Complete Newbie to Metal Detecting - looking for ideas/support

[omillett]

Hello all,

I'm completely new to the hobby. Well, I had one of those $100 Radio Shack detectors in the early 80's, but it was pretty much useless.

In any event, I'm looking for advice guidance on detector selection. Here are the relevant details:

- I live in Chile. So what I buy must be relatively support-free, and I must be able to figure it out pretty much out of the box / with occasional posts to this forum in order to make it work.

- From a budget perspective, I would far rather buy something that will last me for awhile, rather than a machine that I will 'outgrow' rapidly. It will be expensive to ship the detector and pay Chilean import taxes on it, so I would rather spend a little more up front and be happy with my machine for several years, rather than buy one, feel like I need an upgrade after a year or so, and spend all over again.

- I would most likely be detecting on beaches, and in public areas. Chile probably has pretty high mineralization considering how much mining goes on here. So I need something suitable, and able to be used in the surf. (I have no intention of diving and detecting)

- I don't anticipate using the detector to search for alluvial gold. Although having the capacity could be useful if I took a field trip out to the Atacama desert. (Also for meteorites)

- I also need advice on what is appropriate for a newbie for tools. ie - scoops, the tool used to make a 'plug', anything else to consider.

- I am a pretty active gem 'fossicker', so one idea is to use my fossicking sieves, especially on the beach - unless this is a silly idea.

- Our voltage is 220V, so whatever I buy has to handle 110-220V.

Thanks in advance for your opinions/ideas.

 

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[TNGUNS]

First of all, Welcome to Tnet. One of the biggest issues you will face is the wet sand. Seems like the PI machines are most commonly used for salt water and it's beaches (I am from Tennessee so no experience). The Garrett AT Pro is a supper popular machine for general hunting and is waterproof to I think 10 feet. Don't think it will be very effective in the wet sand though. The VLF machines used by the larger percentage of us on land don't get very good depth from what I hear in salt water. The down side to the PI machines is the discrimination or lack of. From my more limited experience I think it would be a good machine if you are going to just use one. Many that hunt salt water have a specialized machine just for that purpose, and another for land. I am sure many are MUCH more qualified than I to put you in the right direction on the machine and it's accessories. Mainly wanted to throw out a HELLO and WELCOME.

 

[omillett]

First of all, Welcome to Tnet. One of the biggest issues you will face is the wet sand. Seems like the PI machines are most commonly used for salt water and it's beaches (I am from Tennessee so no experience). The Garrett AT Pro is a supper popular machine for general hunting and is waterproof to I think 10 feet. Don't think it will be very effective in the wet sand though. The VLF machines used by the larger percentage of us on land don't get very good depth from what I hear in salt water. The down side to the PI machines is the discrimination or lack of. From my more limited experience I think it would be a good machine if you are going to just use one. Many that hunt salt water have a specialized machine just for that purpose, and another for land. I am sure many are MUCH more qualified than I to put you in the right direction on the machine and it's accessories. Mainly wanted to throw out a HELLO and WELCOME.

Thanks for the reply and welcome!

Forgive my ignorance, but - PI and VLF stand for...?

 

[cudamark]

P.I. means Pulse Induction, and VLF stands for Very Low Frequency

 

[cudamark]

With all the various types of detecting you plan to do, I only see one machine that will do all that well. That would be the Minelab CTX 3030. At about $2500 U.S, it's a bit on the expensive side but you won't outgrow it anytime in the foreseeable future. OK, it might not be the greatest at nugget hunting but with a small coil, it's not terrible. If you are REAL careful and don't go more than knee deep in the water, there are many other machines that will do the job too and at a lesser cost. Just about any Minelab model works well in the wet salt water/sand. So do most P.I. machines but those are miserable in a park (and any junky beaches) as they don't have any discrimination to speak of. The Fisher CZ21 is another good surf machine but there again, it's not the best choice for a park.

 

[rainyday101]

When you say beaches, I assume you mean the dry sand. A good saltwater detector usually is not an ideal land/park hunter. I think if you start out with dry sand beaches and parks and land areas some good choices for you might be: AT Pro (it pains me to say that), Xterra 705 or 505, Whites M6, Tesoro Vaquero, Fisher F5 or F70, or an Omega. Start doing some research on one of these models and see if one fits your needs real well. By researching these and reading reviews on them you will learn more and get a better sense of direction for what you are really after. We have no idea of how mineralized your soil is so all the machines I listed have adjustable ground balance to help deal with mineralization.

Check around on the beaches and see what others might be using. Stop and chat with them and see what they have to say.

As far as the CTX3030- Are you kidding? He said he was newbie.

 

[dirtscratcher]

When you say beaches, I assume you mean the dry sand. A good saltwater detector usually is not an ideal land/park hunter. I think if you start out with dry sand beaches and parks and land areas some good choices for you might be: AT Pro (it pains me to say that), Xterra 705 or 505, Whites M6, Tesoro Vaquero, Fisher F5 or F70, or an Omega. Start doing some research on one of these models and see if one fits your needs real well. By researching these and reading reviews on them you will learn more and get a better sense of direction for what you are really after. We have no idea of how mineralized your soil is so all the machines I listed have adjustable ground balance to help deal with mineralization.

Check around on the beaches and see what others might be using. Stop and chat with them and see what they have to say.

As far as the CTX3030- Are you kidding? He said he was newbie.

Why not start with a top of the line if you can afford it. For example I once bought a beep and dig type detector and wasted a,year and a half detector tong with what I consider to be actually handicapping my efforts. I personally found what was supposed to be a more complex as in harder to learn detector much easier and infinitely more effective. If someone is serious about getting into this hobby and can afford to get it done right the first time would save frustration and money in the long run.

 

[Fletch88]

Why not start with a top of the line if you can afford it. For example I once bought a beep and dig type detector and wasted a,year and a half detector tong with what I consider to be actually handicapping my efforts. I personally found what was supposed to be a more complex as in harder to learn detector much easier and infinitely more effective. If someone is serious about getting into this hobby and can afford to get it done right the first time would save frustration and money in the long run.

I did the same thing except I only wasted 3-4 months. But I will say after having Etrac and CTX for a while I kind of enjoy going back to beep and digs. They can be frustrating and discouraging but it's more of a thrill when you do dig a good target. It's like using a fancy compound bow with led sights and a release and then going back to a recurve bow with fingers and no sights.

 

[dirtscratcher]

I did the same thing except I only wasted 3-4 months. But I will say after having Etrac and CTX for a while I kind of enjoy going back to beep and digs. They can be frustrating and discouraging but it's more of a thrill when you do dig a good target. It's like using a fancy compound bow with led sights and a release and then going back to a recurve bow with fingers and no sights.

I will occasionally take the beep and dig out but not with the confidence of my other detectors.

 

[Fletch88]

I've been thinking about this question a lot lately. If it's a place I have one opportunity to hunt I want a machine with every advantage possible to make it enjoyable and worth while. If it's a place that I can hunt anytime I enjoy cherry picking with a beep and dig. Them returning and lowering disc a little and digging the targets that were disc'd out before.

 

[omillett]

I've been thinking about this question a lot lately. If it's a place I have one opportunity to hunt I want a machine with every advantage possible to make it enjoyable and worth while. If it's a place that I can hunt anytime I enjoy cherry picking with a beep and dig. Them returning and lowering disc a little and digging the targets that were disc'd out before.

Hello all, and thank you for your thoughtful responses. Some clarifications:

The beach closest to where I live is a stony beach, and would be VERY trashy, as there are lots of parties / pulltabs, cans etc... down there. It isn't used widely for swimming, so I would be focused mostly on areas where people are congregating / picnicking etc...

I have NEVER seen someone using a metal detector of any kind in Chile. I expect there are some in use in the gold fields, but as far as beach/park hunting goes, I may well be the first. Which means I'm going to be digging a lot of junk I expect.

My town was first populated by the Spanish in the 1560's, so I am very much interested in looking to see if I can find anything 'old'. I expect these finds wouldn't be on the beach.

The beach is of course salt-water, and there is some black sand, but also lots of stones (granite based) and lots of mica, feldspar - what you'd expect in an outcrop of coarse-grained granite.

My beach recovery would likely be for 'fun' and MAYBE recovering some lost jewellery as the biggest prize. Chilean coins only go up to about a dollar in value (500 pesos, worth about 85 cents) and as small as ONE peso (a small aluminum coin). So there isn't much financial gain to be had in their recovery. Silver and gold coins were pulled from circulation in the 30's, so these would be very scarce finds indeed.

Assuming I don't take the detector into the surf, then really what I need is a machine that can cope with the trash, and the heavily mineralized soil found at the beach (and whatever issues salt-wet sand presents). Ultimately for the 'treasure' I am going to be digging in parks / fields, and looking for relatively deep signals, if searching for coins/artifacts that are Spanish colonial in nature.

Thanks for the tips. Are there any recommended books / sites for someone like me, just trying to grasp the startup requirements for this hobby?

 

[rainyday101]

Why not start with a top of the line if you can afford it. For example I once bought a beep and dig type detector and wasted a,year and a half detector tong with what I consider to be actually handicapping my efforts. I personally found what was supposed to be a more complex as in harder to learn detector much easier and infinitely more effective. If someone is serious about getting into this hobby and can afford to get it done right the first time would save frustration and money in the long run.

I guess we probably have different approaches to the same problem, that's fine. I work on high tech electronics all day and like simple, but effective when I go detecting.

For the record, if I ever get back into bow hunting, I'm gonna use a recurve bow. I imagine the archery forums aren't a whole lot different than our forum!

 

[T.C.]

Welcome to Tnet omillett!! Go to this site ahrps.org (American Heritage & Research Preservation Society....whew!!). 'Ol Monte over there knows just about everything there is to know on metal detectors!! He's older than dirt, but very knowledgeable. Good luck!!

 

[cudamark]

If you're not going into the water and you need good discrimination, I'd get any of the Minelab's I mentioned, from the Explorer SE, to the E-trac, and on up to the CTX3030. Any of them will work fine in the salt and black sand that you would find at an ocean beach. They also have a video display to help I.D. targets before you decide to dig or not. Nothing wrong with a newbie starting with top of the line equipment. I'm sure you can resell them if you decide detecting is not for you. If you get a popular model like the ones mentioned, you won't lose much in depreciation on reselling it, assuming you keep it in good condition. Get the Andy Sabisch book for whichever model you get.

 

[Aussie]

I'm going to suggest the minelab sovereign gt.
Excellent beach machine for wet or dry sand.
Getting one is going to be the problem.
Sounds like an exciting area to hunt.
Good luck.