Back to square one on gold, a little help please

[Ronstar]

Ok, still hunting the yellow gold. Hell even the white gold would suffice.......
I have the broken 14k band I stumbled on 6-7 yrs ago. I was actually going after a dime signal when I saw a goldish colored wire sticking out of the thatch layer in the park lawn. It turned out to be a gold band that most likely was sucked up and cut by the lawn mowers. Not anything I would display but obviously kept it.
I remembered I had it and thought it prudent to pull it out as a test target as needed. I’ve never actually tried it until recently and then stumped when the F5 and a Minelab Etrac failed to detect it. All either of us could get was jumpy numbers and no clear hit. By jumpy numbers I mean from low foil to high zinc and nothing repeatable twice.
Today I set up a test. I have an older white gold ring with a diamond and very thin band except where the setting is located. Both rings were taken outside and put on an old cedar shingle. I tested the ground for interference and nothing sounded off. Turned off F5 and restarted. Set gain at 50 and threshold at 0. Performed ground balance and both sides settles at 60-62, normal for here. Set gain to 75 and left TH at 0. On the board was the gold band, then 12” to a clad dime, then 12” to the white gold. Failure to detect the gold band, solid 72 on the dime, and 18-19 on the white gold. I was using the 11” DD factory coil.
Switched to the 5” round coil. Failure on the gold band, 74 on the dime, 19-20 on the white gold. I also tried TH from -9 to +9 with no difference. Height on swing was 2-4”.
The gold band measured 0.125 width (or 3.1 mm) and weighs 1.8 grams. I have not weighed the white gold but band under the finger is extremely thin. Both rings are stamped 14k. Both rings not magnetic.
Does the fact the gold ring is not round play any part? Anybody have any ideas why the gold band is not detectable?

 

[jim tn]

Probably because the band is broken. When you say failure to hit gold band, any kind hit at all? HH jim tn

 

[Ronstar]

No. Numbers jump erratically only

 

[Ronstar]

I should also note I tried All Metal Mode with basically the same results...... Since that lawn is mowed at least once a week the chances of having gold/silver/and jewelry broaches/pins is fairly great

 

[REVIER]

What you just experienced with that broken ring is physics...basically the wonderful and strange world of eddy currents and how they relate to, and affect, what we see on our detectors.
Not just on gold, either, silver broken rings can act just as weird and most chains are notorious for this same kind of weird behavior..
All targets give off eddy currents that our detectors notice when they are energized by the transmit signals given off of our coils but when it comes to targets that are not solid or complete circles like open earrings, cracked or open rings and specifically your open and broken gold ring, signals can get skewed, jumpy or even become almost invisible depending on which brand and detector you are using and the technology it uses to find targets.
Chains are exactly the same, all those different links are seen as separate targets so they diffuse and confuse detectors...there are many out there that haven't found any chains in their entire careers and they wonder why.
I can tell you some reasons, they assume chains act something like predictable coins but they don't...chains are weird, they come in lower than you might think and many that are expecting normal type signals might miss them because chains just don't throw off normal signals.
Neither do open and/or broken round objects like rings.

This is a 12.9g silver bracelet I found, in the ground it was open, not closed, and using an F2 I got a signal that was a bit jumpy and below zinc.
Out of the ground the same thing, tab signal and not super solid but once I closed it and scanned again it became a super solid 80 quarter signal from every direction.
The difference was, the only difference was one way it was closed and the other way it was not a complete circle and open.

Here are two people from another forum that will explain this better than I so I copied and pasted...

vexhold...

This past weekend, a friend and I were hunting together when he found a silver toe ring. I had him place it back in the ground and went over it with my E-Trac. Nothing. He went back over it again and got a very faint signal. Of course this was a re-buried item and the possible halo had been disturbed, but we were confused as well as it was not very deep but was giving us almost no signal.

Since then, I have been doing quite a bit of research on why this could be. Here are my findings...

When using a detector, and this varies greatly between what methods your detector uses, it creates a magnetic field that shoots into the ground. As you pass over a metal object, let's say a coin for now, it creates an electric current in that item. This current is called an Eddy Current. This current moves throughout the coin and creates its own magnetic field. This field is what the detector coil sees and interprets. It then takes all the input and either beeps a certain way, shows on a screen or both.

Now to the matter of different size, shape and wadding of items. These Eddy Currents flow differently depending on the items conductivity. Coins, nails, pull tabs, etc, have varied levels of conductivity and the detector usually reads them as what they are, but, if you change the shape of these items, say if a silver ring is not a "full" ring, or a is an unclasped silver necklace, or a peice of foil is wadded tightly, it will change the conductivity of that object. Not the conductivity of the metal mind you, just the way the current travels through the actual item.

To put it simply, lets say you have a full silver ring (a full O shape) and a silver ring that does not connect fully (basically a C shape), when the electric current passes through the full ring, it is able to travel in all directions easily, versus the incomplete ring, where it loses some current out of the broken ends.

----------------------
Rudy...an electrical engineer...

It's the physics. The magnetic field generated by the Eddy currents induced by the transmit coil on the targets are very small in the case of a chain. Basically, because of the contact resistance between each link is relatively high, the Eddy currents are each confined to a single link in the chain. So, each small link in effect becomes a target. Because each link is small, it can't generate a large field for the receive coil to detect. Also, the links are pointing in somewhat different directions, so their individual magnetic fields don't readily add up to a larger field which would make for easier detection.

For the above reasons, chains are hard to detect. What usually "give them away" is an attached medal, or a sturdily built clasp.


So don't be confused, what you experienced was normal.
Most detectors see normal targets easily but many have a harder time than others noticing chains with links or cracked, broken or open rings.
Fisher is pretty good at this for the most part, I have found plenty of open circle targets and chains with two different Fishers but they are not perfect.
Other brands couldn't see a chain or broken ring if their life depended on it and still others are great at this stuff and don't seem to have any problems in this area at all.
That is why I also own both a Tesoro Compadre and a Mojave...they each find chains and open circle targets extremely well and I love finding chains so both have a place in my arsenal forever.

 

[Ronstar]

Thank you. I simply assumed metal gives off different “vibes” as a rule. I can see small silver rings sounding as dimes and larger mens as quarters. Its the gold thing that has me scratching my head. Ive dug nickel and foil hits now until I’m blue in the face....... anyway, hit on a ‘71 Canadian dime as a dime but it wasnt discolored as expected. Found out its 100% nickel and hit as a dime. Not giving up, .........yet, lol

 

[jim tn]

If you are digging foil and nickel readings and also zinc and Memorial cents, gold will eventually come. I am not a ardent gold hunter and mainly chase old coins, but by digging all nickel and tab readings and zinc and Memorials, I typically find 5-6 gold rings annually. Location, however, is pretty paramount for finding gold. Good luck in your quest. HH jim tn

 

[jkline]

I ran my etrac over Ron's busted ring: barely registered unless it was less than an inch away. Readings were erratic in the top left portion of my screen, which I usually have blocked out.

 

[REVIER]

Thank you. I simply assumed metal gives off different “vibes” as a rule. I can see small silver rings sounding as dimes and larger mens as quarters. Its the gold thing that has me scratching my head. Ive dug nickel and foil hits now until I’m blue in the face....... anyway, hit on a ‘71 Canadian dime as a dime but it wasnt discolored as expected. Found out its 100% nickel and hit as a dime. Not giving up, .........yet, lol

As you find and dig more and more targets you will come to understand why I believe the universe finds it very funny to mess around so much with us that do this hobby.
I was confused about a lot of things over the years, plenty of targets, jewelry, coins and more that I found just didn't seem to make sense when it came to the way they presented themselves.
Too low, too high, hidden with barely any signal and so much more.
So over the years I asked a lot of questions like you are doing now and after I got some logical scientific answers everything made much more sense going forward.
What we learn now will help us find many more great things in the future if you really understand how things actually work out there and know in your heart of hearts that not everything in this world is always black and white.
This is regarding any metal type, precious and not.
Two more examples.

This is one of my favorite silver rings I found.
In the dirt it was crushed in the middle into a figure eight shape and came in as a solid zincoln, 61 on the F70.
Luckily I dig ALL solid signals, even zinc cents, and I was glad I was doing exactly that on this hunt.
Out of the dirt the same 61 but I knew it should have been higher from a dime to a quarter signal.
At home I used my rubber hammer and ring mandrel to fix it.
Wouldn't you know it changed from that 61 to a more logical 80 or so when it filled out to a normal, circular ring shape.

This is one about gold...since you use a Fisher this is something you should know and understand about that brand because as far as I know they all do this...up-averaging around or near iron.

3.2 grams of 10k found in a park just a few inches down but on the left about 4" away at a depth of about 3 -4" there was a pretty decent size rusty nail that I dug after the ring popped up because the gold ring signal didn't make sense when I saw how small it was and to the right of the ring location about 5" away was more iron that was very big and very deep which I didn't bother to even try to dig.
The F70 had the big DD coil mounted and when I swung over the area I got some pretty bouncy numbers because that coil was seeing all the iron and the gold at the same time.
The only reason I went after the ring is because despite the bouncy numbers on every pass I still got a very brief and short and consistent51-53 every time in the middle of this one foot area.
It was real quick, normally I would have just assumed all kinds of junk down there and moved on but those low 50's numbers still popped up every time and as I slowed my coil speed to a crawl they still showed up constantly along with a bunch of other numbers lower and higher.
I had dug at least 4 but and heavy gold class rings by that time in my career and every one came in as those same type of low 50's numbers so by then I was programmed to dig anything that I saw with those same numbers...I had no choice, still don't to this day.
I went after the 50's target and I was shocked when a gold ring actually did show up although at higher numbers than it should have been, normally, because it was much smaller than those big class rings.
High karat gold could have been high numbers but this was marked 10k.
Out of the ground I ran that ring over my coil again but this time it was a solid 41 on every pass.
Earlier in my career this would have confused me but I already understood about Fishers and up-averaging so I knew what happened.
That's when I dug up the rusty nail to the left just to make sure and it proved my suspicions were correct...the gold ring up-averaged a full 10 numbers because it was In the vicinity of iron which was completely understandable to me at that point in my career.

In our world some wonderful things can happen but also some weird and strange behavior can show up too.
Just keep in mind there will be very few times weird things happen for no reason...there is always some sort of scientific explanation for the behavior we see out there whether you understand what is really happening or not.
Your job is to learn all you can when things like this happen and kudos for being on top of things and curious enough to ask when something confuses you.
It's how we learn and the more you learn, know and understand the more fun this hobby becomes and the more great treasure you will find.

 

[Ronstar]

Again I can not thank you enough for sharing your experiences and well earned knowledge. My first few years of this hobby was with a Bounty Hunter Lonestar. Never found anything to brag about but instilled an interest in finding more than pull tabs and bottle caps (at that time I hadn’t really even found clad coins either). Another deputy I worked with had a Tesoro and often found things to brag about so after a little research the F5 seemed not too easy and not too hard to upgrade to plus it kinda told me what I should be looking at when it got unearthed.
The F75 peaks my interest but then so does the Minelab Equinox (new learning curve). With Minelabs Veteran discount both units are close to the same cost.
What you said about zinc solid 61 has happened to me a couple times and it was nothing more than a Zincoln deteriorated to an unrecognizable disc. I hate thinking the ones I passed up may have been the mother of all rings......
I’m resigned to the fact I may have to start all over again and make that giant ball field look like a war zone! I said it once earlier....... this damned contraption is like interviewing a hardened criminal, always lying to you!!! I know what questions to ask to make a guilty person answer in a way to profile them with their answers (Midalake was way to easy....) but now I have to learn a new language to understand what this thing is saying.
Again I thank you

 

[REVIER]

Anytime.
We swing, we dig, we learn.
The natural order of things.