Lessons Learned On Black Sand Beach W Iron

[619_805_okie]

Hi guys - I spent the past two days hunting an area with jet black sand, tons of iron (mainly pieces of nails), and minelab equinox 800 and manticore pressure.

The black sand and iron mixture really seems to give detectors a hard time. I ran in beach and beach sensitive, alternating between the two after each half hour or so. At first i really struggled to find coins due to chatter and iron... until i decided to try turning up reactivity. Bumped it up to a 5 and immediately started hammering out OBVIOUS coins but lost almost all depth, only picked up coins up to 3 inches or so. Did this for a few hours in a 20x40 area. After i ran out of targets i bumped it down to 4 and found new targets but deeper and a bit harder to isolate from the iron, then down to 2.5 and again deeper and tougher. 

Interestingly, at a reactivity of 4 or 5 i could pick up 4 or 5 coins in a coil's width area. It seemed like "chatter" but was actually multiple coins in the same area. Different angles or small movements would give me different vdis but they were very stable. At lower reactivity it seemed to break the D2's brain and only registered as a single target, normally coming in as iron, not coins.

A manticore and equinox 800 user both hit the same area before me and dug a lot of holes with quite a bit of iron left in them. They seemed to do okay but what surprised me is that over 2 days i pulled over 150 coins from a 20x40 area AFTER they had hit it.  The high reactivity really paid off. Since these guys didnt bury their holes i was able to rescan where they dug and a few times i pulled more coins out of their holes! Sometimes multiples! The only thing i can figure is they were getting swamped out by the iron where i wasn't.

All in all i did great with over 150 coins, 6 silver Roosevelt dimes, 2 mercs, 2 silver rings, and one tiny silver piece of a necklace.

Anyone else run reactivity way up at the beach in trashy areas? 99% of my targets were from a small 20x40 are, so just remember to hammer down once you start hitting targets in an area, especially dimes and quarters that are nice and green!

Crown ring was found yesterday, 10 of the 18 in the second pic are from the D2 within the last 3 weeks!!!

 

[Carolina]

You did not say if your setting for black sand was accepted  or rejected ?

[midalake]

7 hours ago, 619_805_okie said:

The black sand and iron mixture really seems to give detectors a hard time. I ran in beach and beach sensitive, alternating between the two after each half hour or so. At first i really struggled to find coins due to chatter and iron..

I am not sure where the info on your settings came from?
I cannot run your settings on black sand. You should be looking at Beach Pitch and Dive Mode! 

BTW> Very nice finds and lots more there! 

[Cheddar]

i have been working a similar beach loaded with coins and iron. i have found beach sensitive to work the best. reactivity 2 to 2.5

you have to go slow and anything that chirps i go back over and tight wiggle. the signals are not clear at all but they have a certain sound that your brain will start to learn. of course iron can still fool you but not nearly as often as was the case with other detectors

[619_805_okie]

2 hours ago, Carolina said:

You did not say if your setting for black sand was accepted  or rejected ?

What do you mean accepted or rejected? The settings worked quite well, if that's what you're asking.

[619_805_okie]

1 hour ago, midalake said:

I am not sure where the info on your settings came from?
I cannot run your settings on black sand. You should be looking at Beach Pitch and Dive Mode! 

BTW> Very nice finds and lots more there! 

Trial and error. I did try the other modes but didnt change reactivity on them. 

[midalake]

8 hours ago, 619_805_okie said:

Trial and error. I did try the other modes but didnt change reactivity on them. 

Beach Pitch and Dive modes in black sand should beat Beach and Beach sensitive hands down.
Example: I could not even run beach at 78 for sensitivity and Dive and Pitch I could both run in the 90's with much more depth.  

[Carolina]

2 hours ago, 619_805_okie said:

What do you mean accepted or rejected? The settings worked quite well, if that's what you're asking.

I can run beach sensitive 93 sensitive 1 reactivity 0 silencer pitch and I do balance in wet sand. I run magnetic sand mostly accepted and salt 7. As Cheddar said move slow. If I have issues I run magnetic rejected. Top right button GB. Then toggle thru past grab and tracking to magnetic ( accept/reject ). You may need to run reject.

[storagebox]

If you are hunting black sand, you should check out the Tarsacci, it was built specifically for that usage and does quite well.    Even on land, I would say the Tarsacci has no problem hanging with, or even beating, the D2 in heavy iron patches, and I'm using a 12" coil vs the 11 on the Deus.  Both great machines!