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A friend of mine went to a local beer store and noticed that the cashier handed him a couple of silver dimes. She checked a couple of rolls for him and let him walk away with 90 silver dimes at face value. Oldest one is 1928. Most are from the 1960's. Even at only $2.00 a coin, that's $180 worth!! No metal detector required.....

I have a mojave and have always been interested in the silver sabre micromax. There’s a silver sabre with the brown 8” donut coil for sale on the friendly forum and was wondering if it has any advantages over the mojave. I’ve read about how good the SS umax is and it intrigues me enough to consider buying one. However, if it’s similar in performance to the mojave, I can’t see any justification in buying one.

A hunt from a few days back. Quarter in pic for size comparison. Going out for the 8th hunt today and after their gold brothers!

Days like today are rare in the winter, but I'm thrilled I get to take advantage of them. It was already t-shirt weather by the time I got out, it got into the 60s today, sunny and no wind. Perfect! I hit this field late last spring, got a lot of great buttons and a small brass cannon. There was a house here long ago, just a small two room shack probably inhabited by plantation "staff". I finally found the cellar hole for it. Searched around it a bit, but found nothing. On a hill nearby is a big iron patch, I think a barn burned there or the house was pushed there and burned. Today I wanted to see how the 13" did finding stuff in it. It did ok, but even Silver Slayer didn't produce anything, so I just hunted in my custom relic program that has been doing well for me. For a place I hit hard, I did ok. I had to park my truck at the entrance to this field, about 2 acres I don't have permission to but no one minded me parking there. They tell me the owner isn't worried about it, and the farmers are done for the year. Only got a handful of trash today, molten metal from the fire, copper nails, bullets, buck balls and the like. It really only is a handful 😏 Here's the take: A bit boss, 3 buttons - one overall, one silverwash and one small. 4 coins, 2 IHPs, 1888 and 1889, a 1963 memorial, and a silver 1950 Roosevelt dime! Got the dime heading back to my truck for a Coke. 😀 Got 3 pieces of what I think is an ancient fancy buckle, a parasol slide (thanks, JCR!) A large piece of cast brass that was attached to something and broke, a buckle fragment and an odd two headed bent copper nail. If anyone knows what that is I'd appreciate it! 😀 It's a curiosity for sure. I was glad to find anything at all here, and thrilled to yet again get a silver coin. Maybe this year I'll be luckier with that. Also found some old bottles, but left them there. There is a dump site on the edge of the ravine, the clear one says "Old Witch", apparently an ammonia brand. I don't think they are very valuable, and the ravine is dangerous, drops off almost 100 feet in some spots.

I don't know if it's the same on cellphones but on computers there are (Google?) ads at the top of each page and another interspersed among the posts to that thread. I'm not complaining as I realize they help pay the bills. I seldom click on them (don't want to targetted any more deeply than I already am) but occasionally I do. I noticed the following ad and took a screenshot: You can see on the inside of the ring it says 'S925'. OK, what gives? Does the 'S' mean 'plated' because it's hard for me to believe a solid sterling ring (with lots of blingy 'stones') is only $2.60. Or is it like those sites that tell you "so-and-so got a new iPhone for $5.95...")? I also wondered if it's fake marking. I've read you guys getting gold jewelry which was marked a certain Karat and it turning out to be plated. Tougher and tougher everyday for detectorists, beach and jewelry specialists included.

This video just popped up a yesterday.

Living in Virginia can be interesting in the winter, one day it's below 30, and the next you're in a t-shirt. 😀 I feel for the original settlers, they must have had a rough time. It hit 65 today. Odd for January 2, but I'll take it. 😀 Today I met Chase at this field, he was pretty sure we would find something here despite being disappointed before, but it wasn't disappointing today. We both had Deus 2s, me with my 13" and him with the 11". He made a pretty impressive find or two, but I'll just post mine and as usual invite him to jump in if he feels like it. It was kinda a celebration of his retirement this past week. 🏆 Time for the gratuitous detector pic, that's Chase way out there, this field is pretty big and has high potential for colonial relics due to its location. I did pretty well, even got some silver. (Sort of): 1943 P war nickel. I was quite surprised to find it here, the Deus reported a 74 I think. The rest of the story is the usual suspects, got 3 coins and a few buttons: Top left is an oval stud of some sort, top right another collar stud. I didn't know these weren't rivets until recently 😀 A couple wheats, old button with some gold still on it, two ball buttons, and a broken two piece that says Holmes Pritchard Co. on the back. Can't make out the top pattern. 😵 At first I thought the bottom coin looking thing was a half reale, it had a waxy feel and looked like it was originally round. 🤔 I have found one in this condition: Ended up only weighing .3g, and it's the size of a seated half dime which weighs 1g. I think it's a hammered Roman pull tab. 🤣 Great fun with a great guest. Trash was about average, don't want people thinking we don't dig a lot of crap! 😀 I don't dig much iron, the D2 rarely falses on it. 👍

One last day of 2022, so out I went to a local ballfield next to a rec. center. As soon as I stepped out of the vehicle, the drops began with distant rumblings. Sensing a deluge was not imminent, I started with the playground that is padded with wood chips. The swing set gave up some coins as did the rest of the structures. I was almost under the monkey bars when I got a softish solid 6-7 ID in 50 tones. After taking a bit of time to locate the item, even with the pinpointer, the silver, sliver moon showed its face. About 3 feet away, the same numbers displayed which turned out to be the back of the earring; the 10x5 is amazing at finding small stuff! After that, I detected a bit in the turf as the rain intensified. I hit a strange signal that was about a 17 ID. The lapel pin, along with the two backing pieces, was about 4 inches down. Happy hunting to you all in the new year!

This is a good way to end the year. It has been over a month since I found a gold ring. This one is a nice 14k band that weighs 7.5 grams. It has an inscription in it that says July 26, 2013. I should have written a date in mine but I used one I found at the beach for my wedding band. On a previous hunt this week I found some nice silver. Happy New Year! The GOLD: The Silver The blue pendant with fine chain literally hurt my ears. I've never had something do that with the Nox at 21. It must be the silver cage that holds the glass. The fine chain broke apart as I was digging. There was a separate chain found also.

Well beach was not producing really anything for me this morning other than a few coins and junk toe ring so I decided to shift gears. Went home swapped out machines and headed to the local park with my wife. She wasn’t detecting today — her back still hurts, but she wanted to get out and stretch her legs. Good news for me more coins and the best part my wife was walking up to see one of the holes I was digging and out pops a silver ring. The bad news is I lost the ring to her faster then I could dig it. 😂

Was out to a local basketball court the other day trying to pad my totals for 2022. I was digging whatever had good, solid sounds using the 10x5 on the Equinox. Just a short time into the hunt, I noticed that a line of shrubbery that had been along one side of the court was no longer there. I started in the middle and worked way to the right side. There were many pennies and dimes, with a few nickels. Quarters were not in the mix, so when a 32-34 ID showed up, it easily caught my attention. Down in the soft dirt, among some roots, a large silver spinner ring popped out, likely lost while someone played ball and it rolled under the shrubs. I just happened to be the first person to detect the area after the removal. The gold ring is my wedding band which looks like a a child's ring next to the silver monster. Park 1, all metal, 7 recovery, 50 tones

Went through some finds from the other day this morning. This was in the dirty coin pile we have with the other copper piece?. Wife found both of them. Thankfully we learned to keep it all over the years. Just takes a lil time to get to the piles somedays. Copper? is going to take me awhile to clean don’t want to mess it up if it is something good, but the silver she found is cleaned up. Found a similar up to date pendant online but this one is older design. It is the center piece of a pendant with a bezel — bezel not found. She was finding so many old quarters in that area it just went into her bag with the other piece. Good for her keeping it.

I got out for a late afternoon hunt in quite a blow. It is not that the temperature was so low at around 52 or so but the wind was blowing about 25 mph. I layered up and was just fine. I thought I was going to only have the one 'spread the ear' ring for the hunt but then I got a deep target. It gave me a squeak above a quarter at 31-32. Down about 14 inches was this ring. It was not that corroded so I wondered about it. It probably had some varnish or protectant of some sort. It cleaned up pretty good. I can't see a maker's mark but it does have a 9(8)25 inside. There should have been more.

I have acquired a makro simplex and am testing it with my investment silver. When I scan a single silver coin I get a good high reading but when I scan over a few coins or more it shows junk numbers.... any advice? I sure don't want to miss out on large piles of silver coins...lol.

Just for the fun , 2 interesting items found during 2 different outings but in the same area .. First a very nice silver roman coin 🙂 , and during the next outing a fragment of a medieval silver medal 🙂. My D2 likes silvers , it is my fifth silver coin since I have it ( September ) Btw the weather is getting colder over here , only 3 celsius degs during the last outing 🤢, hopefully I had my gloves 👌.. I hope it will be a little warmer next time ... For info I was using the same D2 settings : SENSITIVE mode , SQUARE audio , 5 tones . No need to change something that works very well .. 1) the first outing , the roman coin has been found on the right of the path near the wood : An antoninianus of Philip the Arab , 244-249 AD , billon ( 50% silver , 50% copper ) , legend IMP M IUL PHILIPPUS AUG : 2) the 2nd outing , and my D2 WS6 Master : The silver medal fragment :

I've been out again with my new Nokta Legend on the hunt for some gold jewelry. So far the gold is still eluding me, but I did manage another men's silver ring as a consolation prize for digging countless pull tabs along with other trash and clad. This time its the ring on my middle finger in the picture (the other 2 I got a couple of days ago) and its a large ring size, as it still too big even for my average sized hands. I got an ID# of 94 on the Legend and I was nearly positive by the locked on number and sweet-sounding tone it would be silver and likely a ring. I dug it about 3 inches down on the outskirts of a softball field where spectators sit in the shade of a tree. In case anybody is interested to know, my settings were Park, M2, 28sens, G(round) disc mode, 6 recovery, 4IF/3stab, 4 audio gain, using 60 tones. I had the 6in. coil attached. It works great for pinpointing the smaller targets and still gets the big ones.

I went back to the same field a week ago where I found 2 silver dimes (1943s mercury and 1912s Barber) using the Deus 2 and Silver Slayer program. I felt guilty about using it, knowing I was missing all of those possible gold and good penny signals. Well, the following are 3 very good reasons to only use the SS program in moderation, maybe as a last resort, or if you are short on time and want to cherry pick an area. 1919s, 1920d and 1899 Indian head pennies found with Program(3) Sensitive Full Tones with +1 added to audio response and up to +34 notched out to cut out tiny items and foil. VDI# were 84 and 85. The plan this day was to dig up all "zinc" pennies, but these 3 oldies fell into the same general VDI range.

Some friends asked me if I wanted to join them on a hunt at an old coal mining ghost town last week, to which I replied "Hell Yeah!" They warned me that this area had been pounded heavily by everybody for decades, because it is easily accessible and close to some major cities, so not to expect too much and probably no coins. Well that bar was set high enough for me, so off I went. I figured if nothing else, it would be another interesting spot to test Rattlehead's famous Silver Slayer program for the Deus II in relic hunting conditions. The weather was cooler than normal and very windy, so I was hoping the rattlesnakes had moved underground so I wouldn't have to use my Root Slayer as a Snake Slayer. 😱 I use to catch snakes as a kid and don't like to kill them. When we arrived, we split up and started checking out the old house foundations of the now defunct coal town. I started out in a slightly modified Relic mode on the D2 that I normally use for relic hunting and the ground lit up with great sounding targets, most of which were smashed bits of aluminum, lead, tin, and iron. Of course the iron was easy enough to sort out, but there was so much lead and aluminum everywhere that I couldn't even find a clear spot to ground balance. The noise was endless. So I figured, what the heck, I'll try the Silver Slayer again to see what it can do in this kind of environment. This town operated from the early 1900s to about 1950, so I opened the program up a little to allow low mid conductors from 50 to about 68, since there were no pull tabs, and notch out those pesky ring pulls, but left 78 and up opened. That seemed to tame things quite a bit and still allowed me to hear the iron as a reference. That's when interesting targets started coming through, like buttons, clock gears, the back to a pocket watch, harmonica reeds, and my first thimble. I was over by one foundation when my friend said, I'm curious to see if you get anything there because I've beat that foundation into submission several times so I don't think there's anything left there. Well he was right... almost... I was getting nothing but trash signals until I moved just outside one corner near a very large cactus. I was getting lots of iron signals as usual when a bouncy 84-86 kept squeeking through the iron tones. Well I had nothing to lose except an eye if I got too close to that cactus bush, so I carefully dug it out and low and behold, out popped a 1935 Wheat penny! The SS program struck coin again unmasking a Wheatie buried in a pile of nails and other iron bits. Color me impressed again! So I ended the day with some neat relics and a coin and continuing respect for my detector which is teaching me so much. 😎

I’ve been reading some forums and watching some video on the Silver Slayer program for the XP Deus 2. Using notch seems to be the ticket to make the D2 perform well on coins in iron and modern trash. I had experienced a similar phenomenon while hunting for gold nuggets a few months back where I notched out iron on a site that was littered with nails. This resulted in me finding a .40 gram nugget. So, I got to thinking how would using notch work while detecting extremely trashy ghost town sites? Well, I tried it out this past weekend and was pleasantly surprised with the results. Those of you that hunt ghost towns know that it can be very challenging to pull good targets from all the trash. Not only are there hundreds of nails, you also have to deal with tin cans, bottle caps, stove parts, bolts, etc. To help deal with all the trash I developed a program for the D2 I call GHOST, for ghost town hunting. It uses the same principles as the Silver Slayer program but at the same time is nothing like it. The GHOST program is set up to find tokens, nickels and IHP or higher coins. You can make adjustments to it to include Chinese cache coins and 3 cent silver if you like but my intent is to cherry pick the most common coins and tokens. I’m sure some of you will agree that you could spend hours in a small trashy area of a ghost town picking through the targets and analyzing every target with different programs to try and get everything possible. But not all of us have that kind of time so that’s where the GHOST program comes in. It’s meant to pull the best targets possible in the least amount of time. Here is the way I have the D2 setup for the GHOST program. Based off the FAST program. Sensitivity 90, Audio response 4, Silencer 2, Bottle Cap reject 2, PWM audio, Reactivity 3, Notch 0-10, Disc can be setup for anything up to 10 but don’t go above whatever you have notched, 5 tones-first break will be whatever you have your disc set at, second break up to 58 232 Hz, third break 58-62 (or a little higher if you like) 750 or so Hz, fourth break 62-80 550 Hz, fifth break 80-99 901 Hz. In my video the Hz may vary and really you can use whatever Hz you want. The point is to make nickels and IHP/tokens stand out. Now the nickel range you can bump up a bit to 64 or 65 but I find most Jeffersons come in at those higher numbers and I’m really only interested in the Buffalos and older nickels. Having the D2 setup like this really makes for a more enjoyable hunt experience in my opinion. Nails are totally illuminated. Bottle caps and flat tin can easily be ID’s through broken audio. Very little flat tin type targets give a good audio response unlike other setups I’ve used. Coins, tokens and other relics that fall in the target bins, give clean audio and visual responses. For those target s that fall in the bins you have at lower Hz settings, they can be analyzed individually to determine if you want to dig them. So now for the proof. I went to 4 different ghost towns over this last weekend. One is on private property which the owner has allowed hunting on for decades. I have personally been there 30 or 40 times over the last 30 years. I’ve used the Equinox, ORX, Deus, Simplex, Racer 2, Explorer, Fisher CZ 6a. eTrac, etc. over those 30 years and never brought more than one coin/token per trip home. Until now. Day 1 we didn’t start hunting until 2 pm. First good signal in the 90-93 range, right next to a fallen down wooden shack with lots of nails around, up pops a 1944-D dime. Not as old as I would have expected but silver non the less. Second good high tone signal in an area littered with flat tin and nails turns out to be a 1902 barber dime. Day 2 spent most of the morning exploring some other ghost towns in the area on 4 wheelers. Didn’t get the metal detectors out much because it’s BLM and you really should only be searching for minerals or newer relics. Sad because most of these towns have been used as party spots for decades, leaving beer cans and bottle caps littered everywhere. I did pick up a few newer pennies around some of the fire pits. About 3 pm we decided to go back to the private property and search until dark, giving me about 4 hours to find something. Got a number of high tones in the 83-88 range that all turned out to be items such as aluminum caps, a thimble, drawer pull, harmonica reed plates, etc. But then I got one signal in the 90-93 range and out pops the oldest coin of the trip an 1853 seated dime. Keep hunting along and pulled a few targets that were in the nickel range that all turned out to be brass odds and ends. Then 1 hour before we were ready to leave as I was working my way back to the truck I got a signal right next to a piece of flat tin 95-97 range. But after removing the piece of tin I was still getting 95-97 and it turned out to be an 1894-S Quarter. Now you can say that nobody ever swung over those targets before or a host of other things. But me personally I think the D2 has something special going on when notch is used. I did a video of the trip below. In the video I show all the audio and visual ID for the coins so you can get an idea of just how good notch works on the D2. Thanks everybody!

I've been detecting a school built in 1924 the last few weeks and pulling mostly modern clad, a lot of nickels, quite a few copper Memorial pennies, junk jewelry, and pencil eraser ends like you wouldn't believe. So I went back on Saturday for a few hours to try out the Silver Slayer program on the Deus 2 there just out of curiosity. I didn't find any silver and I didn't expect to because this place has been hit hard over the years, but got a really deep 1961 copper Memorial penny and a 1956 Wheat penny in the same hole. A little while later I got a deep 94-96 signal and thought it might be a silver quarter. I dug down about 8 or 9 inches and pulled out an odd looking square lead piece. I didn't look at the other side and just tossed it in to the scrap metal pouch. When I got home, I was separating the finds and was about to toss the square lead when I noticed something on the other side. As I cleared off the caked on dirt and mud I saw that there was a kneeling figure that looks like a fairy. It also looks like there use to be some sort of inlay on it. I have no idea what it is, but maybe it was part of some kind of jewelry or music box. Why it was deep under the school yard grass is also a mystery. Perhaps it was brought in with the fill dirt when they built the school. It just seemed so out of place. Sunday I was called out by my detecting partner, Richard, to help on a recovery mission. A lady had lost her key fob for her car while walking her dog, so along with our club president Derek, we spent five hours searching a huge open space park. Unfortunately we didn't find the key fob, but Derek found an old Henry rifle cartridge and Richard found a nice gilded US Army coat sleeve button. I found a spoon, half of a horseshoe, and a 1988 dog license collar tag. The lady was very appreciative for our effort and donated $50 to our detecting club, which was very nice of her. I hope she finds the key fob in her house somewhere. When we left after the search I had about an hour to kill so I headed back over to the school which was on my way home to try the SS program again. I hit a modern dime, some nickels from 1999 to 1963, some more copper Memorial pennies from 1980 to 1964, and a 1948 silver Roosevelt dime! What a great way to end the day! 😎

Gotta say CPT_GhostLight got me really interested in Rattleheads' Silver Slayer for the Deus 2. I mostly hunt old farms this time of year, we don't have parks in my county, but we do have one beach with a parking lot. 😀 Went there this morning, wasn't feeling too good but decided to power through. 😵 Stayed there about 2 hours, checked the beach for grins and only got one Zincoln, I was surprised to get that. Came back up to this little parking lot that only holds about 15 cars at best, it's full of pull tabs and flattened aluminum bottle caps. It also has lots of bottle caps. 🤬 I thought the SS program would be perfect here, I'd maybe even find some lost jewelry. Got 54 cents in modern coins, and relished the accuracy of the program. It really works well, had I put it back to original with the upper disc at 87 or 88 I probably would have missed those annoying flat aluminum caps. They came in from 86-88. The memorials were coming up in the low 90s today for some reason. I now see the value of that setting in public places! It was so nice to not hear all that crap, and not have to dig any falsing iron. Next I went to the farm I've been hunting to hit an iron patch. I was hoping to eke something out of it. The patch is about the size of a small barn, iron everywhere, I think Chase managed to get one silver out but that has been it. I went back and forth over the patch for a couple hours, it sure was a beautiful day. Had I felt better it would have been a joy. Silver Slayer allows iron to sound somewhat, and it's always accurate. Aluminum is almost not an issue, except that I still didn't expand disc as mentioned. 🤬 I dug some, and any time I tried another setting, which wasn't much, I immediately got more. Here's my take for today, illustrative as opposed to impressive. I did manage to get two "D" buckles, probably the most exciting but boring find you can get relic hunting. You get a high tone and an ID in the 90s, and go "aww" when you dig it up. Got one saddle rein guide with a bit of decoration on it. Trash was very light, except for the heavy zinc padlock and the odd brass thingy that both were in the 90s, as well as the twisted copper or brass. Large can bits still made it there now and again, but no false iron. Wow! I think this is a very valid and worthwhile program to set up on the Deus 2.

I managed to sneak out for a few more hours at the older park that I've been testing the Deus 2 Silver Slayer program at yesterday. I was hoping to score another silver coin and maybe I did... I don't really know for sure. I've gone back over the area where I found the wheat pennies and a Mercury dime twice and gave it one more pass. The ground was quiet as a church mouse so I decided to hit some nearby areas I haven't covered in a while. For those who haven't followed my previous posts, this site had houses on it from the late 1800s to about 1966. The houses were near a railroad track and generally considered the poor side of town at the time and the tracks and houses were torn down in the 60s to make the park. The park has been continually pounded by detectors for years so I, being late to the party, have had to settle for whatever scraps are left. I have made some interesting finds there with the Equinox and have been using the site to learn the Deus 2, but after trying the Silver Slayer program (thanks again Rattlehead!), my learning curve and the park have opened up for me. The older area wasn't giving up much except another hord of 21 crusty Zinc pennies (WTH?), so I dug some stronger iron signals for possible relics and pulled up an old air rifle like the kind my mom told me I'd shoot my eye out with. 😁 I also found an old Bakelite lightbulb holder from a lamp, and most of the junk in the top half of the photo, including the lockblade knife. Time was running out so I headed back across a vacant lot near the park to my car and all of a sudden there were signals everywhere. I hadn't turned on my detector until I had got into the park (lesson learned 😉). I started hitting modern clad coins and then a 1946 nickel popped out. Then I started hitting copper Memorial pennies (1981 to 1966) and a small lion shaped cookie cutter. I also found an arcade token and a smaller corroded copper or bronze coin or token that I can't make out any markings on. Shortly after finding the harmonica reed, I got a smacking 90 on the D2 and thought it might be wheat penny or dime and up comes a small silver filagree ring! 😁 Well I thought that made my day and, as cliche' as it sounds, right before I got to my car I got a slightly bouncy 90-91 signal and pulled a strange silver coin or jewelry piece. It's hard to make out the engraving, but the object is the same diameter as the Mercury dime I found a few days ago and has the same reeded edge but is slightly thinner. This got me wondering if someone made a pendant by grinding down a silver dime and engraving on it. Is that a thing? The engraving looks kind of crude and I think it says Ryan on one side. Anyway I ended up with two more silvers from the old park area so I'm pretty happy about that. 😎

I've been hunting an old park lately. An old-timer told me where the folks used to have their summer get-togethers, so I decided to hunt the area. Pretty promising so far. All this, plus dozens of old cents. 3 quarters in one hole.

Quality items have been a bit scarce lately but I did find this nice ring (and 4 others). It is 13 g with the markings as you see. It has a 22 and a BO or a B0. I don't know what they mean.

For me, some baking soda and a wet toothbrush does the trick, once I get them home. I carry a small squirt bottle when I'm hunting so I don't scratch the silver coins. I cringe whenever I see someone wipe a nice old silver coin with their fingers as soon as it comes out of the ground...... 1938 dime.