Coin Sniper
Jr. Member
- Oct 16, 2012
- 25
- 6
- Detector(s) used
- Minelab CTX-3030
- Primary Interest:
- All Treasure Hunting
Hello all,
I'm having an issue with the CTX that I need some help with.
First of all, let me just throw in the fact that I've only had the CTX for a few months and that this is my first-ever metal detector, so to say that I'm a newbie is an understatement.
I've been getting out and practicing as much as time will allow and I'm having lots of fun finding stuff with my wife and kids, which was the point of getting a detector in the first place. In order for me to learn the visual side of this machine, I've taken a notebook with me and I've been writing down all of the FE-CO numbers I've personally dug up. I've also added the FE-CO numbers of clad and rings that I've thrown out in my backyard. Finally, I've taken the liberty of adding the FE-CO numbers that I've been able to see on many of the videos I've watched. The idea here was to build a database of FE-CO numbers so that I could try to identify what was in the ground before even cutting a plug or moving any sand or rocks. I've called a few out and my kids now think that I'm a mind reader, so I guess I'm on the right track.
After going over the database of numbers with my oldest son, we noticed that almost everything I've written down resides somewhere on the FE 12 line. The two exceptions, so far, are one item on the FE 11 line and another on the FE 13 line. Using this data as the basis for building an aggressive discrimination pattern, we decided to create a discrimination pattern to eliminate everything from FE lines 1-10 and FE lines 14-35, leaving only FE lines 11-13 available. Yes, I agree that this is an unconventional discrimination pattern, but we had an awesome time pulling clad out of a rocky beach a couple of weeks ago!
Here's where things get confusing for me:
Yesterday, I decided to take out some oddball coins that I've had stored away for years and run the coil over them in my backyard. Within those coins, I happened across a tarnished 1890 Morgan silver dollar. To my surprise, running the discrimination pattern that my son and I set up, I was getting a pretty steady 12-42 on the visual, but no audio whatsoever because the CTX was simultaneously bouncing towards 35-50. Obviously, this confused me and prompted some questions:
1) In Ferrous-Coin mode, does a Morgan silver dollar read 12-42 with an iron bounce to the extreme lower right corner? I have ZERO experience with silver coins, so maybe it's doing what it's supposed to do?
2) Whenever I've dug anything with an echo that far down in the chart, it's always been junk. Is this a correct assessment?
3) If I run this particular discrimination pattern and happen across something silver (assuming the iron bounce over silver items to be correct) or something that has a nail next to it and the CTX kills all of the audio (due to the simultaneous iron reading), if I happen to not be looking at the video screen at that moment and miss that big red "dig me" dot on the screen, I'll have essentially walked over a worthy target and not even have known it, right?
What do you think about this? I highly doubt that I've missed any Morgans (
), but I don't want to imagine that I've been doing things correctly only to find out at a later date that I've been leaving good targets in the ground.
As an example, I took this quick video with my phone. At first, I show that the ground is clean. After, I toss down the Morgan and swing over it with an open screen. You can see the 12-42 and the bounce down to iron and hear the external speaker doing its job. When I switch over to the discriminated screen, however, all the sounds disappear, but the video screen continues to do its job correctly.
[video=vimeo;57487635]http://vimeo.com/57487635[/video]
Thanks in advance for your time and efforts!
I'm having an issue with the CTX that I need some help with.
First of all, let me just throw in the fact that I've only had the CTX for a few months and that this is my first-ever metal detector, so to say that I'm a newbie is an understatement.
I've been getting out and practicing as much as time will allow and I'm having lots of fun finding stuff with my wife and kids, which was the point of getting a detector in the first place. In order for me to learn the visual side of this machine, I've taken a notebook with me and I've been writing down all of the FE-CO numbers I've personally dug up. I've also added the FE-CO numbers of clad and rings that I've thrown out in my backyard. Finally, I've taken the liberty of adding the FE-CO numbers that I've been able to see on many of the videos I've watched. The idea here was to build a database of FE-CO numbers so that I could try to identify what was in the ground before even cutting a plug or moving any sand or rocks. I've called a few out and my kids now think that I'm a mind reader, so I guess I'm on the right track.
After going over the database of numbers with my oldest son, we noticed that almost everything I've written down resides somewhere on the FE 12 line. The two exceptions, so far, are one item on the FE 11 line and another on the FE 13 line. Using this data as the basis for building an aggressive discrimination pattern, we decided to create a discrimination pattern to eliminate everything from FE lines 1-10 and FE lines 14-35, leaving only FE lines 11-13 available. Yes, I agree that this is an unconventional discrimination pattern, but we had an awesome time pulling clad out of a rocky beach a couple of weeks ago!
Here's where things get confusing for me:
Yesterday, I decided to take out some oddball coins that I've had stored away for years and run the coil over them in my backyard. Within those coins, I happened across a tarnished 1890 Morgan silver dollar. To my surprise, running the discrimination pattern that my son and I set up, I was getting a pretty steady 12-42 on the visual, but no audio whatsoever because the CTX was simultaneously bouncing towards 35-50. Obviously, this confused me and prompted some questions:
1) In Ferrous-Coin mode, does a Morgan silver dollar read 12-42 with an iron bounce to the extreme lower right corner? I have ZERO experience with silver coins, so maybe it's doing what it's supposed to do?
2) Whenever I've dug anything with an echo that far down in the chart, it's always been junk. Is this a correct assessment?
3) If I run this particular discrimination pattern and happen across something silver (assuming the iron bounce over silver items to be correct) or something that has a nail next to it and the CTX kills all of the audio (due to the simultaneous iron reading), if I happen to not be looking at the video screen at that moment and miss that big red "dig me" dot on the screen, I'll have essentially walked over a worthy target and not even have known it, right?
What do you think about this? I highly doubt that I've missed any Morgans (
), but I don't want to imagine that I've been doing things correctly only to find out at a later date that I've been leaving good targets in the ground.As an example, I took this quick video with my phone. At first, I show that the ground is clean. After, I toss down the Morgan and swing over it with an open screen. You can see the 12-42 and the bounce down to iron and hear the external speaker doing its job. When I switch over to the discriminated screen, however, all the sounds disappear, but the video screen continues to do its job correctly.
[video=vimeo;57487635]http://vimeo.com/57487635[/video]
Thanks in advance for your time and efforts!
