Questions from a “land lubber”.

[Ronstar]

Im not usually on this section of the forums but questions I do have so cozy in with the practitioners I say!
Spent all last week on the OR coast at Lincoln City and of course the Fisher F75SE went along. I read carefully the owners manual and manually set the ground balance down to below 30 where it was acting more normally. Set out to edge of the wet sand and damp sand and started to hunt. Now maybe this is not normal beach conditions but holy cow all I could hit was rusty old nails, some 4” sizes up to some pretty good sized spikes. All nails were coming in as high targets such as 50 cent size coin or silver coin numbers, gave up after about an hour as I think I have all the missing nails from Noah’s Ark!!
Moved back to dry sand and started over. Now hitting a few clad coins and other interesting junk finds. Nails still there and hitting as high value targets, switched from All Metal Motion to Discrim and took out Iron and now acting more like Im accustomed to. I know the F75 is not a preferred machine for beach hunting but it can be used.
Any suggestions or comments here appreciated and I know nothing about beach hunting other than what I read mainly here.
Thx

 

[Dancer]

That F75 seem like it can handle the salt in your area. You might just find some good stuff using discrimination down on the wet sand. Just don't dunk it. You'll be ok Ronstar.

 

[Ronstar]

By Discrim down you mean? In All Metal Motion I dont believe there is discrimination “tuning”. In Discrim Setting I can take Iron completely out but not sure I can get ground balance below 30 as detector has the fast grab ability, when I tried that in the wet sand the balance numbers were up in the 80s which makes no sense.

 

[Dancer]

Well Ronstar, I might be the least knowledgeable person to ask about the F75. What I meant to say was use discrimination on the wet sand. Like I think you did , get stabilized and run it like you normally do. You got a lot of iron on that beach, there's gotta be good stuff there mixed in with it.

 

[Ronstar]

I was using the NEL Sharpshooter but the Fisher 5” probably would have been better. I am trying to see now if manual ground balanced under 30 as suggested carries over to Discrim’ mode. I’m not a big fan of the Delta Pitch wavering all over the place, prefer the distinct beep when on target.
I have to figure I was not doing something correctly because every flippin nail was pounding out as high silver (same as square nails). Thx for your interest and info!

 

[bootyhoundpa]

I’ve never used a 75 and I’ve never been to Oregon but I’m not so sure that would be the right tool for there as the 75 has a reputation for being chatty and I believe the Oregon coast has a reputation for having hotter sand than normal .. multi frequency Would most likely be a better option..even multi frequency gets fooled by some of the iron but would probably run a lot smoother..

 

[tvr]

Best depth I got over wet salt sand with my F75LTD was running all metal and carefully ground balancing in the zero to one range; a little higher as I got closer to dry sand. It did fairly well. If I recall correctly there are ten "clicks" or steps between zero and one on the ground balance. The iron is a real pain to listen to. When the ground balance is set to the wet salt, the iron makes an obnoxious bonging sound. You get the target ID in all metal so to see what the target might be you look at the numerical value to see if it is in the 0 to 6 or 7 range for iron or starts getting up to the foil range and up. As nail riddled as you indicated, running discriminate mode may work better, but I found discriminate mode to false over the wet salt sand even with a proper ground balance while all metal did not. As for nails coming in on the high side, that is a classic "wrap around". I had not experienced that with the F75 except over the big beach drainage pipes and those were easily identified as not a target to dig. That is where all metal might help by not giving a false with a wrap around ID and you might get a real iron ID number. You might just have to play with settings and figure out what works.

As for using over black sand in wet salt, stay on top of the ground balance. If you are falsing on black streaks of sand, slow the sweep down. F75 ID's better with fast sweeps but if the ground is overcoming targets, slow down some.

 

[Dancer]

So with the conditions along that Oregon coast, wonder what is the go to machine for the locals ?

 

[Nauti]

Best single frequency detector i used on the beach was a Whites M6......really stable and fairly decent depth.The problem is that the ground balancing needed to overcome the salt content reduces depth and sensitivity to such an extent that single frequency detectors just don't make great beach detectors.Many have a beach mode but all this bacically does is use a reduced sensitivity/increased discrim setting which isn't ideal.I didn't think he F75 would work at all in the wet sand......i'm quite surprised.

 

[Ronstar]

My 75 has the DST so in Discrim it was actually pretty quiet. When I set GB down to 20 in All Metal Motion it seemed to be about as quiet with little to no chatter. We go to the coast usually once a year so no biggy but maybe I will spend more time in the dry sand where everyone sits and around the big logs that get beached. Will try tvr’s suggestion and go back and look again at Revier’s wisdom.
Thx for the comments!!’

 

[tvr]

My 75 has the DST so in Discrim it was actually pretty quiet. When I set GB down to 20 in All Metal Motion it seemed to be about as quiet with little to no chatter. We go to the coast usually once a year so no biggy but maybe I will spend more time in the dry sand where everyone sits and around the big logs that get beached. Will try tvr’s suggestion and go back and look again at Revier’s wisdom.
Thx for the comments!!’

The noise I got in discriminate mode over the wet salt sand was not interference kind of chatter, it was actually falsing running with the sensitivity up around 90. I could tell it was falsing because they were not consistent repeatable signals on a point over the surface and it wasn't interference type of chatter (I know that sound well). I could run hot in all metal and retain good depth without false signals.
Good luck!

 

[Mark kus]

So with the conditions along that Oregon coast, wonder what is the go to machine for the locals ?

I use a Equinox on my beaches no problems tons of red and purple sand I dig dimes 12"+ with sensitivity maxed out..
That's what I would recommend.
Mark

 

[Florida Son]

And once you dig that iron, you could go back over the area, maybe in a new direction, the iron may be masking better targets. This is a game of inches. I bring a couple things I want to find with me and drop them in the dry sand to hear how they sound. Make small adjustments till you like it. HH