Andy Sabisch is an avid detectorist, writer and reviewer who has contributed to the hobby for years.  I ran across this post over at Findmall.com, one of the largest detecting hobby sites on the web.  I was so impressed I asked Andy for permission to post it here…he graciously consented.

PLEASE NOTE: This is NOT intended to discourage posting…on the contrary, post all ya want!  Andy’s point is to be careful WHAT you post… don’t give away your sites, be careful about posting historically important finds, etc.

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Over the years I have seen many posts that leave me scratching my head wondering what the person was thinking or should I say not thinking when they hit the final ENTER key. With some of the controversy that has come up on this forum and others lately, I wanted to pass on some points to consider when you are thinking of posting something . . . . do with it what you may:

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1) Do you think only your fellow detectorists read these forums? Having done several articles for magazines that cater to the National Park Service and professional archeologists, I can tell you with absolute certainty that archeologists, park service personnel and law makers do in fact read the posts on a regular basis. If you want to ensure more and more sites are closed to future hunting, then by all means post historically significant finds, details on where they were found and be sure to omit the statement that they were found on private property with permission of the landowner. In discussions with Park Superintendents going back more then 15 years, I have heard time and time again of finds made by detectorists from sites that are in fact protected. And these finds shown on printed pages from the forums were pulled from files and shown to me by those in the position of making the laws we are facing. The recent issue of state waters in Wisconsin being closed to detecting was greatly influenced by people postings photos of prehistoric copper artifacts that were being recovered from state owned lands and had been for years. When no one knew about them or publicized where they came from things were fine but when the posts showed the artifacts and then said they came from site X or site Y which was state owned, what reaction did we expect? Exactly what happened!

Think about the photos you post and if you do feel the need to post photos, add that they were found on private property with permission of the owner . . . . take a look at the photos relic hunting legend Ed Fedory publishes . . . since day one he always adds that to his posts. articles or books and does it for a reason.

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2) Do you think all detectorists have strong morals when it comes to hunting someone elses sites? If you find a killer site, you have to be a simpleton or extremely naive to post the specifics of the site where someone else can identify where you were. It would be great to say everyone would respect someone else’s spots that they found but that is like asking a fisherman not to fish your “honey hole” . . . . . there will be 100 guys fishing the spot within 24 hours and detecting is no different. There are very few people I am willing to take to sites I have researched and are producing for that very reason . . . . . I have made that mistake too often in the past and in each case, one person takes two more who in turn take 4 more and so on . . . and the next thing I know the site is cleaned out. “Legal in USA” clearly messed up posting specific details of the golf course and describing why it was a great site to hunt . . . . . if there is a hunter within driving distance that is not at least thinking of hunting it, they must have a dozen other killer sites to hunt. But in fact he is not alone . . . . I will not hunt someone’s site – does not matter of they took me there or they made the mistake of mentioning it in passing . . . . just do not do it. Unfortuately that is a psoition most do not hold . . . heck, the local club is always listening for site leads from “newer” members and have gone in cleaning out several very productive sites . . . . think who you are talking to – they are looking for sites and most will clean yours out given the chance.

Bottom line . . . . unless you are willing to open the door to every hunter with a computer (or a friend with a computer) within 100 miles, DO NOT POST DETAILS OF YOUR SITE! This includes photos that can be identified or or information that someone can deduce where you where.

In my latest book I have a photo of a George Washington button found by John Manger in Maryland. Well, he made the mistake of posting a photo of the find as well as the house he found it at where he had permission. Well, it took less than 24 hours for someone to identify it and John had to ask for the post to be pulled . . . several people went and hunted it without permission and John took the heat for their actions.

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3) Think about particularly rare finds before you post them: If your find has historical significance think twice before you post the photos and details of the find . . . you may be proud of your find and want to share it but as #1 above discusses, the audience is far larger than your fellow detectorists . . . . and they can easily figure out where it comes from.

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Until we have a system like the UK does where finds are cataloged by the local coroner or as we call then historians which encourages hunters to being in what they find along with specifics of where and how it was found to build a database used by historians, there will always be a group trying to shut us all down as we are perceived as “grave robbers” looting historical treasures. We can work to change that perception but many of the posts that appear on forums simply give the other side the ammunition that they are looking for to pass laws and close areas.

Just some points to consider . . . . . . . hope they are taken in the spirit in which they were intended.

Andy Sabisch

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One of the more important things everyone needs to do to be a successful treasure hunter…

is to know the detector your using, know how to set it, know how to tweak it and understand what it’s telling you.

Before I start explaining what I mean let me say that anyone, using any detector, in any hunting condition can find good stuff. It’s just a matter of how long will you hunt and how many bad hunts will you need to endure before the good targets show up.

Knowing how to setup your detector is important, if you have a manual ground balance and can’t balance it well your not going to find as much or  hunt as deep as you could. Threshold, discrimination, gain, even the volume plays a roll in how effective the machine will be for any given condition. Get to know what each knob or button does to the way your detector reacts, and just when you feel you have it mastered play with the settings a bit more, you may be surprised what else you learn about your detector and how it reacts to a different setting.

Understanding what your detector is telling you, by the way no matter what you think or what someone tells you  your detector doesn’t lie to you, even when it’s confused about what’s under the coil there will still be subtle differences in the way it reacts to different targets. There will be a time when you can tell a pull tab from a gold ring , most of the time, just by the subtle difference.

Each detector type, brand, model, individual detector and each person swinging the detector is different. What works for one may or may not work for another.

OK so now you may ask “how do I get to know all this stuff about my detector? Do I read the instructions? Do I read a book about it? Do I watch a video? Talk with someone that metal detects? Search the net?”  The answer is Yes to all of them but the most important, no the only way your ever going to know your detector is to get out and use it, than use it some more. Experience has no shortcuts, that I know of anyway.

The more you know your detector the more stuff you find. It wont take too long before your hearing the whisper of a target below the coil that you didn’t hear before.

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File: El Paso Chapter GPAA talk 12 Feb 08 Dave Johnson minor update 25 march 09

The History of Metal Detectors, with Emphasis on Gold Prospecting

Dave Johnson, Chief Designer @ FTP & Fisher

Good evening! My name is Dave Johnson, and I’m the Chief Design Engineer for the world’s largest manufacturer of hobby type metal detectors located right here in El Paso. The brand names we manufacture include Fisher Research Lab, Bounty Hunter, Teknetics, and a number of private labels. I’ve been designing metal detectors for 27 years for several different companies, so there’s half a chance that if you swing a metal detector, I had something to do with it.

My presentation this evening is on the history of metal detectors, with an emphasis on gold machines. I’m not here to sell my company’s products, but it’d be downright discourteous of me to show up and not bring some literature and a Gold Bug 2 to demo. So after the meeting if anyone is interested I’ll be happy to talk with you.

* * * * *

The earliest electromagnetic device used for gold prospecting was the magnetic dip needle, a sort of compass turned sideways. It’s been around for about 500 years. It didn’t locate gold, but could identify concentrations of iron minerals associated with gold. Modern electronic magnetometers have replaced the dip needle for mapping subsurface geology, but the basic idea is still the same.

The earliest electromagnetic metal detectors date from the late 1800’s. When President Garfield was shot, surgeons were unable to locate the bullet. Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, built a surgical probe metal detector for the purpose of helping the surgeons out. The President later died without the bullet having been successfully located; I don’t remember if Bell’s metal detector ever got used on the President. I believe its design was the induction balance, a basic principle that remains the basis of the vast majority of metal detectors to this day because of its sensitivity.

The earliest discriminating “metal detector” was a benchtop unit patented in the late 1800’s, designed for distinguishing counterfeit coins from the real thing. It was a VLF induction balance which used a motorized commutator as a phase-sensitive synchronous demodulator. It’s the same basic physics principle behind virtually all modern discriminating metal detectors. The amazing thing is that this was done even before the invention of the vacuum tube. What the old timers lacked in off-the-shelf technology they made up for in cleverness and careful attention to detail.

During the early 1900’s, audio frequency induction balances requiring no electronics were occasionally used for locating large masses of metal. The advent of the vacuum tube made it possible to increase sensitivity to pipes and cables by raising the operating frequency above the audio range, and then converting the detected signal back into the audio range, just as with an AM radio. Fisher Research Lab was founded in 1934 to manufacture pipe and cable locators of that type. During this period hand held metal detectors for detecting coins etc. didn’t exist as far as I have been able to determine.

World War II brought the need for hand-held mine detectors. These were audio frequency induction balances with vacuum tube amplification. They didn’t use synchronous demodulation. After WWII the designs were improved but they weren’t much good for civilian use. During the 50’s and 60’s several companies began to produce metal detectors better suited for civilian use. At first they were BFO’s but later radio frequency induction balances with both the transmitter and receiver coils build into a single search head became more popular. These were called “TR” metal detectors, for “Transmit-Receive”.

The late 60’s and early 70’s saw a revolution in metal detecting technology that is still going on today—the VLF synchronously demodulated induction balance—l800’s technology made practical by transistors and integrated circuits. What the so-called “VLF” did that the other technologies couldn’t do, is cancel the signal from iron minerals in the ground, which is often tens or hundreds of times as strong as the signal from a buried metal object.

The earliest VLF’s didn’t offer discrimination, but gold prospectors didn’t need that, they needed to see through ground minerals. The older BFO and TR units wouldn’t detect small nuggets even lying on the surface, and wouldn’t detect larger ones buried, so they weren’t much use for anything other searching quartz mine tailings. The VLF’s would detect small nuggets on the surface and larger ones in the ground. Hillslope areas that were previously unmineable by any method were now accessible to electronic nugget hunting.

During the 1970’s and 80’s there were rapid advancements in VLF technology as engineers became more adept in designing stable low noise circuitry and in using bandpass filters and electronic differentiators to boost signals from metal targets while suppressing interference from ground minerals. The early 1980’s saw the introduction of slow-motion double-derivative discriminators and of target identification meters. The ancestry of many metal detectors manufactured today is traceable to platforms developed in the early 1980’s.

These advances added a lot of value to the coinshooting and relic hunting customer, so that’s where most of the product development was concentrated. Early on there were several gold machines which were adaptations of metal detector designs originally intended for coinshooting. The best of these was probably the Garrett A2B.

In 1986, Fisher introduced the Gold Bug. It was first metal detector designed from the ground up for one purpose only—to find gold nuggets. It became the instant industry standard for gold machines. It was such a solid design that it remained in production for 16 years.

In the late 80’s and early 90’s, White’s introduced its Goldmaster series, which were hotter than the Gold Bug, and Minelab introduced gold machines which included the feature of electronic tracking ground balancing, which eliminated the need for manual ground balancing. In ’95, Fisher introduced the Gold Bug 2, which was basically a higher frequency major revision of the original Gold Bug. In ’97 Tesoro came out with the Lobo Supertraq, which included electronic ground balancing. In 2000, White’s introduced the GMT which had the performance of the GMT series combined with computerized ground balancing and other features. It was a decade of rapid innovation driven by several different manufacturers.

We can’t discuss that decade without mentioning the Minelab SD series including the recent GP. Introduced about 1997, the SD’s owed nothing to the earlier commercial products, not even Minelab’s own tracking VLF units. The Minelab SD was based on the pulse induction principle, which is quite different from VLF induction balance. Pulse induction has some very interesting advantages and also some very difficult disadvantages. Minelab saw that despite the disadvantages of pulse induction, its advantages could be developed into a metal detector which would go deeper on larger nuggets than a VLF in the highly mineralized laterite ground typical of Australian goldfields. It created a modern gold rush in Australia, and became popular in the USA as well.

The 1990’s also saw the introduction of multiple frequency metal detectors. This technology proved itself well for saltwater beach work, and for coinshooting and relic hunting requiring target identification and discrimination. However multiple frequency technology is not by its nature particularly sensitive to small metal objects, and that kept it from having any impact on gold prospecting.

Since the turn of the century, there hasn’t been a lot of basic innovation in gold prospecting machines, it’s been mostly improvement of existing designs. The Tesoro Lobo Supertraq and the White’s MXT created a new market niche—the general purpose machine based on a gold prospecting platform, so that it can do a decent job of gold prospecting. Here in El Paso, Teknetics and Fisher introduced the T2 and the F75 which are general purpose machines with serious gold prospecting capability, but those models proved so good as relic hunting machines that so far their gold prospecting capabilities have been pretty much ignored. We’ve announced the F70 and F5 which are also general purpose machines with gold prospecting capability, and these should be shipping in several weeks. (Update 25 March 09: these units have been in production for about a year now.)

The Fisher Gold Bug II was such a solid design that it’s still selling well. Those who prefer it like it mostly because of its manual ground balance and its extraordinary sensitivity to the smallest nuggets.

So, y’all might be wondering, do we have any new gold machines planned for the future? Well, that’s confidential information. What I can tell you is that the rejuvenated Fisher Research Lab now located in El Paso has made new product development a key part of its business, and that our engineering capability is first-rate.

–Dave Johnson
Chief Design Engineer, Fisher Research Labs and First Texas Products (Teknetics and Bounty Hunter)

Designer of the following gold machines:
Fisher Gold Bug (no longer in production)
Fisher Gold Bug 2 (in production)
Tesoro Diablo Micromax (my personal all-time favorite gold machine, no longer in production)
Tesoro Lobo Supertraq (general purpose, in production)
White’s GMT (in production)
White’s MXT (general purpose, in production)

And also of the following general-purpose machines with serious gold prospecting capability:
Troy X-5 (no longer in production)
Teknetics T2 (in production)
Fisher F75 (in production)
Fisher F70 (in production)
Fisher F5 (in production)

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What A Difference

A Day Makes!

By Tony Mullen

Minted at Charlotte, North Carolina in 1847, this gorgeous Coronet $5 gold piece was the find of a lifetime for Tony Mullen, now a proud member of W&ET’s exclusive “Gold coin Club”

Every treasure hunter has probably had this nightmare. You finally get permission to hunt a particular place that you have been eyeing for quite some time, and then something happens. Something you could never imagine is about to ruin your “perfect opportunity.” Well, that almost happened to me one weekend in March 2001. I hunt with a Fisher CZ-7A and had sent it in to Fisher for some planned maintenance, figuring that I still had time before the weather broke and the hunting season kicked in. I expected that, with transit time included, I would be without a detector for about two weeks. My wife Teresa figured that out, too, and the Honey-do list was a sight to behold!
The first week was not too bad. I was steadily chipping away at “the list.” Then it happened. My father, Frank Mullen, called me from Virginia. He had just turned up an 1852 silver 3 cent piece, having received permission to search a site that dates back to the l770s. We had been watching that place for quite some time. Needless to say,
____________
The look on
Teresa ‘s face was priceless. She just looked at me and asked, “Is it real?”
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I was thinking road trip! Then I remembered that my detector was on the other coast. Before we hung up, we made plans to visit the next weekend. My next call was to Fisher. I checked the status of my repair and told Cori Doninelli the Customer service representative, about our upcoming trip. She assured me that I would have my detector in plenty of time. Now for the hard part— waiting. On Wednesday of the following week I called again to make sure my detector was on its way. As it turned out, the detector was still being worked on. My heart sank. I thought, “There is no way I will have my machine this weekend,” but once again, Cori assured me that it would arrive in plenty of time. On Thursday morning I got a pleasant surprise. UPS brought my detector prepaid, next day air, early a.m. delivery. Thank you, Cori, for defining the words “Customer Service” with your actions.

On Friday I left work a bit early and made the 200-mile drive to Virginia. We managed to hunt at another site that we call “Frank’s Honey Hole” for about an hour and a half before it got dark. There was no doubt the CZ-7 was working. My first find was a 1926 Buffalo, followed a few minutes later by a 1941 Mercury dime, a 1947 Roosevelt dime, and enough Wheat (cents) to feed the Russians!
We headed out early Saturday morning to the old Colonial site. This was the moment I had been waiting for. A coin dated 1852 had already been found at this site, which had been occupied for 80 years before that coin was struck. We had high hopes of possibly finding some Spanish silver or Colonial coppers. Unfortunately, the site proved difficult to hunt, as parts of it are now wooded and the grass is probably mowed no more than twice a year. So, we slowly began searching acres of land.

If you could have heard my headphones, you would have said, “There ain’t nothin’ here but iron!” And there wasn’t. I found a couple of Memorial cents, and that was about it except for the occasional horseshoe and a couple of thousand square nails. Man, was I bummed. So, I packed up the family and headed back to North Carolina. Here it was St. Patrick’s Day, and my Irish Luck was nowhere to be found. But, oh, what a difference a day makes!

The following day it was just cool enough to be comfortable in a sweatshirt. As we drove home from church, I told Teresa, “I am going to find something good there today.” As I said those words, I pointed to the place I was planning to hunt that afternoon. I could almost hear her think it out loud: “Yeah, right. I’ve heard that before.” I got to the house, ate a quick bite, and headed out for the afternoon.

I found a couple of clad coins right off the bat. Then about 15 minutes into the hunt, I heard a rather odd tone in the headphones. I cut a plug about 4” deep, and when I flipped it back I saw a flash of gold. I literally said out loud, “Oh, great! Another arcade token.” I put my Lesche digging tool back in the sheath and started to reach for the “token” when I saw a reeded edge! I thought, “There is no way!” I picked it up and felt the weight. I was almost scared to look. Then I saw FIVE D.
I flipped it over and all I could see of the date was 7. I gently brushed away the black dirt… 1847!

A major numismatic authentication and grading service has certified Tony ‘s 1847-C eagle at a net grade of VF-30, with XF details, making it an extremely valuable find.

Well, let me tell you, it was on! As I told some folks on an internet forum, it was not exactly like you see on Riverdance. It was more like a fat guy stomping out a brushfire! What can I say? It was my first gold dance! Once I realized how ridiculous I looked, I calmed down enough to check the hole again. Nope, just the one! I had just found my oldest and “goldest” coin, an 1847 $5 gold piece minted in Charlotte, North Carolina.

I tried to hunt a little more but it was pointless. I had to tell someone. My first call was to my father. I wanted him to check the value in his coin book. No answer. So, I called my wife. No answer. I couldn’t believe it! I had just found a gold coin, and there was no one to tell! About that time I saw Teresa and my daughter Suzanne coming down the road for their Sunday afternoon, pre-naptime stroll. They knew something was up when I came running to meet them, grinning from ear to ear!
The look on Teresa’s face was priceless. She just looked at me and asked, “Is it real?” She asked me what I thought it was worth. I told her it would probably go up to $300. (When I found the coin, I was too excited to notice the Charlotte mintmark. Once I did, I almost stomped out Act II!) When I got back to the house, I suddenly realized that Teresa had a newfound interest in coins. She had pulled out my Red Book and had it lying open on the kitchen table. Suddenly I had a hunch that it might do a little better than $300!

So far, it’s the find of a lifetime for me. I can’t help thinking about the person who lost that coin. That was quite a bit of money back then. The coin has been authenticated, but I am in the process of having it graded a second time. This rare find has made a very nice addition to Suzanne’s collection. I recently read that less than 1 % of all the gold coins minted at Charlotte exist in any condition. What’s ironic is that I was having a conversation with a fellow employee on Thursday before that weekend, and in that conversation I said to him, “I will probably never find a gold coin, but if I do, I hope it has a Charlotte mint mark.” Who knew?

Since I “struck gold,” I have had plenty of offers from prospective hunting partners and numerous inquires as to exactly where I found it. I don’t want to be unfair to anyone. So, I’ve been telling everyone the same thing: I did not mug the St. Patrick’s Day leprechaun. I found it somewhere in North Carolina… near a tree.

TONY MULLEN may not be quite as rotund (fat) as the reader envisions from this article. it is a fact, however that he cannot dance.

Reprinted from Western & Eastern Treasure
2002

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Contents not to reproduced without written permission of Bill Ladd

“Learn Your Metal Detector”


By Bill Ladd

One important thing I’ve picked up along the way in this great hobby of ours is to never scoff at, or doubt the unit a fellow detectorist is swinging. This is especially true when a fellow hobbiest is carrying a detector some would consider “cheaper” or “outdated” technology. I’ve seen far too many times these wily old vets do just as well, if not better, than all the competition in the same field that day. Why? Well, as we all know, sometimes it’s just the luck of walking over the right spot. But more so, I believe it’s because the detectorist with the older unit has years of experience with his particular machine than the others. Even though his detector may not be digital, multi-frequency, or full of all the latest “bells and whistles” as some of the more expensive modern units, the user knows it. He or she knows it like the back of their hand; just knows the “sounds”. This hobbiest has trained his ears….it talks to he or she so to speak. Perhaps the other treasure hunters were trying out a new brand of detector that day in hope of attaining some kind of edge. But, new detector users often have to struggle though a tough learning curve of several hours with all of the advanced tones, notching, and digital readouts and programming common on today’s top units. Many of us feel new users need a minimum of 30 hours in the field to really grasp all that a new metal detector is trying to “tell” you. A “newbie” to the hobby may need more than twice that.

I remember one local digger who showed up at a field with 4 or 5 different detectors from various popular detector companies and lined them all up along a stonewall. He spent the day switching off, and fiddling around with all the different brands. Meanwhile, I, searching with a one-tone “beep-dig” Fisher 1266x detector was busy recovering several targets while he was “playing”. Now, the hobby is supposed to be taken up for fun, and perhaps experimenting with new units was this users way of enjoying himself. I go to “pounded” sites occasionally with 2-3 detectors and little flags to mark targets and “play” myself. But, if you really want to find more treasures, and increase productivity, hopping from brand to brand can often pose further difficulty I feel. Your finds will always be less than he or she who lives and dies with that one “old faithful” detector. I recently read a magazine article about a gentleman who’s a very successful coinshooter…..using a 1970′s BFO! So, it’s not all about showing up to the field with the newest and best looking equipment. I often use the golf analogy. That buying a $500. titanium, wiz-bang, super duper driver does not instantly translate into better scores. There is some skill involved. Same with metal detecting. One of the best Civil War relic hunters I ever met still uses a beat up old non-metered unit from the 80’s that he even ran over with his car once! (You can’t make this stuff up:) Though duct taped, bent, and really very ugly looking…..well, put it this way, I wouldn’t want to hunt alongside him with any of my flashier “modern” units! He plain knows what to listen for. “If it anit broke, don’t fix it” is probably his motto.

Having a bunch of different units can also get confusing remembering all the ideal settings to succeed. I often need to go back to a certain manual as a refresher on how that unit is ground balanced. All seem to be different. Now, how about trying to remember how to ground balance a whole stable of different metal detectors? Ground balancing may be the most important set up procedure of all. So, it is something that diggers need to be proficient at.

I also observe a lot of folks try a Fisher unit for the first time, and the very first thing they do is turn the sensitivity up to 10 to see how deep it will go. This is a huge mistake, as long-time Fisher users have learned that a setting between 4-5 on a CZ, for example, achieves maximum depth. Overdriving sensitivity just adds chatter, and some will complain about “interference”. But, very sensitive Fisher units like CZ’s, Coinstrike, and the new F75 go as deep as I want to dig with mid-range sensitivity settings.

Though I basically stick to one brand, they all function quite differently. Every detector company has it’s own style of building; it’s own quirks and sound quality. “Tones” may sound far different from detector to detector. After spending countless hours listening to various noises though a pair of headphones, you begin to notice important differences. Again, often it takes years of practice. All detectors behave differently, and unfortunately some sophisticated units are never given a fair shake nowadays. In the old days of detecting, you didn’t have so much buying, selling, and trading as we now have. The internet makes it easy….so trying ‘em all is simple & some even can make a few bucks! Back in the old days, you picked out a detector from a magazine or catalog, saved up, and you really learned it. Basically you were forced to in a way because there were not so many choices right at your fingertips. There were no internet “classifieds” to list it right away to get your money back.

My first decent unit came from the Sears catalog (the 70’s version of the internet?). I owned those first “T/R” (transmitter receiver) detectors until the day they died. There was no one else to trade with, no local dealer, no clubs. In fact, I was the oddball doing a strange hobby most had never witnessed before. Not that I’ll ever complain as all my hunting territory was 100% virgin! Plus, I have to say I did exceptionally well with my “Sears machines”. At the ripe age of 12, I began working with a bit of threshold hum, and thus became quite good at picking out faint signal changes or “whispers”. These often resulted in a deep coin, and I vividly remember the faint threshold change of an 1835 Bust Half dime find. It’s still a coin that I’m proud of to this day. I’m certain I could still walk right to the very tree it was next to, probably right to the exact spot it was dug. It’s that vivid. I grew to know just what that detector was telling me, and just what it was capable of.

Too often nowadays some folks dig one piece of iron or one screw cap their first time out, and all of a sudden their new purchase is for sale online one hour after assembly. Does this mean it’s a “bad machine”? I always wonder, did they read the manual a few times if at all? Were their settings completely wrong? Did they bother to ground balance? Did they just try it on a “pre-set” mode? Did he or she ever own that brand detector before? Maybe it was their first ever target ID machine. Or are they just the folks who love to experiment? Some people just have to sample everything that’s new sometimes. The curiosity factor is often just too great I guess. Plus, sometimes the online, or magazine advertising “hype” can be hard to ignore. This can be especially true if it seems that every forum “big shot” is trading their old units in for the new one as is now happening with the F75 for example. But, I also wonder, are “try ‘em all” detectorists hoping for a “miracle machine”? Are they always holding out some hope that there might be a holy grail of metal detectors hidden out there somewhere? Truth is, there has been no major leaps in metal detector technology since the VLF. All the major brands are all about the same depth-wise and nothing has come out lately that goes say a foot deeper than all the other brands. The major improvement I have seen with modern detectors lately is in regards to trash/iron separation. Though technology has not attained tons more depth, it has made “unmasking” targets in heavy iron a force to be reckoned with….a vehicle to make “hunted out” sites productive again.

This is a hobby that demands much patience…much like fishing it’s not for every one as you don’t always get “a bite”. Sometimes I think folks sell new detectors quickly because they are hopeful to get most all of their money back before they scratch the detector up. In other words, they can sell it fast while “it’s hot” often without a monetary loss. But, is an hour in their test garden, or even a week in the field enough time to have really absorbed what a totally new piece of technology is telling you? Some will swear it is, and one has to give the benefit of the doubt to the person saying, just “not my cup of tea”. But, I’ve had arguments with fellow diggers who say things like, “I’ve been detecting for 30 years; I know how to run a detector!” Well, once again, metal detectors are all very different, especially the modern ones of today are quite complex as compared to the BFO and TR units of the past that didn’t even have meters. The reason I always stress you have to really “learn” a detector is getting to know sounds…not just what the LCD screen or tone said on say your first sweep. For example, though some large pieces of iron may occasionally read 20-30′s on my TID Fisher’s, with my Coin$trike I can tell right away by the sound it’s iron now. It’s hard to put into words, but it just sounds more hollow or echo-like. This is unlike the crisp, sharp, unmistakable coin tone. Learning this “iron sound” took me hundreds of hours in the field training my ears. Now, you may be able to get an idea early on if a detectors not for you, but you can’t train your ears in an hour. So, maybe sticking with one detector and learning it to the best of your ability is half the battle for good consistent treasure hunting?

I remember one time I entered a seeded “competition hunt” that was to be held on a beach. I arrived with my trusty Fisher 1266x, the only machine I owned at that time. This is a one-tone unit recognized as one of the best relic machines ever. This Dave Johnson designed Fisher is a true classic, and is considered by some as still the best for relics. I made loads of good finds with it and loved it, even though some folks in the local clubs had begun calling it, “outdated technology”. Well, in the beach parking lot a couple guys even asked, “was I really gonna use that?” Supposedly the 1266x was not considered a “beach machine” per-say, and one guy actually offered me one of his back-up units for the hunt! I calmly said that I “lived and died” with this machine and I’d be fine. Well, guess what? The so called “relic unit” without a meter found the most coins and tokens that day! I know I wouldn’t have found much of anything with a borrowed machine I would have had to try to decipher on the fly. Did I dig the most because I was simply faster recovery-wise than the competition? Perhaps. Or did really knowing my machine like the back of my hand give me a keen advantage? I lean towards the latter.

Good diggin’
Bill Ladd

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*Reprinted from NASA Toms site site link

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Love is Deep!

Thomas J. Dankowski
Unedited version
Published in Western & Eastern Treasures, March 1999

Just how important is depth? Why do objects sink at different rates? Ever hear statements like, “gold is so-o-o-o elusive”? Read on; I think you will be pleasantly surprised with the knowledge of basic physics.

There are so many misconceptions about these questions that I feel the urgency to clarify these questions. I too have heard gross statements/fallacies/misconceptions AND coming from reasonably intelligent people to boot! If there is one word I want you to remember out of this article it would be, without fail, DENSITY! For the hobbyist it’s moderately important. For the amateur or the professional detectorist it is critical.

Recently, I went to the beach to perform a comparison test between two leading brand detectors. My test target was a woman’s simple gold band of medium thickness. I had about 35 inches of thin dental floss tied to the ring so I would not loose it. I dropped the ring on the wet sand (holding on to the floss), set my shovel down, placed the headphones on my head and set the controls of the detector. Now, I was ready to dig a measured depth hole in the sand to bury the ring. When I looked down at the ring, it was gone! As I held the floss with only a slight amount of slack, I watched the ring sink slowly to a depth of 23 inches before it stopped sinking. Why did it sink? What made it stop sinking? Was this an unusual, unique circumstance? This couldn’t be a better example to demonstrate the principles of density. First, gold is a very dense material in relative comparison to other items we have here on earth. For a better understanding of density here is a correct illustration. Take the new United States clad dime. It weighs 2.27 grams. Now look at a United States quarter-eagle ($2.50 gold piece). It is nearly identical in diameter and thickness compared to the United States dime. In fact, it displaces the exact amount as the dime. But, the quarter eagle weighs 4.18 grams. That’s nearly twice the weight! The gold piece has nearly twice the density as in comparison to the clad piece. Now, which identical size coin do you think would sink faster? ! !

Back to the ring on the beach. It weighs about the same as a dime and is about the same diameter. However, its surface contact area on the ground is dramatically different from a dime. The ring has a hairline thin circle of contact with the ground whereas the dime has about half-an-inch of surface area contact. The ring was sinking at a rate visible to the naked eye. Here’s why; “Due to the force of gravity, objects will sink in whatever medium they are in. This will continue until the level of density of the medium is the same as the object’s density. OR!—Until the object comes in contact with another object in which its sink rate then becomes the same as the obstructing object’s sink rate.” The semi-liquid state of the sand on the beach is a much less dense medium in comparison to the ring, hence the sink-rate. At 23 inches deep, the ring came to rest. Why? The answer is “hardpan”! The ring hit a crushed shell/gravel layer at 23 inches within a time period of approximately 3 minutes. This is not an unusual circumstance by any means. Different areas may produce faster or slower results. A coin would take a bit longer due to its surface contact area and decreased density but would also eventually come to rest on the hardpan. A light aluminum pull-tab or a piece of foil has about the same density as its supporting medium (the wet sand) so it may never sink or can be found at any random churned depth. If you are at the beach and you are finding a lot of light/low density items such as foil or pull-tabs, MOVE! Move to other areas to sample until you hit medium density (coins) or high density (gold/lead) items to suit your interest UNLESS your shovel keeps finding hardpan just a few inches deep. Make sense? If you randomly go to the beach and you randomly hunt, your luck will be random. If you intelligently select your beach time, the laws of physics will overrule the so-called “elusiveness” of gold. What times are these? It is a known fact that violent storms will bring in large volumes of offshore sand and some good items; however, this is not the time to hunt. The high-density items will be out of detectable range. When sand is removed because of riptides or storms this increases the chance of hardpan exposure. It does not happen often but when it does, you will have some of the best detecting times of your life! Incidentally, depth has nearly no relevancy to the age of an item at the beach. A brand new penny can sink several feet deep in just a few hours. As long as your detector is capable of reaching the hardpan, only then does depth become “not so critical”. Make sure that your detector can attain this depth then the key secret is detectable volume. An 8-inch coil will detect approximately one gallon of ground at any given time. Increase your coil size by just 3 inches (11-inch coil) and you will be detecting about 7 gallons of ground at any given time. Your finds will increase 7-fold. Target separation is very poor with a large coil but on a vast beach, area coverage is much more important and target separation becomes inconsequential.

For the majority of us that do not live near a beach, unsuspectingly, depth is more critical than meets the eye. On a sacred piece of property known to produce good finds in Titusville, Florida I brought several pieces of equipment in the field to prove a theory. Equipment: a 5 inch coil, a 8 inch coil, a 10.5 inch coil, and a Fisher CZ6a metal detector. With the 5-inch coil I searched a 110ft by 95ft area of land. It took 2 days to complete, deliberately searching the land from 3 different directions. I found only 2 coins from the early 1960’s at 8.5 inches deep. Keep in mind this property did not consist of any fill-dirt nor was the ground ever disturbed by machinery – it’s virgin soil. I then switched to the 8-inch coil and duplicated my previous steps exactly. The coil change gave me an additional 1.5 inches of depth. At 10 inches I recovered two more coins, both from the early 1950’s. Then I put the large 10.5-inch coil on the Fisher and with identical settings on the detector I searched again. This coil gave me yet another one-inch depth increase on a dime. Guess what? I recovered 17 coins just over 11 inches deep and one quarter at 13 inches deep! The 10-inch mark exposed coins from the early 1950’s. The 11-inch mark exposed coins, every single one of them, from the 1920’s era. One-inch depth increase yielded coins 30 years older. Does depth matter? ! ! ! We’re not finished yet! Weeks go by and somehow I damaged my detector, a fault of my own. Fisher repairs the detector and increases the sensitivity. Consequently, they also increase the stability of the unit to which I must say that I have never owned a detector with this much stability. With the 10.5-inch coil installed I, once again, searched the same 110ft by 95ft area. Certain the area was cleaned out; I soon realized my misconception. How about 14 more coins at the 12-inch mark and another quarter just over 13 inches deep, all from the 1890’s era. Love is deep! ! ! And to solidify my test I reinstalled the 8-inch coil back on the detector and passed over 4 of the targets before I recovered them. With the 8-inch coil, I never even received a false chatter or any indication that a target existed. With the 10.5-inch coil, the signals were very weak but consistently repeatable. Yes, depth is “invisibly” critical. How do you know what you are missing, if you do not know that it even exists! As a coin sinks in the earth, the deeper it goes the slower it will sink because the dirt is more compacted at depth. Once again, the coin will stop sinking when it reaches the level in the soil that is compacted enough to equal the density of the coin; and that’s deep! How many areas do you think you have passed over and missed good targets? I think that you would be startled if I were to tell you that the answer would be just about every time you turn on your detector. When your favorite manufacturer releases a new detector that goes a little deeper, you will have major things to look forward to.

Happy intelligent hunting!
Thomas J. Dankowski
Unedited version
Published in Western & Eastern Treasures, March 1999

These coins were found after changing over to a 10.5 inch coil. The 10.5 inch coil incr

eased depth attainable by about an inch on a dime. These coins were retrieved from about 11 inches deep with the quarter retrieved at 13 inches deep. The coins date from 1920 to 1926.

thomas@dankowskidetectors.com

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