Weird signal but...silver!

[REVIER]

Found in a real trashy site in front of an old elementary school.
I bet every hunter in the city has hit this place over the years but I figured there still might be something good hiding because of masking from 93 years of trash build-up and I was right.
I credit the sniper coil on the F70 for this one
Not real deep, only at about 2-3" and caught up in some roots near a big tree but a strange signal at about 69 and unusually solid and steady.
I figured since shallow copper cents and dimes usually come in at 71-73 this was something else like a small piece of old broken pipe or probably a big mouth screw cap which is the exact same numbers but it was solid from two ways with no jumping, (unusual here even on the shallow stuff sometimes), so it had to be dug to leave nothing to chance.
When a small dirt covered disc popped up with what looked like a silver rim I smiled...when I cleaned it off and looked close I wondered what kind of life did this thing have to end up looking so bad.
Still, it's a 1924 silver merc so...awesome!
Maybe because it is in the beat up and worn shape that caused that low number signal but whatever, this is why you can't assume and just need to dig instead...or develop that X Ray vision thing.
A delightful surprise, a large screw on cap that wasn't but something much better instead.

 

[After-1-]

Way to sniff that girl out, With the vid of 69, I would be thinking something of copper or brass related. Not bashing your find, That is not very normal looking, I have seen a few Nickels look like that. Hey you found what others have missed, good relationship with your machine ---There is more out there -----------------GH----------------------------------------after2-------------

 

[WV62]

Why that poor thing needs a special place in the display case.

Did you think to run the detector over it after you got it out of the ground? Sometimes a little bit of trash will pull your numbers down.

I was running low disc one day and got what I thought was a little high for a pull tab and it turned out to be a nickle and silver dime in the same hole.

Sniper coil, would that be the 5" or the 6.5" (football coil)?

Nice work,

Ron in WV

 

[REVIER]

Why that poor thing needs a special place in the display case.

Did you think to run the detector over it after you got it out of the ground? Sometimes a little bit of trash will pull your numbers down.

I was running low disc one day and got what I thought was a little high for a pull tab and it turned out to be a nickle and silver dime in the same hole.

Sniper coil, would that be the 5" or the 6.5" (football coil)?

Nice work,

Ron in WV

A perfectly normal 72 out of the ground.
Probably some trash down-averaging the signal near it, this is an area in the corner of the property near the street where there has been much traffic and over 90 years of trash deposited and it sits at many layers.
I checked it in high disc before I dug it, disc at 50 trying avoid most of the junk, DE fast speed, sense at a surprisingly high 95, thresh down to -5 and monotone and it was the same signal.
I found it using my blast- through settings using all metal, slower SL boost speed, sense and thresh up to the max.
I have used these crazy all metal settings for so long now they have become my favorite way, my most successful way to hunt in not only heavy iron but in crazy trash, too.
Slow coil movements are the rule, if I was moving any faster than a slow crawl I would not have noticed it.
As always there was some jumping and falsing going on but when the coil acquires a target it stops and repeats, the key is to listen for the more solid tone and watch the screen for repeating numbers with short quick side to side passes after noticing the more solid sounding sharp tones even in all metal.

I use the round Fisher sniper coil, don't really think I want or need any other sniper since this one works so well for me.
Deeper than I ever thought possible even in my difficult soil, handles pop tops easily using the rimming pull back method, finds the tiniest things easily, maneuvers well in stubble or woods, target separation is supreme and especially when using my not so normal high and crazy settings that I favor.

I can't say for sure but I gotta believe this old school had to be targeted by many other hunters since metal detectors were invented because there is mostly just junk and a few modern clad coins still around...all the easy silver was probably culled long ago from this site.
There aren't even many wheats or other modern copper cents so I figure lots of cherry picking went on around here in the past.
That's ok by me, I can get deeper in this dirt than most, trash doesn't scare me so all low conductors are still in play and I have figured out ways to unmask targets pretty well so if there are only a few goodies left around here I think I have a good shot at finding them.
Me and the F70 and that sniper make a pretty good team.

More hunting to do around here with the F70, plus this site is just the type where my Compadre might do extremely well since unmasking in heavy trash is one of its strengths.
I think it would have found this dime fairly easily.
So much dirt to hunt, so many great tools to have fun with doing it.

 

[still looking 52]

Revier , that dime had a rough life. Maybe it was in a war zone during WW2? Nice find, most detectors would have missed that one for sure.

 

[jim tn]

I've got one spot where silver comes out pretty nasty, but your Merc. is about as bad as I've seen. Good job sniping it out. HH jim tn

 

[James/Washington]

Nice! I figure that something trashy real close to the Merc was down averaging the signal and others had just skipped over it. I know that I have skipped over many just like this. It looks bad now but it is silver and it will clean up nicely. Congrats on the nice find!

 

[WV62]

I have found a few that looked pretty bad like yours, and think most were found in gravel driveways, where there is years of moving around and grinding from the gravel.

I also have been working my 5" coil a lot more lately, some days it seems to find coins, and then just when I think I am on to something I will get a zero day.

I am starting to think the soil condition has a lot to do with detecting, the hunt before last at the end of the day the soil was kind wet in this area. I had time to run a couple of passes and picked up 3 clad quarter and 2 wheat pennies and it was time to head home and I was thinking I got to get back there and finish it up.

I went back this past Friday early in the morning, but it was getting hot and the soil was really dry, I worked a pretty good section right were I left off the time before and not a single coin. Both of those hunts was with the 5" coil.

I guess now I need to go back to the same spot on a cool wet day and prove my theory.

Ron in WV

 

[jim tn]

Really worn thin silver dimes have come in as low as 68-69 for me on a couple of occasions. Pleasant surprises, for sure. HH jim tn

 

[osgood]

Got one like that in a gravel parking lot at a house that was once a restaurant. the gravel practically ground it into thin air. Osgood

 

[dfmike]

Like Ron said, it looks like it was ground for years. Funny how the date area seems to have fared better than the rest of the surface. My own 5 inch sniper coil should arrive tomorrow. Your post gives me the motivation to put it on and hunt areas that once paid off but have been hunted to death.

 

[shadowulf]

Congrats REV, nice find.

I wonder if your "down averaging" has to do with your prevalent devil dirt. My target ID numbers are pretty accurate most of the time, except in those areas known for high iron content. Trash usually gets the "up averaging", deceminated iron seems to drag it down.

Just curious if this seems to be an issue in your area.

 

[REVIER]

Congrats REV, nice find.

I wonder if your "down averaging" has to do with your prevalent devil dirt. My target ID numbers are pretty accurate most of the time, except in those areas known for high iron content. Trash usually gets the "up averaging", deceminated iron seems to drag it down.

Just curious if this seems to be an issue in your area.

Down averaging is something that does not happen much here, I suspect there was some masking trash in the vicinity but it wasn't iron, it was shallow and badly masked and mimicked large can slaw so I assumed passed over by everyone else over the years because of that.
For me it was solid enough to trigger my digging instinct so I did.

Most every target that is deeper than really shallow around here is affected by something but mostly iron.
Sometimes down averaged but most times up averaged...the deeper the target the higher the numbers.
This up averaging around iron thing is designed and programmed into this platform, the F75/F70 and T2 all do it and other units might do this too so that makes these the perfect tool to use in an area that has so much of it....once you learn a new language and how strangely targets can behave that exist in it at all depths.
I have found tons of great things here, a surprising amount and even bucket list items at sites scoured by others for decades both deep and shallow precisely because I found how to ID targets deeper and deal better with masking than many others.
Iron is a shockingly huge problem at most sites around here...in the city itself worse of all.
Surprising amounts of iron in the soil because we have all the ingredients naturally existing here, some veins of iron, very tiny bits you can pick up with magnets,larger pieces of slag too that was mixed into lots of the soil and deposited all over the city from commercial to residential sites.
I was told this was a byproduct of the iron and steel business that built this city starting in the 1800's and they thought nothing of dumping their unused garbage from those processes all over the area then it eventually got spread all around.
Then there is the normal iron items like nails which seem to be everywhere because most sites had older structures on them at first in the 1800's then these were knocked down to build newer structures in the 1900's or in park areas they knocked down old neighborhoods that they covered up with a thin layer of dirt to make many of these parks.
Many sites in my local neighborhood park used to be an actual dump site also, I can tell by all the car, motorcycle and house parts I dig up in a few areas.
Then there is the red clay mineralization common in the south.
I usually ground balanced at numbers like from 45-55 in Kansas, here it is always in the 60's to sometimes the mid to high 70's or low 80's.
Not great but not as bad as some areas of the country I know, but mineralization is just part of the problem here, all of that extra iron I have to deal with is worse.
The rare black soil you can find in some areas still has a lot of iron infused into it and I have hunted in sites far away from the city into the suburbs, parks that were built on areas that were always open and others miles away maybe out to 30-40 miles from where I live now.
All of them still had mineralization and at least some extra iron problems no matter where I went and all of this combines to limit depth severely not to mention the masking problem is also huge especially on most targets past 4-5".

Go north from Birmingham up to Huntsville you can get another inch or so, south toward Mobile it also gets a little better but all around here it is horrible and in the city itself where I am it is the worst.
I started here, moved to Kansas and saw how the other half lived and then we returned to this mess...man that was depressing when I realized what I had there and what I would be returning to.

Luckily I have one of the worst sites with all of and the most amount of these problems only 1/2 block away from me so for about a year I have spent most of my time there experimenting with settings galore plus three different coils and looked for new behavioral clues, a whole new language that can enable me to ID targets deeper than most others and deal with the masking problems efficiently.
If you really want to learn something well do it under the worst, hardest most difficult conditions possible.
Once you get good all other places you use these hard learned lessons should be a breeze to deal with.
One day we will probably move again to a state with better dirt but don't feel sorry for me now because of what I have to deal with because my higher end FIsher seems to be the exact tool to use here and I have been forced to expand my skill set tremendously...after all is said and done I am actually grateful, a making lemonade out of lemons thing.
Whatever doesn't kill me makes me stronger.

 

[shadowulf]

Okay, so you are finding similar results in the shallow targets? The down averaging seems to happen, for me, on targets less than 3" deep. Mostly in areas that are local fill dirt, near iron ore deposits. Where I'm getting ground balance numbers in high 80s, into the high 90s. The ground tends to be gray to almost charcoal color.
It's not a common occurrence, but in that particular area, it's easy to skip over the target. I only figured this out because I was in a "dig everything" mood one day. The target sounds solid, but the TID# was lower than desired.

 

[REVIER]

Okay, so you are finding similar results in the shallow targets? The down averaging seems to happen, for me, on targets less than 3" deep. Mostly in areas that are local fill dirt, near iron ore deposits. Where I'm getting ground balance numbers in high 80s, into the high 90s. The ground tends to be gray to almost charcoal color.
It's not a common occurrence, but in that particular area, it's easy to skip over the target. I only figured this out because I was in a "dig everything" mood one day. The target sounds solid, but the TID# was lower than desired.

If you are still in Nevada I think your dirt might be way different then mine.
Here shallow targets surface to about 3" are usually pretty correct if there is no other trash or garbage around or under it.
So much junk at lower levels that affects my signals too if my sense is set pretty high.
On my F2 most targets up to about 3", usually the deepest I found things in the bad stuff, were pretty right on but I am not sure that up averaging thing happens on this one, on my F70 it definitely affects all my signals in this iron infested soil and even on the 2-3" ones and for sure deeper.
A usual IH zinc signal on a really shallow one I found at no more than 2" still soared way higher into the high 70's to low 80's.
I have found others even deeper at 4-5 and 6" that were in the low 90's.
As I said that down averaging stuff rarely happens here unless there is a mixture of targets that is not iron in a hole that is usually shallow.
A dime and a nickel or a tab in the same hole will do it, for instance.

In my opinion using this detector in my current difficult dirt and conditions it is never about the actual numbers I see since they rarely match the known and correct numbers I saw in much better and normal dirt like I had in Kansas.
There even really deep stuff was usually normal.

Here I don't even see many stable 1-2-3 number jumps either like in good dirt, most everything jumps more than that into ranges of maybe 5-6 numbers especially when they are at 4"+.
I look for repeating ranges of numbers from 2 directions, even if there are some drops to iron I will dig targets as long as there are not many or consistent and repeating drops...those are usually iron signals.

Nickels come in near the 90's here deep as do those Indians, copper cents, all dimes and quarters.
A silver dollar was a 98-99, other targets are usually much higher in the dirt than when scanned after they come out junk, trash, junk jewelry et al.

Just had to learn that I can't assume what the numbers say are true because they hardly ever are here, I go for good sounding tones and those repeating ranges if numbers instead.
With lots of observation and practice I still managed to get pretty good at avoiding a lot of the trash while still recovering a surprising amount of good targets...as strange, jumpy, skewed, and masked as those signals usually are.

Actually, I am kinda shocked that I got as good at understanding this new language and behavior patterns as I have to be this successful at hunting here.
Never was before with my F2, Compadre or Vaquero so I gotta think that even though I have more knowledge and experience now than when I did when I hunted here before I still think it is the F70 and it's superior abilities that have the most to do with it.
Whatever it is, knowledge, experience, tools...it seems to be working better than I ever thought for me right now.

 

[shadowulf]

Yes, I'm still in Nevada.
We also have alkali, leached salts, and a few other anomalies. But the down averaging was a bit confusing.
I've learned to trust the sound of the target more that the TID#. Which is why long periods of not detecting can get frustrating. I have to retune my hearing after a long periodof not detecting. I guess I'll just have to note what I find and keep learning.