Minelab prospecting mode/Coin and AM

[Jessgo33]

Well i got my xterra 70 out after i had it returned back from the minelab americas after i fell and broke the display. I just want to say is i really like minelab service. However me and my buddy pete when prospecting here in california and were running a slucie box and we found a nice picker with it and was probably ten bucks worth of gold. My detector would get it no problem even in the high minerlized ground, so i tried to see if i could get it in coin and releic mode, and YEP got it and was reading a 2 on the display. Dose anyone else get a 2 on natural gold nuggets on coin mode? I just hate digging old nails and found out the nails are in a range of 40-45 and silver is about 10 and it won't even get square nails in pattern 1. My question is just this dose natural gold range on a 2 scale? I have notced natural led is bout 6 and aluminum is about 8 or so. Thanks Jess

 

[Digger]

Living where I do, the odds of me finding any natural gold are slim and none. But over the years, I've managed to find a few clinkers while panning out west. They are very small, as you can see by the pic. But if I put them all together, I can hit them with the X-TERRA in Coin/Treasure mode, getting a TID of 2. HH Randy

 

[Jessgo33]

Nice that is what i was saying but you do seem to lose depth on the target but for just moving some dirt i will be using that function all day before i dig. I really like my xterra 70 and the 10x5 ellipical coil. Randy them are some nice peices of gold. I will prob go out tomorrow to some ground that is real tough to get to and hope its not worked over. But from what i have been reading and studying with all the gold minners here in Northern california i would love to find a double eagle 20 doller coin around here. I know they have to be around this area, and some of them are hundrades of thousands of dollars.

 

[Digger]

If I were in your situation, I'd probably set up using Prospecting mode and moderate Iron Mask. After I hit a target, I'd flip over to C/T and confirm the TID. I'd dig all those that registered a conductive number and those that failed to provide a number (due to depth). Good luck in your quest for that Double Eagle. I'm still searching for mine! But as Mel always said.....Today's the Day! HH Randy

 

[Jessgo33]

Yea right. lol is the iron mask on prospecting mode set at 5? I kinda like the settings their. And yea one never knows about the golden eagle i did find a old mercury dime on bed rock but it was so worn that you can only make out the United States, and the back piller on the back of the coin. Im not to fimliar with the diffrent modes but i can switch from the 3 modes AM, prospecting, and C/T and do like the threshold set for me. Well im heading out tomorrow for bout 8 hrs to the river and going to detect most the time.

 

[goldseeker4000]

I've been nugget shooting with my 705 since 2009 and would strongly advise not hunting for natural gold nuggets in coin mode. The 705 is a completely different detector in prospecting mode. Way more sensitive. I have tested different sizes of nuggets in coin mode and prospecting mode and alot of the smaller nuggets are so faint or don't register at all on coin mode that it would be a waste of time to hunt in coin mode for nuggets. The whole consept of nugget hunting is different than coin hunting. Gold nuggets are very low conductive targets and it is hard to find nuggets. you absolutely gotta make sure your ground balance is set correct as where there is gold, the ground mineralization will change from inches to inches. If you use ANY descrimination you run a serious risk of passing over and missing tiny nuggets. And face it most of the nuggets you find detecting are small, thats the bread and butter finds. Several gram size and larger are rare to find in most areas. I have found a 1 or 2 grain piece of gold with my 705 at 3 inches and I wanted to see how far on the iron mask scale I could pick this nugget up, so I reburied it in the hole it came out of and started notchinng up the im scale. It read the nugget low and true on max of 20, but I don't recommend having it up that far. I run mine at 5-7 IM . And only turn it to im from all metal to check a target, if it is iron or non ferrus. There is more trash in gold prospecting areas than you will ever have coin hunting. You just got to accept this and be patient, dig every single target. Recheck every hole. If you do this, you will find more gold nuggets. you have various settings you can utilize on the 705 for prospecting mode to help you distinguish a nugget from trash or hot rocks but you have to listen to the tones. A nugget will sound sharp but mellow, and low, a larger nugget will scream but will usually have some smoothness to the sound. Whereas iron will be loud and not so smooth sounding. To understand what I mean by this you will need to swing over various nuggets and common iron trash to decern the difference that I am talking about, but there is a deffinate difference if you listen. I would not use the concentric coils for nugget hunting, they are nut sensitive enough for natural gold nuggets. Stay with the HF DD's on most of your hunting. However it is a good idea to get the 15" HF and LF for deeper nuggets and larger, deeper nuggets. The 3khz should be used after you already hit an area with one of the other HF DD coils and want to search deeper for nuggets. The 3 khz will punch deeper for gold nuggets at depth than the HF coils. But keep in mind the nugget will have to be larger to register. How large? I don't know but you will have to test it, if you have access to larger nuggets like say a half oz or 1 or 2 oz nugget. Don't be mislead into digging only the loud and true signals, as you will rarely ever find a nugget this way. Most nuggets will be faint but true whispers of a signal. Mello but diffinate repeatable. If you train your self to listen for these signals and dig them you will find more nuggets. Hope this helps you out. Happy hunting.

 

[Duchemin]

@goldseeker4000
Thank you for your tips for hunting goldnuggets.
I am from Germany and in the second half of August I will make a trip to the north of Nevada with a friend of mine hunting for gold.
We own a X-Terra 705 and a Garrett AT Gold.

Do you have some more tips hunting with the 705?

Tanks

Wolfgang

 

[goldseeker4000]

Find bedrock and start your search there, as you have less material to punch thru to the bedrock where good gold will be resting. Keep in mind, every area is different than other areas and where gold is resting may not be the case in the next place you look. Gold wants to drop down as far as it can so looking in all low spots along or in a stream is good place to start. If bedrock is present all the better. take along an assortment of pry bar tools such as a butter spoon with a notch cut out of one side or ground out to clean out very narrow cracks. also a flathead screw driver. take one and heat up shank and bend it so it is angled to get more leverage. A crow bar is invaluable and better yet a point break bar is able to break open big slabs of bedrock where good gold can be hiding. buy a detector scoop for scooping up dirt and waving over coil. A rare earth magnet is a must. if you have a shard of iron detected and is in scoop, place magnet attached to pick under scoop and slide scoop across it. if target is iron, it will pull shard right out of dirt and speed up target recovery. If you dig up a target and it seems to keep moving on you all around the hole and pile of dirt, chances are it is iron. What happens is it dicenerates and you have disturbed the hallo around it making it appear to move all over the place. If this happens, chances of it being gold are nill. Never talk yourself out of checking a spot, thinking gold won't be there. Gold can be in the most unlikely places. If you find a nugget in one spot, concentrate your search there. Where there is one, quite often there will be more. If you find one then search slow and keep your coil resting on the ground while you scan. Be patient and keep a confident attitude that you will find gold. I only found gold on days that my confidence was at its highest. If you have any doubts you will find any gold on a given day, chances are you won't. hope this helps

 

[Goodbaja]

My biggest problem is we have a lot of old creek beds that have bigger rocks that are hard to detect around to get depth. Then the hot rocks are all over the place making it a beeping nightmare. Great tips though thank you.

Digger could you run those nuggies under your 3khz and see what you get? I know a air test isn't the most accurate but we can see if it does punch down to the au like it has been the Nickles on the other threads. T

 

[Digger]

It was "honey-do" weekend at my house. So I loaned the Digger to a friend. He is suppose to bring it back within a couple days, so I'll let you know about the nuggets at that time. HH Randy

 

[Jessgo33]

Cool yea im heading out tomorrow as well will try to take some pic of items i find. And am heading up river about 2 miles from parking lot to see if i can find me some yellow stuff. Keep us posted.