My first detector - HELP PLEASE

[Romantreasures]

Hello, good day to all treasure hunters.
I am completely new to this forum, and basically completely new to all the metal detecting and treasure hunting stuff.

So, I want to buy my first metal detector.
I would like to ask you, what is essential for my detector (what parameters, attachments, etc.) for this purpose:

I would like to use this detector to find small metalic object, like coins, rings, etc.
In my country, there are some places where roman settlements have been in the past, and I want to search there, since in my country nobody is really interested in digging the whole excavation site. For example, in neighbor village, next to the church, about 2 years ago someone found some old roman age things there, and I want to go search there.

Can you please tell me, what do I exactly need in my metal detector? I would like to detect both precious and non precious metals (or whatever is it called in English). For example what depth does the detector have to work? How deep could these roman era things be in the soil?

I would prefer if you suggested me parameters rather than specific detectors, since I live in eastern Europe and many of your detectors will not be for sale here I think. The price is also a limit, but I will search for the best parameters for the lowest price after your suggestions.

thank you very very much!

 

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[digging440yrs]

Welcome aboard

 

[perry2]

I WOULD LOOK HARD AT THE Garrett 400i great starter for the price--good for about 8" for coins

 

[Romantreasures]

I WOULD LOOK HARD AT THE Garrett 400i great starter for the price--good for about 8" for coins

Hello perry, thanks for your reply.
Do you think 8" ( about 20cm) is enough lol?
I thought the roman era things are way deeper.

I found some detector for 80€ which has 3metres deep detection, and found some 380€ detector which has only 1,4 metres detection.
I completely dont understand this, since it has half the deep detection and costs nearly five times the previous.

 

[cudamark]

What can you afford to spend? Depth of detection depends a lot on the size of the target. The deepest detectors are made for large objects.....something larger than a beer can. For coins and small jewelry, 18 inches (45cm) is about the limit on VLF machines, and that is in mild soil without a whole lot of mineralization. You can get more depth with an expensive nugget PI machine, but, you won't have discrimination, so, you'll be digging every piece of iron and lead junk from the beginning of time. For your type of hunting, I'd seriously look at the XP Deus, Minelab CTX or E-trac, and the Fisher F75LTD if you can afford them. Keep in mind that you'll need quality digging tools and a good pin pointer along with the main detector. A large coil is a nice option too for those wide open fields.

 

[vpnavy]

1st - I noticed this was your very first post Romantreasures - so, Welcome Aboard! You didn't list your state (or country) in your profile. So, you might consider jumping over to Sub-Forums: Select Your Area.... and selecting location information (i.e., clubs, hunts, finds, legends, maps, etc.) directly related to your state (or country).
2nd - Whatever you finally decide on - please consider buying one from one of

's Supporting Vendors.

 

[Romantreasures]

What can you afford to spend? Depth of detection depends a lot on the size of the target. The deepest detectors are made for large objects.....something larger than a beer can. For coins and small jewelry, 18 inches (45cm) is about the limit on VLF machines, and that is in mild soil without a whole lot of mineralization. You can get more depth with an expensive nugget PI machine, but, you won't have discrimination, so, you'll be digging every piece of iron and lead junk from the beginning of time. For your type of hunting, I'd seriously look at the XP Deus, Minelab CTX or E-trac, and the Fisher F75LTD if you can afford them. Keep in mind that you'll need quality digging tools and a good pin pointer along with the main detector. A large coil is a nice option too for those wide open fields.

Hello cudamark, thanks for your reply.
Well, i searched those detectors, but unfortunately, they are WAY above my purse. Cant afford them by far. Sorry.
Thanks for pointing out that the deep detectors only find large objects. I didnt know that.
I dont know if it will be enough, but I am able to spend up to 200 - 250€ (circa) on the detector.
I know that this is not much but I hope I will find some suitable detector.
You mentioned the 45cm deep detectors which I cant afford, but do you think it is enough? I mean, can I dig up some roman era things with 45cm reach?
And please could you somehow simply describe to me what the "discrimination" is? My english is not that good and I dont really understand the internet definitions.

thank you so much

 

[DeepseekerADS]

You've never used a detector before. And you're limited in money.

A lot of people purchase detectors, use them once or twice and never use them again.

In my opinion, if you bought one of the expensive detectors, they're pretty complex and would likely frighten you away from the hobby.

Buy an inexpensive one like the Garrett Ace-400. Or actually a Tesoro Compadre is a very basic and capable detector. You will be finding coins and jewelry, and over time you'll learn, and accumulate the money to buy more serious detector.

 

[mlutz]

Hello cudamark, thanks for your reply.
Well, i searched those detectors, but unfortunately, they are WAY above my purse. Cant afford them by far. Sorry.
Thanks for pointing out that the deep detectors only find large objects. I didnt know that.
I dont know if it will be enough, but I am able to spend up to 200 - 250€ (circa) on the detector.
I know that this is not much but I hope I will find some suitable detector.
You mentioned the 45cm deep detectors which I cant afford, but do you think it is enough? I mean, can I dig up some roman era things with 45cm reach?
And please could you somehow simply describe to me what the "discrimination" is? My english is not that good and I dont really understand the internet definitions.

thank you so much

Your English seems fine to me. Here is the definition of Discrimination:

Discrimination is a detector's ability to exclude certain objects usually trash to make it easier to find other metals. Since metal detectors spot objects based on their conductivity, and trashy objects tend to be lower on that scale, you can increase your discrimination setting on a detector to ignore everything below a given threshold.

Discrimination tends to go hand-in-hand with notching, which isolates and filters out specific parts of the scale instead of disregarding everything below the discrimination line. You might, for example, notch out pull-tabs while leaving everything that can be found both above and below those pull-tabs on the scale

 

[nate77]

The cheapest deep machine (12 inches) would probably be the Teknetics T2 Classic, at $499 in the US, I'm not sure about overseas prices.

My first detector, I spent $200 on a detector that air tested at 9 inches, but in actual soil testing I only get around 5 inches; spend a little more in the first place, to avoid a lot of disappointment.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Roman-treasures, you've gotten good advice here so far. As has been pointed out: Those machines you're seeing that advertise 4 to 9 ft. type depths, are talking about large objects. Like from soda can sized to refrigerator sized. And for individual coins, as cudamark points out, the utter max is going to be about 1.5 ft. But be aware, that any detector that pushes those fringes of depth on coins, will have drawbacks. Like, at those type depths approaching 2 ft. on a coin, you will have probably lost all ability to discern iron. And the machine will be REAL "squirrelly" to operate, etc... Hence, realistically, figure your max on coin sized objects will be 11 to 12 inches. A few odd setups can retain good disc., on coins, at perhaps 14" (with various drawbacks). It also depends on the size of the coin. A silver dollar can be detected deeper than a penny, for instance.

And why do you say that Roman stuff will necessarily be deep ? Guys in Britain (and elsewhere in Europe) routinely find Roman age coins and objects. And they are not necessarily deep. Yes perhaps if you're in un-disturbed dirt, in areas of continual habitation/usage (because cities tended to be built "on top" of each other). But out in the country, and Especially if you're hunting furrowed ag. fields (where cultivation/earth-movement moves targets around), there are routinely Roman age coins found.

 

[Geobound]

Personally I would be looking on YouTube for metal detecting Europe......metal detecting UK......metal detecting (insert your country name), and see what they are using.

Since all the higher end machines mentioned in an early post is too much for you, then how about a Garrett AT Pro? That could still be out of your price range?

I've also heard some good things said about the Bounty Hunter Discovery 3300 (more in your price range), but I'm afraid I haven't used it so I can't offer an opinion.

Perhaps I would do some YouTube research on those two machines and see what you think?

For most of the roman coins (and artifacts for that matter) that I have seen found on YouTube, most of them haven't been down much further than 6"-10", so just about any of the aforementioned machines will work fine.

Good luck in your searching.

 

[Romantreasures]

Hello to all of you guys.

Thank you very much, your answers gave me very good info.

thank you Mlutz, I understood completely. The discrimination just sorts out certain types of object based on their electromagnetic attributes, basically.
That can be of much use I think, since I know that I will often find many beer bottle caps etc.

Fine, so I understood from your posts, that, the deeper the detector can detect metal, the bigger the object has to be. Since I want to find minor small items, I will not need deep detection, because I wouldnt find anything due to the size of the objects. Very well, I understand now.

Hello Tom, thanks for your summary.
To the question - i base it on local excavation site which my grandfather has been part of - the digged some roman army graves, and they size was about 25x25x20cm (circa) (that stands for circa 10x10x8 inches) which he said were about 30cm deep in the soil - that is about 12 inches. I dont want end up running on top of roman graves and be just 5 centimeters out of range lol :P .

Well,I guess I will just look for the cheaper detectors you mentioned.
I looked at review video of Garrett 400i but that scans only 8 inches which is too low I guess.


thanks


EDIT:
Those graves I mentioned have been discovered while plowing in the early 60s here (communists loved to use all of the soil, even in harder-to-get-to areas, thus they were plowing before unused areas). The plow "dug out" weird stones that ended up being the tops of the graves.

 

[Romantreasures]

Personally I would be looking on YouTube for metal detecting Europe......metal detecting UK......metal detecting (insert your country name), and see what they are using.

Since all the higher end machines mentioned in an early post is too much for you, then how about a Garrett AT Pro? That could still be out of your price range?

I've also heard some good things said about the Bounty Hunter Discovery 3300 (more in your price range), but I'm afraid I haven't used it so I can't offer an opinion.

Perhaps I would do some YouTube research on those two machines and see what you think?

For most of the roman coins (and artifacts for that matter) that I have seen found on YouTube, most of them haven't been down much further than 6"-10", so just about any of the aforementioned machines will work fine.

Good luck in your searching.

thank you bro, I searched but those are still out of my price range *sigh*
I think I will need bigger budget to get somehow useful detector

 

[tlane38003]

Used explorer on ebay is what you want

Sent from my LG-V410 using Tapatalk

 

[cudamark]

Look at the Eurotek. For an entry level machine in your price range, they have decent depth. You may have to start there and graduate to a higher performing machine as your finances improve.

 

[DeepseekerADS]

Used explorer on ebay is what you want

Yep, that's what you will want. But it's a pretty complex machne, however you can just turn it on and use it without having to learn a new round of science.

If it is a solid sound from two directions, dig it. You can learn a lot as you go. That beast goes deep.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Yep, that's what you will want. But it's a pretty complex machne, ....

Bingo. The Explorer II (or the other incarnations) is still kicking b*tt and very versatile. I use my Exp. II for ALL my coin, relic, and beach hunting. Deep, great tone ID's, fun sounds, etc.... Turf hunters (needing a little cherry-picking discretion) love them here in CA and elsewhere . And for the power-house that they are, hold their own in ghost-townsy relicky sites too. Slices through wet salt sand great!

But it's exactly as you say: I hesitate to recommend them to a beginner, because the tooty-fluty sounds will drive you bonkers. I hated mine at first, but could not deny my Whites was getting spanked. So I forced myself to learn. I had to have a proficient user come out with me and flag targets for signal comparing Q&As. Only THEN did the "lights go on" and I figured it out.

So unless the OP has someone there to shadow him during the learning, it's a gamble to recommend that to someone who's never swung a machine before.

 

[tlane38003]

Watch dirtfishing on Youtube I think you can set it on o only 2 tone sounds not shure never tried run factory setting for a couple houndred hours use the graph dig everything in the upper right screen then start using number if I like conductive sounds see to be better at small finds for me

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[Romantreasures]

Hello all.

So I searched for the Explorer on ebay, and found some used ones.
What do you mean by "pretty complex" ?
Will I be able to use it?
It looks like nice machine and pretty beast, but what does it feature that should make me worry about using it?
I am complete beginner, of course.
I guess there are some tutorials on the internet about this particular machine?
How deep does it detect?
For some reason I cant find this parameter.
Thanks for your explanation