Some Help on Underwater gold detectors

[RotGrub]

I'm looking for a detector that will be hunting for raw gold in fresh water, on bedrock, above and below the water. I read for a few hours on the internet and see that there are several machines all with good and bad reviews... Not sure if a VLF or PI would be best for working bedrock. This will be strictly a nugget machine. Looking for some advice from people that do this sort of hunting and what works for them.

Thanks,

 

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RotGrub, it would help if you would specify shallow water (searchcoil submerged) or deeper water (entire machine submerged). In the former category, lots more choices.

--Dave J.

 

[RotGrub]

For the most part shallow water as I will most likely be walking areas. I wouldn't rule out snorkeling in 3-6' of water. Just got done looking at the Garrett AT Gold maching... also the Infinium PI but keep hearing not so good reports on the Infinium; mostly defect issues. I'm guessing that the GMT or TDI can submerge the coil but the electronics (box) must be kept dry, so these might not be the best choice.

 

[Terry Soloman]

The AT Pro (Gold), is not a good nuggetshooter, not even as good as their old Scorpion. Than is MY OPINION, after testing one in the Arizona goldfields. If you are going to look for gold nuggets that are at least 3-grams, the the AT Gold will probably work for you at 0"-5" in depth. If you want to hunt anything smaller, you will need a Fisher Goldbug; Tesoro Lobo Super Traq; Whites GMT. None of these boxs are waterproof, but most folks chest mount the boxes or plastic wrap them in a backpack when walking creeks and washes.

PI metal detectors, for the most part, suck at finding sub-gram gold. The Infinium is NOT a raw gold machine, and the TDI sucks as well although I have found a 2.6-gram nugget with one at 4" in depth. Good Luck!

 

[Sandman]

Terry is right on about the AT Gold not being sensitive enough to find the smaller gold. His recommandation on the Lobo Super
trac, Gold Bug, or GMT being better at finding those tiny nuggets.

 

[signal_line]

There are several good reasons to buy an AT Gold. I have found coins 12 inches deep in highly mineralised wet sand with the 5x8. I've found deep silver a multi-frequency machine missed. Of course depth is not everything and most people probably don't put that at the top of their list of favorite things about the ATG. I'd have a hard time deciding my favorite feature. Target separation, recovery speed, Iron Audio (kills bottle caps, nails, small iron) , All Metal Iron Audio, Hi-Resolution iron discrimination, push button controls, waterproof to ten feet, those are just a few reasons.

I'll be honest with you. There are a couple of high-ranking employees of two metal detector manufacturers that I dislike. I still considered buying a gold machine from them, but then I saw the Garrett AT Gold. I took a gamble. I'm sure those other machines work okay but they don't have the features. I guess I should thank those guys I don't like because I ended up with a great machine.

 

[Terry Soloman]

There are several good reasons to buy an AT Gold. I have found coins 12 inches deep in highly mineralised wet sand with the 5x8. I've found deep silver a multi-frequency machine missed. Of course depth is not everything and most people probably don't put that at the top of their list of favorite things about the ATG. I'd have a hard time deciding my favorite feature. Target separation, recovery speed, Iron Audio (kills bottle caps, nails, small iron) , All Metal Iron Audio, Hi-Resolution iron discrimination, push button controls, waterproof to ten feet, those are just a few reasons.

I'll be honest with you. There are a couple of high-ranking employees of two metal detector manufacturers that I dislike. I still considered buying a gold machine from them, but then I saw the Garrett AT Gold. I took a gamble. I'm sure those other machines work okay but they don't have the features. I guess I should thank those guys I don't like because I ended up with a great machine.

Show me ONE gold nugget you have found with the AT Gold, and tell us the story behind your find. Here are just a FEW the Lobo Super Traq has helped me find in Arizona, and California..

 

[signal_line]

As I said I have only been prospecting with the AT Gold for five or six hours and I had back problems at the time. And it was in an area no one knew if there was any nuggets there. Obviously I am about as inexperienced as one can be. I learned something from my outing--dig all signals. I passed over hundreds of weak signals thinking I was going to find an easy target. Very naive and I admit it. Everywhere I went I saw unfilled holes where someone had been before me.

As for your gold, it looks very nice. However, that is no proof that one detector is "better" than another. You know that and so do I.

 

[RotGrub]

Thanks for the input. I spent most of the weekend researching the net for info on these MD which made me think specifically on my use for the new machine. We spend most of the summer season running a recirculation highbanker where we excavate the overburden down to bedrock (I have a youtube channel that shows our operations if interested: RotGrubs Mining Clan - YouTube) After we expose several feet of bedrock we crevice and gold-vac which produces the majority of our gold. Now, I'm thinking that a good VLF MD would be good to check the sides and surrounding material before we backfill. I also have several areas on the main river and other creeks that have exposed and shallow bedrock that have not been hunted with MD due to the access and claim owners information. This is why I thought a waterproof MD would be good, but after my research I'm guessing a Gold Bug 2 or GMT would be good selections as the coils can be submerged a foot or two providing I keep the box dry (right?). With that said, I'm leaning towards the GMT and heres why; the GB2 is a bit more sensitive on small gold than the GMT but the GMT provides a bit more depth (auto ground balance vs manual isn't a factor for me) I can give up the sub-grain gold for a little extra depth... Now, after all this I can see that Whites and Fisher need to make waterproof versions of the GMT and GB2...

 

[signal_line]

Yes, the high frequency machines detect smaller gold, but they don't do as well in mineralization. When I looked at the AT Gold I found their machine is about a year or two newer than other machines. I like all the features and I think being waterproof sold me. You need to decide what features you want.

 

[Steve Herschbach]

Hmmm, interesting. I found nine nuggets totaling 1.5 grams with the AT Gold on my first outing with it. Granted, all but one was with the 4.5 sniper coil, and i was scrubbing the soil, but I had no problem hitting reasonably small gold with the AT Gold.

Not trying to push the AT Gold as a nugget detector. It is going to find more use with me hunting micro jewelry. But no problem for me hitting sub-gram gold with the AT Gold in all metal mode. Gram plus would be easy, even with the stock coil.

Steve Herschbach

 

[Terry Soloman]

Hmmm, interesting. I found nine nuggets totaling 1.5 grams with the AT Gold on my first outing with it. Granted, all but one was with the 4.5 sniper coil, and i was scrubbing the soil, but I had no problem hitting reasonably small gold with the AT Gold.

Not trying to push the AT Gold as a nugget detector. It is going to find more use with me hunting micro jewelry. But no problem for me hitting sub-gram gold with the AT Gold in all metal mode. Gram plus would be easy, even with the stock coil.

Steve Herschbach

Great post Steve. How deep? I'm guessing under 2" if you had to scrub the ground with a small coil..

 

[Steve Herschbach]

Hey Terry,

Yeah, couple inches. It was decomposed basalt bedrock. I raked the cobbles off then scrubbed away, same as I would do with my GB2. The AT Gold with the 4.5" sniper is close enough to my Gold Bug Pro with 5" DD or X-Terra 705 with 5.75" 18.75 kHz DD to be not worth quibbling over. Which is to say the GB2 beats all three by the same margin for this type of work. I did it mainly to prove I could do it but the GB2 is my preferred sniping detector.

For fully submersible (not using a wading unit but a fully submersible detector) I would have no problem with the AT Gold for lower mineral ground. The only real alternative is the Tesoro Tiger Shark ar 12 kHz, but it has a hard-wired coil and you have to open the guts up to replace the batteries. The AT interchangeable coils, separate battery compartment, 18 kHz, and extra features make that an easy choice. Higher mineral ground/hot rocks I'd use an Infinium. As noted it will not hit as small a nugget as a VLF but that does not matter is the VLF can't handle the ground. It would also be a real pain in ferrous trash, but I have often pondered that finding concentrations of nails with an Infinium could also put me in gold while dredging.

I just spent quite a bit of time with the AT Pro and AT Gold at a freshwater beach with several coils. I was trying to talk myself in the AT Pro as I wanted the custom notch setting but had to go with the AT Gold as the true all metal mode is just too compelling. The 5" x 8" DD coil proved far superior in my ground to the 6" x 9" concentric though I generally prefer concentric coils myself. Too much magnetite for the concentric. So I will let the AT Pro go and hold onto the AT Gold for freshwater jewelry detecting.

In theory the GB2 should be a killer wader unit but I have found that small ferrous stuff that it correctly calls ferrous on dry land in disc mode reads out as non-ferrous when submerged. My lakes tend to be littered with ferrous trash, and I was disappointed the GB2 went nuts on the highly decomposed ferrous stuff in the lakes. I was going to waterproof one until I found that out.

Funny but true I was just trying to test both units but found a small gold nugget pendant with the AT Gold basically by accident while I was testing the machines.

Steve Herschbach