get a good feedback on vids. I'm glad to see on retrospect now that some time has passed that after all this time my assessment ended up more or less accurate now that many others globally have used both. It takes a lot of time to do these and generally receive more criticism hate than anything else in the end, but Youtube can be like that. At the time, this was the first test on video of the new spiral wound coils, at least here in the states (I did it on day 1 of the US release). I think I deleted 10+ comments that were just insults with no constructive input on that one. One thing I want to mention though is that when testing and standing in place, swing speed on video can look faster than one might think. It's also hard to gauge inconsistencies and slope in the ground from that far away over the course of a swing on video. It's been a while since I did this so my memory faded a bit but I thought I tried to do a fair variety of swing speeds, approaches, and angles to suss out a signal with each target. I'm a fast prospector for sure, but I do slow down in patches. Still my idea of slow may differ greatly from others. I just know what works and gets me the gold. For others it may be different. Depending on the nugget, ground, and EMI sometimes faster works better to get a quick rise, poking and prodding and taking different angles (it happened a couple times in that video from what I remember), sometimes a slow steady approach with a nice mellow rise and fall is what does it. I think I tried to do a good variety, or at least enough that I felt confident the signal was not going to get better with those particular EMI conditions and that ground. It'd be nice to have a second person for tests who has an opposite style than I do though, to see if each other are missing anything. I can only say what I observe personally, but I'm definitely not a proponent of the conservative setting methodology, at least not when I can run in Normal. Every single test I've done, without exception, has shown me that running hotter is better for my style. Of course up to a point, adjusting for changing environments sometimes this isn't the case. I wrote quite a few posts here on this during the first few weeks or month of the GPZ release, at a time when almost everyone here in the US was running in Difficult and low sensitivity, mine seem to have been forgotten for whatever reason though as other people moved into running hotter settings later on, but I spent much of the initial weeks of the GPZ release posting about running hot and I never really changed the entire time I owned a GPZ. To me though, 18 sensitivity is about the maximum. Unless I was in a spot with very little EMI then I usually found that 19 and 20 added more noise than it did depth/nugget sensitivity. It's like the noise/depth scaled linearly until 18, then after that the EMI increases exponentially and the sensitivity still only increases linearly. It's the same with the 4500 to me for 15 gain, I rarely run in it, usually just 13 or 14. So, if I was in a place with even more EMI then I'd probably back the sensitivity off more again and that may be why conservative settings work better in other places, I'm not sure. That said, I can't remember if I explained it in the video or not but I did try a bunch of different settings, including conservative ones, until I found the combination that gave me the best results and they were pretty much the same for each nugget, and that's how I settled on what is in the video. I also tried even hotter, and I think it was slightly better but much noisier.

In the field I find the plumbers propane/oxy torches do pretty well for those who can't afford a furnace. They'll melt buttons way quicker than mapp if you are just using a crucible in open air. Gotta be careful though, too hot and you can vaporize gold! Mapp wouldn't melt the gold to make this 3 ounce slug after like 15 minutes of trying, but I went out and bought an oxy torch and the oxy torch did it in a few minutes. Made a little custom "doubloon" (in my hand next to the other smaller buttons) using the old fashioned cuttlebone casting method too, that's another fun thing you can do when melting gold, cast various things. Like Jen said, if you don't like it just melt and make something new!

Going to a bookstore or prospecting shop is probably a much further drive than a library, though I don't know your particular location. But even most small towns have libraries and you can do interlibrary loans and get almost any book you want to your little local library, including USGS publications and maps. Not to mention almost all libraries today have free internet and computer access if you don't have a computer. For instance, that Maureen Johnson book is in the public domain and accessible for free online. But every prospector and their dogs have read that book, if you want to do real research you need to look at stuff more obscure. I lived alone with my faithful dog in a little tin can hours away from towns too for the last 5 years, all throughout Arizona so probably near you at some point. It's doable, I made it work and anyone can in the Western US too. Sorry to sound crusty, but it just sounds like asking for people to give out free locations without doing the work. Otherwise, it's just a pan, shovel, and boots on the ground if books and computers are a no-go.

...say what?

How much production do you need? For $2k, if you had an axle or old trailer frame you could weld together a 3 tray towable unit, especially if you got the trays used, not sure what they cost these days new. It's possible, I found 3 used trays on AZ craigslists all at the same time about 3 or 4 years ago when I was going to buy and old one that someone else built. But after looking at it I was pretty sure I could build it myself. Here is the unit I was looking at, at least I'm pretty sure it was this one or maybe just a very similar one, the guys in this vid are on this forum occasionally, or at least one of them is.