Condor

Completely underwhelming. Without starting a whole new coil war, I sure would like to see the XCoil over those same targets.

Dave, I doubt we could have done that well without the pointy finger from you and Gone Bush. Most of this gold came from the same spot that both you and Gone Bush recommended. From there we met up with MadTuna, who you know well, and he was again ever so helpful with his time and resources. We could not have organized this adventure without Tony in Perth who handled all our mail order gear and helped outfit our Ute. He was unfortunately called away before he could swing a coil, but he was instrumental in getting us on our way. Bravo Zulu to all of you for helping us hapless Yanks out with kindness and generosity. A special thanks to Steve H. who keeps this forum honest and civil so that this kind of fellowship is possible. Now, all of you go find gold and keep the spirit alive.

Final Results 134 total nuggets: 41.2 grams 10 biggest: 13.3 grams Biggest: 2.8 (actually less, still needs more time in the acid) 10 Smallest: .3 grams total The Smallest were probably all found with the GPX 6000 and Coiltek 14x9 coil. However, I only used the 6k for 2 days. There's a shit ton of tiny gold I found with the Z7k and Xcoil 17" Concentric. I had about 21 days of detecting after discounting the travel days and rain days. Most of the gold came from the 2nd worked out patch containing small deep gold. The final 6 days were a calculated risk for making a move to find bigger gold and new patches. I talked to 2 Aussie prospectors who detect nearly full time. A 5 gram a day average is considered successful, especially when you factor plenty of skunk days. Considering the time and cost, prospecting Australia reinforces our manta: "it's not the probabilities but the possibilities" that keep us on the hunt for gold.

Update: We spent the past week prospecting a gold area with a history of multi ounce patches and bigger nuggets. We made use of some fairly detailed geological maps and Google Earth to identify mineralized zones likely to produce gold. Those resources in fact worked all to well because most of those places ended up hunted to death over the past 10 years. We saw scrapes and dig holes in all but one of the areas we identified. The gold in these areas was shallow enough that they were cleaned out by the GPXs and the GPZs long before we showed up. We found 1 spot that was relatively untouched and found 2 very small patches in the zone that should have produced gold. One patch produced 15 or so small nuggets, nothing over a gram. The 2nd patch produced 6 nuggets for a little over 5 grams. We gridded and expanded our search out to about 1/4 mile for no joy. Every day we did a lot of walking and swinging with 1 mile loops through anything that looked like it could hold gold. Mornings we cool and breezy, afternoons warm and fly ridden. Any little cut or scrape on hands or arms was the fly's favorite dinning delight. Damned irritating for us lightweights. The quandary for anyone in our situation is whether to leave the known small gold 200 miles behind and go looking for lunkers. We hunted the small gold patch pretty hard, but we probably could have eked out another 2 or 3 grams a day with low and slow detecting with the Concentric coils. I think we made the right choice because I'd always look back and wonder what we might have done. The one bright spot was we met up with MadTuna and his faithful canine sidekick Kevin. He was a most generous host and gave us the benefit of his local knowledge and history of gold producing patches. Well another adventure coming to an end and I'm sitting in the airport dreading 23 hrs of airports and airplanes to get home. I'll get the gold cleaned up and weighed when I get home. The total is probably just over an oz total.

I thought about selling the 7k when I finished this trip, until I started working with the big Concentric. It is an amazing coil and brings new life to the 7k. Now I'm anxious to return to my old spots in Yuma to give them another go.

It rained for 4 days, got in a couple hrs detecting for about 1 gram. It stopped raining on Monday and I got in a full day for 7 grams, biggest 1.4 grams about 14 inches deep. Tue we did some exploring on some old leases, nothing but trash. We still got in half day back at the local patch for just shy of 4 grams, all crumbs. Yesterday a full day on the patch looking for deep targets. I got the lunker of the trip so far, 3 gram nugget close to 18 inches deep. Ended the day with 9 grams, the photo includes the half day finds. I would have to dig a moon crater without the 6000 for a pinpointer. The 17" Xcoil concentric is my go to for deep targets and it doesn't miss much of the fly specs either. We're packing up and moving 200 miles to some 40e ground today. We're hoping for an opportunity at bigger gold. The first photo of 14x9 coil in the dig hole was the 1.4 gram gram nugget. The 2nd with the scoop beside it was the 3 grammer. My photos always end up sideways from my phone, but you get the concept. So far I'm just over an oz for the trip. I have about 4 more detecting days left.

This is a short one. We got a few hrs detecting in 2 days ago. I found 5 little crumbs before the rain came in. Rained all day yesterday and showing very little chance of letting up today. The tracks turn to mush so even if we could stay dry chances are we can't get out there. The atmospherics really give the detectors fits so it's bad luck all around. Sunshine should return on Mon, hopefully the tracks dry out quickly.

Typical detecting garb WA, fly mask for us candy asses.

Hey Dave, I need to share with you my settings for the Concentric. A lot different than standard, settings.

Today finishes 1 week of detecting. We're still detecting the same patch and getting some gold every day. There are literally hundreds of dig holes on this patch, so we're trying to concentrate on deeper zones with the Xcoil Concentric. I ran the big 17" just as hot as I could in High Yield/Difficult. Fortunately, the Concentric runs pretty quiet in the hotrocks, but it's still a lot of audio to endure. I burned out after 6 hrs, but it was the most productive day so far. The tiny nuggets were killing me with pinpointing and hole size so after I had the hole opened up, I started using the 6000 as a pinpointer. The nuggets we're chasing are just out of range for the 6000. 1 more day on this patch then off to greener pastures. We're going to leave gold to find gold I think. 2 days of photos, I'm closing in on half oz. Biggest 1.87 gram

Day 4 of detecting down under. I started the day running the big dog Z7000 with 18x12 XCOIL. Running High Yield/Difficult kicked a lot of hotrocks and no gold. I switched to the 17 Concentric coil and it ran really smooth in HY/Difficult, untroubled by hotrocks, but no gold. After I took a break and rested my back, I broke out the gold killer, 6000 with 14x9 Coiltek. I started finding tiny bits at remarkable depth with that machine. I worked the fringes to stay out of the hotrocks and found 18 bits for the day. Nothing big. All the big stuff has done been got, all that is left are the crumbs. Clearly you can't expect to find big gold if you're sticking to the same known patches, but it's early yet. Couple weeks to go, maybe some blue sky exploration to find that dream patch. Photo 1 is yesterday's finds Photo 2 is day 1 and 2 Photo 3 is today's bits

I arrived in Perth with all luggage intact. Caught the Skipper flight to Leonora and my ride was waiting. We pitched camp between Leonora and Leinster and hit a well detected patch. The 6k and 14x9 Coiltek were awesome at sniffing out some incredibly tiny gold. I had 15 crumbs just shy of 2 grams. My partner had an extra half day of detecting and pulled close to 4 grams. We packed up to head north for some 40e spots we had logged. Unfortunately, my partner sprained his detecting wing while loading the truck. We've holed up in the lodge in Leinster, hoping for some mending time, however; we got some pointy fingers from forum members Gone Bush and Dave D. Their guidance produced another couple grams in the poke and we're just getting started. We could not have organized this adventure without our Aussie prospecting brothers on this forum. Bravo Zulu to Tony in Perth for storing our gear and helping us at every step. Bravo Zulu to Gone Bush and Dave D, for unselfishly giving us the pointy fingers to productive areas us poor Yanks might never find. I'll get some photos and nugget weights out tomorrow. I hear the beer time bell at the pub across the street. Don't want to be late for beer time. See you fukkas soon.

Yellow in front, brown in back.

I'm off to OZ on Sat to meet a fellow (but silent) forum member. Our plans included forum member Tony from Perth, but it seems he's been recalled halfway to the Goldfields. I won't actually get to the Goldfields until Wed which gives me about 3 weeks of detecting. I'm packing both the GPX 6000 and GPZ. I've got the new Coiltek 14x9 for the 6k and 3 XCoils for the Z. Looks like I'll miss NursePaul, he'll be about 300k further away. It's been tough to pack for this trip, airlines charge an extra $100 for a 2nd bag and the Skipper flight to the Goldfields charges $8.00 a lb for baggage over 35lbs. I've got the main checked bag down to 40lbs and my carryon at about 15 lbs. Bare minimums, 2 pr of underwear should be sufficient, amirite? I'm an old wildland firefighter, so 8 prs of merino wool hiking socks are a necessity. I don't want to travel halfway around the world and get caught up with blisters or a fungus on my feets. I'll check in periodically with some results and commentary on detector/coil selection. Tally Ho

I made a quick overnight trip to Rye Patch to do some more testing with the GPZ and 17" Concentric Coil. My main goal is to familiarize myself with the Z combination for an upcoming trip to Australia. This testing was merely for my own edification, not to prove any point about this Machine/Coil vs that Machine/Coil. I dug the first 2 nuggets last night and it was getting dark so I didn't have time to do any cross checking. This morning I marked 3 undug targets with the GPZ and 17" XCoil Concentric. I then went over them with the GPZ XCoil 17x12 Spiral Wound. That combination picked up 2 of the 3 targets. I then went over all three with the GPX 6000, 14x9 Coiltek combination. The 6000 heard 1 of the 3, but while detecting back to the truck it picked up 2 more targets. I started over with the Z 17"CC and it picked up the 2 new targets no problem. I then ran the Z 17x12 over the new targets. It picked them up no problem, but on the way back to the truck the 17x12 picked up a faint noise in an old drywash hole. I dug down to bedrock and found bits of charcoal and just general noise so I gave up on it. The 17" CC relocated the 1 missed target and I dug down a few inches thinking to use the 6000 as a pinpointer. It still couldn't pick up the target. I finally dug it out, a tiny piece of steel down about 6 inches. I then dug up the 4 targets which included the 2 remaining targets the 17"CC found and the 2 the 6000 found. 2 were bits of steel and 2 were small round nuggets. Coincidently, the 2 gold targets were the ones found by the 6000, but verified by both coils on the Z. By then it was approaching 10:00 AM, and the NV desert still gets hot this time of year. But, before I left I went back to the 17" CC combination and went over the drywash hole. A clear tone somewhere in the bottom of that hole. The unfortunate thing about the Concentric coil is the receive winding is about 8" round dead center. You're waving 17" of coil with the equivalent of an 8" round receiver. Nearly impossible to pinpoint in a foot deep hole. I dug the hole out some more and tried the 6000 over it. Very noisy, but a faint low tone in the sidewall of the hole. I dug it out some more and finally got a booming target in the spoils. Heartbreak, 1.5 inch piece of rusted steel. My random thoughts on this little experiment are this: 1. The XCoil 17" Concentric will not miss much, "IF" you have fairly flat ground and can consistently overlap your swings to insure you get that 8" receive winding over the targets. 2. The XCoil 17x12 Spiral Wound coil is nearly as good and will ultimately cover more ground with a whole lot less effort. 3. The 6000 with 14x9 Coiltek is no slouch and could save the day if you're old and tired like me. I would be hard pressed to swing the 17"CC all day. The deepest nugget the 6000 found was down about 5 inches, very respectable for a sub/sub gram nugget. All this is very unscientific. I'm at mercy of time and weather in the NV desert this time of year. I did what I could with the equipment I had with me. Rye Patch is a tough hunt in the best of circumstances, so finding 4 nuggets in about 6 hours of detecting is beating the odds. I've had more than a few skunk days out there.

GC, I experimented with all the settings including General/Difficult over this very salty ground. It ran OK, but the "Patch Find" helped considerably. Unfortunately, I couldn't get over another target to really test the response. N NV deserts are still in the mid 90's, so my testing tolerance was sapped. I don't leave for OZ until mid Sept, so I'll get out for another couple runs if the weather cooperates. If you're free, come on out for some testing.

Teaser: Further Testing We reburied the 4.6 gram nugget and every detector coil combination disappointed. I don't want to fuel the old "nugget halo" theory, but things changed for the worse for a reburied nugget. I would have bet money that the 6k could easily find a 4.6 gram nugget at 10 inches. Again, your results may vary, but I was quite surprised.

Hey Jason, We later detected the same area you had joined us for the 6k launch. We had a short hard rain last night and that ground really got extreme in places. I tried the Z in the Salt setting plus Difficult for the first time ever. It quieted the ground, but struggled with a .3 gram test nugget. Andy ran the new Coiltek 10x5 on the 6k and had no trouble with the salt. It's always a toss-up, depth, sensitivity, or stability.

Let me reiterate something about this "test". We never set out to test anything. We did this because the opportunity came upon us with an undug target in ground that had been thoroughly hunted. We did this to satisfy our own curiosity and not to prove one detector or coil is better than any other. We didn't have a stock Z coil, we didn't have a NF aftermarket coil, we had what we brought for an overnight hunt. We should've or could've is simply not in this equation. It is what it is your results may vary.

I bought the GPZ XCoil Concentric for my upcoming trip to Australia coming in mid September. I wanted to put some run time on it so when Steve H suggested we take a short trip to Sawtooth to meet with forum member ABenson I jumped at the chance. Steve H has an old patch that he has detected for over 10 years, I've detected it for over 6 years. We generally find a few pickers but it really has been hunted to death. The benefit of a hunted to death patch is there is no more trash, so any target stands a good chance of being the good yellow stuff. I ran the 17" Concentric as hot as the ground would bear, Normal, High Yield, Sens 17. The ground has a lot of alkali salt, and the upper couple inches was damp from a recent rain so I added in the "Patch Find" setting to quiet the ground a little. After a couple hours with no targets other than a few boot scrapes in hot ground, I got a good repeatable tone on the slope of an old push. Since I'm new to the Concentric I had no idea what that signal was telling me. If I had to guess from the tone, I would say under a gram nugget, 4 to 6 inches down. So I marked the target and walked back to the truck to get my GPX 6000 and the new Coiltek 14x9 coil. Steve H was nearby so we decided to check the target with the new Axiom. We got there and neither the 6k nor the Axiom could hear the target. I had to go back to the truck and get the Z to verify the target was where I had marked. A clear and repeatable tone in both Normal and Difficult for the Z. We pulled a couple inches off the top and started the whole process over. The 6k gave a faint low tone over the target, but not something that would ordinarily stop me in prospecting mode. In fact, I dig very few low tones in this ground because of the hot ground and hot rocks. I'll defer to Steve H for his assessment of how the Axiom was doing over the same target. We did a lot more testing, and found a seam of hot red clay on the target, but to skip to the chase, we recovered a 4.6 gram nugget (4.7 on Steve's scale) at a minimum of 13 inches and probably closer to 14 inches. We reached a few preliminary conclusions on ground handling, raw detecting power and pricing of the 3 detectors, based on this one unscientific, ad hoc test with the detectors and coils we had available. Our ideas on detector performance were severely challenged in some later completely unscientific tests. More to come, Steve H is probably better suited to explain how things changed.

Hey Paul, I just watched the latest Chrissy video with the Task Master running the backhoe. Thought I might hear a Tennessee accent somewhere in the background. Maybe as a true TN Vol, you can volunteer to hold the camera while they do all the work.

Hey Paul, Maybe they fixed the lift mechanism so you won't pinch the end off a finger trying to get it to lock in the upright position. Great camper though, can't give up on equipment just because its got a little age. How's the quad and yellow truck, are they still functioning?

Hey Gerry, I forgot to mention that I did a quick experiment with the hotrocks. These rocks range in size from a basketball to a baseball. After I notched them out, I put the .8 gram nugget right on top of one of the medium sized rocks. Deus 2 hit the nugget no problem. Regrettably, it could not do the same on the smaller nuggets, but the D2 can give you options.