mn90403

I learned something from this story. I never imagined. How one woman helped start the California gold rush (fox40.com)

This could have been a April Fool's post but it is real.

Thanks for the take-a-long. Results will vary! haha

This video highlights a 'new' type of detector from the same group of scammers!

Just what the doctor ordered! All of your missed gold put into a nice chunk of a specimen. There are some formulas for weighing the rock in and out of water. When you do that you can determine the amount of AU! Congratulations. You stuck with it and got a reward. Was your buddy using an Axiom also?

If anyone has a problem just send it to Simon. I had some 'connection' issues last week when things just froze for an extended period but the next day everything seemed fine. I chalked it up to connection issues.

Cash in coins at Coinstar.

I am able to tumble beach coins with sand and soft scrub with bleach and use 90% of my quarters, nickels and dimes. Our quarters go into a laundry machine and the nickels and dimes go into Coin Star. We opt for the Amazon certificate and that makes 100% available for purchase. Pennies ... we have pounds of pennies. They get separated into shields vs copper. Shields are being saved for taking to a Federal Reserve Bank that will exchange them for spendable money. I haven't found one but that will be the next step. The law says it is still money. No one will count them so it will be a pound exchange and an estimate of value.

They are calling it the Lucky Strike. Gerry will be proud. Amateur gold digger finds huge nugget worth $160,000 in Australia - CNN Style

Thanks for the post. It's always nice to see results from a different part of the detecting world. Congrats on the gold and other goodies.

😛

80s? Oh my goodness!

I'm not worthy! Great detecting.

I was wearing my Minelab pouch and I did have crusty pennies in it I showed him. I didn't have any rings or jewelry that day. It was like water off a duck's back as I remember. I wasn't trying to shake some sense into him. I just wanted to listen. My detector and scoop were propped up at some distance. He should have been able to find it. He did say it was hard to tune. haha He didn't ask the normal questions of most non-detectorists. "What is the best thing you've ever found?" or "Do you have anything good today?" As Simon said there are a lot of buildings and things around and not too far away all of the commotion of the Venice Boardwalk. An instrument of that caliber couldn't possibly ignore all of the potential targets. I didn't even try to bring up EMI with him but it was part of what he said he was still learning in order to tune it properly. Given the chance to see him over again I would have just said "I don't have a lot of time right now but if you give me your phone number I'll give you a call." I think I didn't do that because he was too willing to give me the name, website and number of the guy who sold it to him. I'm not a policeman but people ask me about that on the beach as well. "Are you with the government?"

I don't think he was ready to hear it from a stranger.

I think the large stone has been tumbled. It has some irregular features to it. The two smaller 'stones' have been made into marbles. When I take it to my metal detecting club a friend of mine knows the jaspers and other rocks that this could be made from.

You guys get the 'idea' of course. He is part of the problem and it is not all of a technology sale but that is part of it. His expectation of finding things on the beach that just simply were not there was disturbing also. I did spend some time with him just talking about what I find on the beach and what gets lost on the beach to find. He was imersed in the lines produced by the device. The thought did occur to me that the $5500 is not a big deal to him. He just wanted an expensive play toy. I don't know his budget for such things but I know mine. haha There is a certain amount of 'opportunity lost' in the way I handled it. I'll always wonder if I helped very much with our conversation and I didn't get a way to contact him. I did offer my phone number to him but he didn't take it. Maybe other detectorists have already talked to him and he just didn't want to go through his thoughts and choices again with me.

A couple of days ago I was at one of my local beaches after the rain and blow. It had been a rather 'sudden' type of storm with waves only up for 24 hours or so. My results showed it and near the end of my detecting I noticed something odd. I looked up into the dry sand and I saw someone kneeling with a shovel. I was 100 yards away or so and I saw some movement and thought it strange. It reminded me of some type of ritual burial. I wanted to go up and tell the guy if he was burying ashes or something of value he should reconsider as some other detectorist would dig it up. A few minutes passed and it was time for me to go to my car. I wanted to go by the place where the guy was digging. When I got there it had been neatly filled and scattered over with some beach sticks. I thought good for him but then I saw him closer to the wet sand. He was digging another hole and I saw this motion again. It reminded me of a drone this time. A bit of black whirling around and then it hit me. I propped up my 800/15 and walked in his direction. He was a nice-looking young man and he greeted me as I approached. He had dug an almost smoothly round hole with a short handled shovel about 18" deep. I told him I had noticed what he was using and I just couldn't resist coming over to him. He had a thick European accent. He could see my detector which I had turned off about 50 yards away. He began asking me if there was little pieces of gold in the sand. He was rubbing his fingers together saying he was learning his instrument. I asked him if it was made in Germany and he said yes. It was then that I knew 'the gig' and I was careful not to venture to many comments. He was quite enthusiastic about his instrument explaining that he had bought it from a guy (friend?) that said it didn't work but he was convinced he was going to make it work. This was not the first one of these detectors I've seen but it was the first one that I've held. It is relatively small and it will rotate around on its handle so quickly it is a kind of like using divining rods. He showed me the little popup screen that I would have needed my glasses to read and it has several functions. One was to create a line similar to a surveying instrument. He explained that you needed to hold the contraption level and look off into the distance a couple of hundred feet. Then you needed to walk the line and reverse the process and it would create an intersection. That is where you needed to dig! My eyes are rolling up in my head at this point remembering the threads that have been started here about these things. I told him how I detected the beach with my Equinox and he just couldn't be bothered. He had faith in his instrument. He was in full blown pursuit of the truth. When I explained to him that my coil sometimes ran over multiple targets in a swing and sometimes there were targets above and below each other it just didn't register to him. The scale of delusion was massive. I could have spent more time with him and gotten his phone number and gradually shattered his dreams but I just didn't have the heart. I told him about the cost of the Equinox coming in around $1000 and it was then that he proudly said he paid $5500 for his gizmo. It was then I realized it was time for me to leave. I hope he has 'fun' with his experiments. This type of impractical 'science' makes me concerned for the world. I told him about Detector Prospector and actually hope he will make it here and find this thread. I have some other thoughts about the experience but I'll just leave them for now and post the two pictures I took.

If you have a local detector store near you and they sell used equipment I think they would let you try before you buy. As Steve said, I like the 18" NF too. I bought it used and it quickly became my favorite coil finding more gold than all the Commanders combined.

When you hunt on the beaches you don't know exactly what you will find or what you are looking for but I guess jewelry is the preferred find but of course you will get many, many coins. This afternoon I found this bracelet before I really found a few quarters near by. It is a bit odd construction and not very tarnished. I have a feeling that the 'base' is made of silver (it is not magnetic) and then copper wire was added to keep the stones in place. Then it was wrapped in finer coper wire. Actually the order of wrapping and placing the agatized stones could be in a different order than I can imagine. I don't think of this as a really old piece because there is not much sand wear and the corrosion is not that great. It was found on a beach that gets detected often but it was in a bit of fine gravel.

You have described pretty well some of the days I have on the Southern California beaches. I believe this happens because of wave/energy actions. I consider the beaches a big gold pan and nature is supplying the jiggle to separate the concentrates. What makes me slow down for jewelry? Greenies! Give me a patch with some crusty quarters and I'll try to get them all. I hit a few beaches that are close to me and produce. I thought I knew what would turn them on over the last few years. As it turns out I've become very disappointed with my understanding of these beaches. They've stopped producing during this time of Pineapple Expresses. The shape of the beach, the slope and the bars have frustrated me more lately rather than rewarded me. I've had to go to other beaches that I don't know as well and that takes an adjustment in style which is a hit or miss proposition. Some of the fun is missing and more of the work has entered my brain lately. Some of the old timers from the 60s and 70s will tell you some real stories about what you find with jewelry. I only have a few great days.

If you want to Turbo Charge your meteorite hunting in Arizona then take a meteorite lesson from Lunk. I don't know the charge for a day and where he goes but it is one of your fields. He uses a 6000, 7000 and has a lot of experience with the 5000 also. He might even tell you a place or two to hunt for gold! I've taken lessons from him a couple of times. Separately I've hunted meteorites in Franconia and Gold Basin among other places. I've found chondrites and irons with the 5000, 7000 and Equinox. Gerry took a pretty recent trip with Lunk and got some larger meteorites. He might have a deal for you on a used/new detector that would be ideal for what you want.

Is there any way to know 'sales of units' by year? or total units sold of any model?

Minelab seems to have cornered the market on Metal Detecting Insanity. We buy a new product from them and expect different results in connection to the availability of coils. Now the wait for detectors themselves is driving detectorists crazy! Be patient grasshopper, as they say nothing.