GB_Amateur

Sounds like one more black eye for a company that has earned more than its share.

The Warnick mystery continues -- chicken or egg. Is it the corrosion that's causing the high reading or is it a (non-standard) alloy with its high reading that is leading to the unusual corrosion? Nice Buffie. I can see that you had to work it over to make it look nice. Nickels in particular have a difficult time surviving unscathed after many decades in the ground. Any full date Buffie is a good find in my book. S mintmarks typically even better.

I never heard of iron bias before the Equinox, but I also never paid much attention to BBS and FBS detectors, either (and still don't). In my defense ?, I don't remember those detectors being talked about much on this website before the Equinox was introduced, and this is the only website I follow. Is IB strictly a Minelab thing? Something is telling me it also is a feature on the XP Deus (you'll confirm or deny that, I'm sure), but if so, did XP just get the idea from earlier minelab VLF's?

Just measured mine. The upper shaft (where the armrest and control unit/handle mount) is 22.06 mm OD, +/-0.01 mm. Of course there could be manufacturing variations, but probably pretty small if they exist. (The fact that some feel wobble in the shaft assembly and others don't might be an indication of variations, but there are other plausible explanations to that.)

There are a couple lots on Ebay where the seller includes a Tesoro Widescan (DD) 5 3/4 inch coil with plug modified/replaced to operate on a Fisher Gold Bug (the new generation Gold Bug, not the 1990's versions). I'm wondering if anyone here has heard about the possibility of going the other direction -- putting a Fisher Gold Bug / F19 / Tek G2,G2+, Tek Greek series coil on a Tesoro?

I have all three mentioned George Lesche designs (standard handheld, T-handled Sampson, and Raptor). It depends upon the conditions as to which one I use. For manicured, thick, moist sod the Raptor is great. But if the ground is at all rocky (like you can get with either gravel backfill or old crushed stone driveways) it is near impossible. As Cabin Fever notes, the Sampson doesn't present a good image when used on public muni properties. For private permissions and especially when out in the woods, it's the way to go. Regarding cutting roots, I've stopped doing that if larger than about 1/8 inch (3 mm) diameter. In fact I filed off the serrated part of my handheld Lesche so I don't accidentally damage roots. When out in the thick brush/woods sometimes I need the serrated edge of the Sampson, but I always try to work around the roots. It takes longer but I sleep better at night. Photo shows a left side serated (unmodified) and a right side serated with teeth removed (and a bit dirty from my last hunt).

Congrats on finding the Buffy. I predict many more in your future. ? As far as ...those darn tips off of the old ring pull tabs...(nickname ''beavertail'), rest assured that the detectorists before you who left those in the ground also left a lot of nickels and some gold jewelry as well.

Lot of good advice so far. I'm going to emphasize 'lightweight'. Given the many detectors available under 3 lb, you need a very good reason to go heavier. You talked about searching your creek. You can really feel a difference in weight when you are searching the walls of a creek or on a terrace in a park or school, for example. When detecting you need to concentrate on what you are hearing and seeing. If your back is nagging you because you've been swinging a heavy detector for the past couple+ hours your concentration will wane, you will start getting too picky on what you want to dig, etc. Don't forget to budget for some tools and accessories -- 1) a handheld pinpointer ($120-$150), 2) a hand digger (Lesche is the gold standard: $35-$50), 3) a pouch for both treasure and trash (nail apron works well enough -- that's what I use), and 4) a decent set of headphones. The headphones are possibly the most difficult choice because if they don't fit well it doesn't matter how great they block out the ambient noise. There are OK headphones out there $30 all the way up to $150. Over-ear are more comfortable than on-ear, in my experience. It's best to go to a brick and mortar dealer so you can try them on and make sure they are comfortable. Get ones made for metal detecting, not for music listening. Earbuds are more comfortable in hot weather but make sure the cable/wire is long enough. I like buying used equipment, but I warn against buying used headphones and used pinpointers. Both of these can wear out or develop problems and usually you won't notice that until you've already bought them. Here is where a warranty (that comes with a new device) makes buying new worth it over 'saving' by going with used items. IMO, a used Lesche is even better than a new one because they arene't quite as sharp (I've cut myself on a new one) and they are less likely to damage the item you are digging. They still work fine trying to loosen hardpack. If you do get a new one, it will dull with time (actually after ~20 hours you'll notice a significant difference). Make sure when you hunt public property (schools and parks, for example) that digging is allowed. (Two things there - look around for and read the posted signs and check the website of the place you plan to hunt. Beware of calling and asking someone if a public place. Too many people don't know the answer but will say 'no' just to cover their tracks.) If you can't find anything that says 'no metal detecting' or 'no digging' then assume it's ok. That's for public municipal properties. Never hunt a private property without getting permission. Typically state and (for sure) national parks do not allow any detecting or digging. Sometimes state forrests do and sometimes not. Check the websites or ask your local detectorists about these. National Forests and BLM lands are ok to hunt, but don't remove old relics. If you find some, leave them where you found them. Old coins -- you should be fine.

In my experience, this is actually a fairly common occurrence for deep copper coins -- ID while (deep) in the ground higher than expected. It's nice, though, that it is high instead of low. Low tends to indicate nearby trash (iron in particular) contaminating the copper signal. The Equinox is pretty good at giving some kind of positive ID, even with nearby trash. That ring is a beauty! Also, I'm stuck on one silver quarter over the last 3 years of serious hunting. Any (solid) silver is good silver, though. Nice diversion for you when you're not out looking for nature's jewelry. ?

Finding a gold coin is rare enough, but one from the Dahlonega, Georgia mint is orders of magnitude more unusual/fortunate/lucky. The Dahlonega mint was in operation from 1838 to 1861 (when it was confiscated by the Confederacy, only ever minting a single denom, 1861-D dollar after that). It was created to mint coins from locally recovered gold. (Charlotte, NC mint was similarly formed and used.) $5 'Half Eagles' were minted every year the mint was open, and struck in the largest quantities. $2.50 'Quarter Eagles' were next, minted in consecutive years 1839-1857, then 1859. The $1 version (as found by Dar) was minted in continuous years 1849-1861. A single year, 1854, saw the minting of $3 pieces. The approximate total mintage for all years, by denomination: $1: 75,000. $2.50: 175,000. $3: 1,000. $5: 1.1 million. Totalled, less than 1.4 million D mintmarked coins (not to be confused with the later Denver mint issues) were made. If all done on one year on one modern denomination coin that would make it already scarce. For example, the 1914-D Lincoln and 1921 (plain) Merc each saw 1.2 million minted. Given that most gold coins minted in the US were later melted (here or on foreign lands), the surviving Dahlonega coins are likely fewer than 10,000 pieces in all denominations. Bottom line: find of a lifetime for Dar!

Two more of their videos showing the performance of the Equinox 15" coil. The second video I list here (which I think was chronologically first of the three) shows him finding a Barber half dollar which likely is valuable enough to pay for the Eqx and both accessory coils. Beauty! I was unsure until I saw these if I needed the 15" coil....

Is this the coil you're looking for: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Tesoro-10-Elliptical-Widescan-Search-Coil-Delta-Series-Detector-10EW-LW-D-/272385338757?hash=item3f6b6e6d85

Would you explain what you mean here? This is the first I've heard about it (nor have I experienced it after 200 hours of use).

Simon, does the photo show your finds on New Years Day with the Tek T2? I'm guessing someone was pretty snockered to lose a 10 spot note.

Isn't that what our site (detectorprospector.com) is all about?

I've wondered myself about the location of the eddy currents in metal objects. But one piece of evidence we have to show it's not right on the surface -- clad coins. The fact that they show high conductivity (characteristic of copper and thus their cores) indicates it's not purely a surface effect. So my conclusion is that what you are seeing is deeper than some surface layer/scale/etc.

How do you determine these values? (I can see the graphs, but please explain how the graphs lead you to these values.)

Watched episode 1 last night -- disappointed but not surprised. It reminds me of Josh Gates in Expedition Unknown, but without Josh's humor. Appears they at least negotiated with White's to give them detectors, whether or not they are getting paid to use/show them on air. TM808, MX-Sport, and MXT (or is it V3i/VX3?). I'll give it another chance next week. At least it's not all about backstabbing conflict like some of the gold mining shows have turned into.

If you're referring to my (not so?) subtle comment, my point wasn't that they were fiction, it's just that most 'true' treasure stories are based upon fact but the details get twisted over the years with anecdotal additions. Those magazines kept me riveted from the day they arrived in my mailbox until I had them thoroughly devoured. And the ads kept me salivating over all the detectors I couldn't afford.

D-Tex Professional from 1968? That vs. the Equinox is like comparing a Tin Lizzie to a 2019 Jeep Grand Cherokee! I can second Chase's warning to not overdo the sensitivity (gain) setting. I'd say 75% of my 240 hours with the Equinox have been running gain of 18 or 19. Too high of a gain is more costly than too low with most high quality detectors. Don't worry about boring us. We've all been where you are and seeing someone excited about our hobby makes us all feel good.

Steve, have you ever measured the weight of the oddball Warnicks? In paricular the ones with Aluminum might show a significantly different weight than the norm (of course not guaranteed). Obviously other factors (especially wear) will affect the weight. If you find an anomalous weight I would be willing to weigh all of my 'normal' ones and produce a mass spectrum for comparison sake. If you ever get around to having another XRF analysis (and if it's not too expensive to add some more specimens), ask them to XRF the other side of the coin (assuming they didn't already do that, averaging the two results...). Also include a standard copper-nickel sample. It would also be good to include a second normal Warnick to see what kind of variations show up. All of this also helps show the uncertainty of the readings. (One of my pet peaves of XRF analysis is that the few I've seen don't have an uncertainty associated with the values.) As far as some of the comments on that Dankowski forum thread, I doubt the mint has any knowledge about this anymore. Even if the planchets are the culprits, someone then might have known but that doesn't mean they recorded or reported it. Further, as most know, the staffing of many organizations (companies, government agencies, etc.) changed during the war as people were re-assigned to positions which were thought to most advance the war effort. Either the mint employees who did quality control or more likely the people (private company employees?) who were in charge of metal composition may have been less expert than one would expect. Consider the mint denying that 1943 copper cents were made. Yes, there was no official mintage and likely the higher ups (who responded to queries about the anomalies) were unaware, but it did happen. Most are familiar with the 'Red Book' but Whitman has an entire series of a couple dozen "A Guide Book to..." publications (https://whitman.com/store/Inventory/Browse/Whitman-Books) which go way more into detail on the individual series. I've been picking up used ones (some earlier editions) for quite cheap on the internet. I recently got the Buffalo+Jefferson Nickel book and looked for composition variations of Warnicks. Nothing that really helps your study, but there was a writeup regarding the motivation, experimentation, and eventual decision on what became the standard Cu-Ag-Mn values. (I also have the Flying Eagle + Indian Head book and the Lincoln Cent book, the latter of which actually does talk about intended variations in the penny composition. But that's a topic for another thread.)

Finished air testing the 160 Warnick TID's with the Minelab Equinox 800. I used the 11 inch coil, set up a 'platform' (all plastic) ~3.5 inches above the coil to facilitate repeatable tests with no rotation. I ran in Park 1, gain of 16, recovery speed = 5, iron bias = 0. I used my standard custom 5 tones which includes a nickel zone of 12-13, so I can hear 11's and 14's (different tones) separated from the 12-13. I also watched the screen to see the ID's there, too. I moved the coins back and forth across the DD intersection zone at a rate of a couple cycles per second, several cycles for each coin. I did this directly over the center of the coil (attach point) but also about an inch towards the toe and an inch toward the heel of the coil. The 160 nickels were all found in pocket change in the 1960's through the 1970's (and maybe a few from later decades). Most were found in central Indiana. All display the unattractive dark gray patina characteristic of Warnicks well circulated in commerce. Really nothing too exciting here. Most centered on 13 with both 12's and 14's (but these latter in the minority of the chirps). About a dozen showed no 14's but did have some 11's. Two or three stayed exclusively in 12-13. About half dozen coins never showed a 12 and were 13-14 range consistently. I checked the dates and mintmarks of the outliers and saw no pattern. Ditto any wear or coloration differences. One possible clue for Steve's study came when I decided to test the 6 nickels I found (buried) with my Eqx during 2018. Five were consistent with the most common signals shown by the above tests. However, one would occasionally show a TID of 15. I don't remember any of the 160 non-MD find nickels showing a 15 but can't say for certain it never happened. As many of you have experienced, Warnicks that come out of the ground tend not to show the dark gray patina but rather have a cleaner, whiter appearance. The one Warnick that touched 15 had a reverse that was the cleanest of all six, but its obverse had some black scale staining (darker than the non-dug Warnicks). I don't know if this appearance is connected with the 15 reading or not. Sorry, Steve. I would have liked to have found one of the high TID coins both to add to your case but also to just own one myself. But hopefully these new data will somehow be useful in your quest to get an answer to this intriguing mystery.

Are you getting him confused with 'Long John Latham' who published True Treasure and Treasure World? I subscribed to those back in the 1970's. Their stories were intoxicating, and some were even true. ?

Great find, but how the heck did it get to New Zealand? Restoration is always a questionable practice before you find out what something is worth and who may want it. If a museum in the UK would like to have it, for example, they might prefer it be "as found". Suppose they know the reason it was on the coast of NZ. It might carry more meaning if it shows that it was dropped during exercises, etc. I'd hold off until you know more. Glad to hear the Tesoro Lobo Supertraq is still making good finds, particularly something outside of its intended use. Dare I say "another detector that Dave Johnson had a hand in producing"?

I recognize these guys from a cancelled show about searching for gold in Greenland (was it Ice Cold Gold?). You never know about these and you don't want to get your hopes up, but I'm going to check it out. https://www.travelchannel.com/shows/lost-gold