Got some good news

[Mike Hillis]

Sunday morning I got up planning to hunt one of my mineralized sand school playgrounds for the expressed purpose of hunting in high minerals. This is one where in the past I've been able to see the coins on the surface but some of the detector I've used didn't make a sound when swept over them. Anyway, I got there, and they had replaced the playground fixtures with new ones and replaced all the sand with wood chips. Ought to be a better site now and I'm looking forward to seeing what it produces on my fall hunt there.

Moved on to another hot mineral sand site. Bad news. It is still sand. This sand kills the target id of a dime at 3". Below three inches you either don't hear it or it ids as iron. Not much came out of there this go around.

Just thought I'd post something.
HH
Mike

 

[zeekeys]

Mike I have one of those places. The only way I can detect there is to run (AT) mode. The numbers are crazy so just dig everything. In disc mode seldom sees anything beyond an inch. I hit it every couple of weeks and there is so much foil I have to dig because sometimes it gives me dime readings. It would drive a normal person crazy. Just lucky I am not normal and the drive for me is very short to get to crazy. Have fun Mike.... Happy Trails....Z

 

[knarfj]

n/t

 

[mudpuppy]

Chips have their own set of problems...like chasing a wood chip colored penny around until you can see it! Theres a lot of chip colored pennies too!
And when they freeze up in the winter, they really freeze up! I think we all need at least one of those real challenging spots just to go to from time to time and see if we have gotten any better or not! Good to see you Mike, and good luck this summer!
Mud

 

[stilpony]

Hi guys! Yeah, I hear you on the frozen wood chips, my gosh! My first hunt was a tot lot near my house, filled with wood chips. Top layer was fine, but once you hit that frozen layer, as Donnie Brasco would say, "Forget about it!".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zf0ZyoUn7Vk

HH

Pony

 

[wayne_etc]

Yo Mike!

What detector would you say performs best (in discrim and all metal) in conditions like the killer mineralized sand (aside from a PI)?


Thanks!


w

 

[tabman]

Reading this topic got me to thinking. I've detected a really large playground that's fenced off with about a third of it being grass and the other two thirds being pea gravel. I've found plenty of neat stuff in the grassy area, but nothing in the pea gravel where the play equipment is. I know that's where the majority of the loses should be. I'm going back and trying the 'all metal' mode and see what happens.

tabman

 

[Lakota]

I have had some pain in butt tot lot materials ( pea gravel among them) and found that little to no disc was my best chance at small precise metals. This has worked for me and paid off in gold and silver last year. Thankfully we don't freeze to often in AR.

Though more my concern on tot lot substrate is that more parks are going to that rubber mat material , talk about digging issues there lol.

Good luck out there boys and stay safe,

Lakota

 

[Mike Hillis]

Hi Wayne,
Glad to see you are still around and hope all is well with you and yours.

You asked, "What detector would you say performs best (in discrim and all metal) in conditions like the killer mineralized sand (aside from a PI)?"

Wayne, in my experience, the short answer would be the Fisher CoinStrike. What happens is that the ferrous based minerals combine with the non-ferrous object to raise its conductive response. That effect pushes high conductive targets over into the iron range. If you have iron range objects discriminated out, you won't hear them. If you have iron range objects accepted, you hear them as iron. The reason the CoinStrike works well in this type of environment is that it's high conductive TID range is so expanded that non-ferrous targets will stay inside the non-ferrous range. So a dime that gives a TID of 28 in normal dirt and gives a TID in the low 40s in this dirt is still reported as a high conductive target where many others will report it as an iron range target and report it according to your setup. Second reason is that the ferrous ground balance point is kept so far away from the high conductor cut off point, you can't kill target response with the ground balance point. Some ground is so bad it will still wrap a CoinStrike into iron. But with the expanded iron range you can still hunt the non-ferrous in ferrous by TID number.

This is the dirt where the CoinStrike shines.

There are others I can talk about but I got to get back to work

HH
Mike

 

[markg]

Mike that is a very interesting comment on high conductor wrap around to iron.
To my knowledge the V3i can be programmed to accept the lower end of iron (which is the area of wrap around you mentioned) and then a tone can be assigned to that area. Have you ever tried that?

 

[Dan-Pa.]

Our area did away with those wood chip playground and installed those new plastic ones with astro turf types..Really did away with some gas money clad and some small gold rings...I call it changing times with large fences and locked gates but have to adjust...

 

[Mike Hillis]

Hi Mark,
On the DFX the DC Phase measures -95.5, -95.7, one place measured a bit better at -94.8. Thats the ground range I'm canceling on the Whites units. Ground balancing to that range means I'm severely reducing target responses that fall at or close to that range. The V3 uses the same method and suffers from the same issues. You can activate the wrap feature, but the area I'd be accepting is the same area I'm ground cancelling at. I bought a TDI for use in this type of enviroment but the small iron and steel made it too tedious to use so I sold it. I tried both Goldbug and G2 here but lowering the sensitivity lowers target volume and I really disliked that. Question now is, "since these areas are being replaced do I need to continue to chase machines to hunt them with or just be content with what performance I can get from my existing line up until they are all gone? Well...yes and no. The playground areas are gradually being replaced with woodchips, but the volleyball courts are still sand, and some of the other areas outside of playground sand are still pretty hot.

HH
Mike

 

[wayne_etc]

Interesting, Mike. Coinstrike will always hold a special place in my heart. The last one I had was the one I bought from you!


HH


w

 

[BluesCruise]

Tot lots with sand in them...... what an interesting concept. We've got tot lots up the wazoo up here that are almost all wood chips, with the exception of a few of the really old ones that are just plain old packed dirt. As a matter of fact, about the only thing (other than the river) that still has sand in it here, is the cat's litter box, which the Mrs. Has strictly forbidden me from metal detecting in ever since the lost kitty collar incident, which is a whole different topic!

Good to see you around Mike!

HH

Ron

 

[jd88047]

Absolutely correct. Also all metal mode in the sand. I don't talk depth as folks don't believe me. You will have to buy a F75 and just find out for yourself.