Prepping the F19 for the holiday jewelry hunts

[Mike Hillis]

I've been getting ready for my holiday season jewelry hunts by re-reading my jewelry hunting textbooks: DFX Gold Methods, Site Reading For Gold and Silver, and the newest one - The Gold Jewelry Hunter's Handbook. All three of these are written by Clive James Clynick and I personally consider them to be required reading for the dedicated jewelry hunter. So much so that I try to re-read each of them at least 3 times a year, every year. They contain information for both land and beach hunting but of course I focus on the land hunting part.

I like reading these because one, they refresh my mental outlook and two, they trigger new thoughts about places to hunt and new strategies to use. In his books, Clive brings up a point about a skill that I’m really not proficient in, and that is jewelry hunting in the all metal mode. A skill set I intend to cultivate this holiday season.

Which brings me to the Fisher F19. Right after the F19 release the F75 upgrade project came along and I didn't get to spend any more time with the F19. And it was easy to put it aside because I absolutely love the new revised F75. I could be perfectly content treasure hunting with only the F75 LTD for the rest of my life. It really is that good. But I'm blessed in that I don't have to be limited to just one metal detector and I like to find occasions to use them all.

So this holiday season I have determined to focus on jewelry hunting with the F19. The only issue I have is that at 19 kHz it has an inherent bias to foil trash. That is where Clive comes in. He really brings out the need to be proficient in using the All Metal mode to circumvent some of that foil trash bias found in the sensitive, higher frequency metal detectors like the F19.

So that is how I’ll be driving it, in the All Metal mode. It won't be that difficult as the F19's All Metal mode has two forms of target id (segmented bar graph, and phase response) but the real skill will be learning the audio of solid, small, non-ferrous in the midst of non-ferrous and ferrous trash. I intend to use an 8" concentric coil for this. I know it is not advertised to work with concentric coils but my bench testing shows that they do work and I want to capitalize on the all metal audio response a concentric coil will give me.

I'll report on my techniques, successes and failures.

Wish me luck and feel free to offer advice.

HH
Mike

 

[horikindaguy]

Mike says "I've been getting ready for my holiday season jewelry hunts"

When you're retired and an MD'er every day is a holiday....except when the ground is frozen....oh well....I'll just continue reading...

 

[Monte]

You have the right idea, and one I have personally followed since about 1971 and share in encouragement with everyone in a seminar or any open discussion, and that is this.: Regardless of where I am or the occasion, be it at home, a dealer's shop, out detecting, just anywhere, there are two things I want to do every time I turn a metal detector on.

#1.. I want to refresh my memory of something I have learned in the past, and stay alert so that I might learn something new about the detector and it's performance, or about how I hunt a site.

#2.. Have fun, and be successful in my search.

The harder I work at #1, the easier and more rewarding it is to achieve #2.

That goes right along with reading books and other information sources to refresh our memory or learn some new techniques to improve our success.

As for the round 8" Concentric search coil, I am glad to hear someone else mention it. Most know I am quite partial to a Concentric coil, although I do have a couple of Double-D's in detector battery. Back in late 2010 after the Gold Bug Pro and G2 were released, I used all the coils I had for my Omega and Delta on the G2. Yes, we are told these higher-frequency models were designed to work with DD coils only, but I did find some stuff, and had some interesting performance when I used the round 8" Concentric as well as the elliptical 5½X9¾ Concentric that is standard on the Omega.

Refer to #1 above: Yes, I found that they did work, to a degree, and I was able to find coins and jewelry with the G2 and both of the Concentric coils. But I also discovered that, while I like and use Concentric coils most of the time, the Gold Bug Pro and G2 just do not work as well in many applications with Concentric coils as they do with Double-D coils. The 5X10 DD is similar to the size and shape of the Omega's elliptical Concentric, but I had more operating issues with the Concentric and fewer with the Double-D.

I look forward to reading about your adventures afield going after small valuable jewelry with the F19 & 8" Concentric combination. When I had an F19 to evaluate I didn't have an 8" Concentric handy or I might have tried it, but after working it afield several times on the G2, I figured it would be a step down in performance so I didn't try to borrow one from my oldest son.

Report back on the result, and also take a couple of DD's to try in the same area to double-check the 8" coil's performance on the F19.

Monte

 

[mudpuppy]

Thanksgiving Holiday is my premier time to hit some key places around here too...I mentally prepare much in the same way you do, reading CJC and as many posts of other jewelry hunters as possible to 'focus' up on the successful tones and locations. (Schools, Sportsfields, Totlots, etc.)

I look at those places using the satellite images and attempt to 'see' the areas where the gold might be..get a route planned, evaluate the age of the place, get in there early and test it for any merit...I set up the 70 light and stable...I want gold and silver jewelry, specifically chains...in the top 3-4" if possible..running DP tones so the variety of signals stop me..I will not pass up clad...I buckle down and attempt a massive amount of targets in the shortest time possible in what I determined was the best 'dropzone'...and grind it out..I mutter what Capt Phil used to say.."Stay on the Crab!"...more of a harvest than a hunt, pinging and stabbing as fast as possible, foil, wire, any strange target and all solid hits..

If a guy thinks alot about a specific place, concentrates on it hard for a few days before hand, like you are doing, that really seems to help..especially if you've hunted it before, its already told you some things about the zones and the type of people that were hanging around here...a guy can think and see where theres a good possibility of a chain drop, and mentally prepare to concentrate on what is gonna be generally a stupid no good signal..if a guy can pull 500+ targets over this weekend in primo zones, a fellows got a decent chance for running coil over gold and silver jewelry just through the sheer volume of finds....anyway, thats my pre hunt strategy, but like Mike Tyson said, "Plans change once you get hit in the face"..for me, thats tripping into a massive clad bearing area and I wind up sniping coins, and wishing I would just go for the gold! Good Luck Mike!
Mud

 

[Mike Hillis]

I wish I was retired. When I do retire I plan to go into treasure hunting full time.

HH
Mike

 

[Mike Hillis]

Thanks Monte,

There are a few books I re-read regularly just because the information is really good and I need the refreshing, and also because they help keep the hobby alive on those occasions when my workload and/or family commitments don't let me get out very often. They keep the juices flowing and the excitement in place for the next hunt. It also works for when the finds drop off and I need to re-calibrate. Maybe we need to post a list of our favorites.

Regards coil types, I'm partial to DD coils. It is difficult for me to swing a concentric coil unless I have a very specific reason to do so. I like the separation, the mineral handling and the ground coverage provided by DD coils. The only drawback a DD coil has compared to a concentric coil with today's modern detectors is around discrimination capability, which except for a few troublesome objects like flat iron and steel crown style bottle caps, is only a minor difference.

My desire here for the concentric coil is to hear the full signal response (ramp up,peak, ramp down) of objects so I can skip a lot of trash digging and better my trash to treasure dig ratio. I have hunted in all metal before, and I often use all metal for sizing a object but like I said, I'm not proficient in it and I would like to be, especially with a unit like the F19.

I'll be bringing the stock DD coil along with me if the concentric can't deliver, but I think I'll get a better audio picture with the concentric as compared to the DD. Once my ear gets tuned maybe I'll discover that the DD does just as well

Be fun learning anyway,

HH
Mike

 

[Mike Hillis]

I hope you have good luck, Mud.

Inland chain hunting is a totally different animal. For chains I focus on places where 1) the users will most likely wear chains, and 2) the location is isolated so the the trash content isn't as high. And then I don't hunt for the chain itself, but for the clasp. The F5 is good at this. The chains mostly stay at grass root level, or just below, so you don't need high gain, but you do want high sensitivity. The F5 lets you have low gain, high sensitivity so that you don't hear all the crap under them and can focus on the small, tiny signal the clasps make.

There you go. Trade secrets officially spilled.

HH
Mike

 

[Clad2Hunt]

Bought my upgrade for the F75 but wont ship till Monday. Its a jewelry weekend and nothing better than the 75. The elliptical coil is the ticket especially for chains. I will be having lunch with family then off to the fields. I can wait on shipping because the 75 is still a killer a low Sens. The areas I hunt are tough because of EMI. Just set the tones to 1F and turn Sens down to it gets stable. Have noticed that tabs will make a different sound than jewelry in this set up. Happy Thanksgiving too everyone

 

[mudpuppy]

Thanks Mike! Happy Thanksgiving to you ...its gonna be a nasty cold weekend here, with snow on the ground, but I'll see what I can do...
Mud