Do you find the AT Pro iron falses on wet salt beaches?

I've been doing some beach hunting lately with my AT Pro mostly in the wet sand. I am not finding a lot due to the beach I'm hunting at is deep in sand, and the desirable targets (gold rings) have most likely sank (and/or covered up) below detecting range. I am supprised thou at the Pro's ability to find other items/metals in the wet salty sand, and have quit digging targets that have any iron signal in them at all. I have passed a lot of targets doing so and began to wonder if I'm doing the right thing.

What are the experiences of others here using the AT Pro in the salt/ocean envirement? ...or even in normal soil. Have you found the AT Pro to ID a good target (copper, silver or gold) with the iron tone mixed in with the mid or high tone? Most of these have been bottle caps or small rusty pieces of iron that I found before finally beginning to pass on them, but I have also found new clad coins in this wet sand to have some iron tone mixed in with them. I just wonder if the salt mix in the wet ocean sand is/can cause the Pro to miss ID non-iron metals as having iron in them. I don't mind missing on the clad, but I sure don't want to miss targets of silver or gold because iron falsing on them.

If I had thought, I would have brought a couple of gold rings and a few silver coins to test it out. May have to go to a pawn shop or somewhere to purchase one. I wonder if any of those "We buy Gold" places would sell a ring at scrap price?

PS... I've changed the title of this post to better reflect what we're discussing. C.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/05/2012 06:36PM by connortn.

Haven't you been reading Keith's recent ATPro posts?

Yes, I just did :-) But he's discussing finding targets in a mass of nails and iron in normal (not saltwater beach) soil.

I'm not.

I'm discussing targeting a single item with no co-located targets near it. I'll hunt 5 or 10 minutes before I even find a target in this sand, so I don't think there's a lot of chance of all these iron tone targets mixed with mid tone (and ocassionally a quick high tone) being co-located with somthing good. They either have iron mixed in with them as it's composition, or the detector is iron falsing on non-ferrous targets. If it "is" iron falsing, I would like to know if it could be the salt envirement that's causing it. I don't remember hearing it iron falsing when I air tested it with desireable targets before, and it may not be doing that now. I've just never had the opertunity to test it in salt wet/sand before and don't know what to expect.

I'm running GB around 13 and Sen -3 notches. It's running surprizingly quiet except for when I bump it on the wet packed sand, and I've dug caps at 6-7 inches, and small 1/3 inch size pieces of flat thin rusty iron up to around 4+ inches. Clad coins are having the iron tone mixed in with them is what has got me worried. Like I said, I don't mind not digging the clad on the beach, but if it's iron falsing on them in the salty wet sand, could it be doing the same thing with other non-ferrous (gold, silver) targets?

connortn , I use an AT Pro on the salt beach up here in Maine, and I do dig the iron on the beaches, I try to size it first, and some times if it's a deep signal, it's not iron, I say over 6 inches down, it looses it's ability to tell what the metal is and at the deeper depths, everything is dumped into iron, granted I have never dug gold with the Pro, but, I just figured out my coil was cracked and it would go nuts after I got the coil wet, and I never gave the pro a favorable grade on the salt beaches, now I know why

Take a look at the pictures on the "what do I do" post on Findmall's AT Pro forum. This is not good and If it happens to all of these coils as they age Garrett will have a huge problem on their hands.

I was going to try the AT Pro but after seeing this I think I'll hold off for a while.

Some wet saltwater beaches you can't even GB on .....Your 13 number is about right for a lot of the SW beaches that I frequent ....... I keep my Sens. up high even though I get some noise ..... Most of the bottecaps that you will hit in the Saltwater will give up a Fuzzy low tone ......A lot of the iron ( unless it's in the sand itself as black sand ) will disintigrate anyway because of the saltwater ...... As Caretaker has already mentioned , after about 6 or 7 inches or so in WET salt sand , you will have different tones and mostly Iron tones mixed in ...... Heck , you're only digging sand !!!......Dig ALL you mixed tones .....Your iron tones will basically stay in the lower range frequencies with some falsing which you will be able to decipher by seeing if you get a repatable signal or not .... ..... The tone will jump around on other targets that are deeper than 6 or 7 inches ....... Remember also to RE Ground Balance when going from wet to dry sand .....The AT Pro does not do this on it's own ....If you notice the machine getting more noisy, you may have to RE GB your machine also ...... To be honest , I have found more jewelry and coins that are still in good shape in the dry going down the towel line than I do going down the lane in the wet .....I also get a a more accurate number and tone in the dry , not to mention MUCH deeper targets .....Jim

Iron identification with the AT is difficult sometimes even on dry inland site's..

I find the T2 and f75 I.D.'s iron too well and the AT while not quite the opposite will get fooled more...The iron roll audio helps unless the iron is deep then it just dig's it...

It works very well. Just different...

The harder part of running the AT is learnig IN DENSE IRON whats a false and a legitimate good target...

Oh sure you can get some stuff with ease...But to get the most out of the machine good target's will/can mimic iron sounding target's...

it's an easy machine to run or also if you really want to get stuff out of iron it's an advanced machine to run....

If you can get inside the audio and not become discouraged and are not lazy about target retrieval it will surprise you...

But thats the beauty of it...it's easy to run or it's complicated to run all in listening to the audio...

I am afraid alot of people though will never come to grips with the full potential of the audio...They will get alot out of the machine but there's more there if they really listen and trust their detector '6th sense'...

As far salt water beach use I have no truthful answer....But I would wager it works on the beach ..As well as some other VLF's..probably dead to low conductors though in salt

Keith



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/05/2012 06:50PM by Keith Southern.

Thanks guys. I've been working the wet sand pretty heavy during low tide. My reason being that people are swimming during high tide in the area that will be wet sand during low tide, and hopfully will find what they may have lost while swimming or frolicking around. I tried going out in the water but we're having 2 and 3 ft. waves right now. The current from the waves are pushing my coil towards the beach and then the opposite direction when the wave receides. It's as strong as some rivers I've been in. I have learned respect for you guys that battle the water in the ocean, especially during heavy waves. It's not for me :-) I'll stay on the sand!

Jim, I'm GB'ing on the wet sand around 13 and dry sand around 25+. I've found, as you said, I can run the sen. up to -1 bar most of the time. It falses anytime I bump my coil at that setting, but I'm always aware when I do, so I ignore the tones during those instances. I will run it a full sen for the time it takes to check out a weak signal in hopes that it will ID the target better. I am finding that on weak, faint signals that I can't PP them. It's like the coil nulls over the target area and sounds out when the coil is away from the target. Kinda opposite of what you normally hear. Don't know what causes this.

Every weak faint target that jumps around in numbers has been a very rusted thin piece of metal about 1/3 to 1/2 inch square. If they're close to the surface, they are blaringly loud and will sound off on all three tones, plus the numbers are very jumpy, from one extreme to the other. I've quit digging them as they're plentiful and have found nothing else that sounds like them. Square tabs are very distinct and never bounce around in sound, and only 1 or 2 numbers away from 53. Bottle caps can be like the small pieces of rusty iron, but if I slow the coil down, I can hear the "iron, mid, iron" or sometimes "iron, mid, high, mid, iron" sounds. Coins will still have a mix of iron in them, but if I pinpoint and swing short passes over the target, it will clear up a lot and generally settle down within 2 or 3 numbers of their normal ID. I think the salt is causing a lot of iron falsing.

I'm finding a shovel best for the wet sand. My wire mesh scoop clogs up too much if the sand is wet and is a dog to shake it hard enough to sift the sand thru. It's also too heavy for dry sand sifting, so will have to invest in a lightweight aluminum with wire mesh. I don't foresee using my heavier SS scope, so it may go up for sale.

I can understand the dry sand bit. It's muuuccch easier to work in, and you're right about getting better depth. If I had the fore-mentioned light weight sifter, I'd spend my time there during high tide. Much more trash, but as you said, it's only sand.

Thanks for the help fellows, and hope some of this will be of use to someone else.

I'm also editing the title of this post to better reflect the subject better.

C.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/05/2012 06:38PM by connortn.

If you have your iron discriminated , you will get a null , and if you are moving at a pretty good clip , the iron signal will null , and you will get a falsing tone that will be a high tone ....... When you get these tones after the null , sweep 90 detgree's to the way you just swept and sweep slower over the same area .....If you do NOT get a repeatable tone , there's a good chance that you are only hearing a falsing tone from the iron that is nulling ...... A good percentage of the time , when you sweep 90 degree's to the target and also other angles and you get a repeatable tone , you will find that you have hit a target ....If the tone is NOT repeatable in other directions , there is a good possibility that there is NO good target ..... Jim

Jim...
I'm running Iron Disc at 40 but iron "on", so I'm hearing the iron. If it gets too noisy with it on (as in the dry sand sometimes), I'll turn the iron off. I'll turn it back on briefly to check a good sounding target.

The nulling is coming from trying to PP a weak target, usually an iron tone or iron/mid tone mixed. I can't get a PP on them "sometimes", and if it happens, if I move the coil over to the side maybe 6-8 inches, then I get a PP sound everywhere the target isn't. It sounds like I'm pinpointing too close to my target and losing it, but I'm not (PPing too close to my target, that is). I tried PPing in the air and bringing it down to the target area, and same results. I'm sure the salt content is causing it, just don't know why.

Imagine hearing a very weak target signal, just a spit or quick crackle. I'll turn the sen up to max to see if I can make it come thru better. Whether or not I can make it come thru better, I will set the coil down about 8-12 inches away from the target, push the PP button and slowly move the coil over the suspected target. There are times when the target will not PP for whatever reason (too deep to PP or ?) and when my coil goes the 8-12 inches past the target area, I "then" get the PP sound. The surrounding wet sand is setting my PP sound off. It's like the PP is set to go off over the wet salty sand, and null over the target. Doesn't happen a lot, but when it does, I have been passing the target up.

I'm thinking I may be passing up some potentially good targets because of the iron flaks I mentioned before being so numerous, and so far if it's a spit or crackle all that I've dug have been the rusty iron, so I'm not digging them anymore, especially if it nulls out while PPing.

If you can't get a good repeatable signal , it sounds like falsing to me .......By " repeatable " I mean checking the target by sweeping the coil over the target area in multiple angles .....Jim