water hunting: all metal vs discrimination : who finds best goodies

Aug 27, 2006
1,643
3
WHAT KIND OF TREASURE ARE WE HUNTING TODAY ?
Detector(s) used
MINELAB E TRAC, EXCAL2,QUATTRO,WHITE 6000 DI PRO SL,EAGLE SPECTRUM,SILVER UMAX ,BANDIDO UMAX VARIOUS VINTAGE
keep trying to gain knowledge before choosing water unit. couple days left. many conflicting opinions have me dazed. so overall who consistently finds the best stuff? GOLD I WANT TO FIND GOLD. the determined guys using pulse induction who dig all like SURF PI AND SAND SHARK or the vlf machines with extra circuits that can do some salt while still providing some discrimination like BEACH HUNTER ID AND TIGER SHARK. was hoping for one machine to water hunt fla. salt water in winter and chicago lake mich in summer.please help
 

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wreckdiver1715

Bronze Member
May 20, 2004
1,721
151
Satellite Beach
Detector(s) used
Minelab Excal 1000
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Depending on the location I am hunting, and the type of target I am looking for, I find myself hunting in the all metal "Pin Point" mode (Excalibur 1000), more and more.
Up on the beach (most beaches anyway), looking for modern coins and jewelry, so I will discriminate. However, underwater I hunt in Pin Point because relics from a shipwreck are as important as the treasure she carried.

Tom
 

JOE(USA)

Hero Member
Dec 3, 2006
668
5
New Milford,CT.
Detector(s) used
Tesoro Cortes/Tiger Shark,Whites,B.H./ Teknetics,3DElectronics/ Two Box, Minelab XS,Excal.
scrounger,

The biggest part of water detecting is finding the gold. Whatever detector you use and however you have the controls set the bottom line is you have got to get a signal on ALL gold targets. This translates into digging some junk. Another big factor in water hunting is whether the targets you are after are very deep or shallow. If you choose deep then you probably need a PI detector, but know up front that you will dig MUCH more junk and it will take longer because it's deeper. It's a trade off. For the place I hunt and how I hunt I use the Tesoro TS. I finds the tiny gold items and I feel assured that if the coil goes over gold I will hear it. I use a small amount of discrimination which cuts down on the amount of junk I have to dig. (You can only dig so many holes in the time allotted). As with all detectors no one can say brand X model B is the best water detector. It depends what niche you want to hunt in. Joe
 

G.I.B.

Gold Member
Feb 23, 2007
7,187
8,537
North Central Florida
🏆 Honorable Mentions:
1
Detector(s) used
CTX 3030 / GTI 2500 / Infinium LS / Tesoro Sand Shark / 1 Garrett Pro-pointer / 1 Carrot / Vibra Probe 580 (out on loan) / Lesche M85 / Mark1 MOD1 EyeBall
Primary Interest:
Other
IMHO... The one thing that makes the biggest difference is time.

Time is the main factor in finding gold and everything else. The more time you spend swinging a coil, the more stuff you find.

I like my PI machine. My next one is the Infinium LS, just as soon as my wife says I can have it ;D
 

Treasure_Hunter

Administrator
Staff member
Jul 27, 2006
48,301
54,444
Florida
Detector(s) used
Minelab_Equinox_ 800 Minelab_CTX-3030 Minelab_Excal_1000 Minelab_Sovereign_GT Minelab_Safari Minelab_ETrac Whites_Beach_Hunter_ID Fisher_1235_X
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Still a lot of variables.

Locations, time of year, type of detector used. A PI sees deeper, but you spend more time recovering targets as they are deeper and you have more false targets. VLF discriminates out more trash but not as deep. Single freq Vs multiple freq, lost gold jewelry Vs gold nuggets, black sand Vs no black Sand, heavy mineralization Vs little or no mineralization, it just goes on and on.

It appears what your asking is in general what is the perfect gold machine, problem is there is no perfect answer for that question due to the variables and unanswered questions.

I know the Excal works great in Florida, and the Sov GT works great but you can't go deep in water unless you customize it. I have heard good things about the Tiger Shark, but can't comment farther as I have never owned one.

I had a Beach Hunter ID and I traded it in, not becasue it was a bad detector, but becasue of the design of the battery door, mine leaked twice so I traded it on a ML Sovereign GT and never looked back.

Good luck and good hunting.......
 

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