Using the F5 - Focus on finding Jewlery

[will*in*cali]

I have a F5 on the way, and have plenty of experience with the Cz21 in the surf and Tesoro Compadre in ballparks, parks, tot lots etc.

Ive found more than my share of clad and my back isnt what it used to be, and I want to hopefully learn the F5 the best I can, and focus on finding JEWLERY .

Ive read every Mike Hillis post, the tips and tricks and everything else I can find and I thank you all for everything you have tought me.

Question for those that hunt parks with the F5 and find gold rings, do you use specific settings when gold rings are your focus?
Do you every go hunting for just gold rings and say today " Im not digging clad if I can avoid it" ?
Obviously I dont expect to come home with a ring in my pocket on a regular basis.
Use the 4 tones and listen for the nickel?
Anything you guys can suggest would be great.
I found an athletic park the other day that must be untouched ground, I swear I dug a clad quarter every foot I walked. Great the first 3 hours.... then Im thinking.... theres gotta be rings here,
and my back hurts like hell.
Thanks guys!

 

[MarkCZ]

Well, in the parks there is two ways I process the idea for jewelry hunting, one is simple, the other isn't difficult, but it takes a LOT more digging junk.

Simple, surface hunt for fresh drops in the populated areas= Here you DON'T dig anything, no matter what's the target tone or ID is! Extend the lower rod out, use the larger coil, run pretty low sensitivity, disc out small Iron. Reach out with your swing and make long WIDE sweeps and check every good sounding response. Doing this we use the pinpointer, if the detector hits it, the pinpointer hits it, then its either on the ground or its just beneath the surface and you can just pop it out, this will get pretty much everything, even good sounding foil, buts its about the only way to cover a large area and get the jewelry.

The other way, is to just dig everything in the park that's a good signal above small iron! in some parks that can be a hundred items in a ten foot square. Here I think its best to just string off an area with some light weight string and maybe some popsicle sticks for stakes and just clean it out, then pull up two stakes and flip the square end over end and clean another ten foot area. Try to map your worked locations and you can spend the next 20 or 30 years covering a couple of hundred square feet area in that 200 acre park. I can only do this for a couple of hours and then I have to convert over to some other way of detecting, even if its clad stabbing! In our park you can literally spend 10 hours trying to clear out one ten foot square area, so on a good day you can get one box, on an average day you will be back to finish the box you started the day before. My brother Ron actually tried this, and after a few days I offered up some help so he could try another box, we decided that the payoff wasn't even close to the time or work. So, for jewelry hunting we pretty much stay with option number one!
I will sometimes set up the box, but its not to try and clean it, but rather as a guild to thoroughly cover the area for select targets.

Mark

 

[MarkCZ]

So, all in all you just can't place a target ID on gold and silver jewelry! it comes in to many different sizes and shapes, its 10K, 12K, 14K, and even 18K so this just puts it everywhere on the ID scale. A good size mans 10K wedding band will likely fall in the upper foil range, a LARGE 14K men's class ring might make the Zinc penny range, a ladies wedding band may make LOW foil. So, getting the F5 with the thinking you'll be able to get more jewelry and less digging isn't going to happen! you are still stuck running it like a Beep & Dig Tesoro with the exception of you can place jewelry between a low boundary and a high boundary and then dig every good signal in between. The actual idea of the metered detectors revolved around coin shooters, Nickel is a Nickel, a Penny is a Penny, A Quarter is a Quarter, so it became pretty easy to take a already defined target (a coin) and get it to fall in a certain area on the meter and then tag it with a number, but that's just not the case with jewlery! Now, if you and I had the SAME wedding bands, size, weight, and carat and you lost yours then you could use mine and get a target ID response and add a plus minus of say 2 and figure you ring would fall in the zone and maybe find it if you actually go over it with the coil.

The jewelry, our dream! but its as allusive as finding gold has ever been! Dig, Dig, and then dig some more. If there is pull tabs around you can figure at times a ratio of a few thousand tabs to one maybe decent gold ring, silver jewelry will be more common, but still not easy to find.

Keep, in mind I am talking about land hunting, not BEACH hunting.

Mark

 

[mudpuppy]

Yeah, with that many Q's, I'd say you are right about the gold and silver jewelry...the bummer about hunting gold in a heavy Q field, is those nice high Q pings make your ears less sensitive to the foil and tabs..they are just sooo sweet and tasty! You KNOW with that many Q's, the place has not seen a coil in a long time if ever, so the gold is there someplace...Well, I sweep up all the Q's, they give me an idea of the travel patterns of the area and help a guy figure the place out...then the D's and coppers, on to the zincs and nickels...sometimes all at once depending upon how much time I have...any strange signal gets a quick stab...

You need to find an alternate method for target recovery, your back should not be hurting, in fact, you should come out of there feeling great and all limbered up, with no big pain in any particular area... You may try dropping down to one knee or stabbing with a screwdriver instead of digging. Or stooping down with a wide legged stance like how a giraffe takes a drink..your forearms should rest on your legs right above the knees, and your back parallel to the ground with your knees slightly bent...thats a solid stable way to get close to the target and back up again with no strain on anything....whatever you do, I think go in there easy and for the first little bit focus on keeping your back in a dimension that doesnt hurt so much...then hunt that place for old glory, you should be getting some century plus days out of there with a screwdriver in just a few hours...

A place that target heavy is gonna be helpful for you to learn some important tricks about speedy retrieval methods...you may have to break a few habits, like learn how to locate the target without using a Pinpointer or even the PP button on your rig...I tap coil...like a drummer would, while rotating 90 degrees, right on top of the target until the tone centers, then, I stoop down like the aforementioned giraffe, stab down with a driver and grab it...ping to pouch in less than 20 sec, and probably more like 10..the tone strength tells you what it is and how deep it is in fact...so your brain figures all this out instead of your eyes looking at a screen..

So, take some aspirin right BEFORE you hunt, work on that back alignment, get a screwdriver, set up a light fast program with as many tones as you can handle, go after targets in the top 4-5" or less, and think about what the targets are telling you about the place so you can figure out the gold zones where you can slow down and work them right...

REVIER should be coming along soon...he set a goal last year to find 12 gold pieces in parks and fields and did it! You should read some of his posts, they are very helpful for dirt gold hunting!

Mud

 

[MarkCZ]

Mud's right about a place full of coins, there isn't very many places like that left. Like him I would probably just work on moving out those high conductor coins and that will also move out some trash, then when the coins get lean start to work on the jewelry.

Another thing about hunting a possible virgin place is for awhile try to keep a low profile, don't make big brags about the area (don't advertise it so to speak) if stopped by a passer by and your ask if your finding anything good, simply say "Nothing to write home about, plenty of trash and a few cents in modern change". There is people dirty enough to claim jump you if you hint to a good spot that they over looked because of the idea they didn't consider it a good place. And Never! Ever! show off your jewelry finds at a hunting spot! and don't post your really great spots on the forums, lurkers are watching, they most likely are not members but if they can sniff out a good hunting spot off a forum, they will be in your spot come morning!
Its sad it has to be like that, but there has always been claim jumpers and todays times they are actually worse. Try to save these places for friends and family, really good places to detect are often times very hard to find.

Mud's also correct about digging posture, but there is so many things in ones health condition that plays into that like,
Weight,
Age,
Medical condition, I know one person who's weight and knees gave him so much problem that he was using his detector to pull himself up from the ground (coil on the ground and used the upper shaft to literally pull his weight upwards to get off the ground), This is really bad for the detector, so he fixed up a light rod with a grip and used it for an assist off the ground, he carried it in one hand and used the detector with the other.
My brother Greg is in pretty good shape but after awhile of swinging the detector you'll look over and see him laying flat on his back resting his back for a few minutes, he says its just one of those motions that seems to tighten up certain muscles and so far that's what he's found to help, just take a few minutes and relax them.

Mark

 

[Mike Hillis]

Hi Will,

First off...congrats on selecting the F5 as your jewelry hunting unit. It will serve you very well.

Second...jewelry shares a lot in common with clad....it is mostly shallow....and it is being replenished on a daily basis....and can often be found in the same places. It is my personal opinion that a good clad hunter can more easily transition into a good jewelry hunter because a good clad hunter already has some site reading skills developed.

Third....to be good at finding inland jewelry on a regular basis your focus has to change: You locate the jewelry with your mind. You recover it with your metal detector. You metal detect only for site information. and you constantly work on validating your site reading skills.

Now with all that said, start with these...F5 settings....shallow = middle range gain settings with positive threshold settings. audio = 4 tone, let your ears tell you what is under your coil. Disc = I like a 8 disc setting so I can hear some of the iron tones. If you notch, notch out the zinc range. Zinc range gold is uncommon and if there is any around you'll find it when you are metal detecting a site for information.

Focus = where are the hot spots? What loss characteristics would cause someone to loose jewelry in that spot?

Example: Hot spot A....clad finds are telling you that some sort of activity is taking place here. Why is that clad being lost here? What else am I finding that can help me understand the loss characteristics and the site usage for Hot Spot A. Could jewelry be lost for the same reason? Is it likely that jewelry is being lost for the same reason? If you think yes, there is a very good chance to find a piece of jewelry here, then recover it. If you don't recover any, ask why? If you do recover jewelry, validate the site/loss characteristics. Find another site with the same characteristics and see if you find jewelry there, too.

A validated hot spot/loss characteristic will put jewelry in your pouch on a regular basis. And THAT is what you are really hunting for. That is the real treasure. The jewelry is just the proof.

Good luck.
HH
Mike

 

[mudpuppy]

What Mark and Mike said is so true! About the rarity of this kind of place, lurkers, hunting with your mind, and keeping it quiet...Get in there and knock the hell out of it as fast as possible without being seen, or saying dink to nobody!...

Like you mentioned Will, I believe you are a great clad hound, so go ahead and wipe all that stuff out of your way...Its hard to beat having a huge fast clad haul in short order, in the end, its probably more profitable sniping clad than hunting elusive gold...bummer is those clad heavy places are getting of short supply, so when you come across one, its best to just wade in there and see how many you can get...good thing is you will learn a whole lot about your new machine in short order too, and get in some great shape...all the gold and silver jewelry will show up accidental in a place like that (especially the silver of course), ...

I see a great upside here for you all the way around, its a 'win-win' no matter what...new rig, wanting to learn its language, target heavy value environment, great excersize...

I will say on the 'giraffe style stoop n stab' your big butt muscles will really feel it if you are new to this...I remember typing posts a few years ago about how 'butt hurt' I was after a mega clad hunt! Then again, it was a 'good' type of hurt, not like a hurting back, which is never a good type of hurt...once a fellows core 'butt muscles' get used to this and in shape, its amazing how stronger you are for it, you can lift extreme loads, push wheelbarrows full of cement all day long, pull a semi out of the ditch with a chain over your shoulder, show off around a bonfire by twisting open beers for everybody by hitching up on your seat and only using one hand! Heck, after a few years of the 'stoop n stab clad grab' your butt muscles are so strong, you can sharpen a #2 Ticonderoga pencil!... Get us a vid of that if you can..
Mud

 

[will*in*cali]

LOL... oh man.. you guys are a riot.. I love it all, every bit.

Well the F5 wont be here until early next week, so this weekend I am going to clear as much clad out of that place as I can, like you advised, and spend more time looking at the site and evaluating it for possible hot spots, rather than just walking and listening for beeps.
Ive got a brass probe for popping coins, and need to spend more time pinpointing with the coil and not the pinpointer, and popping coins, so this weekend will give me time to do that.
Also, I never speak in person or online about what Im finding (besides clad and trash)

The tips on using a different method for squatting to retrieve targets sounds like a good plan, and my back thanks you in advance!

There will be no pencil sharpening with my derrier! LOL

Take care guys!

 

[mudpuppy]

Yeah, Sorry about that pencil remark, it was a bit over the top and generally only possible after a few solid years of dedicated 'stoop n stab'...thats an advanced move there...

You can easily crush a walnut after your first year though, or one of those small decorative squashes out of the centerpiece display on Thanksgiving, hilariously performed and always appreciated while I'm eating at the kids table....Never gets old! I'm 4yrs into this, so all the neighbors have me sharpening their tomato stakes, in a few more years, I'll be able to handle a treated 4X4 and do some sign installation for the realtors I figure... Little extra money and all..

Good luck, take a pic, We love to see a massive clad stack every so often...
Mud

 

[will*in*cali]

Went back with the compadre since the f5 won't be here until Tuesday and took you guys advice and cleared another $10 in quarters and dimes. Didn't bother with zinc, pulled 3 nickels hoping those signals would be gold ...wishful thinking of course. Hand full of square pull tabs as well of course. But Yea getting this area ready for the F5 ...find some bling. Let's hope.
The clad doesn't hurt. .buys gas right?