F19 Gold, Silver and lots of rubbish

[dfmike]

These finds are from 3 separate beach hunts. I got my very first gold ring. It's really tiny as you can see. It was just a bit over the iron range on the F19 at a solid and unwavering 48. If I had set the V-Break to eliminate foil completely, the ring would still be hiding in the sand. I was surprised to find a 1938 silver blue nose dime. That particular beach has been opened to the public for twenty years perhaps. It obviously comes from another time when it was private property. The rest is the usual recent coins including a 10 cents EIRE euro (Ireland), religious medallions, another pendant written "follow your heart" on it, a Juicy Couture heart which I though was gold initially but it's probably brass or gold plated nickel (a solid 56 on the F19 just like nickels). I found a few toy cars which I always find interesting (a Mustang 427, PT Cruiser and a stock car that had its windshield broken by my digger).

I wrote "lots of rubbish" in the subject title because that's the reality of trying to find gold amongst trash. You will find much more trash than if you cherry pick the high conductor targets such as silver and copper and discriminate the rest. I didn't take a picture of the trash but believe me there was a lot of it. This particular beach is littered with pull tabs, foil and old and new bottle caps.

I did include some of the tiny things the F19 really seems to like (lower left in the picture). Small stuff at depth. Small pins, washers, broken metal pieces, bits of foil, etc. The little washer was 4 inches deep. It's so tiny that my pin pointer could not sniff it out in the pile of sand it came from. This happens often with the F19 but it never happened with the F5. The pin pointer operates at a lower frequency and has trouble finding what the F19 can when it comes to really small targets. It's annoying at times but fortunately it doesn't happen often as most targets are bigger than that.

If anybody is interested my settings were gain at max, discrimination mode with volume at 10 (this uses what Fisher calls FeTone to completely eliminate ferrous sounds). V-Break was set at 45 to eliminate the smaller foil targets. No notching or notch width was used. I used the 11 DD coil.

 

[still looking 52]

Dfmike, congratulations on your 1st gold ring and that silver coin was just a nice bonus. I know you also own an f5 and I was wondering between the two detectors which one is the best overall machine?
I'm still looking for my first gold ring but with my short patiences it will probably never happen, when I set my discrimination down low enough for gold I can't keep digging all that junk to paid my dues.
Right now the ground around here in WV is so hard you can't take a plug , it's just like concrete.

 

[dfmike]

Actually there were 2 silver dimes in there ! I thought one of them was recent because it was blackened but upon further date inspections, it turns out it was a 1944 silver dime. I also found 2 oldish wheats 1944 and 1948. Usually I only find recent stuff on beaches so this is interesting. I have searched about 1/8 of that beach so far.

Thanks Still Looking. I still have my F5 and it's a keeper. The reason I've been searching with the F19 a lot lately is because I wanted to get familiar with it. I kind of clicked with the F19 faster than any detector I have used so far. I'm not sure why but I think it has to do with the audio. There was a few times in the past where I mentioned how nervous my F44 was by the constant chattering it would make and having to decipher all those signals was too much for me. The F19 is the exact opposite. It's a relaxed detector if the term makes sense. Even at max gain It makes noise when there is something to be found only. It will false at times but very rarely. I can also trust the visual ID more than anything I have had. Some prefer robust audio while others prefer robust visual ID. I feel the F5 is a mix of both. The F19 doesn't have the same audio subtleties as the F5 but it has better visual ID. I still prefer the display of the F5 overall which is more informative and better organized.

Which is the better overall machine ? I really don't know. Actually I don't think there is a better overall machine. It depends on what one wants to find I guess. It also depends on what one likes in a machine. A machine that would have the strengths of both and none of the weaknesses would be a dream come true but it doesn't exist. The F5 seems to scream when it gets a high conductor target. The F19 treats it just like any other target when it comes to sound. No subtleties. That's the impression I get. The F19 gives you a better idea of what's in the ground by looking at the target ID, not by sound. There is nothing wrong with the visual ID of the F5, it just moves around a tad more than the F19. When I use the F19 I miss the tone options of the F5. I also miss the live phase readout and threshold control in discrimination. I wish the F5 had target notching without discrimination like the F19 has. It cuts the sound of certain target ranges without affecting sensitivity. I also wish it had a back light and used only one 9V battery. I'm pretty sure the F5 is deeper in 2 tone mode than the F19 in discrimination mode. The tiny targets (mostly trash) might be invisible to the F5 but not the F19. The F5 is better at identifying bottle caps as trash when you lift the DD coil on top of the target. On my F5 the number goes down by either 9, 10 or 11 telling me without a doubt that it's a bottle cap. The number on the F19 goes down but not as much. It might go from 82 to 77 so I dig more bottle caps with the F19. As you can see I can't have the best of both so I have to use 2 detectors. Or perhaps get an XP Deus...

I just want to add that before I bough the F19, I watched a lot of youtube videos, internet reviews and such. Some people made the assumption that since the F19 was a high freq machine, it would do poorly on silver and coins in general. I'm still a newbie with the F19 so I can't make a definitive comment but so far, it has found many silver and copper coins as well as just about everything else I could think of. It probably doesn't have the same depth as lower freq machines on high conductors or bigger targets though. It probably has more depth on gold than lower freq machines. It undoubtedly is more sensitive to the foil and nickel range than lower freq machines. I have found more foil wrappers and nickels in a month with the F19 than a whole year with the F5. The foil and nickel range is of course where gold can be found as well.

 

[Mike Hillis]

Somebody just got the Gold bug

Good post.

HH
Mike

 

[dfmike]

Thanks Mike. Yeah I got the Gold bug all right. If only I could get paid for all the pull tabs and foil bits I have to pick up in the search for that precious but rare metal...

 

[Rob in (Ca)]

Nice find there dfmike, the small ring is a example why beach hunters dig all targets above iron.