Beach Hunting Advice Needed

[Anonymous]

I will be taking my new Explorer XS to the beach in a couple of weeks. I am totally new to metal detecting, but have spent several weeks getting to know the Explorer here at my home. My question is this; Are there any Explorer settings that would be better to use at the beach. I hope to be doing a lot of detecting the week that I am there. Currently I am detecting in the Smartfind, Factory Preset settings. If anyone can give me some advice about using the Explorer at the beach it would be greatly appreciated. Also, any helpful hints about beach detecting in general, where is the best place to search, etc., etc., would also be appreciated. Like I said, I am new to this hobby, have never done any beach metal detecting, and really have no idea how to start. Thanks alot and happy hunting.

 

[Anonymous]

Curtis, I'm not primarily a beach hunter --wish I was but live too far away-- but if I was hitting the beach I would plan to hunt in Iron Mask mode set anywhere between a -6 and a -10. Also, I would plan to dig everything, if it beeps I'd dig it and dig as much as possible as fast as possible --the more you dig the closer you get to that gold ring, they are there and can fall in any conductivity level. Also I would run Manual sensitivity set as high as possible but no higher than to where I could still obtain at least a 50% threshold.
I would also mostly work the wet sand and look for any cuts or troughs.
GL/HH

 

[Anonymous]

I have been doing some detecting this year here at my local freshwater beach with some luck.I like to use ironmask set at -13 and my sens. set at 32 auto and my gain set at 7.It really will get the small stuff that will annoy you at times,but the cool little earrings you will find will make up for that.
Small thin gold rings will read off of the bottom of the screen and to the left towards the bottom left corner of the screen,that is why I like running with iron mask at -13 so those for sure do not get discriminated out.A higher setting on ironmask would still get them,but on the beach I do not take any chances and dig anything that is not in the very upper left corner.
When I get a signal that will not repeat good,I will switch from 32 auto to 32 manual for that target and try to get it to repeat.If that still does not work I will up the gain to 9 to try and get it to lock on.It also helps with pinpointing small targets to up the gain on individual targets that has weak and/or broken signals.These signals that I do all this,usually,more times than not,are small targets,which at best turn out to be small earrings but still could turn out to be small thin gold rings.I probably waste too much time on these signals,but I try and find everything.Make sure if you change these settings for a target to change them back.
Hope this will help you some.Make sure you try all of the suggestions you get because some might work better for you than others at your beach you will hunt.