is there a way

[smartfox]

to find all gold, silver and coins or maybe just gold or just silver or just coins without having to put up with all that metal garbage? does discrimination have something to do with it? thanks in advance.

[bigjohn]

yep turn ya disc. to get rid of foil,pulltabs,screwcaps, oh ya and flatened beer cans.. then ya got real big iron and ?

nope dig it. if ya got a spot that heavy in .22 brass or 12 gauge try to disc just that out you will lose stuff but i had a spot that had 100S of .22 brass disc. out and found a cw officer's sword plate keeper. some machines will tell ya by the tone. miss john can tell a new dime to a old //merc. just by the sound of her cz-3d. when i post pics of my finds ya dont see the trash that comes with it.

[bill(de)]

In a perfect world .. Yes !!

But nothings perfect so ..No !!

Some sites allow fairly easy target ID such as low trash and mineralization conditions, little iron contamination and no hotrocks or fertilizer applications, and lest we not forget electrical interference.

It gets better with the more sophisticated detector but even they have trouble at times.Since you mentioned having to put up with all the metal garbage and does discrimination have anything to do with it ?

Absolutely YES !!!

It basically boils down to knowing your detector and what settings work best for the conditions at that site, what coil to use, and how confident you are with all the information provided to dig the target. Some are easy and some are not and usually the best finds are made by those that are surprised at what they dug. Just a thought, HH Bill

[Tony]

I have seen numerous posts refering to "hot rocks" When your digging your hole and you come across rocks and nothing else can I assume they are hot rocks? Are they a certain kind of rock? What do they look like? I almost broke the point of my Lesche hitting those darnrocks and then to add insult to injury not find anything

Bill(de) posted this a while ago. Perhaps his explanation will help you.


Since no responses yet i'm gonna try to answer as best i can in amateur speak and post a url from the man, Mr. George Payne who was one of pioneers in the development of the modern motion, discrimination detectors we enjoy today.
Mineralized ground is either natural or man-made and sometimes a combination of both. Hotrocks,natural minerals,decomposing iron,modern fertilizers all contribute towards the so called mineralized soil. At the ocean beaches the detector reacts to salt which is a mineral as a lower conductive metal and will produce either a solid beep response or just go nuts coming off the dry sand , especially with high sensitivty settings

Some of our parks and other sites were possibly backfilled with demolition from all types of old construction and will cause hissy fits to detectors and many of us consider that mineralized conditions.

If you are in highly mineralized soil many detectors become unstable and will not be stable at the factory presets for normal use. Some detectors can ground balance out some of the mineralization but many can't and you must lower sensitivity settings and use smaller concentric or DD coils etc. to hunt these sites.

If using a detector that has no ground balance adjustment and the factory has established what is the best overall setting you only adjust (lower) sensitivity and raise discrimination levels to help overcome the mineralization

If using a detector that has a manual or automatic Ground Balance ,you find the cleanest ground you can find in 0 disc or all metal and GB at that spot adjust sensitivity and hunt but allow for some possible falsing.

If using a ground tracking detector is best IMHO to take a few swings in the cleanest ground you can find and lock GB when detector is most stable and adjust sensitivity to particular site.

Here's a perfect explanation of the knowlege that developed our modern detectors GB system.
http://www.buriedcrap.com/buriedcrap...n&ContentID=56

Not sure if this ithe answer Don but it's best i can come up with. HH Bill

[smartfox]

I've heard that if you discriminate too much you can also lose valuable stuff. is that true?

From what I have experienced that is VERY true.
I passed up a nice ring using to much discrimination and my buddy was right behind me and got it. I might add with a loud tone.

[smartfox]

thanks boobie

[Tony]

Thanks Boobie on the hot rocks question. I read the George Payne article. A little deep but after a couple of readings I think I understand it.

[Joe(TX)]

For parks and schoolyards I'd use a notch type detector and concentrate on the nickel and screwcap type signals. This way you are stacking the deck in your favor! Of course I wouldn't do this at the beach, Where I would hunt in either zero discriminate or very low discriminate to at least pickup the nickels. The reason for this is that jewelry is more favorable to find because of the water and suntan lotion on one's hands. Also the beach induces rough housing type behavior that helps one to lose jewelry. And of course the sand is soft and very easy to dig and sift thru so digging every target is not that hard to do and doesn't take that much more time! Good Luck.....