Clad experts

Garypederson

Jr. Member
Aug 4, 2020
78
182
Payson, Az, Avila beach, Ca, Naples, Florida
Detector(s) used
Fisher gold bug & Whites Spectra 3vi & Minelab Equinox
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
Have a question for all. My partner and I have been detecting for 9 months. Both Atlantic and Pacific beaches. Arizona forts. Arizona ghost towns, Georgia homesteads, the oldest home in Delaware, Forgotten Maryland and California cemeteries with graves going back to 1700?s . Today we are in Rhode Island and we detected two 1700 churches, 3 18th century homes, and 1 19th century home. In total I have found approx 300 coins all clad and my partner has found 100. I use a Whites VSi, A Minelab Equinox, and a Fisher gold bug ll. I use a Whites TRX pin pointer, my partner is using the Minelab 800 and a garret pin pointer. All coins are from 2 to 6 inches deep. Here is our question. Why haven?t we found a single old coin? Are they down past the detectors threshold and we simply are not getting the signal. We watch those ? videos?, and old coins are being found 4 to 8 inches deep. We are frustrated and stumped. Any suggestions are welcome. Gary Pederson. P.s. yes we take the videos with a grain ( bucket) of salt. Thanks
 

Lenrac2

Silver Member
Apr 1, 2021
2,761
6,386
Illinois
🏆 Honorable Mentions:
1
Detector(s) used
Denise-Nokta Legend/Garrett Apex Nox600
Bob-AT Max/ Nox800
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
Practice. Learn your machines, play with the settings. When we got back into it with new machines it was a learning curve. We didn't find much of nothing at first but clad. But we kept at it and learned. Now we are digging older stuff at a park that has been detected to death. Not everything has a great signal. The best advice I got was from someone on TNet that told someone else that you got to dig it all. If you aren't digging trash, you won't find the good stuff. Wish I would have made note of who so I could thank them!
And go slow..slowing down seems to help.
 

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Charlie P. (NY)

Gold Member
Feb 3, 2006
13,003
17,106
South Central Upstate NY in the foothills of the h
Detector(s) used
Minelab Musketeer Advantage Pro w/8" & 10" DD coils/Fisher F75se(Upgraded to LTD2) w/11" DD, 6.5" concentric & 9.5" NEL Sharpshooter DD coils/Sunray FX-1 Probe & F-Point/Black Widows/Rattler headphone
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
First rule of "Silver Coin Club" is to look where silver coins are. Go slow and thorough. Listen for faint signals (headphones a must).

One trick is to hunt after a rainstorm - wet ground = deeper signals. And go back to where you hunted earlier. There are likely coins "masked" by other coins.

Personally, I set no notch and very low discrimination (5 on a 1 to 99 scale) and would rather hear/see trash and decide than let the detector's parameters try and decide for me. Sweeping at a different angle sometimes helps you rule out trashy signals. Or decided maybe it's not trash.

Only way to be sure is dig everything. Then, for sanity, you may decide to pass on specific signals if it is a common item at that sight.
 

Honest Samuel

Banned
Sep 23, 2015
8,814
4,969
Connecticut
Detector(s) used
Minelab
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
You both must spend a lot of money on gas and oil. You are not in a race, slow down and found more/ Good hunting and good luck.
 

FreeBirdTim

Silver Member
Sep 24, 2013
3,757
6,730
Scituate, RI
🥇 Banner finds
1
Detector(s) used
Garrett AT Pro
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
If I had permission to detect any of those spots in RI, I'd spend at least a week at each one. How you did all six in a day is beyond me. You must be running around like a chicken with it's head cut off! Slow down! You're digging a ton of clad because that's the easy stuff on top. Most silver coins and large cents will be 4 to 6 inches down, so it's easy to miss their signal if you're going at that pace.
 

ScoTTT2

Jr. Member
Jul 19, 2021
47
133
steuben county, ny
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
for sure the places you've mentioned have silver coins somewhere in the ground .. if they are really good places chances are they were hit before and all the easy signals were dug, now the easy signals are replaced by clad .. but still there are silver coins and old coppers, no doubt .. try this next time you hit a old spot .. one start at on edge of the property and the other at the other edge (property line) .. if the property line is 100 foot expect it to take you 1/2 an hour at least to get to the other end .. dig every signal that repeats, no matter how deep and forget about the TID numbers .. turn your iron volume low so you can just hear it .. no notch, little to no discrim (maybe to eliminate hot rocks).. if you don't have any, buy the best headphones you can find .. and practice coil control ..the whole coil on the ground and overlap each swing ... this is my third year detecting and I can pretty much find silver coins anytime I go out .. my biggest struggle at first was only digging the good numbers .. once I stopped paying attention to the numbers and listening to the sounds, the good finds started coming and along with that the sound of a good target became more recognizable .. by doing this it made me slow down, way down, when I started I was mostly out for a walk and not hunting for coins .. there are two kinds of hunting you can do with your detector, you can cover a lot of ground or you can focus on those deep targets .. not both .. don't get discouraged they will come
 

Tony in SC

Gold Member
Jun 8, 2006
6,081
8,400
Upstate South Carolina
Detector(s) used
Whites, Minelab, Tesoro, and custom machines
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
One thing to add. If a detector has auto ground balance ( like the old DFX and others) moving the coil creepy slow will make the machine miss deep coins. Detecting slow should mean overlapping your sweeps and taking your time. Make you a garden and experiment with coil speed. You might be surprised.
 

Clad2Silver

Bronze Member
Jul 17, 2018
2,052
5,648
Eastern Connecticut
Detector(s) used
Garrett AT Max/ Garrett AT Pro/ Garrett Ace 400/ Garrett Pro Pointer 2 / Garrett Z-Lynk AT Propointer
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
In addition to the very good technical advice that has been posted in response to your questions, I'll add the following......Though the sites you mentioned would seem to have a lot of "potential", there is no guarantee that there are any good targets in the grounds that you searched. Don't believe all the videos you watch because while some of them are real , they can be faked, and I'd bet that more than quite a few are in fact "questionable". Those videos aren't showing you all the times those guys dug nothing but clad or junk and go home "skunked". Good luck, keep at it, and sooner or later you'll find some of the good stuff.
 

Gare

Gold Member
Dec 30, 2012
7,366
13,874
Canton Ohio Area
🏆 Honorable Mentions:
2
Detector(s) used
Presently using Deus 2's & have Minelabs, Nokta's Tesoro's DEus's Have them all . Have WAY to many need to get rid of some
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
To find a old coin you have to put your coil over one :) You will find them . Keep searching.
 

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