Lesgold

A beautiful little spot to detect. A nice piece of gold was pulled from bedrock in about a foot of water. (Just below the tree on the left hand side) The best part was to share the day with a good mate and video the gold reveal.

Camping on the gold fields at Tibooburra Somehow the search for yellow was a secondary pursuit.

I agree phrunt. I had a deposit on the Xceed for months and got sick of waiting so the Goldhawke got a run. You wouldn’t need both coils but I believe that the Nuggetfinder will be a better all round hunting coil with the 10x5 being used for vacuuming the scraps, especially in tight areas.

Took the 12x7 out for its first swing today. The only issue I encountered was not wanting to take the Coiltek 10x5 off the 6. It is an awesome bit of gear that sniffs out a lot of small stuff that the standard coil won’t hear. My mate and I decided that if either one of us were to get a faint signal, the target would be marked and I would swap over to the 12x7 to compare signal strengths etc. We were detecting in fairly benign ground and generally bounced between normal and difficult in auto plus. Both 10x5’s were running really well. After the first target was detected, I swapped coils for the comparison. We tried the full range of settings on both machines and we agreed that each coil nailed the signal exceptionally well. If I were to put money on it, I would have given it to the 10x5 purely due to the short , sharp signal response. My mate eventually picked up a really faint signal on the side of an old mullock heap. When I ran the 12x7 coil over the target, the signal came through but was totally different to what the 10x5 was saying. The short, sharp but quiet signal from the Coiltek coil was replaced by a broad, faint chirp from the Nuggetfinder. We discussed this for a minute or so and agreed that the target was going to be relatively deep. A small bit of gold popped out from a depth of around 5 inches. Again, there was nothing in it but I would say that the Coiltek’s crisp signal was slightly better. The Nuggetfinder came out on top later in the day on a reasonably deep target. I heard a faint signal and stupidly dug down a couple of inches to confirm it before calling my mate over to compare signals. When he passed his coil over the target approximating original ground level, nothing could be heard with the 10x5. When we debriefed at the end of the day we agreed that the coils both performed as we guessed they would. The 10x5 has a slight advantage on the small, shallow targets and the 12x7 punches a bit deeper. It’s far to early to read too much into what we found but we were both happy with how the Xceed performed. The 12x7 was exceptionally quiet and ran really well in auto plus with threshold on. The detector was in normal all day and settings were only changed when comparing coils. The Xceed appears to be well made floats effortlessly over the ground. I think it is going to be a good general purpose coil for hunting in a variety of terrains. Although the standard 11” coil performs quite well, I think it’s skid plate is going to last quite a few years. cheers Les

Hopefully a small coil with sensitivity close to the edge would be something that is being considered. Perhaps even a small DD for those damp, highly mineralised rocky areas.

I would expect that Coiltek will be testing a range of coils to suit the 6k. The 14x9 would be my guess for the first release as they have the tooling and equipment already in place for that specific size.

Thanks for the replies everyone. Sorry about the delay in getting back to you, there’s just been a lot on lately. The battle belt idea is what I was thinking of but what I was also considering was the option of modifying the standard harness to add a camelback arrangement using webbing and Velcro as it is one area that is not utilised at the moment. This would free up some space on the belt as this is where water is currently held. Will keep scratching my head and thinking about it for a while until a moment of brilliance hits. (This may take a while) cheers Les

Hi Folks just Finished reading the detecting backpack thread with interest. Some great ideas presented there for people who will be detecting and camping out for a few days. My question relates to detecting harnesses that many of you use on day trips. What do you wear and how do you configure them? Now before we get started, I know that many of you hate wearing a harness and use other methods to hold your gear. I understand that and can relate to that but as a harness wearer, I’d be interested in what solutions people have come up with to hold a pick, scoop, phone, gps, enhancer, speakers, water, finds container, first aid kit, camera gear, food etc, etc, etc. I have always used the Minelab harness and found that it works well in most situations but it does lack storage space and I have run out of room. It would be great to see photographs, ideas, links etc as even one small idea could make a huge difference to harness “efficiency”. Looking forward to reading about some of your rigs. cheers Les

I have a roll of the cloth tape that prospecting stores sell but the problem with it is that it works too well. It sticks effectively and lasts a long time but it is a pain to remove. I tend to clean the area between the skid plate and the coil regularly as moisture and dust tend to build up when a section of the seal breaks down. Like phrunt, pvc tape works well for me. It is inexpensive, lasts longer than I need it to and is easy to clean off. I use a label remover liquid to clean up the gum quickly. It doesn’t leave any residue and the tape sticks well to the cleaned surface. Be careful not to put it on the manufacturers label as it will peel it off.

My opinion is any of the above. Each machine will challenge you and on some days make life quite difficult. I wish I had the skill to use them to their true potential and push machines right to the limit. For me it’s more about learning, improvement in technique and the enjoyment of being out in the bush looking for that patch or piece that the ones who have gone there before have left behind. It’s about making the most out of an opportunity with the machine that’s in your hand.

Thanks everyone for the warm welcome. Hope to be able to learn a lot and contribute a bit from time to time. cheers Les

Thanks rvpopeye. Lately I should be calling myself goldles. That’s the challenge of the hobby. Not a wizard, just someone who enjoys being out there.

Thanks guys. Great to be here.

Hi Folks Just a quick hello to everyone on the forum. It’s good to be a part of your community. I’m another bloke from downunder that struggles with gold fever. I live on the south coast of New South Wales and try to get out for a play in the bush at least a couple of times every week. My toys include a 7, 6 and 2300. Hope to be able to learn from some of you wizards and contribute where ever I can. cheers Les