mn90403

I've evaluated the situation. We have seen nearly the last of Nurse Paul. He won't be hunting much up this way any more. It won't be worth his TIME or energy. Nothing will provide him with the excitement. He'll start saving for next year to go back to his nuggie busters. Mitchel

Norvic, What kind of chocolate did he promise you? I'll make sure you get it ... if he has eaten all of it! Mitchel

I hope we don't leave it to Paul to be the only one to tell us about his adventure. His memory is not quite the same as the mates he has been with so we want the REAL story in addition to his ... if possible. The yarn ... oh the YARN ... will any of us hear it all?

Chris, WTG If you go to the right places and put in the hours it still can be found. Good proof. Mitchel

That's what we need! More eye candy.

Falling a bit short of big expectations is part of the process I guess. That is not arrogance. It is part of the risk and reward. Don't be too disappointed but I know you want to keep the pressure on yourself to meet your budget marks. Just remember that 99.9% of us can't make such a plan because we don't have the knowledge or the area and those that do have 'mixed' results also. Some things you just can't control. Fantastic job no matter what. Mitchel

Thank you Norvic. I know what you mean of course being out in the field is such a great joy. How do you take or would you want to take that solitary experience 'away?' I don't think it would take that away but give us better detectors and entertainment. Race car drivers race and then return to their normal driving when not in competition. What I'm 'proposing' is an artificial event. A made up competition that would allow detectorists and manufacturers a format to display the considerable skills they have and the equipment that they use. I doubt that anyone reading on this forum would much be interested without knowing there would be a big prize (Darts paid the winner 350,000 lbs!!!) and you would have to be younger than most of us to get the proper coverages and sponsorships and survive the challenges. Maybe there are some physical barriers that would require physical agility as well. To use another cliche ... this is a very preliminary trial balloon for such an event. The largest event I attend has 400 or so detectorists in a scramble, finding coins and tokens. It is fun for some but not all like it. You pay $25 to get in and in about an hour if you are quick you can just about get your money back. Local businesses contribute prizes and services which are awarded by raffle and finding the right tokens. Metal detecting companies and dealers kick in detectors and products as well. Minelab had a National Metal Detecting Day event for a couple of years. It was a scramble style event. I won an eTrac at the second event in Santa Barbara. Skill in these events is necessary but not primary. I would like to promote skills and equipment to a much higher degree. It is done with other hobbies, pursuits and professions so why can't we have a few professional metal detectorists who are praised for being our elite? I can imagine planting targets to try and trick the detectorists and they would have figured out the puzzle. Something that we could all 'relate to' so to say so that we would be interested at some level at watching the competition. Without viewers, fans or public interest then it could never be a viable proposal or event. From the lack of reaction so far I'd say the idea is dead in the water or as they say dead on arrival but at least I got it out there! haha

That is almost too good for me to imagine ... splitting 23 ounces and that being a tough trip! Well done. Thank you. Mitchel

The 'new' would be 'Who could see it and who could not?' Who saw the most or what detector saw the most with multiple operators? Can't we design a skills competition that would push the detector industry for better detectors and at the same time give us winner of the U.S. Open of detecting or the Australian Open champion? Have you seen all the money in darts? fishing? tennis? golf? any of the racing? And let's not forget poker. Let's get some. As many of you here have stated ... you can give a good detectorist almost any detector and he will out-find a bad detectorist with a good machine. How much of that is really true? How much is the detector and how much is the detectorist? If I went out and told 10 detectorists who I think are good to go to 10 spots to detect with THEIR OWN detector would they all find THE target there, or NO target there in some cases or could anyone GUESS or use a discriminating detector and tell me if it is a penny, dime, nickle, Euro, quarter, etc and the depth? What if I gave these same detectorists the SAME detector ... could we learn or could they learn anything from this? To a large degree we are scientists here using scientific instruments to sense the ground. What if we found that one of us has a technique for using it better than the rest of us? Is that supposed to remain a secret? Maybe it would and the 'tell' that the detectorist learned who be his/her advantage over the rest of us. I must admit. I am guilty of not practicing very much before I go out looking for nuggets. I don't set up a few samples, a few local hot rocks, etc and try a few different settings with the EMI present. I should and I'll try next time harder. I do have two test chips and the ferrite ring but then I'm on my way. I'll compare this with my other pursuit of 3 cushion billiards. Many times I just go in and play a game. You can be on or you can be off. There is very little time for warm-up because someone is always waiting to play a game. Later in the day there is time to practice shots. Practice helps and good practice helps even more. After an hour or so of practice (just like a lesson from Lunk) it sticks with me and I'm better for a few weeks. I can tell I'm swimming up river with this idea of a competition. I'll kick it around for a bit more before I let it go. Would Minelab like to go against Garrett? or Deus? or Nokta? Whites? Does Toyota like to go against Ford, Chevy, Chrysler/Fiat/Dodge?

Steve, All other hunts are a first find competition. You find it first only. You keep what you find. If you are quick you find more and if you are lucky you find a good token or object. Where is the skill test? My idea is for many people to be told where there may or may not be a target(s) and everyone tries to find it and in some cases tell what it is without seeing it. Let's say you have 20 people go to the same 15 'holes' on a course. They do it one by one. It would be like me being invited to your test garden. Can I see all of your targets? Could you see all of mine? You don't dig them as a one-off/first find competition. Someone has put a test garden near the GPAA claims in Gold Basin. I don't know the depths or the objects and I have only seen it once but I'm told there are objects buried to 18" with a 'marker' above each target. Does anyone know? Mitchel

This morning I was reviewing another thread and there was a link to Steve's review philosophy. I encourage everyone to read it. It reminded me of an idea I have had for a long time about having an event (several events) with all metal detectorists and manufacturers products used to find professionally hidden and buried targets. You don't get to dig or recover the targets. You put a score on each hole like you do on a golf score card. Rules can be made to make it fair. Spectators would be encouraged as the locations for these events could be elevated. The finals could be in a stadium depending on EMI! haha The idea is that there could be events and at each of the events there could be courses and each of these courses could have holes. Some of the courses could be coin only, gold only or relic only. Some of the 'holes' would have gold nuggets, hot rocks, coins, rings, etc. Some of the events/courses would let you use your own detector and some of the events would be using the same detector ... like some of the auto races. Some of the events could use discriminating detectors and some would be size and depth competitions using PIs. Some of the events would be set up like panning contests. I think everyone gets their own ideas. You get people and kids out early to find things. What would we get out of this as the metal detecting community? Competition, advertising and exposure of detectorists skills and manufacturers products that could result in better equipment. What would be a possible negative? Some of us would rather keep ourselves invisible to the public at large. Some of that would be lost. What say you? Mitchel

Excellent examples of some of California's pretty gold. Thanks for sharing the pictures. Mitchel

Thanks Steve and all. I, like everyone else, have to make time to dig targets. I can't find them making comments here on the forum! Mitchel

We all can use a little crow (critique) and hunting time, sprinkled with gold dust and a few nuggets so that we bring in better results. My 'crow' is people chiding me over my coil control. (Too fast, too high, too ...) Mitchel

Mike, Steve has made a guide to gold detectors which he updated in May of this year. That would be a good place to start. https://www.detectorprospector.com/magazine/steves-guides/steve-guide-gold-nugget-detectors/

Difference in the beginning is a 'shock' and I saw it before you switched on Bill's forum. That was my shock time but I spend more time here than there these days so I could 'ignore' it. Now I have to get more familiar with it because the old is gone away. I hope it makes it easier for you to administer. Mitchel

Got out to the Sierras this weekend and found a 1g nugget (7000/14) on some tailings and workings. I tried for 3 days to find more but this was all I could muster while also doing some exploring. When I got back the tides seemed to be right so the night beach hunt was on for a couple of days. These are the best finds from about 6 hours with the 3030/17. There is one 9g/10k ring there so I can find more gold on the beach than in the mountains! The total change I found was about $12 and most of it right now is deep ... well over 6 inches in the tide areas. I don't hunt the blanket line/dry very often. Mitchel

Thank you very much for the share. Great bit of info from a time that could not imagine a metal detector. History like this needs to be read to understand what we are missing today. The clues are gone in many areas. Mitchel

Here is the link to the part about Y&P. http://www.yesteryearstools.com/Yesteryears Tools/Plumb Co..html

Steve, Very nice job with the photos. caprock, That would be cool! The mines up the wash from where we found it were working during that time period. Lucky, I hope you got something. My 4Runner still has a thick layer of dust. Mitchel

Lu found a pick on one of our outings to Quartzsite. We are trying to do a little research on it. I found an eBay item that had a similar mark but the seller does not know anything about the maker. The mark is a Y P with an anchor between the two letters. Does anyone here know about this mark? Mitchel

I'd have more to say if I had one but I can tell it is a good GET TO KNOW what you are doing instruction that helps all of us with more than just the GM 1000. Mitchel

Want to see a big slug? http://earth-chronicles.com/science/in-the-khabarovsk-territory-of-russia-found-a-gold-nugget-weighing-more-than-10-kilograms.html

Great job!

Norvic, This brings up the whole problem with powerful metal detectors. This weekend we were sitting around 'testing' the fringe area of the 14Z. It became obvious that you can sense large objects many feet away from the coil. When in the field we could sense square nails many inches off of the coil. And finally we could sense deep and near very small targets and hotrocks that sounded just like gold. You have to dig it all. Now you have a pinpointing problem. Sensing is only part of the problem with detecting. Efficient pinpointing saves time and frustrations. There is a feature on the 3030 that allows the operator to 'zero in' on a target in a hole. You hold in the pinpoint button and with sound you can center the coil over the target. I don't know if this is possible with the Z technology. I expect not. Maybe Steve can tell us about that. As good as the pinpointing is on the 3030 it is still sometimes more efficient to use a water proof pointer on the beach. I've bought several and still find myself just digging a bigger hole and sifting more sand. Mitchel