Mike Furness

One of my other passions beside detecting is tournament bass fishing out of my kayak. Now one of the items that I felt was essential in any tournament is my fish finder. It is run by a small 12 volt battery. Tournament was about 300 miles from home and guess what was still on the porch back home ... YUP! The battery! I did fish the tourney without the fish finder as there wasn't a store nearby that had anything other than a big car battery. I didn't come close to winning that one but I did make the middle of the pack. In the end I was happy where I placed even if it was out of the money. i use a check list now for every trip.

On 1/19/2024 at 4:41 AM, dig4gold said:

The GP 3000 replaced the GP Extreme.

D4G

Yup! Totally forgot about the extreme.

On 1/17/2024 at 11:19 AM, GhostMiner said:

Were Garrett detectors one of the best you could buy back in 2002?

No. At that time I believe the new more powerful(my opinion) Minelab GP3000 had just come come on the market at about $2900. The GP3000 replaced the older SD2200.

GhostMiner ... If I was the crew boss they would be gone now. Are they still getting a share of the gold while they continue on their treasure hunt?

beatup ... you and your brother still hunting the same area you guys hunted with me a few years back? Hoping to get down there during the time I am in AZ in February. If you're still around in February would be great to see you guys again.

Took a bit of a rest from the forum and the computer in general over the weekend. So Happy Belated New Year to all. Here's hoping your new year has started off prosperous ... in whatever that prosperity might be. 2024 is going to be a good year I believe!

flakmagnet ... when I was living in AZ I was a Costco member but dropped it when I moved to NH because Sam's Club was the nearby center about 12 miles away in Concord NH. Unfortunately they don't have a hearing center in the Concord Sam's Club. I kept putting it off when I lived in AZ and now I am beginning to regret doing that as the hearing loss especially in my left ear is getting worse. Ah ... what was that you said? LOL Thanks for chiming in. I think I will look to see if another Sam's Club in NH might have a hearing center.

Andyy ... Did you ever lose one over in the Cleator AZ area on one of the Road Runner claims? I found a Bunk's Burro (I think it is called) pick, the smaller of his two sizes, over there a few years ago and gave it to one of my 'students' during a detector lesson.

Mitchell ... I'm now beginning to think Miracle ear is not the place to go ... WOW ... $6000.00 seems a bit much. May still get tested there though.

mn90403 ... be very interested in what you finally settle on. I will be having a hearing test after the first of the year. It will probably be at Miracle ear because that is a more local place for me. Hope they have their act together.

So now you not only have a pissed off Conner but Jacob as well. Not sure which one I would be afraid of something happening. I guess I would watch Conner and beware of Jacobs experience and history. I would not want to be on the wrong end of Jacob's tommy gun! As for Conner if he does one more stupid thing with that 45 I would be taking possession of it. But then that is just my way of handling things. Looking forward to how it plays out in the story.

Heat exhaustion is no joke ... good thing he collapsed when he did because heat stroke is the next step and that far up the mountain could prove fatal!

51 minutes ago, phrunt said:

pretty slow ground tracking,

Yup a little slow but if you rely on manually ground balancing as soon as it starts to be a bit noisy you will have a super hunting tool! Bill Southern's video is a perfect example of when and how to ground balance the machine. The only thing he didn't cover is that when you stop moving the coil to either dig a target ... hopefully ... a nugget or just to look around without moving the detector/coil you will have to ground balance before moving on. Basically the answer to most problems folks have with this machine can be fixed by ground balancing in the way that Bill showed in that video.

15 hours ago, QcGOLD said:

Note that I absolutely hated the GoldMonster 1000...

QcGold I haven't heard anyone say they absolutely hated the monster. Just wondering why? In your river beds did you ever rake them down incrementally say 2" at a time and detect each drop in layer down to bedrock or clay that typically would stop gold from dropping further? Or was it that it had no true threshold to listen to? I have heard that complaint a few times. Just never heard anyone adamant that they hated the Monster. As for myself the Monster has provided me with ounces of AZ gold. It is one of the few machines I did not sell when I moved out of AZ back to NH.

Bedrocker I thought the same thing. LOL, Great minds think alike! 😂

MN90403 (Mitchel?)But then again even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and again!🤣

At 74 almost 75 now I have been fighting the 'whats' and background noise for a few years. Sounds like I need to put the ego away and chase down an appointment. I KNOW that I need them!

If it helps any Doc I am a bit different with a long torso and short legs, pant leg inseam is only 29". I'm 5'9.5" and the top of shoulder to my belt is just shy of 24" as measured on me by a friend. I tried to get an accurate measure by myself and came up a lot longer for the belt to shoulder. Any way hope that helps.

Try Doc at Doc's Detecting Supplies: https://docsdetecting.com/ 

Given the history of the area and the type of people it often contained I personally would try to open that old mine with just the three of you. And I would require a gag order for the three of you not that you three really need it! It will definitely take longer to do but in the end it would be worth it if no one other than you three knew about it and it produced great gold! Just my opinion for what it's worth!

I have had the Monster since the beginning. I run without discrimination all the time. Depending on mineralization of the ground I will run in Auto  or Auto + when I first get to a site. Once I have found either gold or lead I will test various manual settings until I get the best signal response. I will then use the manual setting until something in the ground changes and makes the background noise, threshold, change. Just for clarity in theory this machine has NO threshold but if the ground is very hot(highly mineralized) you will hear chatter and that is what I am calling threshold with this machine. If that happens I will retest in manual again for the best response. Lacking a freshly dug gold or lead target I always have a 0.25 gram test nugget to set up my detector. Other than that when the detector gets noisy, erratic threshold, I ground balance. In hot or highly mineralized soil I find myself doing that often. And last but certainly not of least importance is to go very slow ... if you think you are going slow try a little slower! Be sure to cover the entire ground in front of you with overlapping Sllloooowwww swings.

Hey Flash ... Tried to be gentle in my response to your original post. Sorry if it offended ... wasn't my intention at all. You are right I am a relatively new member again to this forum ... was a member years ago and got involved with another forum as an admin ... assume I was dropped back then for lack of activity and that's OK. I've been using a detector since 1989 and gold detector since 2003. I taught metal detecting for gold nuggets in AZ to a number of folks with another forum/company for a couple years. A few of those old 'students' are on this forum. I posted this info for you so you don't think I'm a newbee. Now as to a detector for you I have to agree with Steve H that the Equinox 800 or better yet the newer more powerful 900 is a great machine. I have both the 800 and the GM1000 aka Gold Monster. They are both great machines on fine gold and small pickers. I would say they both are worthy of your consideration. My dealer of choice is Bill Southern at: https://www.nuggetshooter.com 

Just a heads up guys ... Buna Flash has been a member for less than a day when he made this, his first post. I have no reason to doubt his sincerity asking about a dealer but he has no info on his bio ... no interests, location etc. That in itself leads me to ask for a little more info before dealing with him. Sorry BF if this offends but I have been burned on other forums because of a first time poster. Just sharing my personal red flag indicator. I hope you are here with good intentions.

And you, GhostMiner, leave us hanging on that last sentence! Well played! LOL!

Well done guys. And no violence! LOL! Hope the agreement works out well for everyone..