Fisher Gold Bug

[Arlin]

Hello All,

It's fantastic to find your forum to get together and share ideas and information about this fantastic hobby. I been out of it for years and now am getting a chance to get back into it. I had run across a guy that has a Fisher Gold Bug for sale. I had never heard of them but I looked at his detector. It's in pretty decent shape, it's missing a knobs and arm strap but fires right up and does seem to discriminate the different coins. It only has a 5" coil. My questions are, are they a decent detector? Where might I find a replacement knob and arm strap? Also, in regards to the disc, what would be a decent disc to look for to gain more coverage area looking more for coins and such. If you seen a detector such as this on the market, what would you give as a price for this unit? Any help that you can give me would be greatly appreciated. Thank You.

Arlin 

[GB_Amateur]

Is it one of these (and which one)?

You can read about those in Steve's database here and here.

The landscape has changed considerably since those were released 13 years ago (in the $800 pricerange then).  Just to stay in the First Texas family, here's a thread from a few weeks ago:

showing you can get a brand new Teknetics Patriot for $229.  The Patriot is a re-release of the Fisher F70 which was developed about the same time period as the Gold Bug family.  It's widely considered a step up from the Gold Bugs (including by First Texas, its engineers, etc.).

To get an idea of value, consider that the particular Gold Bug unit you are looking at is used, missing a knob (IMO not a good sign that this particular unit has been taken care of...), and doesn't currently have a coil that is optimal for general (park, school, etc.) detecting.  (The 5 inch coil will do fine in that environment other than the coverage per swing being paltry.)

A used 7"x11" coil will (I'm guessing as I haven't looked) cost close to $100 on Ebay.

And I've yet to mention competing brands' more recently released, in the under $300 price range detectors (e.g. Nokta Simplex, Minelab X-Terra Pro, Minelab Vanquish,...) which have more features, new units coming with warranties, etc.

If you've taken a liking to that Gold Bug (I still have one and it does have a nice 'feel' performance-wise), I'd say realistically it's worth no more than $100, and that may be a generous valuation given the missing knob....  We are currently living in a time when the so-called entry level detectors are both powerful and inexpensive (thanks to intense competition).  These 10+ year old models have mostly been relegated to nostalgic enthusiasts.  They're still capable but their value is vastly diminished compared to even just a couple years ago.

[Arlin]

Thank you so much GB_Amateur for your quick response. You all in this forum are such nice people. Its fantastic that you share information and help others in this hobby. My hat is off to you all, many thanks and hopefully I'll be able to pay it forward. Thanks again.

Arlin Scheib