What to wear.....what to wear.....

[Wooden Nickel]

I am anything but new........ but I am new to metal detecting and the forum. Here is my question - what do all of you take with you to metal detect with? What do you dig with? Do you feel a pinpointer is a necessity or just nice to have? What do you carry all your stuff in, a nail apron, a game bag? Take a magnet with you? Things to "calibrate" your md.....ferrite, tab, screw on cap, ertc.? OK, lunch would be nice? A bottle of water to clean off things? A soft brush? The list can go on. When I get the new machine I want to be prepared when I go out, but I don't want to look like Fred Sanford. What is essential? What is "nice to have?"

Answers please......

Too...... I see the Coast Guard emblem in the smiley / avatar list. It couldn't have appeared there without having someone around who served as I did. There aren't that many of us. Who are you?

Thanks, Mike.....:coastgaurd:

 

[WV62]

Lot guys and a lot of different tools, but this is about what I go out with, most of the time I do have a couple of coins in my pocket for testing. My way of thinking is lighter is better and I am pretty much a coin and jewelry hunter. Other types of hunting different tools.

I do have other things in the car like coils, water, lunch and so on.

Ron in WV

 

[TerraDigger]

I like a dual pouch cloth nail apron for coin hunting. The nail apron is lightweight. Definitely get a Garrett pinpointer. Pricey....but they will so speed up your coin recoveries, that in the long run they pay for themselves. A Lesche or Predator digging tool. They are almost exactly the same. I always use cloth gloves with rubberized palms/fingers. Even on the hottest summer days. Your crazy to use bare hands. Holes have glass & razor sharp metal along with coins. I also use knee pads. Nothing as painful as a glass or aluminum shard embedded in one's knee. And get a tetnaus shot if your not current on your tetnaus immunizations.

My father was Coast Guard in WW II. Running Marines onto the japanese beach heads...those fun islands...like Tarawa & Saipan etc. Go CG!!
Ex-Navy myself. Welcome aboard.

 

[BarberBill]

On a belt, I have a goodies pouch, a lesche digger, a screw driver, and a pinpointer. In my pocket there's a coin or two for testing. While a pinpointer isn't strictly necessary, I find that over a several hours of hunting my time per recovery is much quicker using one. I have a bag I leave in the vehicle that contains extra batteries, headphones and a few other extras that I essentially never need, but would be dead in the water, if needed. Also a different sized coil or two as well as any lunch, snack or drinks if I'm going to be out for quite a while. While actually hunting I carry the belt with the tools mentioned above and the detector and headphones of course.
BB

 

[mudpuppy]

This is really a site specific answer. If you are slamming chip totlots one after the other, you just need a screwdriver and thats about all, maybe the twin nail cheapo cloth carpenters pouch. If you are hitting gravel totters, you just need the side of your foot! If you are going "off road" so to speak, you need to carry the basics. I carry about everything in the truck, including sandscoop, tiling spade, spare batteries, waders, coffee, pinpointer, xtra socks and shoes, shirts, rain gear, machete, you name it.
I'm never more than maybe a couple hundred yards from the truck, (unless I'm swinging the beach) if I find a spot thats bangin', I'll go back and suit up appropriatly. I suppose on a general sortie digging for silver coins in a field,, you need the PP, some sort of little trowel, a folding lockback serrated blade knife, screwdriver, and a pouch that doesn't impede your movement and is comfortable.
I will say this, for general clad grabbing, I would be absolutely lost without the screwdriver, but again, I'm hunting deep sandy loam, and stabbing clad on sports fields, it would not work well at the beach...
Mud

 

[Wooden Nickel]

So far so good. Keep 'em coming and thanks.

m.....:coastgaurd:

 

[Mike Hillis]

For hunting in town, I have a Side Kick pouch (got from Kellyco). In it I keep a screwdriver for shallow recovery, a Treasure Wise digger for plugging, a magnet, and sometimes a hand held electronic pinpointer. I don't carry the pinpointer very often because I mostly use the Uniprobes headphone/electronic probe combo.

And into that same bag goes all my finds, both trash and treasure.

HH
Mike

 

[hatpin]

Im sort of a knife nut and have probably a hundred different ones. Lately Ive been carrying a Swiss Army knife. The "One Handed Trekker" to be exact. I often use the saw blade to cut through roots.When in the woods I try to clear the area Im about to dig in. I have been in places that are overgrown with little saplings and dont feel guilty about removing an occasional one if needed. [I am not destroying forrest } This knife works well for that. Simply bend the trunk at the base and push the blade through, its a very fast way to remove one.. Remove limbs that way to. I use the awl to clean dirt from the cavities of my finds. Yesterday I had to use the tweezers to remove a splinter while out detecting. Every trip Ive taken it on I have used it often.

 

[Marcus Detectus]

Thank you for your service. Welcome home. Now get out there and knock em dead.

 

[fowlercharles]

Hi Mike,Welcome to metal detecting and you done good already by coming in here and getting some good advice.Only additional advice I could contribute would be to say that after I have arrived "on site" with probably 2 of everything I could possibly need stashed away in my truck,I like to hit the dirt traveling as" lite".as possible.If I am to be any distance from my truck I will make it a point though to always have extra (fresh)batteries (on me), that I have already checked and know they are good.Years ago, after checking, and finding the batteries in my detector "supposedly" to be good I found that they soon played out and the "new" ones I replaced them with were DOA.Being NEW and still in the package when I put them in my pouch, I felt no need to check them before I started.my hunt. I was wrong and had a long walk back to my truck,for some more "good" batteries. LOL, you would be surprized to learn that many of us have headed out all fired up for digging , only to learn we have forgotten our 'diggers' or some other critical piece of gear.It's all worth it though cause we all got the fever! HH Charlie

 

[BarberBill]

Fowlercharles makes a very good point. One time one of my detectors seemed to go berserk after a few minutes. I swapped the battery out for new one and after a few minutes the detector went berserk. Thinking I was going to need to send it in, I did check the second battery with a tester and sure enough, even though it hadn't been used it was a goner as well as the first. Since then, one of the first things I always check if the detector doesn't seem normal is the battery(ies). Simple, easy and often solves the problem.
BB