Old park still giving up wheaties....

[fwcrawford]

I went back to the old park today and found 5 more wheat pennies with the oldest dated 1918.
After reading the recent posts about sensitivity settings, I decided to play with the settings on the Sovereign and see what kind of results I got.
I have been searching this park in mostly Auto or very low manual sensitivity due to the nulling, but today I ran the Sensitivity from around 12:00 to about 3:00 and checked some signals while readjusting.
One thing I noticed is that I get a lot of false signals and it takes some time to get the hang of the good signals from the falses at least for me.
The detector nulled quite a bit too although it did detect these coins while in a null.
I think I need to try it some more in manual sensitivity and get used to this mode.
I also used iron mask on during this hunt and wonder now if switching it off would have cut down on the false signals.
I'll have to do some more testing, but I did find out that this detector sure acts different in manual sensitivity than it does in auto.

 

[MINELABMIKE]

there has to be silver if your getting wheaties, those signals you think are falsing could be deep silver

 

[Critterhunter]

People try to cherry pick the silver and leave the wheats, but that means there is plenty of silver left. Silver can read like wheats due to soil or how it sits in the ground, and also you'll dig a wheat and find silver under it.

 

[fwcrawford]

I do think there is some deep silver in there still.
When I referred to the false signals, I would get a signal and then try to pinpoint it in all metal pinpoint and the signal would not be close to where it was in discriminate mode.
I'm assuming it is iron falsing, but due to not using the Sovereign in manual sensitivity much, this was a little overwhelming.
I need to try some more testing in manual mode to get used to the signals and operation of this detector, but I am very impressed with what I have found with it so far by mostly operating in auto sensitivity mode.
I think this park is littered with nails as I have pulled many out of holes with coins.
I just need to get some more time in with this detector.
The site where these finds were made is a good location to get to learn the Sovereign as it is old and has the potential for some deep finds, has been hunted hard over the years, and is littlered with iron which could be masking some of the finds which is why they are still there.

 

[Rick(ND)]

Felix,

You are seeing what false signals sound like and after a while you can tell them in disc without going to pinpoint by just coming at the signal from different angle as they will move or null in coming at a different angle. Some even will move like you seen when in pinpoint, but just sounds too good to be a false signal. These are coins that are close to a bigger piece of iron as in pinpoint it will pull the signal more towards the iron as it is bigger. It takes time to learn what they sound like, one of the guys I hunt with at times wont use the pinpoint for that reason as he seen too many pieces of iron pull a good coin signal towards the iron. He stays in disc and goes all the way around the signal to make sure what he wants will read the same 2 or 3 different directions when going around the signal.
Here is a little part of what I posted the other day on what I have learned,

Now another tip I can offer is some of those iffy target you cant tell are good or bad. I will try to get the target to the tip of the coil by moving the coil back to me with the short side to side until I lose it, then move the coil forward until I get the target. Now I will know about right where it is so I will come at it from a different angle and see if it is there or moved. I may come from a different angle all the way around and find if I can only see it one way it is probably a false off of iron, but if I can get it several ways I will be digging. Now I will go to all metal pinpoint and pinpoint it doing the 90 degrees turn as I find on the deeper targets this works great plus to do my test to see if it is good I have to have the target centered right on. I will switch to pinpoint and go side to side and center the target, but don't go forward or backward, just side to side. Now when you have the target centered I push the coil to the ground so it will not move off that spot and turn 90 degrees and then swing the coil side to side again until you have it centered, but make sure you don't go forward or backwards with the coil. Now you have the target right under the very center of the coil and if it was a iffy one because it was deeper and want to get a better ID I will hold the coil very still and switch back to disc mode, now once this is done I will wiggle the coil every so slightly, if it nulls it is trash, if it is a positive signal trying to climb I will be digging and even if the threshold don't change I will wiggle a little more and chance are it wont null so you want to dig this one too to make sure. I found with the GT it is harder to do this for some reason as I get a null first, but by wiggling it a little more it will ID it. I also find that the GT seems to be more sensitive and will false on iron more, but by coming at the target from a different angle it is easy to tell it is iron as it will move or null.


Good luck and keep trying to pick out some good silver out of this park.

 

[fwcrawford]

Rick,
I remembered some of these techniques from reading your posts earlier on.
I did try some of the tips, but to tell you the truth, I'm a little hesitant to dig deep holes at this park unless I am
almost sure that it is a coin or other good target.
Some of the signals I got left me scratching my in confusion.
The grass is starting to come back from the winter and I don't want to get kicked out.
I am definately going to keep trying using manual sensitivity and try getting used how the detector responds
while searching.
I know when I found all the wheat pennies and the few silver coins from this area, I was certain that it was coin even when I detected some that were close to iron.
I learned alot about the Sovereign at this park and I believe it is a very good spot to learn how to better use this detector, but I may have to wait until next winter before I get in there digging iffy signals.
I will continue trying your tips and perhaps some of these signals will not sound so iffy after applying some of your techniques.
I just read a recent post by someone that stated that the Sovereign will still detect deep coins while in a null.. is this your opinion too?
This would make me feel more comfortable while having high sensitivity settings.
Thanks again for all your help and I will continue trying to save those deep finds at the park,
Felix

 

[gear box]

way to go. I like your ethics. not wanting to dig unless you know it's a coin. When you are comfortable with your abilities you can alway's go back. Nice job.
Gary

 

[Neil]

Felix you are an ispiration, keep it up and keep posting as its well received here!

 

[Ron from Michigan]

Felix,wheat's are always great to find,which means silver is close.HH Ron

 

[Critterhunter]

I do think there is some deep silver in there still.
When I referred to the false signals, I would get a signal and then try to pinpoint it in all metal pinpoint and the signal would not be close to where it was in discriminate mode.
I'm assuming it is iron falsing, but due to not using the Sovereign in manual sensitivity much, this was a little overwhelming.
I need to try some more testing in manual mode to get used to the signals and operation of this detector, but I am very impressed with what I have found with it so far by mostly operating in auto sensitivity mode.
I think this park is littered with nails as I have pulled many out of holes with coins.
I just need to get some more time in with this detector.
The site where these finds were made is a good location to get to learn the Sovereign as it is old and has the potential for some deep finds, has been hunted hard over the years, and is littlered with iron which could be masking some of the finds which is why they are still there.

I have found that pinpoint is worthless some times due to bad ground or nearby targets causing it to sound off in the wrong spot or over a wider area, or even that it won't see the target at all. I have taken to using discriminate to PP targets most of the time now. I usually will then flip to PP and double check things but often just flip once again back to discriminate to do my final PPing. Kind of ironic that after designing/building a remote PP circuit for my GT that I would prefer using disc to PP targets much of the time anyway. I use the tip of the coil to laser in on targets. Wiggle back and fourth and move forward until you just get a response and it will be right at the edge of the coil. Really helps to PP amongst trash. Do NOT go by the old rule that if the target moves in pinpoint from where it says it is in disc. I have found deep coins, ones on edge, or nearby iron can cause the target to move. I use other ways to determine if it's iron such as sound or VDI response but not by if it moves in disc. versus PP.

Auto will work well at a place like that. What I do is keep lowering it in manual until the threshold gets real stabile. If that end up being lower than about 3 to 3:30 on the dial then I just flip over to Auto as it will get the same depth of anything that low yet provides a much more stabile threshold. Even still, there are places were manual just won't get as stabile no matter how low it's set and that's when Auto saves the day.

With all the iron there you might want to get a 5" coil as it will really lower the nulling and sniff between the nails better. Also, grid 90 degrees as in my testing the GT will unmask better going over the width of a nail rather than down it's length.

 

[fwcrawford]

n/t