My Deus FINALLY beat the red Virginia dirt.

[smokeythecat]

Now I didn't whoop the dirt real good, but I was detecting a relatively new permission. I have pulled some nice items out of there, nothing spectacular, bullets and buttons, melted lead, pieces of ration cans. I hadn't been on the site since I got the 9" elliptical coil. Today i was basically "horseing around", as it was 27 degrees or so, and fortunately in the woods the ground was not frozen. The place has ultra hot ground. At least 50% of the local rocks are "hot rocks" and make the machine sound off. There is an enormous amount of ration can pieces and other scraps of iron there. It is a difficult place to hunt. PLUS, it's a known site and people have detected it probably since the 1960's. When I first went there, I pulled hundreds of pieces of ration cans from around the trees.

Non ferrous targets have become imaginary. Until today. Today was the first time I tried the 9" elliptical on the site. Of course I dug the iron to get it out of the way. But today I did much better than I have in a long time. Please see the pic. First is a pile of the iron.

Second, I have two dropped minies, the one on the right is extra cool as is side cast. I also got a couple lead blobs and a coat and cuff eagle button. I also have the little iron "thing" with a screw hole in the flat end, and two ancient shotgun shell bases. It's been a long time since I got any of these from this site.

I set up the machine with the factory "Deus Fast" mode. I was running 4 tones, and used the tracking ground balance setting. THIS TIME, I took a chance and bumped the frequency up to 74khz, not really knowing what it would do.

I went over the exact same spots I had hunted with the regular coil and pulled out these items. It is a small place, so going around in circles is a given there. That 74 khz frequency did the trick. The one minie was about 7-8" deep which is unheard of for a vlf machine in the red dirt. Now YOU know the secret. Go save some history.

 

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[RustyGold]

Congratulations on some cool finds Smokey. Glad you were able to go for a hunt. I love the HF Elliptical Coil too. It’s very stable and quiet at the beach.

 

[Calabash Digger]

cool and thanks for the info.

 

[smokeythecat]

Calabash, I see you're up early too. It's a warm 15 degrees out today, so maybe I won't detect. I was really surprised to find that one minie that deep. I had to go very slowly and it was just a squeaker of a tone, but I got it!

 

[Calabash Digger]

Ive been digging a lot of those type tones with the hf coil. BTW the GW was one of those a very faint smooth tone but I was in pitch.

 

[smokeythecat]

I haven't used the pitch mode yet. My Confederate buckle was I guess 8 inches, again using HF and Deus Fast, 74 khz, but it was a screamer due to its size and the very mellow dirt on my PA site. Now I want to go out and dig this am. Only 15 degrees out there.

 

[3cylbill]

WOW 74 khz ....i don't think i have that on my machine...great hunt smokey . imagine that, you learned something new ...at your age !

 

[dirtlooter]

pretty exciting when you are able to make adjustments with a machine and improve your odds as dramatically as that. congrats and good luck. can't wait to see what else you are able to pull out of the ground. I can easily see where guys like you and CD love those HF coils. For me, finds like those would be real confidence boosters that I was doing something right and that the investments would be worth it.

 

[smokeythecat]

The real secret to detecting it to...go detecting. It's mostly a matter of time spent. Not the machine so much. Now if you're fortunate to live in an old area, like I do, the possibilities are great. I go pretty slow, and dig the marginal targets. Don't assume the "screamers" are aluminum cans. Three of my "screamers" this year were a Confederate buckle, a Union belt buckle a 6 pound cannon ball and a Rev War cross belt plate. Others had walked over the cross belt plate, literally, thinking it was a can. Go in the briars, I got a minie UNDER a tree (6" across) I had to move yesterday. Look in the rocks, the swamps, the water. Everywhere. ESPECIALLY right next to driveways and roads. Dig those cans out of the way. Think out of the box. Remember, this site has been hunted since probably 1960 or so. Theoretically there shouldn't be much of anything left there.

 

[Patriot Relics]

Glad to hear the positive reviews on the HF elliptical coil- I've got one, but rarely take it out. Anyone else find that it hits hard on the tin yest of conductive targets? Like spending a 20 minutes trying to recover the head of a needle. I find on my sites the 9 in standard provides the best of both target separation and depth.

 

[Carolina Tom]

Very well done STC! I really need to get one of those HF coils. I guess I better start saving my money up.

Thanks for the tip!

 

[smokeythecat]

3cylbill, I don't think any manufacturer has a coil that screams that high except the XP Deus. The 28k frequency on it does well, but there is world of difference if you want to get the tiny gold and all those pesky Civil War cuff buttons down deep with your machine.

 

[vferrari]

STC - What did the tones for the minies sound like? Especially the deep one (i.e., iron, mid, or high tone)?

 

[beep1971]

Have you tried the goldfield program using the HF coils yet?
I've a theory that as there's less of the ground signal being cut in Goldfield, which in turn may be an area that includes higher conductors, that it may offset the effect of the higher frequencies that put deep large silver above the 99ID and call it iron in hot ground.
It might be worth trying out.

 

[smokeythecat]

beep1971, I am not real tech saavy, I admit it. I'm just a dirt grubber. My mom got me started when I was little. So I have not used the goldfield program. Ground is hot, and there is a nail every 3 inches. Next to a piece of a broken ration can. I dug maybe 100 of those yesterday.

Hugh, the sound was repeatable and sounded a lot like a small, deep piece of foil with no vdi.

 

[vferrari]

Have you tried the goldfield program using the HF coils yet?
I've a theory that as there's less of the ground signal being cut in Goldfield, which in turn may be an area that includes higher conductors, that it may offset the effect of the higher frequencies that put deep large silver above the 99ID and call it iron in hot ground.
It might be worth trying out.

I programmed Smokey's machine to use ground field with some highly mineralized ground tweaks. It was not a hit wit Smokey. Too chatty.

 

[smokeythecat]

Yes, that gold field was pretty useless in this particular site. It went off constantly. On any given 1' square piece of land there can be 10-20 targets. What I normally do is simply put the machine aside, go at that spot with a shovel taking off 2" at a time, using a large magnet to try to get the nails out then use the machine to find the mid tones and pinpointer for the toughies. Normally under those conditions I will get either a minie ball, piece of lead, button or such out of that little area. Plus the 25 pieces of junk iron.

 

[Bart@Big Boys Hobbies]

Now I didn't whoop the dirt real good, but I was detecting a relatively new permission. I have pulled some nice items out of there, nothing spectacular, bullets and buttons, melted lead, pieces of ration cans. I hadn't been on the site since I got the 9" elliptical coil. Today i was basically "horseing around", as it was 27 degrees or so, and fortunately in the woods the ground was not frozen. The place has ultra hot ground. At least 50% of the local rocks are "hot rocks" and make the machine sound off. There is an enormous amount of ration can pieces and other scraps of iron there. It is a difficult place to hunt. PLUS, it's a known site and people have detected it probably since the 1960's. When I first went there, I pulled hundreds of pieces of ration cans from around the trees.

Non ferrous targets have become imaginary. Until today. Today was the first time I tried the 9" elliptical on the site. Of course I dug the iron to get it out of the way. But today I did much better than I have in a long time. Please see the pic. First is a pile of the iron.

Second, I have two dropped minies, the one on the right is extra cool as is side cast. I also got a couple lead blobs and a coat and cuff eagle button. I also have the little iron "thing" with a screw hole in the flat end, and two ancient shotgun shell bases. It's been a long time since I got any of these from this site.

I set up the machine with the factory "Deus Fast" mode. I was running 4 tones, and used the tracking ground balance setting. THIS TIME, I took a chance and bumped the frequency up to 74khz, not really knowing what it would do.

I went over the exact same spots I had hunted with the regular coil and pulled out these items. It is a small place, so going around in circles is a given there. That 74 khz frequency did the trick. The one minie was about 7-8" deep which is unheard of for a vlf machine in the red dirt. Now YOU know the secret. Go save some history.

View attachment 1537088 View attachment 1537089

This is GREAT news on the bad soil! Thanks!

 

[tnsharpshooter]

Smokey the cat is a Smoking!!

 

[smokeythecat]

Yes, right now I have smoke coming out of my ears. Last beach hunt just produced coins. On a gold dry spell right now. Not even a silver earring. Of course, it IS January. Saw some nice ruddy ducks, my first this last week and some scaup. The one little female scaup was apparently sleeping next to what remained of an ice flow. I got within 15 feet, didn't see her and she woke up and tore out to join the other ones. Really cute.