MXT in the California Gold Country

[GoldChaser]

I posted this in the White's forum, so apologize if some of you have already seen it.

MXT in California Gold Country
I will apologize in advance for the lengthy post, but wanted to provide the whole story so those who are newer than me may get something out of it, and those who are more knowledgeable and experienced can provide some feedback.

My experience started two summers ago when, after a ton of research, I bought my very first metal detector, the White

 

[Dustyroundup]

Howdy Goldchaser,
hey thanks, for the info.
it was kinda long , but informative. i too am reading jeffs book , for my first round, and only the relic and coin info.
As thats pretty much what I have availiable at the time ,as far as prospective ground.
I did purchase my MXT with the ideas of Gold ,Prospecting / Nugget shooting.
Ive done quite a bit of dredging and highbanking in Wyo, Calif, Wash,Colo, and panning/ sluicing here in in Mont.
So, I do love the ALLURE of Gold.
It sounds to me like you were Nugget shooting, I was wondering, whats your input on ,
Using the MXT to find heavy concentrations of black sand , and then digging that up and running it through a sluice ,
to find flour gold, possible pickers.?
My area is not known for nuggets or pickers
(though there have been a few found for sure)
But my research shows that i should find color in most of the creeks.
I have had the family out screeening and sluicing and havent really impressed the kids too much.
So, this summer I'm plannin on trying to incorporate my Mxt into our sluicing adventures.
if you have any ideas that might help, it would be GREATLY appreciated.
Thanks alot , for your time.
And the Best of luck to ya ,out in the field.
Dusty

 

[RedRockNv]

There is a book from the USGS "Tertiary Gravels of the Sierra Nevada of California (Hardcover)
~ Waldemar Lindgren (Author)" you can find it at Amazon.com it will give you some good idea for places to search and great old time pictures from the old days of prospecting. I really like your persistance with the MXT. I learned a lot reading your post. I to have a MXT and I have a White's TDI on the way as soon as my cashiers check arrives. I will be using it in Az. My grand parents had a great ranch in the gold country of Nor Cal. by RailRoad Flats. The book I mentioned did mention two places on their ranch Fort Mountian and the Fine Gold Mine. What Pi machine do you have?

 

[GoldChaser]

Hi RedRockNV, funny you should ask. I have an Infinium but just decided to trade it in for a TDI Pro.
I also have the Lindgren book, as well as several others. The tricky part is finding places that are reasonably easy to get to where it's OK to prospect.

 

[RedRockNv]

I hope you don't mind I added your post to my tips and tricks. I will probably edit it some time (yeah I see that happening real fast) I liked some of your logic. I did get a message from you then promptly lost it.

 

[GoldChaser]

Sure RedRockNv. Thanks again for sharing your tips with me. I really appreciated seeing the parts that supported my observations:

* "VDI numbers increase as the nugget size increases." (This applies to sizes of all metal objects in general)
* "Certain steel items can give positive VDI numbers"

And then these tips were great too:

* "take another pass over them in discriminate mode, but this time do it with the edge of the coil, not centered on the target. "Rimming" the target this way will let the MXT show them up as a ferrous target."
* As you dig down, if the VDI numbers rise it's probably non-ferrous. If the VDI numbers drop, it's probably ferrous.
* "When using the prospecting mode, probably anything that does not make the "grunt" sound (80% iron probability) should be dug."
* when pinpointing... "Coins and other non-ferrous (not magnetic) targets tend have sharp pinpoints and go from nothing to max to nothing very quickly, over a short distance. Iron junk tends to have large broad pinpoints as if they were much larger than they are - they go slowly up to max and then down - a rusty bolt will act as if it were as big as a coffee can to the pin pointer. The pinpoint trigger can be used to help ID targets."

 

[Aussie MXT]

In the gold fields of Australia I like to dig everything even the 80% iron stuff just to clear it out of the way. I got a deep musket ball under a shallow bit of iron once. It could as easily have been gold.

Dicko..