Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.
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| Interesting Lot in the Current Sedwick Auction Catalog. |
I was looking through the current Sedwick auction catalog and noticed the item shown above. It is referred to as an "imitation cob." Below is the lot description.
Caracas, Venezuela, 2 reales "imitation cob," date as 142 date (early 1800s), struck over a Spanish bust 2R (milled edge), rare, NGC XF 40. ,KM-C13.1. Well-centered pillars, off-center cross (with often off-the-flan M visible to right), faint toning around details, but most important aspect is that the edge shows traces of the rectangle-circle milling from a bust 2R (first we have seen). NGC #4841431-006.
So it looks like somebody for some reason turned a milled Spanish 2 reale into a fake cob, and didn't do a very good job of it. The elements on the coin are very crude. Was it made to fool people? Maybe it was just somebody fooling around. The date doesn't make sense at all. There is a story behind that, but I can only wonder what it is.
Here is the link to the imitation cob.
There is another imitation cob in the catalog that is very much like the one shown above.
Here is the link to the Sedwick auction site.
https://auction.sedwickcoins.com/auctionlist.aspx
You need to register to bid.
Among the more interesting pieces, in my opinion, were the gold finger bars. The finger bars had some of the highest auction estimates of the entire auction. They were in the third session. Look around lot 80 or 81.
I really think there will be a lot of reales that don't sell. There is something for everybody though.
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I wanted to rank the metal detectors that I've owned and used over the years. I found out it wasn't easy to do that. There are a lot of factors.
This isn't an objective ranking or comparison.
My favorites though are the Noga and MacDonald modified Nautilus detectors. They were excellent at finding gold on the beaches and in the water. That is what they were made for. They nulled on iron, which I liked. If I'd been hunting relics instead of gold at the time, it would have been a different story. But they worked very well for what I was doing at the time, and back then I was doing it a lot and had a lot of success with it. One story that I recall and that illustrates how those detectors worked, was when I detected a small gold bead very near the access at Turtle Trail. I could easily detect the bead, but I could find it. I put a handful of sand containing the bead on the coil and still couldn't see the bead. I moved the sand around and the detector gave a signal. The sand was course and a color that matched closely to that of the bead, but I eventually found the bead.
Herb claimed his detectors were better than the Noga ones, but I'm not sure that was true.
I know some of the coils for those detectors were hotter than others.
They were very easy to set up and use because they were made for one type of hunting and didn't require or allow much adjustment.
The reason it is so difficult to rank the detectors, is that most of them have things that I like and find very effective, but also negatives.
I'd tend to rank the Garrett GTX second among those I've owned, but it is very heavy, difficult to learn to use well, and loves iron. Those sound might sound like serious problems, but when you learn to use it and if you aren't bothered much by trash, it is a powerful detector. I have confidence that I won't miss much of anything with that detector.
Of course the best detector for you always depends upon what you want to do with it, and your style and even your personality. There are some people who would never ever use the GTX.
In the middle of the pack are many others. High in the middle of the pack I'd put the other Minelab detectors that I've owned, including the Excalibur and Sovereign.
I used the Excalibur for several years. It worked well, but I used it differently than most people. I always used the pinpoint rather than the discrimination mode. If I'd been able to get either the Noga or MacDonald detectors at that point, I would have been using them.
I'd rank the Fisher 1280 right up there with the Excalibur. I used the 1280 a lot and found a lot with it. It was a good detector and very reliable. I eventually sold it for about as much as I bought it for. Long before I sold it, I found enough coins to more than pay for it, not counting any jewelry. I was keeping good records at the time and knew exactly when my coin finds went over the purchase price, which, if I correctly recall, was about $640.
The 1280 was also the detector that found my first silver and gold rings. One of the things I learned while using that detector is the danger of using too much discrimination. Overall, it was one of my favorites.
I'd rank the Royal Sabre after that. For such an old detector, it has a lot of nice features, but it I'd use it in dry sand or dry land only.
Then maybe the Stringray. I had trouble with the Tesoro Stingray from the beginning. I sent it back about three times and it was returned with the same problem. They wanted to blame it on underwater cables or something in the area, so I told them to send me another one to try in place of the original one to see if it was the location or the detector's fault. The replacement detector worked fine. The original Stingray had a grounding problem and the replacement was hardwired.
When I eventually sent the replacement in for repairs years later, they said it wasn't under warranty because it had been modified. That is one way for them to get out of their Lifetime Warranty, but they should have had records showing it was the detector as I received it from them.
When it worked, it was not the deepest seeking detector, but was good at detecting small gold. It was never anything other than a back-up detector for me.
You need to register to bid.
Among the more interesting pieces, in my opinion, were the gold finger bars. The finger bars had some of the highest auction estimates of the entire auction. They were in the third session. Look around lot 80 or 81.
I really think there will be a lot of reales that don't sell. There is something for everybody though.
----
I wanted to rank the metal detectors that I've owned and used over the years. I found out it wasn't easy to do that. There are a lot of factors.
This isn't an objective ranking or comparison.
My favorites though are the Noga and MacDonald modified Nautilus detectors. They were excellent at finding gold on the beaches and in the water. That is what they were made for. They nulled on iron, which I liked. If I'd been hunting relics instead of gold at the time, it would have been a different story. But they worked very well for what I was doing at the time, and back then I was doing it a lot and had a lot of success with it. One story that I recall and that illustrates how those detectors worked, was when I detected a small gold bead very near the access at Turtle Trail. I could easily detect the bead, but I could find it. I put a handful of sand containing the bead on the coil and still couldn't see the bead. I moved the sand around and the detector gave a signal. The sand was course and a color that matched closely to that of the bead, but I eventually found the bead.
Herb claimed his detectors were better than the Noga ones, but I'm not sure that was true.
I know some of the coils for those detectors were hotter than others.
They were very easy to set up and use because they were made for one type of hunting and didn't require or allow much adjustment.
The reason it is so difficult to rank the detectors, is that most of them have things that I like and find very effective, but also negatives.
I'd tend to rank the Garrett GTX second among those I've owned, but it is very heavy, difficult to learn to use well, and loves iron. Those sound might sound like serious problems, but when you learn to use it and if you aren't bothered much by trash, it is a powerful detector. I have confidence that I won't miss much of anything with that detector.
Of course the best detector for you always depends upon what you want to do with it, and your style and even your personality. There are some people who would never ever use the GTX.
In the middle of the pack are many others. High in the middle of the pack I'd put the other Minelab detectors that I've owned, including the Excalibur and Sovereign.
I used the Excalibur for several years. It worked well, but I used it differently than most people. I always used the pinpoint rather than the discrimination mode. If I'd been able to get either the Noga or MacDonald detectors at that point, I would have been using them.
I'd rank the Fisher 1280 right up there with the Excalibur. I used the 1280 a lot and found a lot with it. It was a good detector and very reliable. I eventually sold it for about as much as I bought it for. Long before I sold it, I found enough coins to more than pay for it, not counting any jewelry. I was keeping good records at the time and knew exactly when my coin finds went over the purchase price, which, if I correctly recall, was about $640.
The 1280 was also the detector that found my first silver and gold rings. One of the things I learned while using that detector is the danger of using too much discrimination. Overall, it was one of my favorites.
Maybe I rank it higher because it was the detector that I learned a lot from and it found me a lot in my early days of metal detecting.
I'd rank the Royal Sabre after that. For such an old detector, it has a lot of nice features, but it I'd use it in dry sand or dry land only.
Then maybe the Stringray. I had trouble with the Tesoro Stingray from the beginning. I sent it back about three times and it was returned with the same problem. They wanted to blame it on underwater cables or something in the area, so I told them to send me another one to try in place of the original one to see if it was the location or the detector's fault. The replacement detector worked fine. The original Stingray had a grounding problem and the replacement was hardwired.
When I eventually sent the replacement in for repairs years later, they said it wasn't under warranty because it had been modified. That is one way for them to get out of their Lifetime Warranty, but they should have had records showing it was the detector as I received it from them.
When it worked, it was not the deepest seeking detector, but was good at detecting small gold. It was never anything other than a back-up detector for me.
After that I can't say much good about the other metal detectors. I probably didn't know enough about the White's CoinMaster to rank it fairly. The same might also be the case for the Garrett pulse detector. So I won't say much negative about them. I know the CoinMaster didn't get a fair chance. I just didn't know much about metal detectors or metal detecting when I had that one.
I know there metal detectors out there that might be better. I'm just reporting my observations and feelings on some that I've owned and used. The ranking is scientific and it isn't objective, but some of you might find my observations somewhat useful anyhow.
I didn't include anything about the Equinox today. I plan on doing more precise testing on it. So far I like it a lot. It seems like an effective detector that could be useful in many situations. Right now I'd rank it above the Excalibur and in some ways above the GTX. I don't want to say much more about it yet, but it looks like I will be using it a lot in the future.
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The surf is going to be about 3 - 4 feet for a couple days. I'm not expecting much change to the beaches for a while.
Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
The surf is going to be about 3 - 4 feet for a couple days. I'm not expecting much change to the beaches for a while.
Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
Minelab Equinox. I'm just leaning the Equinox, but it appears to be an easy to use and adequate metal detector for a variety of situations. I expected the visual displays to be more useful, so that was a bit of a disappointment. You can avoid trash, but in the process can miss a lot of good targets.
