mn90403

Just reading this thread/sub-forum for the first time ... Steve, You are a teacher. You teach us and you teach Minelab. Who else is there to teach? My kid? He is on the way and I hope you teach him too! Mitchel

Jin, You are a young man. Don't be scared by trash. The man I know who finds more than all of the rest of us combined month after month after month has a Surfmaster PI. Sure he has a big pile of trash at the end of the year also but he is greatly rewarded. He goes to the deep 'holes' in the surf beaches and doesn't wait for the wave energy to bring it back to the shore. You will have fun. Once you find a patch treat it just like gold. As Steve has said the beaches are just like a big pan. Once it is shaken around for a few years/months/weeks the fines and the heavies sort themselves out. Look for the lead fishing weights! Look online for a video about the beach you are going to and see what they have found. Mitchel

Jin, I've posted elsewhere about beaches and energy. When there is no energy the valuable objects are not moved into the tidal areas on my beaches here in Southern California. When we had the El Nino a couple of years ago there were many areas with lots of rings and valuables that were washed up because of the short interval waves for many weeks. What if you had a lake or ocean level for a few hundred thousand years doing the same thing with natural gold and then that sea dropped away. You could have both deep gold that stopped at the shoreline and you could have other gold pay streaks that were brought back up by the energy in the waves at the time. We have been told that one area where we hunt in Rye Patch, Nevada had an ancient lake and that shoreline held enough gold for us to target it as a pattern. It has been hunted extensively below the source gold at the ancient lake level at that elevation and I think the pattern produced. Mitchel

Jin, I bought a 5000 in 2010 and used it on the beach for nearly two years. It found everything ... well ... not really ... I've got a story about a diamond on a very thin chain I found by accident. I heard another target and found the chain! Don't use a big coil. It will just see too many targets. You have enough timings on the 4500 to find a place for it to be quiet. If you have a beach with a substantial tide then hunt the wet sand on the low tide. There is no real reason to get the coil or the unit wet. One thing you can do to protect it is to put it in a plastic bag. You can still adjust it. You just have to get your headphone cord out of it. I think you will have fun digging everything. It is a good way to learn a beach. You want to know what trash to look for that holds the rings and jewelry. You'll learn the coin sounds. Dig, dig, dig ... it will go deeper than anyone else on the beach. You'll find some good things. Mitchel

goldrat, Good suggestion about being new to a forum. You have to also understand there are many on a forum who don't want to say much or be 'known' as the same guy/gal on the other forums so Steve has to balance things too. I'd say whoever gave you a lesson and made the CTX 'too complicated' did you a dis-service. This is a very good detector that I use very often and I don't complicate. I let it do the work. Turn it on. Select the mode. Ground balance it and away you go. In my case I have it set for the beach, highest sensitivity, low trash and each time I turn it on that is where it starts and stays for hours. I don't do anything but look at the objects on the screen to see if I want to dig them or not. If you don't need that type of detector then I would sell it. (I hope you don't take a big hit.) Mitchel

Well done Walker! I hope you get to keep this one. Mitchel

Steve, You could have Minelab send mine early and I'll tell you what it is like on the Southern California Beaches. Just let Bill know my order is filled. I'm going out in about an hour so if I had one I could give a report. Mitchel

Yes, it is Blake! Can I still change it? Changed, thanks Lunk.

Now that we know you are in Quartzsite we'll be able to have a better idea of your gold problem also. There are many patches and many on this forum that have been going there for many years. Make sure you go see Blake at Miner's Depot and join the Quartzsite Metal Detecting Club. Their 'season' has just started and you will get lots of information from them at the claims and at the coin hunts. It is truly one of the best clubs in the world. Mitchel

Bill, Well done! (I bet you couldn't believe your luck!) You have about the right amount of time per day in I'd say. It lets you enjoy the activity and still be focused. Now you can hear the gold. How deep were the nuggets and were they near each other? Patches will come your way. Gold has a source and when you find some go in circles around where you found it. You are mapping out a path on how it got there. You can see the gullies and follow them. It is harder to follow hillsides or ridges but they all can hold gold. Mitchel

Very nice nugget. Mitchel

He's at his new job about 4 miles from me but we have not had time to meet up yet. Next week I suspect we'll see each other and give it a go.

This guy ... a Grey Nomad found $6000 worth of nuggets in 3 days! https://www.reuters.com/article/us-australia-gold-kirklandlake/australias-new-gold-rush-lures-prospectors-down-under-idUSKBN1DU04F

Now the problem with a booster is going to be where can you plug it in. I think the use of the booster with the WM12 or 10 is ok because I can attach both of them to my cap. I can't do this with the 2300. I have a set of wireless headphones with a separate transmitter but the connections are not compatible with the B&Z. Mitchel

I turned in my 'waiting list' spot for a prepaid spot earlier this week. I put down $500 because I was told those orders were filled first. I did this with Bill Southern and got his forum member discount.

The best part about excess volume is the sound when it is under 50% used! It is like an idling car with a big engine. You KNOW what you've got. In many cases you never use it. Many of us now listen to our detectors more than music and I always wanted lots of power with my stereo.

Can we ask him how big his nuggets are yet?

Thanks Steve. I hope your suggestions are helping them with the final release. Is the volume enough or do you need the booster? Mitchel

Good luck finding the acorns! With time lots can happen and it is a nice 'hobby' for a few months in the desert.

The buyer could pay for them with Bitcoin!

billdean, I'll take a shot at your dilemma to encourage you and give you some pointers I wish I had when I was new to gold nugget detecting in 2010. You are doing one good thing by asking questions. Don't think you know it all or much of anything and your first gold will come sooner. A novice with a metal detector looking for a gold nugget is a frustrating scenario that most of us can remember. Many of us were with someone else when they found our first gold. That is one of the first lessons. Go with someone else who will show you their area, maybe you belong to their club or you just happen to watch what they are doing. Many of us will help but that is part of the problem ... you don't know anyone yet. I didn't so I spent many wasted hours on the wrong areas and often times going too fast. I thought I knew more than I did. What I have learned is that finding gold with a detector is an expert's game. Go where the experts go and start to think like the experts think. The second lesson I would say is have a target in mind. Get a sample nugget and test it on top of the ground and buried at different depths. Those of us who find gold know it sounds different in many cases than a nail or a bullet. Learn that sound. Dig everything in the beginning even if it says trash on your screen. What kind of trash is it? I was in Arizona near Lake Havasu (Yucca Strewn Field) targeting meteorites with my 5000 one trip. I had only found a couple of pieces of gold then but this trip I was looking for hot rocks! I was using all the proper swing techniques and I got a signal and I looked down at my feet and there was a golf ball sized specimen (sunbaker) that turned out to have 1.5 ounces of gold in a 3.5 ounce piece of quartz. It was the wrong target ... but I kept it! (A year and a half later I went back looking for gold in a meteorite field and found a larger piece but that is a different story.) I'll followup on your post by going line by line ... sort of: I have a new GM 1000. I have never done any detecting for gold before and could use some help deciphering the area I am detecting in. I have been reading mining reports that say this area has a lot of shallow gold in it but after few days of detecting (total 15 hours) all I have is bullets, bird shot, tin foil, tin cans and a few magnetized rocks I have found. My first observation is that 15 hours is not a whole lot of time. Experts (not me) will sometimes go a day or two without finding a nugget and they know where to look. As they say ... don't be too impatient grasshopper. Your research is good and you may be close but that only counts in horseshoes and ... I am not sure I am detecting in the right type area? I have been concentrating on the deeper washes in Sw Arizona. I have attached some pics of the area. Maybe I should try higher ground. Just getting a little discouraged and need some help on the type of area I should be looking for. Do my areas look ok? Two guys that I respect a lot have already given you some advice and I think it is good. Being a novice you may have missed what they said. Do you know what a bench is? Do you know what happens when water flows and moves rocks and gold? Do you know where gold will tend to collect? Scott said look in areas up on the sides ... that would be gold that hasn't really moved or washed in a long time. Benches can also be in the center. Big rocks can also trap nuggets. Move a few of them. JW and Scott both said look for man-made stacks. These would have been made by someone before you picking up those rocks and stacking them to the side because they were in the way of the gold they were looking for. The more stacks and the bigger the stacks probably means more gold was found. By now some of it will have replenished with the monsoons. You can find it. If you have stuck with me through all of this then you might have the patience to find your first gold before you throw the detector in a closet and never use it again. Mitchel

Some nuggets are worth more than the gold content. http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-south-east-wales-42081538 Would you take $200 for a 3 grammer? Mitchel

Norvic, Well said. Mitchel

That coin is rare Steve. It should be worth more now! Mitchel

Chris and Dave, You show us why this place is named Gold Basin. WTG Mitchel