7/18/14 Report - Which Is Most Important: Search Strategy or Detector Capabilities? How Beach Detecting Is Similar To Detecting In The Mountains. Crucifix & Large Cent.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.



1823 Large Cent Find

A few days ago I did a post about some views concerning metal detecting and metal detectors.  At the time I said I would talk more about strategies in the future.  I'll do that some today.  

Yesterday I told how I used an inexpensive metal detector in an old yard and in a woods and found a few wheat cents, an 1829 Large Cent, a brass relic and a ring in a few hours of detecting with a brand new detector that I had never used before. 

It is important to know your metal detector very well and metal detecting experience can be a big help. My previous experience with other metal detectors helped me quickly learn how to use the new detector fairly effectively.  I am still a relative novice when it comes to knowing this new detector.  It takes a while to learn all the ins and outs of any detector.

What helped me most, I believe, is my search strategy.  You might find it surprising that there is a lot about hunting a beach that can be directly applied to detecting a heavily wooded mountain.  Those two types of environments are very different, yet there are some commonalities when it comes to search strategies.

As you might know if you've been reading this blog very long, I do not put much emphasis on the detector I use.  I put more emphasis on search strategies than any thing else.  If you are in the wrong spot, your detector, no matter how good it is, can't do much for you.  I believe that the most important thing is to find the right spot to spend your time and avoid spending a lot of time in the wrong spots.  You can not do that with 100% accuracy, but it really makes a big difference if you spend your time in the most promising spots whether it is on a beach or a wooded wilderness.  Both present huge expanses that will be highly unproductive.

On a beach there is the wet sand area where the water comes and goes and sifts and sorts things.  On a beach, heavier items tend to get buried deeper in some areas and get uncovered in others.  There are also areas where things get covered or uncovered on a wooded hillside.

I like to eye-ball.  I've talked about that before.  To find old things by eye-balling, you have to find things that have been completely uncovered.  You have to find those areas where old things, instead of sinking, either remain on the surface or have been uncovered. 

Of course eye-balling is more difficult, because even if you find an area where things are being uncovered, a lot of items will still be under a layer of dust or under a little earth.   But if you do enough eye-balling to learn to find old things that way, you have probably learned to find and identify those good areas.  Eye-balling provides a good test of your ability to identify the most promising detecting spots.

On a beach, there are areas where the sand accumulates and older and heavier items are too deep to be detected.  In a woods, there isn't sand, but there are areas, usually flat areas or slight depressions, where leaves accumulate and the cover items quickly.  The soil quickly builds in those areas and old items are quickly buried.  Pull tabs and other similar light junk will stay in the top layers of humus or leaves just like light junk is often found in the top layers of accumulated sand.  There are a lot of similarities.

On the other hand, in the mountains there are streams and run-off areas on the hills where erosion occurs and where old items remain near the surface or are uncovered.  In the future I'll show you a very steep hillside where old things were found near the surface.  I'll do that as soon as I can ge my pictures transferred to this computer.  Right now the devices are not working.

I've given this analogy before.   I'd bet on an old Indian with a bow and arrow who knows how to track game and knows where game can be found over a city slicker with the best gun ever made.  Metal detecting is much like that.  I believe search skills are more important than detector capabilities.  That is one reason I showed what could be done with a relatively inexpensive detector.  It seems people tend to think they need a better detector if they aren't finding much.  In my opinion, that is seldom the biggest part of the problem.

Whether you are hunting a beach or a wooded mountain, there are good areas and poor areas for hunting and you can learn to find the good areas where old items will be near the surface.  I'll give more tips on that in the future.

If you learn to identify those good areas, you'll be able to find old things that do not require you to detect real deep and you won't have to dig big deep holes.  Talk about a time saver!


Here are two views of a broken crucifix from 17th Century Newfoundland believed to be a part of a rosary.  You can see extensive wear from rubbing, which suggests that it could be from a rosary.

Here is the link for more of that story and the source of the photos.

http://www.thetelegram.com/News/Local/2014-07-10/article-3794329/17th-century-crucifix-unearthed-in-Ferryland/1

The Large Cent has a diameter of between 27mm and 29mm. The first official mintage of the large cent was in 1793.  Production continued until 1857, when it was replaced by the much smaller penny.

When I dug the one shown above it was covered with mud and when I first saw it, from the size I thought it might be a half dollar.  After rubbing off some mud, I saw the faint image on the front of the coin and knew it was from an older era.  I was eventually surprised to see One Cent shown on the other side.

All Large Cents were minted in Philadelphia.

People complained that they were too big for pocket change.

While Spanish shipwreck cobs will be much older than a Large Cent, for a US coin, it is one of the oldest US coins that you will find.

Treasure Coast beach conditions haven't changed yet.

Hopefully I'll get more find pictures uploaded soon.

Happy hunting,
Treasureguide@comcast.net

7/17/14 Report - Testing A Good Inexpensive New Detector On a Yard and In The Woods. 1829 Large Cent Found

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

1829 Large Cent Found By New Ace 250 Detector

I'm going to do something today that I never do.  I'm going to give you a review of a metal detector.  It is the Garrett Ace 250, which just out of the box was able to detect various types of old and new targets on its first three short outings.   I was surprised by one find in particular (See photo.).

The Garrett Ace 250 is an inexpensive but very adequate metal detector.  For the price, it is an excellent detector.   Selling for just a little over $200 as compared to something more like $1200 for an Excalibur, it offers excellent performance for the price.  Don't, however, confuse it with something like the Excalibur, which has a totally different purpose.  As I've discussed before, a detector should be selected based upon what you plan to do with it, where you are going to hunt, and what you want to find, etc.

The Ace 250 is not a submersible detector.  In fact you should not get the control box wet.  So if you think it might rain, be sure to carry a cover or something with you. 

It is very compact and light weight.

It is very easy to assemble.  It came with batteries and headphones.  I assembled the entire thing and had it working in probably less than fifteen minutes.  It might take slightly longer if it is your first detector.

After quickly taking it out of the box and putting it together, I did a couple quick air tests  on coins in the house.  Everything looked good.  Then to the outdoors.

I took a penny, nickel, dime and quarter, threw them on the ground with a small distance between.  I  ran my coin over them and got good audio and display responses.  Again, no problem.

If this is a first detector for you, spend a lot of time on this step.  Also take a nail, pull tab and bottle cap.  The more time you spend practicing the better off you will be.

I'd start in coin mode.



Ace 250  Display and Buttons

The detector has five different modes that are selected by push button.   They are coin, relics, custom, jewelry and all metals modes,

You'll short change yourself if you don't spend good time practicing with known targets, but I've talked about that a lot in the past.

After some time, place some test targets very close to each other and on top of each other, like a nail and a coin.  The goal is to really get to know your detector and how it sounds when you encounter things in the field.

The settings and adjustments on this detector are easy to select and use.

Within an hour of first opening the box, I found a wheat penny along with a handful of other newer coins with this detector.  I was working an old yard that had been lightly worked before.

The one thing that you might find disappointing if you are new to detecting is that target ID is not as simple as it sounds.  It has both a graphic display, which is well organized and effective, and audio tones to discriminate.

When you first read about target ID you might imagine that it is clear cut and simple.  Just wave the coil over an object and read the ID.   It is not quite that simple though.  Many targets will cause the meter to jump around.  A target might read pull tab then nickel and the pull tab again, for one example.

In this yard there were a lot of roofing nails,  The display usually jumped back and forth between quarter and iron on those.  After a while you know how they display.

It does take time to get to know things like that though.

When a coin was detected it usually gave a pretty consistent reading.   Some cases were more complicated though.  For example when multiple targets were on top of each other or close to each other.

On the first day using this inexpensive detector in the first hour of operation in the yard I found several regular coins, including a wheat penny.

The next day I took the detector out on an old path where I found a 1909 wheat penny and some other clad coins.  Then back to the yard for a little more hunting.  I switched from the Coin mode to the All Metals mode. 

If you know me, you might be surprised that it took me that long to go to All Metals mode, but I wanted to explore the Coin Mode, so played with that a while first.  After switching to All Metals mode, one more wheat penny and a nice brass relic popped up.  I'll show the relic some time.

Then the next day a couple of hours in the woods resulted in finds which included another wheat penny, a 1829 large cent and an old inexpensive ring.

You'd never believe where I found those.  It was a very steep hillside in the woods.  A lot of the time I was following a deer path.  There was no obvious reason to suspect those items were there.  Also found was the metal end of a shot gun shell and a bullet casing.  Those types of finds were expected.  I'll show a picture of that woods area maybe tomorrow.

You can use the various modes together too.   For example if you are hunting in All Metals mode and get a signal that you want to check in Coin mode, that is very easy.  Just hit the push button with your thumb to change modes. 

I would use All Metals Mode a lot and then switch modes when I want to double check a target.

That shows what you can do with a detector that costs not much more than two hundred dollars.  I thought it worked well.  Part of it was my search strategy.  I'll get into that more sometime too.

One feature that this detector has that is better than the high-end detectors that I use is how easy it is to change the modes and settings.  Just use your thumb of your hand holding the detector without letting go of the detector rod or using your other hand.  That is a feature that I'd really like to see on my high-end detectors.

To summarize, the Ace 250 worked well inland, and I'm sure it will work well in dry sand too, although I do not know how well the few exposed metal parts will stand up to constant salt spray without some extra protection.

One reason I did this review is that a lot of people ask what they should get for their first detector.  I'm not saying this is it, because as I've explained, it depends on a lot of factors, but in many cases this would be a good first detector.

I highly recommend this detector as a first detector, especially if you are going to hunt inland.  It is easy to use and effective.  It would also make a good back-up or special purpose detector.  I thought it was a great value at a low price.

I did not test it on the beach and suspect that it is better choice for hunting inland.  I suspect that it might function well in dry sand.  I don't know how it would do in wet sand. 


On the Treasure Coas the surf is still small, but the tides are unusually big now.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net