Mike_Hillis

Nice rings! Have you spent any time figuring out why they are there? HH Mike

Jim, do you do your own lapidary work or do you sell the stones? The chrome diopside is very pretty. I could easily mistake it for emerald. Thanks for sharing the pics. HH MIke

Hi Daniel, I would like to own the two Andy Sabisch handbooks. I can pay shipping. Mike

Nice save on that chain. Always nice to find a keeper piece of jewelry and eyeballing it counts in my book. Looks like you got your knee bends in for the day, too. I notice the old ring pull in your trash looks new. Is that because of the ground? I'm just curious as my ground corrodes the old ring pulls and they tend to disintegrate somewhat like an old zinc penny. Or maybe its not a old drink ring pull but something else? Looks like a good hunt! HH Mike

Now that IS funny, Dig. I thought you WERE Tom. HH Mike

Yes I do. I just can't process them as well as a graph can present them. Maybe I'll get a Manticore when I return to the hobby as I had been waiting for a visual to go with their new Multi-IQ and see for myself. Good luck! HH Mike

I am not against dig it all, as when I had a hot spot identified, I dug it out clean over time to make it faster to harvest later. However, anything that can possibly give an edge in high non-ferrous trash sites shouldn't be discouraged. Can Target Trace tell shape? Looks to me that it some ability at that. Can Target Trace show roundness vs angles? Looks to me that it has some ability at that. Can Target Trace show density? Looks to me that it has some ability at that. But rather than talk it down I'd be more inclined to buy and try and see if it could indeed do what it looks like it might do and then see if it could improve my trash to treasure ratio. Who knows, maybe, in the right ground, in the right trash, it might be able to tell treasure from trash pretty reliably. But you can't tell that from standing on the outside looking in. Probably a learning curve involved. Might be a good gold chain hunter if it could be dialed in to solid, tiny hits. Audio with a TT check? HH Mike

If I was to win a big lottery I would consider creating a metal detector company and license with Garrett to take the V3i forward into the future. Find a savvy marketing human that can navigate the world as it is today and can keep up with the changing market place venues. Alas....odds are not in my favor. HH Mike

I don't think of Fisher after the buyout by First Texas as Fisher. I think of Fisher as First Texas Products. And I think Tom and Dave Johnson have achieved their mutual metal detecting goals and you will not see another headliner out of First Texas until Tom retires and the new guy wants his own metal detector legacy and can find an engineer to provide it. Until then Tom/Dave's legacy in the (T2/F75/Goldbug Pro) will still be around for years to come. My nickel. Mike

You hid a jewelry box (10" x 6" x 4") weighing about 2.5 pounds from thieves while you were gone and now can't remember where you hid it. If it were me, I'd probably sit down and quietly and sincerely ask Jesus to help me find it. The other route would be to drink a couple of glasses of water and try to remember where you last saw it. It is probably in that little room under the stairs, sitting there on top of the door jam. You probably didn't even look when you hooked your arm up there and sit it down which is why you can't remember putting it there. I guess that is where I would have put it. Good luck. HH Mike

Somebody lost their boot gun. I dunno. Finding firearms is a headache. I'd be more inclined to toss them back like an illegal size fish. But now you can't cause you walked away with them, and posted about them. So you pretty much have to turn them in and deal with the stink eye and the 100 questions to follow. But I enjoyed hearing about them and looking at the pics 🙂 Good luck. HH Mike

I concur, that is good news! HH Mike

Rutus Altrex has a screen that shows you what freq has the most EMI interference.

Are the quartered Reales from the same coin? 1723? Way cool. Thanks for sharing. HH Mike

Nickels just act weird. I guess it being a cupronickel coin, something about the way it electrically ties to the ground minerals just makes it behave differently. I personally think the nickel leaches out and makes the surface porous which affects how it conducts the current. How detectors deal with that porosity varies between makes and models. Probably why the multi-frequency detectors have the edge on nickels. I dunno. Just my nickel. :) Mike

Sounds like a Time Ranger Pro/GBP/F19 would foot the bill. HH Mike

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Best new park hunter advice I can give you is turn down your sensitivity to start...and just dig high conductive coins for a while (dimes and higher). You get three things....better separation in the trash, experience finding good targets in the trash, and an understanding of park dynamics. Once you get some time in it you can bump your sensitivity. Good luck. Mike

This is an interesting development. I guess single frequency isn't dead after all . So all of us who kept our single frequency and selectable single frequency detectors are not so behind the curve after all. Thank you Minelab for validating us. HA! Mike

Badger, did you ever see....whats his name....Old California....i forget his name....anyway, he put the CZ box under the arm but put the faceplate in a box on top so you could still see the meter and use the pinpoint button. Made a nice looking easy swing unit......Paul...Paul (CA) is his name. He did some really good mods on the CZ. To me...the F75 LTD was a good replacement for the CZ series. HH Mike

I'm just a pirate. When I find a silver coin it just goes into the back pocket of my jeans and I'll wash it off under the facet when I get home. Then I'll coon-finger it for the rest of the day, take it to work for show and tell and then toss it into the silver drawer with the others and occasionally sit down with the drawer and coon-finger them all again, remembering where I found them, or trying too, and noticing they are getting a little blacker than last time I pulled them out. All the others just go into a tub for cleaning and cashing in on some rainy day. HH Mike

Chuck, That has pretty much been why my "buy and try" have been used machines several years out from their release dates, with a few exceptions here and there where I knew I'd most likely need the warranty of a new detector, and the itch wouldn't let me wait. But I get where you are coming from. My first Xterra 70 purchase was a new one and less than a month after I bought it and a extra coil, they came out with a two coil package for less money that included the coil I just bought. Man I was mad about that. Xterra's are a money pit anyway and that really sunk home the lesson. If I recall right, a lot of people got upset over the Xterra release...X 30 and X50 and then out of the blue the X70.....ticked off the X50 buyers who thought they were buying the top Xterra and now couldn't get the normal Minelab premium on their resale. I never buy new Minelabs anymore and luckily never been interested enough to get into the multi-IQ offerings until the Manticore came out. And I'll wait several more years before I scratch that itch. But anyway...I feel for you. Best thing to do is identify why you are buying what you are buying before you buy it. "buy and try" or "own it". Good luck. Mike

You are blessed! HH Mike

Yep that was the issue. I re-subscribed and the archives are available now. Mike

I guess my subscription expired with the December issue and that is why I can't see the archives now when I log in. oh well. Be funny to see these selling for $3 bucks each next to the True West and Frontier mags at the antique shops. HH Mike