Nails

[weequay]

Today was the maiden voyage. I did find a 2 cent piece.

However, I found myself digging a lot of nails, usually a few in a cluster--they sounded good and hit in the 'coin range'.
I was using Gonehunting's program + some discrim.

Does anyone have any advice how to recognize nails?

 

[firefighter254]

how much discrimination are you using i had the same problem at first but i discrim out from the bottom up to the 28 to 30 fe line no more falsing you could also try discriminating just the bottom right corner up to the 28 fe line good luck

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CTX 3030
Etrac
whites m6
pro pointer
Ulster County NY
Youtube Channel http://www.youtube.com/user/firefighter2542005

 

[Smack]

What TID information were you getting?

 

[Gonehunting]

I have noticed that too only when it wasn't a real solid left to right tone or vice versa... I dug 32 iffy's the second Saturday I had the machine,, the tone would only hit on one side of the target. Say from left to right I got a good tone but from right to left I didn't. or vice versa.. If it did not repeat on almost every swing, I considered it iffy, I would also change the direction I came in on the target. Of the 32, I dug "0" were good. (28 I wrote down and documented how many nails where in the hole and would quit counting in each hole at 5). 23 holes were either a "cluster" of nails, mostly roofing nails or really large nails. 10 nails were large and bent. 2 were from deep rusted iron pieces 16 were cluster of more than 5. 24 tones were in the 12-40 to 12-44 range.. 2 was 12-38 and 12-39, 2 were 12-45.
I cleaned the entire hole where I did not hear a tone..with the machine or the pinpointer.. Several times when I removed a certain nail, usually the larger headed nail in the cluster, the tone disappeared entirely when re-scanning.
Rusty nails or larger rusty iron were the culprits in every instance. One other thing 4 times a almost good tone (repeated but not every time)would entirely change to bad when switching directions..
I was using combined ferrous coin, fast off deep off, no discrim, auto +2 ground balance disabled. Didn't write down what the volume gain.

 

[Diggin-it]

I have noticed that too only when it wasn't a real solid left to right tone or vice versa... I dug 32 iffy's the second Saturday I had the machine,, the tone would only hit on one side of the target. Say from left to right I got a good tone but from right to left I didn't. or vice versa.. If it did not repeat on almost every swing, I considered it iffy, I would also change the direction I came in on the target. Of the 32, I dug "0" were good. (28 I wrote down and documented how many nails where in the hole and would quit counting in each hole at 5). 23 holes were either a "cluster" of nails, mostly roofing nails or really large nails. 10 nails were large and bent. 2 were from deep rusted iron pieces 16 were cluster of more than 5. 24 tones were in the 12-40 to 12-44 range.. 2 was 12-38 and 12-39, 2 were 12-45.
I cleaned the entire hole where I did not hear a tone..with the machine or the pinpointer.. Several times when I removed a certain nail, usually the larger headed nail in the cluster, the tone disappeared entirely when re-scanning.
Rusty nails or larger rusty iron were the culprits in every instance. One other thing 4 times a almost good tone (repeated but not every time)would entirely change to bad when switching directions..
I was using combined ferrous coin, fast off deep off, no discrim, auto +2 ground balance disabled. Didn't write down what the volume gain.

Good, solid info....thanks for sharing your knowledge!

 

[Larry (IL)]

With a little more experience, you will be able to tell the difference and I usually move 90 degrees and scan again on a good "maybe" tone. The nails will usually break up real bad or no tone at all from another direction. I have yet to have a "maybe" target turn out to be a keeper so I now listen for a good repeatable tone from all directions before digging. Another tip that might help is nails will sometimes pinpoint "off center" from your tone. The eddy currents like to accumulate off of the pointed end of a nail giving a false target, so when you pinpoint the actual target, it will be an inch or two from where you got your best tone.

Good luck with your new CTX.

 

[JoeinMemphis]

Thank you for this info, you can see in my Saturday's post about the 1849 house, I dug my share of iron too, but NONE of them would I consider a good solid signal except maybe the large caster. I had to "tease" that higher tone from the ground on all the others, I need to start trusting the machine a bit more I suppose, and stop digging the iffy's. My problem is in the month I have owned it, other than 2 wheaties, a zincolin, and a nickel, I haven't yet heard good signals, so I am still unsure about what to dig, and what to leave in the ground.
FYI I was using the Gonehunting setup, open screen, Noise Cancel, Ground Balance (once i found a patch of ground the size of the coil I could GB on, that place is IRON CITY!!) and I was switching back and forth between Auto+2 and manual around 27.
HH
Joe

 

[jimpugh]

least in my soil and if i were a bettin man probably yours to......

some time on real deepies i will get a tone drawn out both ways but it will be a flattened X instead of 90 degrees....... say 45 degrees.......when this happens it usually always a coin up to my

elbow.....



Happy Trails
jimpugh

 

[earthmansurfer]

Good info Evan and Larry.

With past machines, I could often coax a target from a so so signal. I get the feeling with the CTX, that it does a lot of the work/processing for you.

Has anyone dug coins that were bad or so-so signals with the CTX? Thus far I have not.

Albert

 

[etracjoe]

With a little more experience, you will be able to tell the difference and I usually move 90 degrees and scan again on a good "maybe" tone. The nails will usually break up real bad or no tone at all from another direction. I have yet to have a "maybe" target turn out to be a keeper so I now listen for a good repeatable tone from all directions before digging. Another tip that might help is nails will sometimes pinpoint "off center" from your tone. The eddy currents like to accumulate off of the pointed end of a nail giving a false target, so when you pinpoint the actual target, it will be an inch or two from where you got your best tone.

Good luck with your new CTX.

This is exactly what I was finding today in a park nearby. I would get the most beautiful high tone turn 90 and it would be either gone or sounded broken up. And they tend to always pinpoint quite a difference from the original tone. With not having many hours on this machine I will dig them anyway. You just never know for sure. Like with the Etrac......one day I will "just get it" and all those initial troubles will be a thing of the past. I will say too that I noticed swing speed plays a very important role in the tid numbers. It also will be the difference of getting a good repeatable hit. If I slow way down I get about 50-60% more repeatable signals then I did on the Etrac. I run with a open screen in combined with the high tone in the silver range up so it sticks out like a sore thumb(thanks to Jimzilla) High trash(sometimes I switch to ferrous coin) and deep on. I have only been digging in the 12-40 on up range right now because these parks have tons of trash all over the place and that high tone really brakes through. Every time you get a blip of it just slow down and work your "magic" in circles around the target until you determine if it is diggable. Pinpointing the target will be the last determining factor. This is what I have been doing and although I have been digging them anyway.....I pretty much can tell iron now.

 

[Digger]

One other thing I've noticed Jim..... if you are able to circle a target until you get (what you think is going to be) a "good" target..... when you go to digging, that bent nail will be hiding down in the lower left hand corner of the hole. If the hole were a clock face, that darn nail is usually in the 7:30 area. At least they are in my neck of the woods. I found this on several different detectors I've had. Wonder if there is a correlation between the target location (once it sounds good) and characteristics of the coil windings? HH Randy

 

[Larry (IL)]

Now that you mention it Randy, my nail finds were between 3 and 4 O'clock consistently.

 

[Gonehunting]

One other thing I've noticed Jim..... if you are able to circle a target until you get (what you think is going to be) a "good" target..... when you go to digging, that bent nail will be hiding down in the lower left hand corner of the hole. If the hole were a clock face, that darn nail is usually in the 7:30 area. At least they are in my neck of the woods. I found this on several different detectors I've had. Wonder if there is a correlation between the target location (once it sounds good) and characteristics of the coil windings? HH Randy

same here Randy. Some times its at the 1:30 position too.

 

[bik-il]

In my limited experience on the 3030 I have yet to dig a one-way signal that was not a nail or other trash.
Although I have gotten nice hard one-way 12-40 to 12-47 signals that I have dug thusfar, they were broken and not clean on the 90 degree sweep and were invariably nails.
Once in a while on the Etrac using ttf this type of signal would yield a keeper.
I'm learning to use target trace and pay attention to the visual pattern. From what I've seen thusfar coins have a tighter red 'cluster' with fewer yellow 'trailers.'
As others here have stated, it will all come together with more hours logged.

Another thing I've noticed is how stable the FE numbers are on the CTX.

 

[weequay]

I dug zero nails today! (Unfortunately, there were no good targets either).
Each target I dug was a solid 2 way target.
Thanks for all the advice.

 

[jimzilla]

The best way to tell if its a nail is when pinpointing using "normal", once you squeeze the pp button in, you will get a nice solid and long tone if its a coin. If its a nail, the pp sound will be shorter and more precise. The only exception will be bent nails or large square nails. Rarely will I get a nice sounding nail. I may get a signal that "blips" in the coin range, but that is only due to the TID number changing as you leave the target area. For example, a nail may read 28-44 but every now and then, it will drop down to 16-44 or clsoe to that. That will give you the "good" sound. When I get a target, I may sweep over it 10-15 times before I dig it. I average out all of the responses coming from all different angles. If there are more + sounds (not TID#s) then I dig. For me sound is extremely important. If Im in a really good area, I dig everything. How hard is it to dig a 6" hole?? Many times especially in older parks, you will have multiple layers of signals. Typically, the 1950-1980s layer is loaded with trash. Those iron bottle caps can add up and block good targets from coming through. Try laying a rusty bottlecap over a silver dime and see if you get a good reading. One time while hunting an old park with the etrac, I cleaned out everything in small areas. After some time and about 1000 targets later, I started getting the indian heads and barber dimes. I even got a barber quarter and a gold signet ring from the 1890s. The reason was that I eliminated the upper layers of trash.

 

[Gonehunting]

Good post Zilla.... thanks for the info

 

[firefighter254]

Good post That's what i do when i hunt an old park or old places in general i try to dig everything that gives a good repeatable sound with a decent vdi because sometime's the vdi's can be a little off due to the ground conditions but you can always rely on the sounds they are pretty dead on, if you turn at different angles and its repeatable and its sounds good not choppy ill dig it I've had some really worn silvers come in with low vdi's so you can't always go by the vdi the one thing about the ctx 3030 is if its telling you the signal is junk then its junk if there's a good target it will find it; nails are alway's going to be a pain i get good vdi's all the time that turn out to be nails but like you said if you sweep over the target at different angles multiple times and the sound breaks up or disappears it most likely a nail

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CTX 3030
Etrac
whites m6
pro pointer
Ulster County NY
Youtube Channel http://www.youtube.com/user/firefighter2542005