All this talk of soccer fields and old phinbolt takin' it to the bank got me fired up for a field hunt. Not to mention that I've been figthing the flu and am feelin' sorta punky... so I took it easy by heading over to my local high-school soccer clearing.
I decided to try a muli-level approach and do some 'cherry picking". For you newcomers, that is an old fashioned way of hunting, something the oldsters did back before we had our nice TID detectors. What you do is set your DISC for high conductivity coins FIRST, and clean them out of an area. Then you DISC down to the lower, nickel/pulltab range and switch directions. This second pass allows you to (hopefully) scoop up the vast number of gold targets that lie in waiting. Good plan....
To effect this little brainstorm of mine, I pursued a grid approach. I have some 3/8 plexiglas spikes cut from scrap, to which I've attached 12' of stout cord. There are three of them: one at each end of 24' of cord and one in the middle. This way I can lay out two sides of a 12' square and so keep my bearings as I scan. I use plexiglas as it can take a pounding if needs be, and is non-conductive. Besides, I get it at work for free!
Here's what I mean:
[attachment 108670 100_0107.jpg]
In the expanded view you can make out the two sides of the grid.
[attachment 108671 100_0108.jpg]
One of the spikes, with the cord shown in perspective.
You'll note I was also using the Vaquero with it's small coil, as this is a really trashy area - I mean covered in litter. High schoolers are not only obnoxious louts, but pigs, as well. The Vaq is perfect for this sort of thing, with great separation in that small coil.
After one pass through the initial grid, first one direction cherry picking and then the other in low DISC, heres the results:
[attachment 108672 100_0106.jpg]
Well, hey, that wasn't such a bad haul for 10 minutes! This might work after all!!
Well..... not so fast. I didn't find much else in many more griddings, as can be seen in the final pic:
[attachment 108673 100_0110.jpg]
I gotta say that this effort worked - I left out the numerous pulltabs, foil balls, canslaw, shoe eyelets, eraser ends, zipper pulls and sundry other crappy trash common at these fields. All of which look just like a gold doodad to a detector. SO, had there been any gold there, I'd have found it.
To be fair this is actually a practice field, not the real deal. No spectators or huge numbers of people traipsing back and forth... just a bunch of hormone infected hooligans, dressed out for practice. I'm certain this would still work, if only at a regular field where people with stuff to lose visited.
Thanks for looking.
I decided to try a muli-level approach and do some 'cherry picking". For you newcomers, that is an old fashioned way of hunting, something the oldsters did back before we had our nice TID detectors. What you do is set your DISC for high conductivity coins FIRST, and clean them out of an area. Then you DISC down to the lower, nickel/pulltab range and switch directions. This second pass allows you to (hopefully) scoop up the vast number of gold targets that lie in waiting. Good plan....
To effect this little brainstorm of mine, I pursued a grid approach. I have some 3/8 plexiglas spikes cut from scrap, to which I've attached 12' of stout cord. There are three of them: one at each end of 24' of cord and one in the middle. This way I can lay out two sides of a 12' square and so keep my bearings as I scan. I use plexiglas as it can take a pounding if needs be, and is non-conductive. Besides, I get it at work for free!
Here's what I mean:
[attachment 108670 100_0107.jpg]
In the expanded view you can make out the two sides of the grid.
[attachment 108671 100_0108.jpg]
One of the spikes, with the cord shown in perspective.
You'll note I was also using the Vaquero with it's small coil, as this is a really trashy area - I mean covered in litter. High schoolers are not only obnoxious louts, but pigs, as well. The Vaq is perfect for this sort of thing, with great separation in that small coil.
After one pass through the initial grid, first one direction cherry picking and then the other in low DISC, heres the results:
[attachment 108672 100_0106.jpg]
Well, hey, that wasn't such a bad haul for 10 minutes! This might work after all!!
Well..... not so fast. I didn't find much else in many more griddings, as can be seen in the final pic:
[attachment 108673 100_0110.jpg]
I gotta say that this effort worked - I left out the numerous pulltabs, foil balls, canslaw, shoe eyelets, eraser ends, zipper pulls and sundry other crappy trash common at these fields. All of which look just like a gold doodad to a detector. SO, had there been any gold there, I'd have found it.
To be fair this is actually a practice field, not the real deal. No spectators or huge numbers of people traipsing back and forth... just a bunch of hormone infected hooligans, dressed out for practice. I'm certain this would still work, if only at a regular field where people with stuff to lose visited.
Thanks for looking.