Pull Tabs + Pennies = Gold

[Jeff McClendon]

I hunt almost every day year round for 2 to 3 hours when the weather isn't below 25F or above 100F. It's good exercise, my dog gets to go too, and I get to detect!!!! I change up the pattern sometimes but 90% of the time I am hunting for coins and jewelry with my Equinox 600 with 11" coil  or my Fisher F19 with Detech Ultimate 13" coil. Usually my Nox is in Park 1 or Park 2 discriminating -9 to +4 and my F19 is in disc mode, iron volume 11, tone break at 55, discrimination 35.

Today, like most days I was concentrating on the pull tab, ring tab/beaver tail, zinc penny range looking for gold jewelry. That's roughly +6 to +23 on the Nox and 50 to 80 on the F19. If I am feeling pretty good I will dig anything in that range. I live in suburban Denver so no shovels, only screwdriver coin popping. It is really hot and dry here at the moment too, so I was only willing to dig shallow surface to 4" targets today so I wouldn't destroy the turf in the park I was going to.

I was planning to dig lots of pull tabs, ring tabs, beaver tails and zinc pennies. If I dug a nickel,  copper penny, dime or quarter in the mean time: Great! That definitely happened. I skipped over a few pull tabs/ring tabs and dug 41. Dug 11 pennies. So roughly 50 possible gold targets in 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Amazingly enough before I recovered the 8 gram 14K gold ring ($240 melt value ?) the first thing in the hole was a beaver tail. It was actually on my screw driver - perfect bull's eye. I was  NOT thinking "#$%%^^ another tab! I did what I usually do and rechecked the hole with my handheld pinpointer. The original target ID on my F19 with the Ultimate coil (thank you phrunt for constantly recommending it!) was a really steady 70 to 72 at 2 inches, so I was a little surprised with the beaver tail ring tab. Usually the numbers jump a little more just because of all the varying surfaces on the target when the beaver tail is still attached to the pull ring. So, I wasn't surprised that there was a second target (I was thinking maybe a zinc penny) but I was really happy that my remembering and practicing three important things payed off with a great ring. 

I don't find gold rings every time I hunt. I do find rings (junk and bling) at least 3 times a week along with earrings, chains, pendants etc. Some are gold or silver, most are bling. I would say that the ratio I experience  between trash and jewelry is about 50 to 1. This hunt was right in line with that ratio.

 

DIG PULL TABS/BEAVER TAILS

DIG ZINC PENNIES

RECHECK THE HOLE FOR OTHER TARGETS

Jeff

[GB_Amateur]

Congrats on the ring, Jeff!  I know Denver parks get hit pretty hard so I'm surprised you're finding so many ring&beavertail pull tabs from the 1965-75 era.  Is that because nearly everyone is using strong discrimination?

[Jeff McClendon]

That's a great question GB_Amateur. You are probably right. I don't think it's because folks here are still drinking 40+ year old beer. I have a lot of friends that are older than me or have less time to detect and they do their best to avoid beer and soda tabs as if they are something bad to dig. Unfortunately, there aren't any detectors that I know of that can accurately and consistently tell you whether you have a pull tab or gold jewelry under your coil. It takes a lot of practice to get a good feel for if and how any detector reacts differently to pull tabs and the occasional gold jewelry. If one tries to avoid them they lose that learning experience and finding gold becomes more by luck than anything else.  Or a person can do what one of my good friends does which is only detect areas that he would have picked for a place to make out with his girlfriend or wife!!! It works great for him as far as nice gold jewelry...... 

 

Jeff

[strick]

Nice score on that ring.. I live in the bay area and still find tons of old style pull tabs..left by lazy detectorists who are disking them out... If someone thinks that they are that smart that it's for sure a pull tab they are only fooling themselves... Yes i'll pass on some targets when time is a factor but you gotta dig those tabs and old zinc pennies if you want the gold 

strick

[Mark Gillespie]

Really nice write up and pictures.

[kac]

On my Tejon with the concentric coil thin, medium rings and gold earings come in between the lines on nickels while a large platinum ring comes in on the high side of that. With the larger 10x12 coil they come in on a wider range but think the larger coil might be dropping the frequency a bit. Beaver tails hit at the bottom line of the nickel range marks and square tabs can be from the mid point of the markers and above. Ring tabs always hit on the pull tab mark and pretty much spot on between both coils. I pretty much avoid anything below that lower nickel mark in parks as it has never produced anything good and has always been can slag.

On my AT Pro it performs similar to the larger 12x10 coil but stronger signals on copper and silver.

I'm thinking of hitting that area and dig a wider range after seeing what you pulled up.

Nice ring!

[kac]

Extending the range from just above foil to just above top line of nickel mark on my Tejon which hits on square tabs I dug this up in the park I hit all the time. I didn't pass up the usual coin sounds (pennies, dimes and quarters).  I would have passed over this nice white gold charm with an opal in the middle. The large stone is a cz in plated metal setting, other looks like a zipper pull maybe?

Thought I would have hit a lot more tabs than I actually did. Usually just coin shoot there and gloss over that range. Thanks!

[Noah (FL)]

On 7/31/2019 at 5:46 PM, phrunt said:

  You've got me motivated to go back to my "spot" to dig them all up. ?

 

 

Definitely do dig them Phrunt!!

My last two gold rings were a pull tab signal and a zinc penny signal.  Both were in places I’ve detected before and can almost guarantee that I passed them because it was hot and I’d already dug my share of similar ID junk targets.  

 

[Mark Gillespie]

Maybe I need to rethink the pull tab digging option.  The majority of my gold rings read either at or below a US nickel.  I've found one large wedding band that read as a zinc penny.  Man I was luck to dig that one, almost passed by.

 

[Mark Gillespie]

Wow, that is an awesome ring.