Joe, nice write up. I find that using headphones is a must. The sounds are much cleaner and the faint really deep items can be heard with more clarity. I also run with discrimination off most of the time and listen to the iron, one must fight the urge to dig a good one way pop off the edge of rusty iron, check from multiple directions and with varied sweep speeds before you dig.
Most areas I work are old farmsteads and fields where they were 150 years ago, very trashy sites. I really like the Detech 4.5x7” DD EXcelerator on any of my machines. Coins at 10 inches if you run open discrimination and pay attention. When I find clean areas I go to the Minelab 8” FBS or even the Detech 10x12” SEF Butterfly (one hot coil!) and for really clean pastures and fields I have a 15 inch coil for the Minelab that will go deeper than I want to dig sometimes. With the last coil I have pulled the little 1/4 brass tack rivet heads at over 13”, real PITA.
Used an old, really old White’s when I was a kid and started again at about 45 as therapy for my back and had forgotten how much fun it was to find things…
My father-in-law got a Garrett Ace 250 (?Maybe? Not sure of the model…) recently. I don’t know anything about the quality of that model unit, but I did spend some time walking around the field with it over the weekend. Found a couple of random iron pieces, and a handful of .45ACP casings. Of course, for the shell casings, it’s like hunting a baited area with the shooting we do there. I was surprised, the casings were a couple of inches underground even though they would only have been fired within the past couple of years.
I’ve used a basic kid-style detector on my grandfather’s land. He has some old farm land, and there had been a blacksmith shop there at one time. We find a LOT of stuff but it’s all junk, like broken tools, chains, and plow points. I think my uncle found a single wheat penny there, but that was the only “valuable” item discovered.
I’d like to get into the hobby, but the initial expense is a bit intimidating. That, and my half-acre of land would be pretty boring. I’d like to take one to the beach, but I understand it takes a high end unit to really do well there.
Just imagine what you can find in the ground over here in the old lands, we even have a TV station that regularly have a program with detector guys running around.
Off course if you find a horde of nice Viking gold you have to hand it in, but you will get a finders fee off course, and its more than a pad on the back, some of those guys have gotten a new house for their finders fee.
Not hard to find stuff older than when we discovered the Americas.
Garrett ACE 250 is one of the best metal detectors when it comes to coin-hunting and relic hunting with its powerful discrimination, digital ID, and Iron audio finding treasure is like a walk in the park.
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