First CW Relic hunt advice

[Toothpick]

Heading south next week and will be enjoying my first attempt at CW relic hunting.

Normally I sand/surf hunt with the Deus along with a little coin shooting at parks and schools.

I have the 11" & 9" LF and both HF coils.

It will be in the woods.

What setup and which coil would you relic hunters use?

Thanks!

 

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[Joe hunter]

I would definitely use lf 9.its the only one I have.good luck I hope you score big.

 

[G.A.P.metal]

I`m with Joe, as i only have the 11" !
Good luck Toothpick !
LOL
Gary

 

[vferrari]

In the woods use the 9". I would try a sifter setup. You actually want to find iron, exp. square nails because that would indicate structures, perhaps camp huts. Do you know if the soil is mineralized or mild where you are headed. If highly mineralized, then you might want to try the gold field all metal program. Practice with it because it takes some getting used to as it is a pitch vice a tone program, but you can set a threshold buzz for deep targets, can still use the display for target ID and can cut in some iron rejection, which is not quite the same as discrimination. I would use 8 or 12 khz regardless of soil conditions. HTH.

 

[vferrari]

Also, be aware that what you are mainly interested in are going to be mid-conductors, small lead, brass buttons, brass hardware. So a silver coinshooting optimized program is not ideal. Get used to digging a lot of lower numbered target ID's (30 to 70's). Go slow and once you find an area that is giving up buttons or minie balls just spiral around it. If upon target recovery you hit broken glass or ash, then just widen up that hole dig down a couple of feed (2x2x2 foot hole) and see if you hit a trash or fire pit. Use a tarp for the dirt and scan the dirt with your deus. You would be surprised how many small relics you can pull out of such a hole. Also, I advise digging every repeatable target even if it is ferrous. Many cool relics are made of iron like bayonets, spurs, horseshoes, and buckles. Plus it's good to get the big iron out that may be masking something.

 

[gsxraddict]

11 if there is no junk, 9 if it's junky.

I use the 9 most of the time unless it's clean ground, but I find most of my relics in iron trash.

 

[Bharpring]

If using the Gold Field Program for relic hunting, what would the best settings be for depth? I have never been able to get deep targets with the Gold Field.

I would also recommend the 9" LF Coil. I recently have been using the HF Elliptical coil with some awesome results. It finds the non ferrous in iron very well, but not as deep as the 9" LF coil. Most awesome buttons are not very deep though.

 

[vferrari]

If using the Gold Field Program for relic hunting, what would the best settings be for depth? I have never been able to get deep targets with the Gold Field.

I would also recommend the 9" LF Coil. I recently have been using the HF Elliptical coil with some awesome results. It finds the non ferrous in iron very well, but not as deep as the 9" LF coil. Most awesome buttons are not very deep though.

Not sure why your results have not been very good depth wise with gold field, it should be the deepest program as it is true all metal. To hit the really deep targets you need to increase the threshold hum to just audible and look for both solid hits with the pitch signal and, this is important, small disturbances in the threshhold which would indicate a really deep target, though not necessarily identifiable until target recovery. To knock out big iron, set the iron reject ("Disc IAR") to 3 - 5. Set reactivity to 2 as a starting point. In highly mineralized ground, go to 3 if 2 is not getting you enough depth (reactivity behaves a little differently (i.e., counterintuitively deeper in some cases with higher reactivity) in Gold Field, dunno why). Also, in highly mineralized ground, knock sensitivity back to 90 to start.

For the HF Coil: Use 14 khz to max depth (for high conductors). You can attempt to bias towards mid-conductors by operating at the mid-high frequency (e.g., 26 - 28 khz) but don't go any higher or you will defintiely sacrifice depth. Like I said, most small relics are mid-conductors (brass hardware, buttons, small lead) so you can use the higher frequency but you may lose depth on larger, more conductive targets like lead minie balls, coins, and silver plated items.

For the HF Coil: Use 8 or 12 khz or you can also bias toward mid-conductors at 18 hz. Same logic as above applies. Avoid, 4 khz in highly mineralized ground because for the LF coil, TX power is locked at 3 at 4 khz which is not a good setting for highly mineralized ground (high beams in fog analogy - i.e., more is not better in this case) where you want to be at 2 and sometimes even 1 (not an option for the HF coils which are locked at Tx power of 2).

In low mineralized ground you can use tracking but in highly mineralized ground - Ground Grab by going to pinpoint and pumping the coil to get a decent ground reading then adjust to match that reading.

Also, try to get a bead on what the iron is at your site. It could be discarded farm junk like springs, bolts, or broken plow blades or it could be a spur or bayonet, you never know.