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Where's the Silver ?

P

pilot

New member
I have been using my E-Trac for a couple weeks now. Tried TTF, Stock coin pattern and the Trashy Park pattern to no avail. I was hoping to get the silver that others have missed but it seems I am doing something wrong or it just isn't there. I even double check the same sidewalks and areas with my 705 (which I trust more at this time) to see if I have missed any obvious signals. My only silver so far was pretty good...a silver spoon ring but even the wheats are few and far between. I get jealous of all the cool finds I see here but it serves to motivate me also. I just wish I can find a few silver coins before my season ends up here. I did recieve my Sunray X1 yesterday so I am going out today sometime and try it out. Wish me LUCK it is going to be a cold hunt today here in Southern Minnesota.

HH
Kim
 
Make sure you slow down when you recheck those areas.
 
I know the feeling.You're in an area that should have something left to find and it's just not happening.
Heck,I even take some sample coins along and put them in a hole I just dug to double check that everything's working.
Now, it's impossible to tell without actually being right there with you, but maybe your hunting sites are getting played out ????
I can tell you from personal experience, park hunting ain't what it was 35 years ago !!
It was nothing to come home with a pocket full of wheaties,buffaloes and a few bucks in silver.
And I didn't have an Etrac either !
No brag, just fact.
So, before you think your detecting technique is at fault, perhaps you need to change your approach .
If the obvious places aren't producing the desired results,then go for the not so obvious.
You are coming into the winter months,so now is a great time to do research.Be creative.
These days you can obtain copies of old county atlases pretty cheap on CD's,and maybe local histories as well.
Get to talking with old timers about the history of their small towns; find out where the church socials were held,revival meetings and carnival sites,where the old swimming holes were. That sort of thing.
Start looking around with a suspicious eye: why is that old grove of trees there? why are there stones in that plowed field and no where else ??
Try door knocking at older homes; a number of successful detectorists have become "door to door salesmen".
Keep swinging and you're bound to find what you're after.
Good Luck and H.H. !!
 
I think I was a little disappointed in not finding all those coins that others have missed or not been able to detect also. The advertizing and constant stories of others goin back to their honey holes and finding more silver at new depths. But then it occurred to me that maybe/probably they are just not there. If soil conditions are preventing coins from going only so deep, and it's well with-in other MD to find them, then the hopes of finding those"deep ones that where left" is just not going to happen, they do not exist. So you just have to be smarter in your hunting and find places that others miss as stated above,,,,, etrac is a very capable machine it's not it's fault there are no coins to find, you not taking it to the right place !!!!! LOL
 
I will assure you, FIRST and foremost, you need to get to know the nuances of any machine. You have to "pay your dues" so to speak. You will find surface or near surface coins if any are present. The deeper ones, you will also find, after you learn the ETRAC better.

You look like a young fellow, and I don't have a clue how long you have been detecting. I have been doing this for 37 years, and I can assure you that with any given machine, my silver coin score has gone up with the amount of time I have had a machine.

The ETRAC is a stellar producer. Period. With time you will find, not only silver, but more than with other machines, imho.

The first thing you need to do, is to use one program, and dig a LOT of signals. DON'T get in a hurry with learning, and I think, instead of trying all the TTF, Different Patterns, etc, learn what the machine is saying to you. PLANT a test garden for sure.. At 100 hours in time used, you will see a marked increase in recovery I predict, if you learn the machine. There are so many tricks with any detector, to learn. With my ETRAC, I hear buzz, static, thumps, roundness of signal, abruptness, whispers, and other subtle sounds, that all are clues as to what is there, and what the ETRAC is saying to me. The height of the coil off the ground, while still sounding, will tell you how big the target is, or isn't. Using the edge of the coil can tell you information, as can speed of sweep, both on an already found signal, or just sweep.

There is NO quick and ready answer to finding all the stuff others miss. Speed, direction of sweep, moisture of the soil, length of time an item is buried, electrical interference, and experitise of the operator all play a role in recovery. A blind hog can still find an acorn as well, so things will pop up, occasionally. (My recent find of my 1807/06 overstrike one cent piece could have been found by a blind man with a radio shack detector, as it was only 4 inches down, and nothing but soil around it. ) That being said, there is simply no substitute for experience with your machine. DON'T give up on it. DON'T get in a hurry with it.

I just spent a couple of days, hunting an old church from the 1800's, which was torn down in 1956. I have taken 4 Mercury dimes out of here, and the newest wheats have been 1942 (only one) The rest of the coins have been in the teens. The dimes were at an honest 8 or 9 inches, and rang solid with the ETRAC, is manual sens at 27, multi, and the old park pattern. Since the dimes are there, I can reasonably assume there are other silver coins there. There should be some barbers/seated. I can further deduce that they are likely to relatively deeper, up to 12 to 14 inches, which is beyond my depth capabilities with the machine I suspect, even with my 15x12 SEF. I am going to try my WOT next time out, just to see if it reacts differently, and simply dig anyting beyond 6 inches.

I have wandered a bit on this post, but my advice, is slow down your speed, and slow down your changing modes, and above all, slow down your learning process, and you will indeed find the stuff that others have left. Finally, as another post in this thread alluded to, use your head, and look places that might be overlooked by others. When you get a goodie, search a circular spiraling pattern around it, in case the same person lost more stuff at the time......

HH

Dennis
 
I agree with Kuletule 100%.
Slow down,and I would add ,dig various signals regardless of the readings just for the experience.
Your mind will subliminally file away those experiences and with time, you will develop an intuition that will help identify what your machine is trying to tell you.
 
The silver ain't rockin', it's time to go knockin'!
& try the less obvious older homes... Not the huge Victorians on the corner that everyone
else with a detector has wanted to hunt over the years...
Try 40's or 50's yards & parkways... Everybody wants the ancient stuff...
But you want silver!
 
We've all been there. You just buy the etrac and you expect magic to happen at least I did anyway. I went through every pattern thinking I was doing it wrong or had it setup wrong. What I finally figured out was half of detecting is the detector the other half is you. Do your homework, get to those spots nobody else has hunted. I've hunted one local park and its great for clad, easy pickens but no silver. Got an 1896 plat book and hit places not on the maps anymore and that's when the silver started flowing. Your not gonna find it if it isn't there anymore. And your silver spoon ring was a hell of a find. It don't get much cooler than that!
 
From a person also with 38 years of experience I agree with you as we all got to pay our dues and the more you know your detector the easier it is to use and the better finds you will get. Take some good research too on some of the older sites to find the older coins. I have a couple good Friends that been detecting central and south central MN this past summer and one has close to 300 silver coins this year, so we know there is some great coins to find, but it takes time to know where to go and what the detector is telling you. One of the places I did well was in Morris, MN back some years ago as they have a school that shares the football Field with the college that is very big area and we would get many silver from it. Now I been told there is a old park I didn't know about also in that town that has been giving up some nice silver for the Explorers and E-Trac.
Myself I cant go too far for health reasons, so I go back to sites that have been hammered to death looking for those odd signals with the E-Trac and use one pattern only and that is quick mask set at 21 ferrous and 10 conductivity so I hear most everything and use the tones and the meter readings and my head to decide to dig or not as i am looking for those signals other pass up.
 
I feel your pain! I bought an etrac last December and couldn't figure out what all of the tones were saying to me. I went out detecting with another etrac user at an old house I had detected before with my 705. The guy I was detecting with went to an area I had gone over with my 705 and my etrac, about 10 minutes into the hunt he pulls out a large cent that was in very nice condion, there was also some trash in the hole with it - he said he got an "iffy signal". It deflated me pretty quick, I know I went over that same area with both my machines and evidently I could not decipher the "iffy signal". I did find many silver coins and wheaties with my etrac over a 5 month period, but they were all clean signals. I had to sell my etrac in July for financial reasons, but I just bought another one a couple of weeks ago and am relearning it. I feel more confident with the etrac this time I understand the falsing singnals better now, I'm just not sure what an "iffy signal" is.

So to sum it up, you need to know what the etrac is saying if you want to get the stuff everyone else is missing. This will take many hours using your new machine to learn its language. I am finally begining to understand my machine. I am no longer fixated on the TID, learn the sounds and that will tell you what is below the coil better than the TID can. Another thing is I shortened the shaft so my coil is just barely in front of me so my arm and back no longer get tired from the weight of the etrac, I can now detect a whole lot longer.
 
door knocking is the answer, 98% of my hunting I just get in my car and go knock doors, old houses, private yards is where I get the silver!
 
Great thanks to all of you that encouraged me!! Thank goodness for this forum. Thank you all for your advice and hopefully I will have some good reports and pic's to share!!!

HH
Kim
 
Put the 705 AWAY! You don't trust the E-Trac because you haven't learned it yet. Stick with the E-Trac until it's familiar and comfortable.

You are right, that if the silver isn't there you can't find it! But many times, the silver is hidden in the trash.
 
Iffy is just that, it can be many things. It can be sounding half way good but the numbers are not right. It can be real deep so it's just a faint signal but the no's don't even want to work . It can be co-located targets and you have to do the 360 dance around the signal trying to see if it's good one way and maybe not another way so could be multiple targets there close together or all together under the coil. It could be a good hit while swinging the coil one way only and nulling the other way. It could be one target shallow and one deep. It could be a coin on edge, who knows what it could be unless you dig it up ????

It could be almost anything!! It is up to us to dig to see. All signals aren't clean, most aren't that is why you have to give it a thought do I want to dig. The numbers won't always be perfect they will be off or bounce around.
That is some of it the rest is really truly some people will dig more and will find more and others want it to be right or know within reason before they will dig so will cherry pick more but will end up finding less because the "good stuff" don't read or come up right on the TID or sound right most of the time.

I started in coins mode last spring and listened to the sounds if it sounded half way decent at all I was digging it to see what it was and I didn't care what the numbers said!! Then I switched directions and each time I got signals that I didn't hear the other directions.

Then I opened the screen up to quick mask allowing more sounds in and found more things. Then went to TTF and found all the nickels I had missed the numbers were all over the place but THE SOUND WAS HALF WAY DECENT.
I even got a signal I didn't want to dig because the conductive number was 25 ( I don't care at all what the ferous no is) but it sounded pretty good and so I dug and it was a silver rosie and a silver war nickel in the same hole together that is why the pulltab number (25 around here) I almost didn't bother to dig.

GO SLOW, LISTEN, AND DIG to LEARN is the best advice we can give. I think were all in a hurry to find the good stuff we end up missing it because we want it to be right or a good/perfect signal and it won't be.

I stay at one small park down the street and just keep hunting it till I clean it out then I will move on.
Found 3 rings together in one hole 2 small silver ones and one 10K gold and the signal was weird sound and number wise but I had to dig it to see what it was last week!!
There is no hurry the good stuff is there and will still be there, SWING SLOW and LISTEN then DIG!!
 
that's the way to do it!..gotta tell ya though,if you are doing that all the time,ya really don't need an e-trac!
hell! even a "compadre" will get the goodies in private lawns! just sayin'

(h.h.!)
j.t.
 
I am a new user also. Spent the summer with two other machines for sand and water. I have a couple of silvers but I am still trying to slow down and learn. Couple of weeks ago, I went to get my flu shot. While there I saw my usual good sports park in a pic from 1915. Didn't know it was that old. I went home, grabbed the Trac and headed over in search of the elusive silver. Trying to go slower than my other machines. Some nice deep older coins but no silver. Kept trying and zeroed in slowly with a nice signal. Gold St Christopher medal at 6 inches that I am sure I wouldn't have gotten with the way I swung the other machine. This time I didn't mind no silver. I am still digging all good repeatable signals.
good luck
Doc
 
Good advice from all!:thumbup: Hope I can find silver too when I get my E-trac next week(weather permitting):detecting:
HH Kim
 
pilot, i know you are an xterra 705 user E track is a great machine but let me tell you saomthing if you buy 18.75 coil you will be very happy, i have a pal that has an etrac and he has found 3 silver in 5 months , me 14 in 3 months of course sensitivity on x terra 705 27, sound 30
 
Wow nice Gold Medal...I went out yesterday to a 1950's abandoned school and froze my fingers but started concentrating on the repeatable sounds and found several wheats and a couple clad quarters just missing the silver year by one. I know there has to be a few silver coins there somewhere. I used my Sunray X1 for the first time and love it. I think I am starting to understand the E-Trac's music and what it is telling me. Just haven't heard the silver song yet! My goal is to find at least one silver coin before the ground is too frozen. Thanks everyone for the support.

HH
Kim
 
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