What was the first detector that you purchased?

Jetco BFO circa 1976. Think it was around $100 new. Next detector was White's 6000 Di Pro in 1985 for about $650 new.

Whites TR discriminator bought from Sears 1974. Second and the one that really got me going was a Nautilus LF purchased 1978.

cpaman00@tctwest.net Wrote:
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> I constructed a detector off a schematic in Mecha
> nic Illustrated or Popular Science about 1967. I
> couldn't get it to work. A few months later I pur
> chased a kit from Heathkit. My first coin was a h
> alf dollar under a swing in the park. They had me
> by then. I mail ordered a Detex BFO discriminato
> r. It was amazing what I found with that machine
> in those early days.


I can still hear those ole BFO's chugging through the woods----45 years ago.

First detector was a toy purchased with green stamps in 1975. It could find coins at 2-3 inches or so. Second detector was a White's 5000-D in 1976 or 77. I was in Junior High School and paid about $150 for it using money earned mowing lawns, and working odd jobs. Took a long time to save up $150.

White's Coinmaster 1986

An old Relco in my early teens. I can't remember the model number, but one of the cheaper ones. It was almost a toy, but sure hooked me

Whites 63 TR. Spent every penny of my first summer job on that detector. Still have ‘Ol Blue’ in a case somewhere around here. Coin dealer in town sold it to me, Said it works great on the beach. He lied. No descrim in those days, just metal - mineral. Last time I tried, it still worked.

1979 Garrett ADS (minter) - wanted to learn it but too impatient so

bought a Fisher F2 - the rest is history

[www.earthscan.co.nz]

1975, traded my Saxophone for a White's Gold Master with the Metal / Mineral knob. No disc but I found a lot of goodies with it.

Garrett ADS Deepseeker and then a Compass X-80 Challenger shortly after that.

Boy 7th Hunter TR500 Outlaw. 1977.

Nautilus LF... green box, horseshoe handle. Still have it but retired. Found my first US boxplate with it.

XP DEUS* NAUTILUS 2B WITH WHITES ROD CONVERSION* LESCHE PIRANAH* LESCHE DIGGER* THE BOMB SHEATH* GARRETT ZLYNK PP W/ WIRELESS HEADPHONES* OLDEST COIN 1776 2 REALE*

White's GoldMaster 4B. Was on my own to figure the darn thing out but got there eventually.

In 1986 I bought my first machine, a Whites 6000 Di Pro, great machine, ergonomically horrible!

cpaman00@tctwest.net Wrote:
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> .... It was amazing what I found with that machine
> in those early days.

Not sure where you were hunting. Or what years you're referring to when you say "early days".

But talking to guys in my city , who started in the mid 1960s (early Whites BFO's, etc...), they were doing good to get 3" deep. Heck, my first machine, a 66TR, I was doing good to get 4 or 5" (although, by this time in the mid 1970s, that 66TR was a dinosaur, and other machines were getting deeper).

And no discrimination till the mid 1970s. Any earlier attempts at disc, and you'd be compromising your depth. So there was really no deepseeking disc. till the later 1970s.

For all these reasons, most of the old-timers you talk to, were not raking in coins "hand over fist", despite being in virgin times. Unless someone was wiser to the "correct spots", and were the first ones to ever work under the upside-down tilt-a-whirl rides at a carnival ground. So barring a few pioneering forward thinking souls: The early park and school yard and sandbox hunters, were doing good to get a few silvers a day. But ... I'm sure there were exceptions.

The real "leap forward", as I remember it, was when the 6000D and Red Baron came out. The first guys to use those in the old parks were getting a lot of silver. That was in about 1979 to '80-ish, is about when they started catching on, and being widely sold and understood.

I look back now, and kick myself for not going to certain places, and availing myself of the "right machines" when they first hit the market. But I was just in high school, then dealing with college, women, starting careers, growing up, etc....



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/20/2018 01:10AM by Tom_in_CA.

I was doing well at schoolyards back around 1968-70 is my D-Tex Tiny Tex BFO. Finding quarters dimes, pennies under and by the swings. Got me hooked. Then moved to the Coinmaster IV with disc. Raking in the coins, lots and lots. Then picked up a White's Coinmaster V, we had some great virgin schoolyards. Lots of silver. One schoolyard there was soo many coins we had to dump our pockets full of them every hour or so. About every 5th dime found was silver. Don't recall anything being more than 4" deep. Then some of us were pretty dumb, ran disc pretty high to get rid of foil and pulltabs. Kick myself for missing all the gold. There was always a couple who found several gold rings or so by each club meeting. Had we just lowered or disc setting some. Back then there was no one really there to educate us on detector use. We learned and didn't learn by trial and error. About 1977 or so switched to the Garrett Master hunter VLF/TR disc units and learned to relic hunt for War of 1812 stuff. Things began to look up.

DeepTech Vista X with 3 search coils.
Works for me

Sven1 Wrote:
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> I was doing well at schoolyards back around 1968-7
> 0 is my D-Tex Tiny Tex BFO. Finding quarters dimes
> , pennies under and by the swings. Got me hooked.
> Then moved to the Coinmaster IV with disc. Raking
> in the coins, lots and lots. Then picked up a Whit
> e's Coinmaster V, we had some great virgin schooly
> ards. Lots of silver. One schoolyard there was soo
> many coins we had to dump our pockets full of them
> every hour or so. About every 5th dime found was s
> ilver. Don't recall anything being more than 4" de
> ep. Then some of us were pretty dumb, ran disc p
> retty high to get rid of foil and pulltabs. Kick m
> yself for missing all the gold. There was always a
> couple who found several gold rings or so by each
> club meeting. Had we just lowered or disc setting
> some. Back then there was no one really there to e
> ducate us on detector use. We learned and didn't l
> earn by trial and error. About 1977 or so switche
> d to the Garrett Master hunter VLF/TR disc units a
> nd learned to relic hunt for War of 1812 stuff. Th
> ings began to look up.


Thanx for the nostalgic look back.

In the mid 1980s, I met a guy who had been stationed in New Zealand, while in the Navy during the early to mid 1970s ( I guess the Navy had some USA base there). Somehow , as an American, he was able to get a detector shipped there. And ..... to his knowledge, was the first one to ever swing a detector there. At least on the beach that was by his base !! A heavily used swimming beach, which had snack-stands right there on the beach. Ie.: the burger joint, the place to buy ice-cream, soda, beer, etc.... all fronted the sand. Ie.: the counters reached right out onto the sand, and people just lined up for decades, coins in hand, to buy refreshments.

He said that for months, all he ever needed to do was go to the sand in front of those snack stands, and dig countless endless coins in the sand. (probably could have just sifted them faster). None of them were particularly old. And he never branched out beyond his tiny little zone. Said he never needed to. Because any day he cared to walk to the beach, he could load up on 50 to 100 coins. Whatever it was he had, could only get 4" or so. But that was all he needed.

Fun topic; it's really neat to hear some of the "old timers" talking about how things "used to be," in terms of "virgin" ground!

The first machine I ever USED (briefly) was my grandfather's unit; he had died by the time I got my hands on his White's Goldmaster, with the blue box! I used it a bit, in the mid 1980s, as a teen, but I was too busy, and batteries too expensive, and with no instruction manual to even know how to set it up, I moved on from detecting for awhile -- foolishly, as I look back in hindsight. But that brief experience "planted a seed," for sure.

The first machine I bought, was a second-hand (or third- or fourth-) Radio Shack model of the Bounty Hunter SharpShooter II. I bought this in the late 1990s, and used it only occasionally. Then, in 2010, I decided to REALLY get into the hobby, moving quickly from the SharpShooter to a Bounty Hunter Time Ranger, and then to a Fisher F70...and then finally to an Explorer SE Pro -- all within that first year. From there, I owned several other "secondary" machines (including a Fisher Gold Bug Pro, and F19), but the Explorer remained my machine-of-choice for most hunting situations for the next 7 years, until I arrived at where I am now -- swinging the CTX 3030 and Equinox.

Steve

BigSkyGuy Wrote:
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> First detector was a toy purchased with green stam
> ps in 1975. It could find coins at 2-3 inches or s
> o. Second detector was a White's 5000-D in 1976 or
> 77. I was in Junior High School and paid about $15
> 0 for it using money earned mowing lawns, and work
> ing odd jobs. Took a long time to save up $150.

Green Stamps what was it H&H green stamp and back then you could also cash a book in for like 3-4 dollars. that brings back memories

u2robert Wrote:
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> Green Stamps what was it H&H green stamp and back
> then you could also cash a book in for like 3-4 do
> llars. that brings back memories

Robert,
I think it's S&H Green Stamps that you're remembering...

As I get older, I find different parts of my memories developing 'fog', LOL.


mike

Mike now that you said S&H it's right on. What was that back in the 60's and 70's and I believe they had S&H green stamp stores, is that right?