The Effects of Ground Mineralization

[RLOH]

First, let me set the scene. I have my favorite go to detecting place and I have had great finds and many finds from this park. I have had several detectors that plain would not ground balance here. I never really knew why until I started using detector with ground mineral readouts(Fisher-Teknetics) This place has pockets of 4 bar mineralization. The detectors that worked well in this park all had one common denominator, they were multi-frequency detectors.

What is the issue with single freqency detectors at this particular place. Just about every pull tab like target that was over 6 inches deep rang up in the coin range both with tones and numbers. I could and have dug 100's of deeper tabs that sounded EXACTLY like a deeper coin. I tried everything I knew to figure out what the detector was saying. I tried setting the ground balance both negative and positive, but nothing really worked.

Because this place is an older park, it is absolutely loaded with aluminum slaw, pull tabs or every era, and any newer type trash. I have trained myself to hunt with little discrimination and be able to pick out the "high ticks and tones" indicative of deeper, older coins. Some of the older technology detectors(Fisher CZ's and DFX) did extremely well here. The Minelab FBS, Equinox, and Whites V3i were all the best performing detectors at my park.

What happened recently. I have been a big fan of two First Texas detectors, the Fisher F5 and Omega 8000. I really think these two detector are some of the best coin hunters ever made. But, they do not work well here. In medium to mild soil, they are super. Yesterday I took my Omega 8500 to this park and tried hunting with no disc, medium disc, notch, and finally all metal. I kept getting repeatable mid to high 80's high tones and dug at least 25 five real old pull tabs(the kind where the ring and tab came off) Absolutely perfect in ground signals. I was extremely frustrated and started checking them out of the ground. They immediately read as they should, low 50's medium tones. I placed them back in the hole without covering them up and the signal started reading in the low 70's with bouncing tones. When covered up, they sounded like a perfect coin signal.

I am by no means a technical guy like Monte or Sven, but my observations point to how bad ground can skew a signal. For the record, the ground balance reading read in the mid to high 90's. At my home where my test garden is located, the ground reads in the mid 60's and my T2 limited and Omega 8500 hit all targets as well as the many other high end detector did. I had alway believed that a detector with any type of adjustable ground balance would eliminate the effects of ground minerals. I guess to moral of the story is "Buy What Works". I can afford most any detector made, but many can't.

 

[Ronstar]

I believe I experience the same type of thing here. With the F75SE one just flips the toggle switch forward and the ground balance relocks in a flash. Digitally I usually see up to a 6-8 point difference in a larger area hunt. Whether this affects target readout I do not know but I also find the older beavertail pulls (as you describe) periodically. I dont complain too much because I use it as an indicator of what era the area was more used and the depth can also clue you in as to what depth those coins can be. Tabs at 4” and 60-70s coins at 4”? Then something at 6” could be a good one!!!!

 

[bootyhoundpa]

I’ve had great success with the Sovereign GT in farm fields where old homes had once stood..these areas often have coal ash ,coke and a whole lotta whatnot mixed in ..the multi frequency GT despite not being a great separator did very well quantity and depth wise.. this scenario was proven one day when I found a part of a field where a home had stood 150 years ago..anyway just 2 hours into hunting this virgin site I see 3 guys walking towards me with Whites metal detectors in hand..they stopped and chatted and said they heading a quarter mile down the field where a foundation still stands... after about another 2 hours they came walking back and asked if I minded if they hunt along with me ..I said ok.. the 3 of them hunted that area for 20 minutes and couldn’t come up with a single target while I pulled yet another large cent out ..I got 4 or 5 that day.. these guys did pretty good at the other site a quarter mile down the field scoring silver and a large cent themselves but the soil is a little different at the two sites.. I’ve since gone back several times rarely finding anything but the Equinox 800 can still pull some smaller flat buttons the GT won’t hit on due to size..