To: P runar - Re: Metal Detecting / Prospecting & Relics
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P runar wrote:
Great photos Marco. I have a metaldetector and i think i need a better one.
This 100 $ i have are they any good?
Hi P runar. I haven't seen that particular detector before so I can't really comment on what they're like. Although it does resemble an expensive one I see on ebay that seems to annoy people trying to use them. Try to gravitate towards one of the major brand names (see below). These days you might want to consider something like a Minelab Go-Find detector to start out with. The Go-Find 40 is pretty good value although it's a little more expensive than the machine you have.
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the main five brands of metal detectors carried by most dealers will be:
* Minelab
* Whites
* Garrett
* Bounty Hunter
* Tesoro
There's others out there but the main brands tend to be the ones above.
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Because I'm in Australia, only the Minelab detectors are designed to handle our extremely high mineralization where the gold tends to reside. Garrett brand detectors can be used here but they usually struggle to penetrate the generalization here and are better suited to more neutral soils. If you're in North America, Europe or any other place other than Africa and Australia, you can use pretty much any machine to seek gold nuggets because they've generally moved away from their host rock and have been washed elsewhere where you can more easily locate them. And just about any detector works to find relics. If you live near beaches you can be sure there's a few people who look for valuables by combing the beach with a metal detector that visit from time to time. The trick is to work out where the visitors are likely to drop their coins etc. Surfers often leave their wallets and jewellery with their girlfriends up on the high sand or on the grass near carparks so that's always a good place to check. Extremely low tides are always great times to go detecting. If you live in the country or near a historical location you'll probably do well looking for relics and artifacts but be wary of your local laws and be particularly aware of finding live ordinance in places where battle has occurred.
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My first two days exploring a goldfield with metal detectors was pretty uneventful.
Finding more interesting things in other locations years later.
This 1820s cannon ball was used as a ball-&-chain weight on a set of leg irons for a convict. It was found with an inexpensive metal detector and presumably is worth a few thousand dollars. A ball attached to a set of leg irons often holds an auction price of around $20K locally.
Meteorite located with a very inexpensive coin and relic metal detector
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If it's gold you are looking for you only occasionally find it on the first day out looking for it. In fact even with the very best equipment you can't always be assured of finding gold... All goldfields can give up gold but not all goldfields have nuggets. And most metal detectors (if not all) can't detect fine gold... the sort of thing you'd pick up in a gold pan. If you're relic hunting then the detectors are much more affordable. Coin and Relic detectors are very good these days. Buy a major brand like Whites, Garrett or Minelab. There's a few lesser brands but those are the top three manufacturers and the most popular brands today. At the very bottom of the range are fairly rubbishy detectors that aren't worth your time and will frustrate you.
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Long Range Locators (AKA L.R.L.s) - these are a modern scam. Some dealers sell them. You will never find anything with them. People have gone to jail for selling them to the army and even the FBI.
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Coin and Relic Detectors - suitable for coins, relics, jewellery and meteorites. They tend to be quite affordable and can often discriminate between different metals. There is currently no metal detector that can identify gold.
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Gold Detectors - Very Low Frequency (VLF) - Relatively affordable - can discriminate between different types of metals with some models. Not much depth... perhaps about a foot at maximum in low-mineralization. Often used for relic hunting as well as gold nuggets.
Gold Detectors - Pulse Induction (PI) - More expensive. Goes much deeper - possibly deeper than 2 or 3 meters with a large coil in ideal conditions. More sensitive to electrical interference. Can't be used near powerlines or near cities without considerable interference. Usually can't discriminate but some coils allow for a different sound for ferrous and non-ferrous targets.
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Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) - Not a metal detector. Heavy and Expensive but difficult to use. Better suited to finding extremely large articles at considerable depth (several meters deep). Suitable for finding voids in rock or walls. Often used to locate graves or buried aircraft and caches at depth. VERY hard to use and not entirely reliable - even when operated by experts.
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Two control-boxes from detectors that were for sale at the same price. The one of the left was a counterfeit and the one on the right was real. The counterfeit was from China and didn't perform.
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Just watch out for counterfeits if you buy machines online and not from a certified dealer since the Chinese knockoffs are all over the internet. I see a lot of them circulating these days and I've even seen people trying to resell them to another unsuspecting buyer to try and recover their lost money. There's usually a dealer near all major cities these days. The only place I've heard of metal detectors being banned is in France and Turkey with other restrictions in Greece and possibly Iran (to protect the cultural antiquities from being found and then sold on the black market or even eBay).
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My first day out detecting with a $700 Minelab X-Terra 70 gold detector at Sofala goldfield.
My wife testing a Minelab GPX-5000 on the week of its release - in the Ophir Gold District.
My wife again - testing a Minelab SDC-2300 in the Oberon Goldfield.
Me using the Minelab GPX-4500 gold detector for the first time at the Sunny Corner goldfield.
Me using a GPX-5000 last month (EOS M camera on shoulder).
One of our friends using a Minelab GPX-5000 gold detector in Hill End
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But our Australian gold is usually in the most mineralized soil in the world where most other metal detectors simply go nuts. It's impossible to stabilize them. The machine I've been using since 2009 is the GPX-5000 from Minelab. I'm also using specialized optional coils for the type of locations I'm in. These are pretty expensive machines although there's one recent model called the GPZ-7000 that is slightly more powerful and retails locally for about AUD $10,500.00. But remember that those machines are designed for people who seek gold professionally and need extreme performance to cut through all the iron and minerals in the goldfields here. It's not easy finding gold. If it was easy to find it wouldn't be so valuable. I've met people who claim to find it every time they go out but that hasn't been my experience. No matter where you are in the world, there are things you can look for with metal detectors. It's a healthy hobby and a rewarding one. There are also people who do this full time - either as gold prospectors or relic hunters.
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Fine gold recovered with a $20 gold pan.
Gold found and recovered with a $400 high-banker sluice
Coarse nuggets I found with a $700 metal detector.
Gold nuggets found with a $6,500 gold detector.Larger nugget is 11 ounces.
Larger gold nugget found with a $6,500 gold detector. This one was 5 ounces (troy oz).
Gold nuggets & specimens found with a $10,500 gold detector.... missed by other machines.
My first day out relic hunting with a 'cheap' detector (Minelab X-terra 70) produced a heck of a lot of great stuff. The gold chain in the top left corner was solid 18ct gold and weighed 2oz. This was at the base of a wharf in mud (cleaned with an ultrasonic cleaner). Larger coins on the right came from a sack found in the bush on another day.
Gold Doubloons found with a less expensive coin & relic metal detector.
A massive Platinum and gold nugget found by a friend using a GPX-5000 ... we thought it was a meteorite because magnets stuck to it. It contained 5oz of pure gold and about 10 or 11 kilos of platinum plus Iridium. I think there was a tiny amount of silver in it as well. The refiner purchased all of the metals.
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