jackintexas said:
I have found 116 gold rings.
Was that 116 gold rings just this year? Impressive, then again, I hunt some sort of a beach maybe one or two times in any given year so they haven't been great jewelry producers for me.
jackintexas said:
I find that most gold rings come in the foil range.After all who wears the most gold rings. Women. And they most often wear several at once. If they were heavy rings they would not wear several. I believe about 60% of gold rings (womens) are to be found in the foil range.
In fifty years of avid detecting I have found 2 gold rings that had a VDI read-out in the 1¢
/10¢ range. Both were made in Hong Kong and marked [size=small](when translated)[/size] 24K or actually "100% gold" as it was read to me. Back in the late '70s I evaluated a lot of gold and silver jewelry using different models that I had and used, adjusting the Discrimination to see where some of the gold fell out. With some of the models out there, the minimum Discrimination setting was still too high to respond to some of the gold chains and very thin children's gold rings or many small pendants and ear rings.
In about late '84 I tinkered with some of the Target ID detectors, checking both the Discrimination acceptance level on the lower end, and the visual Target ID display. It still confirmed what I had learned years before, that a lot of the thin gold jewelry, based upon it's alloy make-up, size, shape and position, 'read' very low and many detectors wouldn't respond to a lot of it in the Discriminate mode.
Also, confirmed with those early TID models that had a range or band for 'TABS" that was just a bit above the US 5¢ coin, is where only a few typical women's rings and most men's gold rings ranged [size=small](through 5¢ 'nickel' coins up into the old ring-pull tab range)[/size], while the vast majority of gold rings and other gold jewelry I found might read ± the 5¢ zone and down into the very low FOIL or into the upper IRON range. Most of the gold jewelry was women's, but some larger gold, like thick men's neck chains, did run up-scale.
Tesoro acknowledged the poor gold detection capability and in March of '90 came out with their Bandido model which featured what Jack Gifford referred to as ED-120 Discrimination. That Expanded or Enhanced Discrimination range improved the very low conductive target detection. While some other manufacturers still had a few models that did adjust down low like that, I noticed more low-conductive range improvement in the Discrimination circuitry across the board in years that followed. I had been finding some thin or small low-conductive gold jewelry with the White's models I was using and a lot of 'average' or 'typical' size gold using my Tesoro's and the copy-cat circuitry Gold Mountain Technology Cobra and GMT-1650 models, and a few others.
My years of results would suggest that maybe more like 80% of the women's and child's gold rings fall in the small to lower FOIL range, while some read down into an upper IRON range, as do most ear rings, thin to medium gold chains, and a lot of the smaller gold pendants. The rest ranged up from there into and through the NICKEL and TAB range.
jackintexas said:
My saying is I don't have the time or the back to dig every pull tab.
I have ample time, but I am with you when it comes to a very functional and endurance level back .... that's sure a limiting part of the game plan.
Still, even though I don't care for pull tabs and similar conductive range junk, I do like gold rings and other 'keepers' that fall in that range. Some old Trade Tokens fall in there as well as other goodies. So, for me, a lot depends upon the site I am hunting. I never use more Discrimination than just barely enough to reject common iron nails ... or lower to zero ... and I might glance at a VDI read-out [size=small](which I prefer to use than a TID 'zone')[/size] but still recover the target.
Like I said, a lot depends on the site you search and because the getty-down and getty-up routine is slow and painful, I don't even hunt grassy areas like I used to ... if I can help it. Most of my time is concentrated on non-urban areas, old locations, or renovation work, and when I do hunt in bigger towns, most of the time is spent making "marathon runs" around to woodchip and sand-filled playgrounds. Yes, pull tabs and trash are there, but so are a lot of gold rings and coins and recovery is simple. I only bend down and pick up a target after I toe-scuff the material to get to it. Of course since about 90% or more of the targets I 'scuff up' are at least partly visible, I can use the 'ignore' method and not bend over to get the pull tabs.
I just scuff them aside to check the spot and make sure no good targets were being masked.
jackintexas said:
Check all of your wife's or girl friends rings with your detector.
You are right, but I don't have a wife or a girl friend anymore so I just rely on all the results I get afield that keeps confirming past results.
jackintexas said:
Almost all white gold and platinum rings fall in the foil range.
I find more yellow gold, and a lot of it is in that FOIL range.
jackintexas said:
Depending on the site....if at a beach or swimming area I dig everything but coins. Why waste time digging clad coins when looking for gold. That time could be spent looking for gold rings.
I still recover coins and other keepers and just keep hoping good gold or silver jewelry will come my way.
jackintexas said:
If at a site loaded with pull tabs I will probably notch out everything but nickels and foil. I don't even want to hear the coins, otherwise I may stop and dig them. In the nickel and foil range only, you will not dig many targets. Beaver tails, can slaw or large foil.
I never use Notch Discrimination, and I don't mind recovering coins. For decades now I have cleaned and counted all of a year's "flash money" to take to the back for Christmas shopping money, as well as sell my gold and silver jewelry. Again, it depends on where we live, the sites we can hunt, and the time and effort we put into it, but before I moved to a very small Eastern Oregon town in September of last year, most of my life I have lived in the large metro area of Portland Oregon. There you will, find a lot of parks and schools with woodchip or sand-filled playgrounds and volleyball courts and in almost any year my Coin Finds Tally just about matched the $$$ income as selling all of my Gold and Silver Jewelry. There were a few exceptions, but that was a normal expectation.
jackintexas said:
My best ring find appraised for $2000.00. Found at a swimming area. During a drought. What used to be water was then dry land.
My best gold rings were valued at over $12,000, about $8,000 and one at $4,250. I located to owners of the last two, and the first one I found on a contract search. Otherwise, the best I found and converted to $$$ for myself was just under that $2000 mark, and it sure doesn't happen often.
I said I am not much of a beach hunter but there is a popular use beach about an hour-and-a-half drive from where I live. I haven't hunted that big river beach yet, but I plan to this coming spring and I hope it has plenty of keepers to find, both coins and jewelry.
Best of success to you in your jewelry hunting!
Monte
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