Let's Give The Detector A Little More Credit

[Steve Herschbach]

A good friend of mine says it is better to be lucky than be good. There is a kernel of truth in there because when my luck is down I may as well stay home. Sometimes it is as random as whether you go left and your buddy goes right. But good pays off in the long run.

[Sourdough Scott]

Well there is no I in TEAM. 

But there is META in METAL Detector.

You have to be a team player with your detector. You have to feel and listen to what information it feeds you.

You have to give it what it needs. Putting it over the right kind ground to have success on.

You members on the forums ,clubs, groups and other fellow detectorists are like coaches .Giving and trading information with you to help prep your gameplan. 

You , yourself has to study the game film. Find the strategy that works. Get boots and coils on the ground. Find the right field to swing successfully in. Swing with confidence.

And sometimes you need to need to part ways with your old teammate. You need to make a trade. Trade up to the new young prospect. The one that gives you the best chance to win.

Or do you keep the old veteran? The one you have won with for years. 

So swing like a champion today!

[hawkeye]

Let's add a new element that combined with luck to got me 3 little nuggets all within a 10' circle.  Laziness.  Near the end of the day heading back to the jeep came to a little wash and being to lazy to stumble down the wash I chose instead to walk on a nice level bench next to the wash.  Went twenty yards got a nice signal on the 2300, dug the target, a nice little nugget.  Three feet away another target and nugget.  Five feet away under a little bush another target and nugget.  This was on a club claim that has been searched a lot.  In this case luck was a big factor, and a good deal of credit goes to the 2300.  I'm sure I wasn't the first guy to search that nice level bench.  Or maybe all the hard workers walked down the wash ;-)

[fredmason]

I completely agree that to find gold consistently the guy that knows the geology, signs and area  and is an expert operator will get many more of the goodies.

However, I will give Minelab credit for building Pi detectors that will find gold when in the arms of the most inept operator. I have  read  many accounts of people that barely knew how to power up their detector that found gold. Yes, there is luck involved but there is atl east an even chance that the detector should be given its due.

In fact, I give Minelab credit for helping me find my biggest nugget to date (1.4 oz) with a minelab 2000 my first time out.

I also give my intuition credit for getting me to that spot...It is better to be lucky than good...

fred

[Norvic]

My take there is no such thing as luck, how often I`ve heard individuals say they should have followed that creek right up to the ridge, and then comment on how lucky the fellow was that did follow that creek. Operators make their own "luck", out of bed with the chooks, work all day, back to bed with the chooks because your knackered. Sorry tis not luck. But that is my opinion.

[fredmason]

I respect your right to your opinion and all others right as well.

LUCK can have a multitude of values...raw, blind luck is when a complete newbie walks out with his new detector and finds a big thumper...

 

Anyone that finds a huge nugget is lucky even if they are a skilled operator..

 

Luck, chance, serendipity; who cares as long as we find the gold!

 

fred

[Norvic]

Thank you, Fred, rereading my post again I may be a little brutal, but many years ago I stopped showing nuggets to even family, the first comment you get is aren`t you "lucky". Makes me see red, I`ve dragged my wife and kids into dry remote locations, just a wipe down each night with little water for weeks at a time, worn out boots, bruises etc. You`ve gotta walk in those shoes to really understand and appreciate where I`m coming from. But regardless of the hardness, it has been Magic, love it, there is no thrill greater for me than to dig up a nugget and then the scenery of those locations, the nuggets are a bonus.

May our electronic gold rush go on.

[Gold Hound]

Hi Hawkeye, guys

There is no luck but that you make!

Every time I make a good find I always analyze how it happened.

Mainly so I can learn from it and hopfully repeat it.

And not once was it luck!

Let me tell you about a patch I found.

I was in the Australian dessert prospecting new ground in an un proven area over 150km from the nearest known gold area I was systematically running gullys just trying to find a my first piece, I had already done 2 months for virtually nothing.

I was walking from the head of one gully that I had just finished to ward the next one across a hill.

When I reached the summit of the hill I serveyed the surrounding hills and noticed in the distance that a few of the hills about 5km away were a different

Color, so i decided that I have to check those hills the next day to see why the hills are a different color as they were to far to walk to that late in the day.

That night I decided I would move my camp to a place in between the hills and the gully where I left off giving me better position to ether continue my work or investigate the hills.

So the next day I move my camp to a spot on a dry creek where I belived the water table should be within 2m of the surface in between the hills and the last gully I finished.

I bush bashed my way to the spot in the car and when I got there I dug in the best looking spot to try and find water after about 10 mins of digging I hit the water table.........cool!

Now that I had water I could stay as long as food supplys last and could systematically invesigate the surrounds no worries about water.

I then grabbed my detector and pick and power walked the 2km to the hills to have a closer look.

As I got closer I saw a main creek that fed from in between the hills and decided to run up the creek and try jag my firzt piece.

As I was walking towards the hills up the creek I noticed the soil change color, so I hoped out of the dry creek to have a look at the low hills around me and I imedetly noticed that the rock type had changed and it had good fulting and quartz and ironstone out crops and the tops of the hills were covered in broken conglomerate.

I started to get excited and decided to run every creek, gully, fedder gully and storm gutter that cut's this geological feature.

So i started in the creek I was in and decided to run all of the left side first.

So I walked up the main creek until the first left.

It was just a storm gutter that fed off the side of a low hill.

And right at the mouth I got my first piece about .3 of a gram.

Cool the area carry's so I continued up the gutter and got a few more pices for about 2g total.

When I reched the head of the gutter I looked at the gradual slopes ether side of the gutter and noticed that the right one has a ironstone and quartz baring fault that goes under the conglomerate on top of the hill.

I carefully serched the 2 slopes... Nothing.

So i decided that the gold definatly came from the fault but under the cap.

So I decide to walk over the hill to the opposit fall of the same hill.

I proceded to detect down the gully on the opposit side of the hill and about 100m from the top I got my first bit on that side, a 10g waterworn piece.

So I kept going down the gully and picked up about another 40g in smaller pices ranging from .3 to 5g.

It was getting late so I headed back to camp for the night.

Next morning I went back to the hill again and looked at the terrain and I noticed that the fault came out of the cap and ran allong the right hand side of the gully so I decided to look there first.

I walked straight down to the first 10g nugget spot and started zig zag ing the hill side.

I started picking up nuggets every few steps so I decided to grid the whole hill side with my 14in coil.

After a week of gridding I finally finished the hillside with the 14in coil and ended up with 2351g.

Whilst I was gridding with the 14 I built up a mental picture of the depth of the soil and I picked out one area at the bottom of the hill that was deep so I decided that I had to re-grid this section with the 25in coil.

After about 10 min I got my first deep target, a 8oz specie at about 850mm.

Then only 4m away 2 more a 6.5oz and a 13oz nearly in the same hole at about

900mm.

Then 3m away from them a 22oz solid nugget then only 2m away I got another signal after 3 hours digging out poped a 32ozer.

To say I was excited would be an understatement I was over the moon!

When I had finished I ended up with just over 4.5kg for 13 days gridding.

Ok now tell me that I was lucky........ I don't think so!

I was methodically working the area I identified an anomaly and and went to investigate, then I found good indicators and followed them, then I followed the gold run.

Where is the luck?

Just hard work, persistence, and sound operating procedures if you ask me.

[mn90403]

Thank you for your prospecting procedure.  It serves as a 'model' for prospectors with and without metal detectors.

We all know that more gold has been 'found' without detectors than with.  The early prospectors in the states would take off with their mules and pans and seek out features that held gold.  This is not luck. (Except for that storm that made them go to a different set of mountains.)  They weren't looking for gold on a sand dune!  They didn't have Google Earth to 'pre-prospect.'

Some of us have been lucky.  We have found gold in placer deposits that moved to its found location without a direct link to a specific lode.  No known gold feature clues would be available for the find.  (My 20.5/8 ozt specie is both luck and work.)

We also have been unlucky by going to places just as you describe and there is no gold to be detected.  

Now, armed with the great confidence you have we should move on to the next set of gold clues and be confident (not lucky) to repeat your success.

Congratulations again.  I hope to be more confident and less lucky.

[Gold Hound]

Mn90403

I had never tought about the confidence factor before.

Now that I think about it confidence is a very important part of prospecting!

As you have to have the confidence to keep going through the lean times.