1820 Home Hunt Advice Pls.

pa-dirt_nc-sand

Silver Member
Apr 18, 2016
4,260
14,942
South Western PA
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2
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Detector(s) used
ACE 250 with DD coil
Equinox 600
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
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I got permission to MD one of the oldest standing homes in my town this coming Saturday.

Up til now I have spent time refining Park 1 for super trashy old parks and also time on Field 2 (pretty much stock) for cellar hole sites. I have a 600 and Park 1 and Field 2 have similar tones. Sort of how I have landed on these 2.

Would you go Field 2 because all the mid and high tones are audible or Park 1 and cherry pick. I have 3 hours on this 1.5 acre site. Not sure if I will get repeat permission. May be a one shot deal.

I’m sure there will be layers of modern junk and clad over any oldies that are still there.

Thx
 

3 hours.... cherry pick! There will be trash there don't waste time chasing it. If you get to go back then you might change your stratigy . Cherry pick is my vote.
 

Another cherry pick vote. Largies and old silver come in high. Along with some buttons and bigger relics.
 

Yes for only 3hrs.cherry pick. If you get a chance to go back use field 2 and clean up all the relics. Congrats on the permission.
 

Ok, thx all. I will start out with my Park 1 cherry picker (high trash disc), and if pickins are slim I’ll open it up with the Field2 and start digging mid tones.
 

Ok, thx all. I will start out with my Park 1 cherry picker (high trash disc), and if pickins are slim I’ll open it up with the Field2 and start digging mid tones.

Hopefully you pull something good out of there. Looks like a good spot!
 

I just did a test run with my Park1 high disc setting. Looks like I will be missing Shield Nickels, 3 Cent Nickels, fatty IHP’s, anything gold, suspender clips, miners tags, and small flat buttons. I am debating on adding 15 back in as this is where War Nickels are signaling. I think the trade off with disc on all of these numbers should reduce the trash holes at this short permission.
 

If there is a lot of non-ferrou, mid-conductive trash, then consider going single frequency at 5 khz to focus on the high conductors which are more easily masked by thick non-ferrous, mid-conductive trash. If ferrous junk is thick then back of on the Park 1 iron bias because you will miss masked high conductive targets with it set too high and if the iron is unbearable, consider lowering sensitivity to sift the iron out. You may lose some depth, but the fact is you are trying to nab shallow to mid-depth masked targets anyway. The super deep stuff is going to get lost in all the junk noise.
 

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Ok, 11 wheat pennies, a little clad, a couple brass relics, Small crotal bell and a token. Never found so many wheat pennies in a short hunt before.

Super nice experience, the little girl and her twin brother did a lot of the pinpointer work.

I have permission to “come back any time” which is great. I had to stick to the Park1 with 6 Noise cancel and 32 ground balance, power 22. (The soil in W Pa typically does not need ground balancing.). Switching to Field2 the machine would sound off like crazy. There are at least 3 visible major overhead power lines on this property, not sure if that was the issue. I fired up my Ace 250 for the owner to try and in coin mode had to lower it to 2 sensitivity in order for it not to sound like a pinball machine, not really usable.

I may try changing frequencies as recommended next time. With 11 wheats I can’t see this property being hunted too heavily before, hard to cherry pick around wheats. There have to be some silvers in there, wish I had some more experience on the Nox, will wait until I am a bit better before going back with a different strategy.

Thx all!
 

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Ok, 11 wheat pennies, a little clad, a couple brass relics, Small crotal bell and a token. Never found so many wheat pennies in a short hunt before.

Super nice experience, the little girl and her twin brother did a lot of the pinpointer work.

I have permission to “come back any time” which is great. I had to stick to the Park1 with 6 Noise cancel and 32 ground balance, power 22. (The soil in W Pa typically does not need ground balancing.). Switching to Field2 the machine would sound off like crazy. There are at least 3 visible major overhead power lines on this property, not sure if that was the issue. I fired up my Ace 250 for the owner to try and in coin mode had to lower it to 2 sensitivity in order for it not to sound like a pinball machine, not really usable.

I may try changing frequencies as recommended next time. With 11 wheats I can’t see this property being hunted too heavily before, hard to cherry pick around wheats. There have to be some silvers in there, wish I had some more experience on the Nox, will wait until I am a bit better before going back with a different strategy.

Thx all!

Great finds. Is that Cafe still around? Lol.

Couple of comments. Remember that you have to noise cancel (including lowering sensitivity as needed - having to go a few points less than 20 on sensitivity is not really a game changer as far as depth is concerned) and ground balance separately for each mode. That could be why Field 2 was noisy. Unless there are a lot of mid-conductors to be had, though, I would just stick with Park 1.

Even though you feel you don't need to ground balance in PA, there is no harm in doing so, it takes just a few seconds, and if you don't want to mess with it, just use tracking GB which will work fine with no downside as long as your ground is not reading 0. That being said, the Equinox with Multi IQ is very forgiving of a less than optimal GB.

My best relic and coin finds have come in PA and the Equinox scored some great bucket listers for me in PA (including silvers), running Field 2 in plowed fields using tracking GB. So I like detecting up there. Looks like you have a great permissions with some nice finds yet to come. Congrats.
 

If there is a lot of non-ferrou, mid-conductive trash, then consider going single frequency at 5 khz to focus on the high conductors which are more easily masked by thick non-ferrous, mid-conductive trash. If ferrous junk is thick then back of on the Park 1 iron bias because you will miss masked high conductive targets with it set too high and if the iron is unbearable, consider lowering sensitivity to sift the iron out. You may lose some depth, but the fact is you are trying to nab shallow to mid-depth masked targets anyway. The super deep stuff is going to get lost in all the junk noise.

Is that the same advice you’d give in high iron high mineralized soil? I planted a Rosie 7” or so and barely got a signal in any mode.
 

I gave you my recommendations on your Rosie dilemma in the thread you started on it, Truth. Mineralized soil kills depth, period. It is not like high iron trash you can pick around with a small coil and high recovery speeds. Just a fact of life. But you should do some experiments with diffrent targets, different modes, and different settings. PA ground where I've hunted is not highly mineralized so the approach and advice I have given to the OP is different than how I would approach extremely hot ground like Culpeper, VA. I also set my expectations lower when hunting in that stuff.
 

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Great finds. Is that Cafe still around? Lol.

Couple of comments. Remember that you have to noise cancel (including lowering sensitivity as needed - having to go a few points less than 20 on sensitivity is not really a game changer as far as depth is concerned) and ground balance separately for each mode. That could be why Field 2 was noisy. Unless there are a lot of mid-conductors to be had, though, I would just stick with Park 1.

Even though you feel you don't need to ground balance in PA, there is no harm in doing so, it takes just a few seconds, and if you don't want to mess with it, just use tracking GB which will work fine with no downside as long as your ground is not reading 0. That being said, the Equinox with Multi IQ is very forgiving of a less than optimal GB.

My best relic and coin finds have come in PA and the Equinox scored some great bucket listers for me in PA (including silvers), running Field 2 in plowed fields using tracking GB. So I like detecting up there. Looks like you have a great permissions with some nice finds yet to come. Congrats.

Thx. Next time there I’ll try lowering sensitivity, noise cancel etc in Field2. All the small keeper targets were only 2-4” deep, some garbage much deeper. I’ll try burying a silver quarter and dime 6” -8” and see if the detector sees it at this site or not. Definitely a ton of EMI.
 

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