X-Terra 70 HF DD 6" Coil - Questions

[nero_design]

Hi all.
I'm visiting a remote creek (in which I panned some very small particles of fine gold last week) and am curious to know if anyone
has any opinions or thoughts on the High Frequency 6" DD coil - as I understand this coil is waterproof and is recommended for finding small nuggets
that are submerged. The river and creek banks here are drying up so much of the soil is out of the water. High banks and elevated areas might be ideal for
small nuggets. Hard to say. I have the 5x10" HF DD Elliptical but am not about to place it in the water.

Some people say this coil is ideal in theory but I am yet to hear from anyone who actually has owned or used one.
There was a concern about this coil not having a skid plate which I recall was a concern to some.

What have people heard about this smaller 6" DD coil? I have an opportunity to buy one tomorrow and would like to know if anyone thinks
this would be a useful tool or not. I could (or should) divert my funds into buying a sluice or similar so I'm of a mixed mind as to the application of the 6" DD
and how useful I might find it. I thought the salesperson I spoke to might push for a sale on this coil but I've spoken to him twice about it & he
didn't seem to think it was worth my curiosity.



Any input is appreciated.



Below is a picture of the creek - which I'm going to follow for about 4km to where it reaches the mountains and widens.

 

[rwsnc]

Nero... somebody more knowledgeable than me, will jump in here pretty soon and give you better answer. In the mean time let me say that I have heard that the 6" coil is good for finding targets in trashy areas. It's small, so it doesn't pick up trash that's lying within a couple of inches of a good target. Personally, I like the 5X10 coil. They're both DD types and both are suppose to be good at finding gold, especially small specs (because of the high frequency). I have both and if I was in your position (although I haven't done any nugget hunting), I would probably go ahead and get the 6".

 

[Digger]

I just did a search on this site for posts concerning the 6 inch DD coil, and found 50 of them. Might be worth taking a look at. Personally, I like it very much. It has excellent depth, separates much better than the larger coils, is very sensitive to small targets and coins, it is waterproof, lightweight and from what I've read from other prospectors, is capable of finding extremely small pieces of gold. Here is one of those posts, by BT, with a couple follow-ups. http://www.findmall.com/read.php?55,586043,586043#msg-586043


HH Randy

 

[nero_design]

Thanks. I'm of the opinion that this might be a great coil for shallow creeks. I remember walking a LONG way to get to a creek (that actually feeds from the far end of the very one I'm about to visit... about 16km away!) ... And when I got to the water's edge, I didn't want to risk the Elliptical DD in water. I poked it about in a few shallow puddles and kept the lip of the skid plate above the surface.
I can recall wishing for something to allow me to submerge my coil properly. The recently posted video on YouTube on the 6" DD HF coil made the it look ideal - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2a5AzczfS8E

B.T. - I remember your post in the above link. If you read this post, can you tell me how sharp your submerged signals were?

Cheers & Many Thanks

 

[ChookFoot]

You might have already thought of this stuff but.....
Is the area nuggetty ? I've spent many (frustrating) hours detecting known, gold bearing areas to no avail because the gold was not nuggetty.
Sure, there's always a chance there will be a bit big enough to ping with your XTerra but I've found it important not to get frustrated because of unrealistic expectations.
I guess if you're doing pure prospecting where there's no information about the area then go for it.
And about the sluice. I've just spent the weekend away on a property 3 hrs from home. My mate worked a sluice and I had a pan. Because I was more mobile than him I managed to get onto a better run of gold up the creek 100metres or so, He stuck it out in a hole close to the sluice and even though I spent only 1/2 the time panning as he spent on the sluice, we came away with similar amounts of gold.
Anyway, hope you get onto goodly amounts of the yellow stuff.
Cheers !

 

[RonNH]

I don't know about gold, but it does an awesome job hunting for coins and relics. Light, sensitive and separates well. Ron

 

[nero_design]

That's true ChookFoot, I'm about 20km from the actual thick of the Goldfields if I go to this creek.
The government recently bulldozed all the surface for a replantation there so a few prospectors who run out there
with their detectors ...although I have no feedback on their results. Some gold mines & silver mines dotted about too.

What I know about the area is that a few sluice operators go there due to good concentrations being reported.
I was advised by a prospector to try the top of the nearest hill for nuggets as he's been researching the area but could not get away from work to
try it. He showed me a Govt chart showing how many tons of gold had been extracted in the past nearby. My inspection showed no signs of
junk on the creek bed. Also, no signs of anyone having been there in a very long time.

As for 'nuggety', this is the pan I sampled before I lost the samples in a small disaster of my own making. One flake (not shown) had rough and ragged edges which looked to have come straight from a quartz deposit. Plenty of reef quartz around. I assumed that if I made my way along the creek beds to the mountain bases, I'd have a chance to try an area which hadn't been aggressively thrashed by too many detectorists... nor by the Chinese who tore into the nearby towns and systematically sluiced and dredged every square foot of it three times.

I'm off to buy one of those new gold pans I saw down at the local supplier... the weird looking ones: Shame they only make them in a bright blue color
which on the other hand should appeal to children. Why no black ones?
http://www.usprospector.com/pages/description.html

RonNH, I guess being so light has a LOT of advantages but I also noticed that the smaller diameter on this coil seemed thinner when I looked at one the other day. That should allow for poking into the sort of places that gold might accumulate - and other detectors might not reach. I can't tell you how many times I've come across an area with mounds of dirt piled over a chunk of bedrock or a large stone - and wondered if gold had accumulated there in the form of small nuggets or fine particles. Even larger nuggets would get stopped by a large enough rock in heavy downpours.

I think the smaller coil might do the job. I'm wondering if it could be used out of the creeks and on rocky ground effectively - or if the lack of a skid plate is to my disadvantage.