On February 10, 2013 will complete the first 3 years of metal detecting. Although it started out very slow, I’m very pleased with the gold/platinum finds. The peak period was from July 13, 2011 until July 17, 2012, in which I made at least 100 gold/platinum finds, but from July 18, 2012 to Feb 10, 2013 only 12.
This post will display the gold finds for 2010 only. The next post will be for 2011, and the 3rd will be for 2012. On each post, I’ll indicate what I’ve learned that year about detecting gold. This 1st one is very long-winded because for some reason or another, this 1st 17 gold finds were very memorable, so excuse all the specifics.



The 2010 year started out very slow. It took nearly 4 months to find my first gold, (at least one that I knew was gold and didn’t throw away). As a matter of fact, the first 12 gold finds were mostly accidental. They were either close enough to the nickel range to think they might be nickels, or were dug out of curiosity. Out of the 3 years of detecting, only 4 gold finds were from parks, the rest were from beaches or saltw@ter shorelines.

The first gold was the small gold opal ring at the bottom left. It was in a shallow-buried modern coin spill, and I thought it was a nickel. The other 3 park gold finds were the 3rd and 4th class rings on the 1st row, and the 7-point “UAOD” star at the bottom right (United Ancient Order of Druids). All 3 were from buffalo nickel hunting. Broke the 3rd ring on the 1st row during recovery.

The first beach/saltw@ter shoreline gold find was the last ring on the 2nd row (with the split in the front). A rocky location was loaded with corroded buffalo nickels and several V-nickels. It was in the nickel range (before splitting). It had a reddish brownish copper color, and I thought it was a copper compression fitting of some sort. I was about to put it in the trash pouch when I saw the “14” stamp without the “K”, but still wasn’t convinced it was gold because of the copper color. After getting back, soaked it in a salt-vinegar solution for 30 minutes, and then a baking soda rubdown. The gold color came out! After an extensive overcleaning, more salt-vinegar and electrolysis, the ring’s solder joint eventually gave out, and the ring split. I faintly recall a very thin copper colored band with a very low conductivity reading that I found several weeks earlier at another beach, but without thinking, discarded it in the trash pouch. That was a very important lesson on how saltw@ter can, over time, discolor 14k gold and lower.

The next beach gold was pure luck, a 1945 class ring 2nd in the 1st row. At a rocky location where I had found a 1905 Barber half, less than a meter away I got a deep wheat penny. Using the Sunray Target Probe, a 2nd signal was in a lower side wall of the hole, and had a conductivity of around 08, something I would normally avoid digging in those days. Turned out to be a beautiful 10k gold ring, with only a few green corrosion globs. After that, the minimum conductivity that I would consider digging dropped down to around 05. The next gold was from the rocky buffalo nickel area, a diamond ring in the nickel range (3rd in the last row). Then next day came a thin gold ring at 06 conductivity a few meters away from the diamond find. The next 2 rings (1st and last on the 1st row) were found the same day.

Then next gold (2nd ring on the 2nd row) I broke while cleaning, my 2nd “broken gold ring of shame”. It had the green corrosion globs at certain locations around the ring. After the salt-vinegar bath, electrolysis, and baking soda rubdowns, it cleaned up beautifully, and I should have left it alone. But it was oval in shape, and I thought I could reshape it by applying a little pressure at both ends. Well, the ring broke in half, fell on the carpet, and both halves broke in half. A once beautiful 10k plumb ring was now in 4 pieces. The glued results are evident. The lesson here was 9k/10k gold with green globs can become brittle, because part of the alloy leaches out of the gold during the corrosion process. Extensive cleaning in salt-vinegar and electrolysis can further weaken the low carat gold, and weaken the solder joints. This lesson still cost several more future gold finds in 2011 and 2012.

The next gold, 3rd on the 2nd row, was found by checking the low tide waterline while heading back. Got a strong signal that I thought was a pull-tab, turned out to be gold. Several meters later, got a high ferrous-reading signal in the nickel range. Switched to an all-metal pattern and it read 35-17. Being near the gold find, a curiosity dig revealed a nickel that read around 12-15 out of the ground. This was an extremely important nickel find. It told me that high mineralization and very high iron rust could adversely affect the ferrous reading, and slightly increase the conductivity reading on the E-trac. This led to a modification of the discrimination pattern from discriminating everything below a ferrous reading of around 27 to using a couple of lines of discrimination at the bottom for conductivity 01 to around 30, and keeping 31 to 50 conductivity discriminated below 27.
The gold ring and nickel were near an area that had a lot of extremely rusted iron junk of varying size, and caused an unbearable amount of falsing when using a high manual sensitivity. I’m pretty sure that most previous detectorists skipped over this area because of the very bad conditions. The next day, hit that area and pulled out 2 gold rings, the Crucifix ring 4th in the last row, and the white gold ring 4th in the 2nd row. After several more visits, got 2 more gold rings in 1 day, the 1st in the 2nd row, and 5th in the last row. The last gold detected there was a small diamond ring, 2nd in the last row. The last 5 gold ring finds was the first time that I had specifically hunted for gold, and found it.
The lesson here was careful sweep control could limit falsing in such a bad area. Lowering the amount of discrimination on low conductive targets probably increased detection depth (or say, lowered partial discrimination which causes a partially broken signal), and targeting mainly low conductive targets and digging them regardless of the ferrous reading also helped.

The posts for 2011 and 2012 will be shorter.

Detecting since Feb, 2010
E-trac with 18"x15" SEF, 13" Ultimate coil, Pro coil, Minelab 8" coil, 4.5"x7" SEF, Sunray target probe
CTX3030 with 17"x13" DD coil, 11" DD coil

Great Post!.

Liked the write up and the pictures.

Congrats on your gold!

HH
Mike

Lot of gold Congrat's.

Enjoyed reding about it.

Keith

VERY nice account on your learning-curve! When you found that 10K ring that ID'd around '08'........ prompting you to start digging targets that ID'd down to '05' (subsequently.... finding a ring that ID'd '06' )............. did you ever lower your 'conductive' ID expectations any further?

All I can think to say is: WOW!!! And then the next word that comes to mind is: CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!! You definitely deserve it!!! Good work!!!!

Congrats Diggs! Some really nice gold and great information on your learning curve on gold and the machine you are using. Look forward to hearing the rest of your installments.

Man that's alot of gold
Congrats

NASA-Tom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> VERY nice account on your learning-curve! When you
> found that 10K ring that ID'd around '08'........
> prompting you to start digging targets that ID'd
> down to '05' (subsequently.... finding a ring that
> ID'd '06' )............. did you ever lower your
> 'conductive' ID expectations any further?


The first gold item that had a 01 conductivity came from a curiosity dig, a small, hollow, Italian 10k heart pendant. Because it was hollow, it was just below the surface. Although I expected a piece of foil, it was a quick, easy dig. At that time, I made the mistake of assuming that because it was small and hollow, it would have a very low conductivity.

Around the fall of 2011, started hunting the middle and lower beach areas after the tide went out from those areas. As the conductivity of small gold items detected dropped down to 02 (a small non-broken gold ring), that’s when it finally kicked in. That small gold rings could have a conductivity all the way down to 01.

I don’t recall when I started using no discrimination on low conductive targets (an all-metal pattern on the left 3/5s of the screen), but it was a result of finding small gold at the beach.

Detecting since Feb, 2010
E-trac with 18"x15" SEF, 13" Ultimate coil, Pro coil, Minelab 8" coil, 4.5"x7" SEF, Sunray target probe
CTX3030 with 17"x13" DD coil, 11" DD coil

I have a fairly large 10Kt white gold ring that ID's as '02'............ and many, many (especially white) gold rings/pendents/charms/earrings etc......... that ID as '01' on ML Explorer.

Great write-up. Congrats on the awesome finds!

You mention that several of those rings hit "in the nickel range." I have spent a year now focusing on digging a large number of "nickel" signals, looking for the elusive gold ring. I know that many will come in much lower, but in trashy parks, this is where I've decided to start. So far, I've gained plenty of experience digging pull tabs , and my nickel digs have increased dramatically (including a Buff and two Jeffs just last night.) BUT -- not a single gold ring has been found in the nickel range for me yet. I'm really surprised that hundreds of pull tabs and nickels have made their way into my pouch without a single "nickel-reading" gold ring. The only gold ring I have found so far was a year ago -- it rang in the zinc range, and turned out to be a broken, bent-up 10K ring.

Bottom line, seeing that much gold from your first year of digging is really, really amazing to me.

NICE JOB!

Steve

Very nice write-up... refreshing change of pace... beautiful photo of terrific recoveries. Reminds me of years ago water hunting except that we tended to find a much higher ratio of wedding bands at our freshwater beaches. You've done very well Digs_alot, and deserve a hearty clap on the back!! Congratulations...

Jim.

NASA-Tom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have a fairly large 10Kt white gold ring that
> ID's as '02'............ and many, many
> (especially white) gold
> rings/pendents/charms/earrings etc......... that
> ID as '01' on ML Explorer.


The only white gold in 2010 was 14k, weighs 6.87g, and air-tests at 12-15. This beach generally produces older gold, and a rare white gold ring. Of the 4 white gold rings found, 3 were from this beach.

ID = inner diameter

carat ID   grams depth  FE-CO  max depth  description
18k   15    2.42   4”   12-03     7”      750 white gold
14k   19    6.87   4”   12-15     8”      white gold
14k   16.5  2.81   4”   12-02     6”      2 tone white gold with diamonds
14k   17    1.14   4”   12-01     5”      tiny white gold with diamond

The smaller white gold rings all had very low conductivity readings.

Detecting since Feb, 2010
E-trac with 18"x15" SEF, 13" Ultimate coil, Pro coil, Minelab 8" coil, 4.5"x7" SEF, Sunray target probe
CTX3030 with 17"x13" DD coil, 11" DD coil

A man on a mission with a metal detector,... Amazing.

HH
Johnb

steveg Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Great write-up. Congrats on the awesome finds!
>
> You mention that several of those rings hit "in
> the nickel range." I have spent a year now
> focusing on digging a large number of "nickel"
> signals, looking for the elusive gold ring. I
> know that many will come in much lower, but in
> trashy parks, this is where I've decided to start.
> So far, I've gained plenty of experience digging
> pull tabs , and my nickel digs have increased
> dramatically (including a Buff and two Jeffs just
> last night.) BUT -- not a single gold ring has
> been found in the nickel range for me yet. I'm
> really surprised that hundreds of pull tabs and
> nickels have made their way into my pouch without
> a single "nickel-reading" gold ring. The only
> gold ring I have found so far was a year ago -- it
> rang in the zinc range, and turned out to be a
> broken, bent-up 10K ring.
>
> Bottom line, seeing that much gold from your first
> year of digging is really, really amazing to me.
>
> NICE JOB!
>
> Steve


Of all my gold/platinum finds to date, only 4 have been from parks. Since I started finding gold at beaches and shorelines, searching for gold in parks has been extremely undesirable.

The “nickel range” can vary depending on the type of coil you use and the Noise Cancel number you use. The higher Noise Cancel numbers tend to have a higher conductivity reading for coins in ground. A very worn, saltw@ter corroded buffalo or V-nickel has read as low as 09 (a worn down shield nickel 08), but usually they read around 11. In very mineralized wet sand with a high Noise Cancel number, a newer, slightly corroded nickel can read as high as 17.

If I recall correctly, modern nickels in parks generally read from 13 up to around 15, but I have found a buffalo nickel at the base of a tree that had a solid 18 conductivity in ground, this was around the time I got the 3rd ring in the 1st row, several meters away. Thought it was another buffalo nickel. Once again, it was unexpected and pure luck.

Unfortunately there is no conductive zone that is exclusive to gold/silver rings. They cluster around 12Fe in neutral soil but any target with a conductivity from 01Co to 47Co could be a ring. Generally, if the conductivity is greater than 36Co the ring is silver and if from 01-36Co it will be yellow gold with white gold toward the lower Co numbers. Very pure and/or larger silver rings will be in the upper-right corner (of an E-Trac) at 05-10Fe and 48-49Co (you wouldn't miss those).

This means, the 21st foil to pull-tab reading that you receive after wasting time digging up the other 20, may instead be a fantastic 14K gold ring with large diamonds embedded in it. That ubiquitous penny reading at 12-41 could also be a small silver ring waiting to be found. Those nasty round tabs at 12-25 could also be a medium sized gold ring a few inches down. That beaver-tail pull-tab signal at 12-18 might be a nice yellow-gold ring too. That round tab without the tail at 12-11Co could actually be a somewhat smaller gold ring. Another bullet casing signal at 12-05 could instead be a medium-sized white gold ring just as readily. All those thin foil wrappers that read at 12-03 or even at 12-01 could be a great looking smallish slim yellow or small 14K white gold ring perhaps with a small stone in it.

The moral of the story is: you just have to dig all repeatable signals and take out the trash to get the gold. No way around it.

So when you see someone who has accumulated a pile of gold rings you know they worked for it - and hard. They took out the trash.

The one question I have: why is saltwater spelled saltw@ter?

Johnnyanglo Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Unfortunately there is no conductive zone that is
> exclusive to gold/silver rings. They cluster
> around 12Fe in neutral soil but any target with a
> conductivity from 01Co to 47Co could be a ring.
> Generally, if the conductivity is greater than
> 36Co the ring is silver and if from 01-36Co it
> will be yellow gold with white gold toward the
> lower Co numbers. Very pure and/or larger silver
> rings will be in the upper-right corner (of an
> E-Trac) at 05-10Fe and 48-49Co (you wouldn't miss
> those).
>
> This means, the 21st foil to pull-tab reading that
> you receive after wasting time digging up the
> other 20, may instead be a fantastic 14K gold ring
> with large diamonds embedded in it. That
> ubiquitous penny reading at 12-41 could also be a
> small silver ring waiting to be found. Those nasty
> round tabs at 12-25 could also be a medium sized
> gold ring a few inches down. That beaver-tail
> pull-tab signal at 12-18 might be a nice
> yellow-gold ring too. That round tab without the
> tail at 12-11Co could actually be a somewhat
> smaller gold ring. Another bullet casing signal at
> 12-05 could instead be a medium-sized white gold
> ring just as readily. All those thin foil wrappers
> that read at 12-03 or even at 12-01 could be a
> great looking smallish slim yellow or small 14K
> white gold ring perhaps with a small stone in it.
>
> The moral of the story is: you just have to dig
> all repeatable signals and take out the trash to
> get the gold. No way around it.
>
> So when you see someone who has accumulated a pile
> of gold rings you know they worked for it - and
> hard. They took out the trash.
>
> The one question I have: why is saltwater spelled
> saltw@ter?


At another forum, certain works are censored out, even when they are inside of other words. There are 4 consecutive letters inside of saltw@ter that could be offensive, and the @ masks that word from the censor program.

Detecting since Feb, 2010
E-trac with 18"x15" SEF, 13" Ultimate coil, Pro coil, Minelab 8" coil, 4.5"x7" SEF, Sunray target probe
CTX3030 with 17"x13" DD coil, 11" DD coil

Nickel range gold rings idea probably originated from people who were searching for U.S. coins, including nickels. Periodically, they would get lucky and detect a gold ring instead of a nickel.

As Johnnyanglo indicated, the gold jewelry range on the E-trac can range from 01 conductivity on up. A large 24k gold ring would probably read nearly as high as a silver ring.

The difference between beach aluminum trash and park aluminum trash is that the tides can move much of the lightweight junk into predictable areas, or digging a lot of lightweight trash targets can indicate to you where not to search. The tides can do much of the target sorting by density, making it easier to locate denser targets. Also saltw@ter can eventually break down lightweight aluminum trash over time.

Parks are a different story. Trash just accumulates and accumulates over the decades at a much faster rate than the occasionally lost gold item. And the trash just sits there, masking older, deeper buried targets. In my opinion, it’s more of a random luck thing to locate park gold than targets in a beach tidal zone.

If someone has found a more efficient way of locating park gold, it sure would be nice if they would post it.

Detecting since Feb, 2010
E-trac with 18"x15" SEF, 13" Ultimate coil, Pro coil, Minelab 8" coil, 4.5"x7" SEF, Sunray target probe
CTX3030 with 17"x13" DD coil, 11" DD coil

On most brands of detectors........... the 'nickel' ID window is quite (excessively) wide.......... and will find a bit more rings; hence, the resultant.

*** If someone has found a more efficient way of locating park gold, it sure would be nice if they would post it. ***

One wonders where the detectorist here have found the majority of their rings?

At parks, schools, lakes, or the beach?

Where within a park has the highest probability for success and likewise what location(s) at a beach?

How deep on average would you expect to find such rings?

Baseball field = 'outfield'
Under the larger/largest tree(s) in a park
Wet slope & in the water

When jewelry hunting on land you determine the jewelry item's loss characteristics. Figure out why it was lost where you found it, then search out other places where that loss can be replicated. Inland jewelry is replenished all the time just like at the beach. The loss characteristics are repeated over and over again. There is nothing like proving out a particular loss characteristic by making repeated finds at simular sites. That is satisfaction!

Once you get a few loss charateristics proven, you can hunt jewelry from your computer by looking at ariel images and then go recover it with your detector. The best thing is that you can't hunt that type of site out. You just go back periodically and hunt it again.

This type of hunting changes your detector selection and priorities. Efficiency becomes the name of the game.

HH
Mike

Johnnyanglo Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> *** If someone has found a more efficient way of
> locating park gold, it sure would be nice if they
> would post it. ***
>
> One wonders where the detectorist here have found
> the majority of their rings?
>
> At parks, schools, lakes, or the beach?
>
> Where within a park has the highest probability
> for success and likewise what location(s) at a
> beach?
>
> How deep on average would you expect to find such
> rings?

Personally most of mine have been in the shallow water(plus some diving). depths will vary with bottom conditions (inland detecting)

Most of the gold ring finds Ive made on land(parks or sport fields) ID either as foil or square tab, and most are stuck in the roots ie. 3" or less. Many of the rings can been seen once the grass has been parted.

For those that dont jewelry hunt on land much, Mr Hillis nailed it out of the park!

understanding your machine(s) (and/or where to use them) is much more important than having a high-dollar flag-ship to do the job.

Thanks for the replies.

To encapsulate:

The broad answer as to where to start looking for rings is:

1. Beaches - wet sand along beach
2. Beaches - in the shallow water
3. Parks - ball fields (particularly the outfield)
4. Parks - under old, large trees in the roots

The narrower answer is to determine why the ring loss occurred and look for similarities to other locations for repeatable results.

This is fascinating info, guys, about land-hunting jewelry.

I realize completely that gold is all over the scale -- my only reason for focusing in the nickel area is that in that area (the 05-07 conductive range on my Explorer), a decent number of the finds will actually be nickels (along with junk). In other words, some "reward" is likely for this somewhat impatient hunter who doesn't like coming home with a pouch full of beaver tails and foil, and nothing else! If I dug all 03-04 conductive signals, for instance, in the average park, I'd dig all day, and come home with nothing but trash on a vast majority of hunts. Anyway, my point is that while I realize that a bunch of gold will lie outside the nickel range, this is where I've focused my attention so far, at least in trashy parks.

Also, it's a good point Digs_alot that nickels hit differently on an FBS unit depending upon the noise cancel number. I have noticed this myself, very clearly. I keep my noise cancel in the "mid-range" most times, with nickels coming in around 06 CO, because if I raise or lower it, it seems that the nickels begin to overlap more with certain common pieces of trash. I tend to dig much more trash when running higher or lower noise cancel and trying for nickels.

Stecve

Life is about ratios/time/efficiency.
Maximize ALL of them!

You are not a cat. You do not have 9-lives. Only but one. Life is not a dress-rehearsal/dry-run. It's the real McCoy. Do it right the first time!