bado1

My buddy Steve and I made it out for a couple of days this weekend with the idea of locating a new patch in Central Arizona. Steve started on Friday afternoon. We both wore out some boot leather but were not rewarded with a new patch. That's not to say that we didn't find some cool stuff and a little (very little) gold though. Friday afternoon Steve found this cool old bottle... Gentleman that Steve is, he graciously gave the bottle to my wife who loves things like this. We wondered over dinner and drinks what could the bottle have been used for? Then, Steve hit on it!..... It's an old Soft Soap bottle!! And you thought that the Old Timers had it rough . By Sunday we were discouraged with patch hunting so we decided to go hunt an area that had been hit hard by the Old Timers. Steve used his GPX-5000 with a 6" coil and I brought both the Nokta Fors CoRe and the SDC. At this place I opted for the Nokta with the little 5" coil. This area has been mined for 100+ years and has the trash to prove it. This is where the Nokta shines! Lots of trash and some relics... Finally found some old, large caliber rim fire cases. Everyone but me seems to find these things...until now . Wanted one for a while. 56-56 Spencer cases. They are actually 52 caliber according to my research. 1860s to 1920s. And the gold... Very little for the effort we put in but we scored one each to keep the skunk away. Steve found the Merc dime a couple of weekends ago out in the gold fields. Proving once again...the GPX-5000 is a hell of a coin shooter . I may ask him to borrow it for my next park hunt! And, of course, no hunt is complete without being surrounded by, and taking notice of, the beauty of Mother Nature... The Stag Horn Cactus is a late bloomer and the Prickly Pear Cactus fruit is ripe for the picking. Prickly Pear jelly anyone? Happy hunting. Dean

Wow, 1515Art you are incredibly talented! Beautiful works. I had to go get my wife and show her. Beautiful guitar, John. When I'm not swinging a detector I'm hunting/shooting. I'm not artistic nor musically talented. Wish I were.

Great advise! Thanks!!

Wow! Super good!! The learning curve with this machine is pretty short. You will have it down in short order. What I have found is that there isn't any "iffy" signals with this machine. When it hits on a coin, for example, the audible signal is very clear and "unwavering" and the VID #s don't bounce all over the place they are very stable. A zinc penny in my ground comes up as 82/83 every time from every direction. Now pull tabs bounce around in the 57-60 range but nickles hit 56/57 and don't bounce. The biggest thing I have noticed is that bottle caps sound great and will give a pretty solid 84 BUT if you circle the target while swinging you will notice that the numbers will make a quick bounce down in to the 70s and then go right back up to 84. Coins don't bounce like that. So, in my experience thus far, if the numbers bounce around as you circle the target it's garbage. Your numbers may be different than mine due to different ground. Also, I'm finding I like DI2 better. It seems to hit harder but I think it's a preference thing. It's fun learning the nuances of a new machine and you are off to a great start. Congrats! Dean

Welcome! This is a great forum you will learn a lot here. Chris at AZO is a great guy. He and I live in the same town and he actually will make a personal delivery. You just don't get that kind of service any more. I'm very impressed thus far with my Fors CoRe. Still learning it's language. Steve is right regarding it being able to pick through the ferrous junk and pick out a non-ferrous target. Excellent separation. Did you get the 5.5" coil as well? It is the bomb in very trashy areas. Please feel free to PM me if you have any questions and I will help where I can. Still learning it myself. You made a great choice. Dean

Wow. Good work.

LOL! Oh no, that's not what I'm after. I like the SDC and the coil it comes with. That was my point. I think Lucky said it better than I. I love the SDC for it's simplicity and effectiveness. Instead of slapping on a coil that may or may not work, and that was certainly not designed for the machine, use a different machine. It would be great if ML would do as Lucky suggested. Dean

Ivan- Maybe that's why I feel like I do. I find gold with the SDC just about every time out. Now, is there more lurking down there just out of reach of my fixed stock coil? Perhaps.. And this is where a larger coil would be nice. Or, you bring in a different machine that was designed for multiple/ larger coils, as Rick just pointed out, and check it out. Dean

Thanks Rick. Very interesting. I think, right or wrong, that the SDC is what it is and it does a very good job at doing what it does the way it is. It is the tool for that particular job. If a guy needs a PI with interchangeable coils...then buy one. As an SDC user I have often wished for a larger coil to get more depth, but not at the cost of possibly damaging a machine that works extremely well for it's intended purpose (I bought it knowing what it's purpose was and that it only had one coil). My hope is that ML will introduce a "SDC-like" machine that will be designed from the get go with interchangeable coils. All that being said though, I will follow that thread and see where they go with it. Hopefully, like Steve's ATX project, it will get Minelabs attention and they will design a "SDC" with interchangeable coils. Dean

Beautiful gold. Well done.

Well done! I haven't had a chance to take the Fors out again. Hopefully, this week some time. Thanks for the pics! Dean

Sounds fun. WTG!!

Yes, the CoRe has the ground tracking switch same as the Gold. I will give the All Metal mode a shot. This ground is so mild that, at times, with a PI unit you have to run it by your pick to make sure it's on and working. Dean

Wow! Great advise guys. Thank you both very much. Californiagold- The "jumpy number" explanation is excellent. Your posts have been very helpful in cutting down the learning curve of this machine-Thank you! I have a great spot to try this machine on next. The ground is very mild with very little trash compared to the spot we were in yesterday. We have hammered it with our PI units. It will be interesting to see if the VLF will find gold that the PIs "couldn't see". It will be interesting just to get a different machine on it... other than a 3500,5000, and SDC. I will give your suggestions a go. Dean

Spectacular! WTG!!

John and Steve- I agree. I love the PI machines but there is just some ground that is more suited to a VLF...like this place. I also like the fact that most VLF's are super light and easy to swing for long periods. I also enjoy going to even a modern park, for example, with a VLF and just try to figure out what the machine is telling me before I dig the target. The VLF's are more "interactive" with VID #s and multiple tones, etc. thus more mentally stimulating/challenging to me. Thank God we have many different machines to choose from- the right tool for the job. Dean

Took the CoRe out today to a new area (to us, anyway)in the gold fields. Started with the SDC and very shortly realized that the area was very trashy from a 100+ years of mining activity. Traded the SDC for the Nokta and the small 5.5" coil, ran the ID-Mask up to 20 and away I went. Made a huge difference! No more iron garbage signals which really quieted things down. The machine had no trouble at all handling the soil and only sounded off on a couple of hot rocks. Dug some lead of course and a number of copper grommets that were wedged down in the bedrock cracks. No gold which was no fault of the machine.... just didn't get the coil over any gold. I used the DI2 mode (BST on the Fors Gold), sensitivity at 50, ID-Mask at 20. Needless to say I am very pleased.

"Paul The Cleaner" sounds like your new mob name. Yo, Paulie. Yeah, I second what Paul said...let him go in there with his 2300;). Seriously, the previous suggestions are good ones. We will go looking for new ground early in the day then go back to the old proven spots at the end of the day just to avoid the skunk. Something about being on proven ground raises the confidence level. Do some "landscaping" (remove brush,etc.)and use a different detector/coils. Good luck! Dean

Excellent price especially for the extra coils. I like how the head phone jack is on the back of the machine making it "ambidextrous". May not seem like a big deal to you right handed folks but for us left handers having everything on the "other side" of the machine sucks. Especially things like the head phone jack that could have, just as easily, been located in a more convenient location for both users. Cool looking machine as well! Dean

Nicely done!

Not standard. The standard coil is something like 11"x7" DD. The "pro pack" comes with three coils...the 11x7, 15x11, and a 5.5" or something close to those measurements.

What John said. The Core and the Gold are the same machine except that the Core has an additional "timing" called "conductive ground" that allows for hunting places with heavily mineralised soil, salt (beach), salt sand both for the same price. So, the Core is a better deal as you get an extra timing.

Thanks Guys! The folded shell was filled with super fine.......dirt!

Chris at AZO set me up with a Fors CoRe yesterday. Been eyeing one for a while. I took it out for a spin today. First, to a local modern park just to get familiar with it then to a 1870s era ghost town that is so trashy that it's hard to find a spot to ground balance. I am very impressed with it's recovery speed/target separation. It hits super hard on coins and really "locks" in on them leaving little doubt that there is a coin under the coil. I know I'm a late comer to the Nokta Fors party and everyone already knows all this so I'll just show the goodies I found today on the CoRe's maiden run... The coins are all modern and most were found in the park. The shell casings are .30WCF. Notice one has been pounded flat and the end folded over. It's got something in it as it rattles when I shake it. The casings and the little copper things near the casings were found in the ghost town. Looking forward to giving it a spin in the gold fields. HH Dean

Thanks, All! So far the SDC has proven itself to be a great little detector.