I am Positive Arizona or California will have some pleasant weather to finish my first series of evaluations of the Nokta FORS Gold +, and also put the Makro Gold Racer to the test as soon as it arrives.
A Negative is that we just picked up a fresh half-inch of snow to add to our blanket of white making things here in Eastern Oregon very wintry.
Of course that is a Positive because it means that tomorrow we are guaranteed a White Christmas, bringing back memories of my childhood in Utah, and with the snow here for some of our winter, I can get more research done like I did yesterday at the library. That will help line up more new Relic Hunting sites for this spring [size=small](about 1½-2 months from now most likely)[/size].
Now this will bring about a Negative, too, because at least three of the sites Oregon Gregg and I will hunt in a couple of months are old Gold Prospecting town sites from the 1860's thru 1890's, and one a decade or two more use after that, but they were not major gold production locations. I hope to do okay with the Nokta FORS CoRe and Gold+ in my Relic Hunting, and might even get lucky chasing gold, but I feel the Makro Gold Racer, with its higher Low Frequency range operation, will provide the edge needed because this was mostly a fine, smaller-size gold production zone.
In the end, however, there are still more Positives because we have a metal detector company who has come on the scene in a big way, providing excellent Makro and Nokta brand detectors that are reasonably affordable yet provide exceptional performance ... AND ... they have provided us with the first quality engineered LF detector designed primarily for Gold Prospecting that incorporates very functional Discrimination mode operation.
Other detectors have been designed for the Gold Nugget Prospector, but primarily with only All Metal mode operation and they ignored the potential of having an incorporated Discriminate mode which can be helpful in many hunting environments such as dealing with hot rocks and other challenges we might need to deal with.
The Makro Gold Racer is slowly getting into the hands of those who have experience in gold nugget hunting environments, and I know when I get out in just a few weeks I'll employ it for both serious Nugget Hunting and also give it a go for Relic Hunting some old mining camps, homesteads and ghost towns just to see how it compares as a Relic Hunting tool.
More to follow when I have a chance to get away from the snow and frozen ground and give the Gold + and Gold Racer some good side-by-side evaluation out in the real world. It's almost January and I am abouit ready to load-up and hit the road.
Monte
