CTX 3030 Screw Cap Question

WisconsinPirate

Full Member
Aug 2, 2017
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Racine, Wi
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Hi! I am a bit new to the CTX and had a question about the VDI/Sound/Visual for screw caps. I went to a park today. I was trying to dig bad/good (iffy) signals today because I have not had any luck finding anything silver and I thought this might be a way to find things other detectors could not distinguish. The park is one of the older ones in town, but I think the park has been hit many times since forever. So I was trying this to see if I could pull anything out of the ground. Well I did not. I only found screw caps and pull tabs. I dug about 20 malt liquor screw caps, and modern pull tabs.

I get the pull tab thing but I did not think screw caps rung exactly the same as quarters. Is this what other people get?

I was running FE CO, coin mode, basically factory settings. The VDI/Sound/Visual were the same for the screw caps as for quarters: high bell tone, 12-45, and a tight red ball on the screen. After about 10 of these I was trying to figure out a "tell" and I could not. Any advice or is this like pull tabs
meaning tough luck there is no tell dig them all. Thanks in advance.

20171110_145858.jpg
 

ChampFerguson/TN

Bronze Member
Nov 22, 2013
1,181
1,620
TN
Detector(s) used
Minelab Safari .......... Minelab Excalibur II ....... ........Minelab CTX 3030
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Screw caps are tough for me too, but part of the answer is in your post;
"I was trying to dig bad/good (iffy) signals..."

Its hard to describe, but coins just sound more 'solid' than screw caps to me. Maybe "crisp tone" is a better description of the good sound. An iffy signal in the quarter range is almost always junk in my heavily hunted parks ime. Sure, it could possibly be junk interfering with a good signal, but Target Trace seems to do a very good job of showing when multiple targets are present.
I still dig a lot of screw caps because I hate not being sure, but if I would learn to trust myself more I think I would dig a LOT less screw caps without leaving very many quarters behind.
 

Jason in Enid

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Oct 10, 2009
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Screw caps are a PIA. You cant eliminate them, just part of the detecting game.
 

cudamark

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Interesting that you get a quarter reading out of a screw cap. I find they usually read 12-40 and similar to Chucky Cheese (or similar) tokens and keys. Clad quarters are usually 12-46-12-47 on my machine. I haven't had a screw top read that high unless it's a huge cap.....like one for a juice jar.
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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Aug 2, 2017
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Thank-You Gents for the response! I appreciate it!

Jason agreed they are a PIA and where I am going I feel like someone buried a screw cap every few inches or so just to scr** with people metal detecting.

ChampF I should have described the bell tone was ringing solid not really iffy. Not multiple signals just solid 12-45 ringing strong. What you wrote is helpful and I am gonna try listening for the bell and crisper tone. Maybe I was hoping for a good signal and interpreting the sound to be good. If all else fails I'll keep digging everything and by the law of large numbers I will hit something eventually.

Gonna go out now and try for a few hours at the very least it is not snowing today so better conditions.

Thank-You!
 

ChampFerguson/TN

Bronze Member
Nov 22, 2013
1,181
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TN
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Minelab Safari .......... Minelab Excalibur II ....... ........Minelab CTX 3030
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Interesting that you get a quarter reading out of a screw cap. I find they usually read 12-40 and similar to Chucky Cheese (or similar) tokens and keys. Clad quarters are usually 12-46-12-47 on my machine. I haven't had a screw top read that high unless it's a huge cap.....like one for a juice jar.


Now a 47 for a clad qtr is something I rarely see with my CTX. 47 is almost always silver on my machine. I've heard folks say different machines can hit slightly different on some things- maybe this is a case of that.
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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Aug 2, 2017
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Went out again this evening to the same park for about an hour and a half. I hit four clad quarters, one dime, one nickel, and three pennies (three quarters and a penny were in a coin spill). I also hit several screw caps, foil, and pull tabs. The clad quarters rang solidly at 12-45, the pennies hit 12-36, 12-38; the nickel hit at 12-15; and the clad dime hit 12-43. All these coins were between 1/2"-4" I paid attention to the screw/bottle caps again. One Soda Root Beer Cap a 12-45, one gold beer cap 12-45, one Pepsi bottle cap 12-43, one smashed white screw cap also 12-45, and one blue Budweiser screw cap 12-40. All the sounds for the screw caps and bottle caps sounded like quarter and dime sounds other than the 12-40 Budweiser cap which as ChampF said did not sound the same but it was very subtlety different. The foil ranged between 12-03, 12-05, 12-07 all low sounding. The Pull Tabs ranged between 12-10, 12-17, 12-16, and 12-21 - each mid-level tones. I have never hit a silver quarter or dime with the machine and I pretty much dig anything 12-30 and above so I am hoping at some point I do.

Thank-You for the responses.
 

mrwilburino

Hero Member
May 7, 2010
680
617
Northern Ohio
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I like to use combined tones and set the last bin at about 38 conductive. Then I dig anything that high-tones unless it's an obvious iron false. If I'm hitting a lot of aluminum trash, then I'll skip anything that reads shallower than 4" to 6" although that depends on the site.
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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Aug 2, 2017
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I like to use combined tones and set the last bin at about 38 conductive. Then I dig anything that high-tones unless it's an obvious iron false. If I'm hitting a lot of aluminum trash, then I'll skip anything that reads shallower than 4" to 6" although that depends on the site.

Thank-You Mr. Wilburino! Not exactly sure how to set the last bin tone but I will read the manual and give it a shot. I like the idea of skipping the aluminum trash in the range discussed just to see if I can start pulling older coins out. It would be nice. Since, I have really been watching what I dig lately I have noticed I do not get many actual tone signals between 5"-8". After eight I get negative breaks in the Hmmm like a pulse induction detector. The screen usually shows a VDI number when this happens but I am not getting many actual beeps below 5" approximately. I'm thinking the park just might be cleaned out.

Thank-You!
 

DeepDigs

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Oct 27, 2016
218
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Make sure you are performing a noise cancel about once every 15 minutes with the coil TO THE GROUND and not in the air. This may help even out your VDI numbers abit.

Bottle caps should appear in the 12-39 to 12-40 range, or at least thats how they appear for me. Hope this helps.
 

cudamark

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Make sure you are performing a noise cancel about once every 15 minutes with the coil TO THE GROUND and not in the air. This may help even out your VDI numbers abit.

Bottle caps should appear in the 12-39 to 12-40 range, or at least thats how they appear for me. Hope this helps.

I assume you mean screw caps, right? Bottle caps (AKA crown caps) should read 01-02 on the ferrous numbers and upper teens to mid 20's on the conductive side. As for noise cancel, I rarely ever have to hit mine. Usually if I'm around another machine or an area with EMI are the only places I need to use it.
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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DeepDigs,
I will try this. I keep hitting beer screw caps in the range of 12-38; 12-40; 12-41. Soda Screw caps seems to ring a little higher. I have no idea why. Bottle Caps or crown caps hit around 12-37 or 12-38 for me. I have not actually hit a crown cap in the low ferrous and 20's conductive range. I pulled three out yesterday and they rang at 12-37 and 12-38. They were old and rusted. The tones and VDI are all the same so basically I dig everything. I hit a 1940 wheat penny two days ago at 12-40, and four feet away from this target I hit a beer screw cap at 12-40. Yesterday I had two targets about a three feet apart one was a 1973 penny and the other a crown cap both rang in at 12-38.
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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Aug 2, 2017
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139
Racine, Wi
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DeepDigs,
I will try this. I keep hitting beer screw caps in the range of 12-38; 12-40; 12-41. Soda Screw caps seems to ring a little higher. I have no idea why. Bottle Caps or crown caps hit around 12-37 or 12-38 for me. I have not actually hit a crown cap in the low ferrous and 20's conductive range. I pulled three out yesterday and they rang at 12-37 and 12-38. They were old and rusted. The tones and VDI are all the same so basically I dig everything. I hit a 1940 wheat penny two days ago at 12-40, and four feet away from this target I hit a beer screw cap at 12-40. Yesterday I had two targets about a three feet apart one was a 1973 penny and the other a crown cap both rang in at 12-38.
 

DeepDigs

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Oct 27, 2016
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Yes, sorry, I meant screw caps. The noise cancel is paramount to getting maximum performance out of the CTX 3030. This is per Andy Sabisch and I have to admit, I used to leave my machine on noise cancel:6 all the time before reading his article. Since trying his suggestion, my machine has run smoother AND has kept the Auto +3 sensitivity at or around 25-26 constantly in areas where it used to run 22-23 constantly. I suggest trying it every 15-20 minutes while you're out in the field and see if it helps on days where your struggling to maintain consistency.

As a side note - while digging your targets, I suggest keeping the coil flat on the ground at all times, and not up in the air. That also seems to help keep your machine running smoother, while it reads the ground and not the air in between making adjustments.
 

DeepDigs

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Oct 27, 2016
218
195
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Equinox 800, XP Deus 2, XP Deus, Tesoro Vaquero
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DeepDigs,
I will try this. I keep hitting beer screw caps in the range of 12-38; 12-40; 12-41. Soda Screw caps seems to ring a little higher. I have no idea why. Bottle Caps or crown caps hit around 12-37 or 12-38 for me. I have not actually hit a crown cap in the low ferrous and 20's conductive range. I pulled three out yesterday and they rang at 12-37 and 12-38. They were old and rusted. The tones and VDI are all the same so basically I dig everything. I hit a 1940 wheat penny two days ago at 12-40, and four feet away from this target I hit a beer screw cap at 12-40. Yesterday I had two targets about a three feet apart one was a 1973 penny and the other a crown cap both rang in at 12-38.

My friend, I feel your pain. In an older area where I hunt 90% of the time, screw caps (in particularly BACARDI) ring a solid 12-39/12-40. The only way I can cheat this is to only dig targets that are 5" and deeper. Since I don't want to walk away and regret my decision, I just dig them and move on.

Also, due to the amount of rusted nails at the sites I hunt, I mainly hunt in Ferrous/Coin mode. Im not sure if switching modes (High Trash vs Ferrous/Coin) might help differentiate between a wheatie and a screw cap, might be worth a try. Wheaties here hit a solid 12-39/12-40 here in the Northwoods :(
 

WaterScoop

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Sep 12, 2017
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Now a 47 for a clad qtr is something I rarely see with my CTX. 47 is almost always silver on my machine. I've heard folks say different machines can hit slightly different on some things- maybe this is a case of that.

A BIG part of the VDI number difference has to do with Ground mineralization difference between the states. I’ve noticed that we have a wide range of demographics when it comes to the geology of the members in this “chat”:Wisconsin, California & Tennessee.

I have recently discovered a beautiful WIKI visual of the different soils around our country

HERE —> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._state_soils

You can visually see the difference in mineralization.

FA37C9FE-6BEA-4975-8D1A-86338433F9A8.jpeg
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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Good info!!! I am going to try this. I have been out well over 100+hours on the machine now and I don't think I have dug many coins more than 5" deep with it. I got a hit yesterday at 7" reading 12-39. I thought finally a coin because of the depth. I dug the plug and had a minor heart attack when I took a handful of dirt out and I saw gold in hand. I brushed it off and it was a smashed gold colored screw cap. 7" holy cow. Anyway, I am starting to wonder if there is fill in this park. I was up in Ashland late this summer and it is beautiful up there! Thanks for the response!
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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Waterscoop, Interesting. I am sure the soil composition has a lot to do with the readings. The soil at this particular park is rich topsoil with a lot of organics in it. Not seeing a ton of rock, sand or clay. Supposedly it was an old saw mill.
 

WaterScoop

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Sep 12, 2017
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... I brushed it off and it was a smashed gold colored screw cap. ...

I know the feeling , I can’t tell you how many times a gold crown bottle cap or gold crushed screw cap that only uncovered the edge of the top of the cap in dirt almost gave me a heart attack. After all the VDI numbers are there and when you see a shimmer of gold.. you think to yourself: ..” this is the ONE!!!” Then you pout maybe say a small profanity cover the hole and swing again.

D5B7BEFD-41F4-4C9F-9D1F-B0E062E6124D.jpeg
 

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WisconsinPirate

WisconsinPirate

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Haha. When I saw the gold I thought to myself finally my wife will stop giving me crud going out all of the time. Nope still getting crud. My other heart attack moment was finding a new dollar coin. What a major disappointment but I guess it is still worth a dollar.

I used to live in Dupont. You close to that neck of the woods?
 

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