GB_Amateur

I would think the DIV CW crazies (oops, bad choice of words) who go to Culpeper and are rabid (there I go again) about finding as much good stuff as possible in a short amount of time would be knowledgeable on relic PI detecting. Even if they haven't used every model they see others swinging all varieties of PI's. I suspect some here can already tell you what the Garrett Axiom is capable of in that trying environment. @Chase Goldman and @abenson are two here I bet can give you some indication. You didn't mention cost limitations but did say weight is a concern. Keep in mind that some gold detectorists are willing to swing a 7+ lb GPZ7000 so 'lightweight' to them has a different meaning than for most of us.

How many hours with the Manticore? Always enjoy your finds & trash photos. Do you ever look through date+mm on the Jefferson nickels? I assume the amount of finds is indirectly proportional to the amount of clothing worn....

Am I the only one who did a double-take when first seeing that image? Lawyers are already toasting their upcoming cases.

I have the 12" Oz mono coil because it came stock with all TDI SPP's. It's easy for that size coil to tell if it's dual field or simply mono -- just bring a hand-held pinpointer tip close to the inner round ring and see if it squeals. (Mine is silent.) I don't know if that's a telltale sign for the 7 1/2" size but you could try that. I really like the 12" OZ mono as it's quite lightweight for its size (512 g = 18 oz or 1 lb 2 oz w/skidplate) but sorry to have to tell you it's staying with me. (As I think, is this the one I loaned you for a short time?) I doubt many were sold individually here in the USA and pretty sure the other White's TDI models here were outfitted with the dual field 12" (if they shipped with 12" coils at all, that is). Might be easier to find one in Australia but then have to pay through the nose for shipping. I assume you checked with Centerville Electronics (official repair site for White's). They have a 12" TDI coil listed there but it doesn't say which variety so likely the dual field. Might know of one salted away though?

I agree with Zincoln. That 1886 is pretty rare and although the photo doesn't show its detail (and no reverse) I'm going to say it grades at least VG and quite possibly F. Could be a 3 figure coin assuming the discoloration doesn't detract too much.... As was typical back then, except for the first year of issue very few of the early years escaped circulation and subsequently a lot of wear. I think that is true of the 1886 adding to its 3.33 million (fairly low) mintage to its value today. My mom had an 1886 in her collection that was really trashed. I recall in a book I read (don't remember which) the author said to look for ghost towns that were present during a particular time period that had scarce-to-rare coins. His example was a mountain ghost town (I think maybe also in Colorado) that only existed a few years but bracketted 1877 and thus the key date Indian Head Cent. The other thing going along with that is the condition of the coins, with not many years get worn down. If the ghost town you were in fits that concept could there be the even rarer (and 2-3x valued) 1885 just waiting for your detector to beep? Fun to contemplate!

Any legislation like this looks kind of ridiculous if it doesn't at least propose getting rid of the one cent coin completely. Even with that, though, consider that according to the video even the USA 5 cent coin costs about $0.06 each over face value to produce. Assuming 1.5 billion minted per year that's around $90 million per year. "Save taxpayers money?" The USA federal budget is ~$1 trillion annually, so they are talking about saving 0.01% (a part in 10,000) of it to get the cost down to break-even on that coin's production. Sounds like window-dressing / vote generating legislation to me. And this doesn't even address the fact that 'paper' (plastic?, digital??) transactions are taking over the commerce of the world. Even USA metal detectorists would be thrilled if they'd stop producing Zincolns altogether. I'd rather find a beaver tail than a Zincoln -- I'm not exaggerating.

Welcome, Admiral! Sounds like you have the tools and the shipmates to handle them. Locate some good spots (I bet you have a lot there in the Scandanavian old country) and go have a blast.

Yes, but that's about the only change since 1965. (Half dollars were clad starting in 1965 but those early years still had 90% silver outer layers. Starting in 1971 their composition was changed to be identical to dimes and quarters. Dollars -- always unpopular -- have changed from cupro-nickel clad to brass.) But other denominations (5,10,25 cents) should degrade similarly in the 1965-1989 era as the 1990-present. The above mentioned zinc pennies (aka 'Zincolns') have an especially bad problem due to the galvanic process that causes the copper coating (only ~2% of the entire coin) to chemically react with the zinc interior somewhat like what goes on in a common battery.

I can confirm that. I think I just read something about it again yesterday. I wonder if Nokta found the sweet-spot number of conductive VDI channels with the Legend, which is in-between the Equinox 800/600 and the Manticore, Equinox 900/700, and XP Deus 2. Then again, no matter the VDI scale distribution there are going to be complaints.

Quite a nice collection of tools you use, and your description of recovery sounds benign. Does this method still work under dry conditions or do you just head out into the desert then? I've always been curious as to the composition of probes. I know some are brass but many (most?) are steel. I've epoxy coated the tip before but haven't really used one long enough to see if that wears off or breaks off fairly quickly. One of my recovery tools is a ~1" wide garden spade made of aluminum. I've never scratched a coin with it yet although I mostly use a Lesche hand digger and the tip of that can do damage if it happens to accidentally scrape across the coin's surface. The aluminum one is for working around roots. What's your damage experience with that setup of yours?

This has not been the case for my early experiences (in-the-field and in the test garden) for me with the Manticore. Do the VDI's wander higher with depth? Yes, eventually. But for good targets in my testbed I don't notice significant degradation in the VDI spread even then, except as the detection limit is reached. In-the-wild where conditions aren't as tightly controlled I may have noticed more spread but nothing that has kept me from investigating and digging. I will continue to pay attention as I gain more experience. There may be a strong correlation with settings or ground mineralization (or from nearby targets). I haven't gone above sensitivity of 23 so far. I've been confining my searching and testing to All-Terrain Hi, AT-Lo, and AT-General with recovery speed = 4, Iron Mask 8 over 3, custom five (flat) tones, and all VDI bins open (i.e. "all metal" in Minelab parlance).

What was your solution for the Eqx 800?

Any documentation that these were used during the CW and for what? That would definitely help authenticate it. Does seem kind of small if meant to be a chunk of iron intended to be repurposed. If it were lead that would be a different story. Quite interesting & tantalizing find so far, though. Some knowledgeable CW detectorists (e.g. @Chase Goldman) here yet to comment, and if that goes nowhere there are likely online forums full of collectors who might be able to help.

I think there is something new, but as of now seems like maybe just a teaser. The YouTube video Rob(CA) linked on page 1 of this thread as of a few minutes ago had the following sub-title: So unless someone is spoofing, this was put out by Fisher. It says '2 hours ago' so maybe updated since I watched it on Saturday. Would be interesting if @Joe Beechnut OBN or others intimately knowledgeable with this detector can say if the one in the video is the original or has some changes.

What are the VDI's of a USA nickel and a Zincoln? (I don't know the Deus 2 scale.)

Fantastic finds! I'm also curious as to the size of the gold coin. Just putting something in the photo for scale (such as one of the quarters) would answer for many of us. Ruler even better. Carson City minted coins are rather rare finds in the Eastern USA and even tough out West where most of them remained. Interestingly the mint seems to have gotten stamp-happy around that Centennial year, but only for silver coins. This pattern included the branch mints in Carson City and San Francisco. If you look at the highest mintage year of those three mints (including Philadelphia) for dimes, quarters, halves I think the 1876 year was either 1st or 2nd most prolific in every case. Smaller denominations and especially gold coins (except $20 Double Eagle) had, on the contrary, low mintages for their respective series. 1875 and 1877 shared some of those high mintage figures so maybe it wasn't (solely) due to the mint expecting the 1876 issues to be salted away as souvenirs.

Where do pewter buttons ID? (If you can put the answer relative to modern USA coins as well as VDI's, that would be helpful for those of us in this country not familiar with the Deus 2 scale.) I've found plenty of brass buttons but don't recall a pewter one.

I should have looked more carefully -- I now notice a photo of the recovered one above a photo of a non-recovered one. Maybe it will still clean up but likely the gilding is gone. Items like that at least give an indication of the site's age. For sites not otherwise documented it can confirm it's worth hanging around searching for old coins for those of us driven by that target.

Mark, do you mean a dry land version with ground balancing for more extreme mineralization than typically found near&in the sea? Do you have inside info / recent revelation or just remembering what was said 2-3 years ago? Not chastising, just wondering if something new has been announced because for a long time it's been crickets coming from First Texas. KellyCo jacking up the price for the base version with its out-of-the-factory warts isn't exactly heart-warming news for those who have been hopeful that more&better would be coming. Joe, I'm assuming you are referring to a submersible/saltwater-capable model, but is there news on that front also? Seems that this kind of info (and what Mark hinted at) would be worthy of some party noisemakers!

XRF spectrometers only measure the surface content. As such I don't know if they can tell plated from solid. However, your jeweler probably does know, and further I think they sometimes have other methods including their own years of experience appraising jewelry of all kinds. So I agree s/he is a good resource to have available.

Great finds, particularly the trolley button which looks like brand new. Keep that British penny in an accessible spot since it's a good calibration piece when comparing detector performance between different countries. The Aussies have an identical(?) size,shape,weight,composition version, too. Possibly other Commonwealth countries? I am a bit curious as to your recovery method given that you started out by saying digging in city parks was illegal but then you "dug" these items. I was told that Denver city parks (not that I'm trying to guess where you hunt...) had specified a certain blade (no more than 6" long and no more than 1" wide) as being allowed. And a lot of people have perfected the screwdriver stealth method which is accepted in even some of the most restricted public places.

This seems to be a common theme with 15" round DD's on today's under 4 lb IB/VLF detectors. I have two of that size (one is a Nel Attack for Fisher Gold Bug Pro; the other is a 3 kHz Coiltek for the Minelab X-Terra 705) and I've hardly used them, at least partly because of their dead weight. I'm with you on that, too. I have the Minelab 12"x15" for the Equinox, which isn't as heavy as my just mentioned 15" rounds but searching on sloped ground where more muscle is required does make things extra hard on my back. For me (certainly not speaking for others) the time saved with the 15" sweep path (think "windshield wiper coverage") is offset by the extra time it takes me to pinpoint and investigate the target, compared to the 11" DD stock coil. Coiltek has earned a deserved strong reputation for their many coils over the years. But the 15" round DD for the Equinox is a head-scratcher for many given its overlap with the already (at the time of its release) available 12"x15". Their 9"x14" DD Nox is a toe smasher as well but there was thought that this one was intended for underwater use where extra weight offsets coil buoyancy. The third Nox coil they made has been a widely praised winner, though -- 5"x10" DD.

What detector(s) were you using? Also I'm curious as to how you rejected some of your potential meteorites. You gave us a hint ('magnetic properties') but more detail would be helpful. I assume one thing that comes into play is knowing exactly what kind of meteoroid resulted in the strewn field you are hunting. And thus you require your finds to match the properties of previous finds? Good stuff!

Here's a table showing specific gravities (S.G.) of common gold and platinum alloys. If plated it would likely be right around the S.G. of pure copper (8.9). It will take a careful measurement of volume displacement via the Archimedes method, best with a scale with 3(!) decimal positions on the grams setting if available. One with only 2 might be able to distinguish S.G. ~9 vs. S.G. ~11.5 though. Notice the * about "theoretical" values. I found this table using Google Search and there was a link associated with it there but when I clicked on the link I got an article that didn't have this table. There's probably better data out there based upon actual S.G. measurements of specimens. I suspect the above are reasonably close, though.

He was in a state park??