Hunting rings with the CTX or eTrac

[pulltabfelix]

This is to you guys with CTX experience.



I am giving up hunting Civil War relics for a while and concentrating on finding rings in tot-lots, volleyball courts and old baseball fields. Of course I will take any silver I find, but I am really after rings.



Any hints, suggestions on determining rings from metallic trash? Skippy SH13 Friendly Metal Detecting forum has good luck finding rings in landlocked areas. He uses AT Pro and AT max now.



He states: When you target gold, you consider each piece of trash you come across and rule out anything that is likely NOT to be Gold.



Of course I know rings can ring up from 01 to 36 on the CO scale which makes hunting rings a challenge.



Do you know of any tricks like determining silver coin from clad coin switching between FC & high trash and 50 tones?

Always looking to the experienced CTX users for help.



John

 

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[cudamark]

See my comments in your CTX post. I've used both the CTX and Etrac in parks. I actually like the Equinox even better in a tot lot. I find I can get much closer to the metal posts and other metal equipment before a target gets masked. The faster processor of the Nox helps a lot.

 

[Robinb]

Have a look at this video on target numbers for gold.

 

[pulltabfelix]

Thanks Robin, helps me set up my discrim pattern. I am not near a ocean beach so I am hunting rings in city and county parks. Tough going due to ring pulls and poptop tabs. It is a game of which percentages are the most between gold and ring pulls and pop tops. Have to find the right discrim mix. Not easy, almost impossible.
But no way am I going to spend all my time digging ring pulls and pop tops.

Ring pulls are older and fewer than pop tops and thus deeper. But rings can be any depth in my parks from 0" to 6 or 7".

 

[Robinb]

Unfortunately ring pulls fall in the middle of the gold band. I had some gold pendants, all were low numbers, equally I have had thin gold rings right down low. Signet rings come in at 12:07, the heavier the ring, the higher the number.
Most rings come up a little higher around 12-12 to 12-20, the heaviest up to 12-36

Now if only the detector could tell composition of target :-)

 

[pulltabfelix]

Unfortunately ring pulls fall in the middle of the gold band. I had some gold pendants, all were low numbers, equally I have had thin gold rings right down low. Signet rings come in at 12:07, the heavier the ring, the higher the number.
Most rings come up a little higher around 12-12 to 12-20, the heaviest up to 12-36

Now if only the detector could tell composition of target :-)

Skippy SH13 over on Friendly Metal detecting forum is a big park ring hunter.

He advocates rings because one nice gold ring or nice gold ring with a diamond is worth more silver coins you will ever dig. Plus even if you find a key date silver coin, usually they come out of the dirt a little rough.

He does advocate using discrim at the expense of missing some rings co-located along the ring pull and pull tab CO line. He is saying that reducing your digging trash time increases your hunting time and thus the chances of finding gold rings.

I have taken Jay's gold program and added in some discrim areas that I hope to prove Skiippy's practice that he uses. He does quite well in the ring finding in parks department.

So I will hunt with it and that will be the final proof. It will work well for me, or not.

 

[eddie13]

What is it about 12s?
Does that guy only dig 12s so therefore only has gold that rings 12s or is their some magic about 12s?

I just tested the 2 rings I found..
The one I believe is brass rings 12:31
10k gold class ring that weighs 17.5 grams rings 12:36..

 

[pulltabfelix]

What is it about 12s?
Does that guy only dig 12s so therefore only has gold that rings 12s or is their some magic about 12s?

I just tested the 2 rings I found..
The one I believe is brass rings 12:31
10k gold class ring that weighs 17.5 grams rings 12:36..

It could be he was in the Ferrous-Coin setting which normalizes (or reports) all the FE as 12. If he was hunting with the setting of High Trash, you would see the real FE numbers. This is on the CTX. Not sure if eTrac has a 12 normalization feataure.

 

[JVA5th]

Late to this one and have used multiple metal detectors don't have any experience with the one you have. Though I've learned find gold anything can just be well a lot of work. Done lots of test comparing how gold rings up with nuggets, rings and all kinds of stuff compared to things like pull tabs and junk they often are nearly identical. I found when I tried to avoid that I'd never find gold. But perhaps maybe it's a me problem and I simply don't have some sort of talent. Just my humble opinion

 

[pulltabfelix]

Probably 95% of the people don't have that talent. Why? There is not a detector out there than can determine rings from junk like foil, pull tabs, ring pulls, even some coins. Why? They all occupy the same TID range and there is not much to clue you in the the target is a ring or not a ring.

The most successful ring finders are on the beach. Why, because that is where most rings are lost. Finding rings on the land is very difficult because less rings are lost and those that are come in the junk range. The good ring finders on land hunt volley ball courts, around basketball courts and totlots and some even in parks. You have to be a dig all targets kind of detectorists to be successful at finding rings in the dirt.

 

[pepperj]

Back in the late 80's I said to myself this is crazy. Digging 200-300 trash targets and not 1 gold.
I had better luck just coin shooting and getting the occasional gold.
Best of luck, dig enough targets, there's bound to get a gold.

 

[pulltabfelix]

Most of my few park rings have come from coin shooting. Usually when digging nickels. Lake beach hunting is different. I pretty much dig all signals except very obvious pull tabs. When wading in the water hunting, I find fewer pull tabs. Those are mostly up on the dry beach. Not many people bring their can drinks into the water.