Will my Whites Surf PI Pro Dual Field Machine detect nuggets????

[theseeker]

I will be in northern California up in Oroville area and also up around El Dorado county at the end of August to do some sampling, prospecting and camping on private property in those areas. Never prospected or hunted for gold when I lived there in the 70's but I sure have the bug now. I live in Florida and I was thinking of taking my Whites Surf PI Pro Dual Field detector to do some nugget hunting and was wondering if it would perform in that environment? I also have a Sovereign Elite. Will either of these detectors work in the Northern California mountains to find gold? If anyone has any thoughts they could share, I would greatly appreciate your input.

Pete

 

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[63bkpkr]

theseeker/Pete,

Your question is interesting and I look forward to reply's form knowledgeable owners/users of these two machines.

In the California mountains the main problem is highly mineralized soil that must be canceled out in order to hear the good targets. I use a White's GMT VLF type machine and I find gold with it's very good ground balance system taking care of the mineralization. If either of your machines have a ground balance system then they might work. Bring um, try um and see what happens, also bring a couple of lead targets for checking. The hot rocks also can be troublesome but first lets see if the machines will cope with the mineralization. Have a great time but bring sun protection and a water carrying system as right now we are expecting it to be a very dry summer, hot is unknown at the moment.

63bkpkr

 

[gunsil]

63bplr, PI machines punch through highly mineralized soil better than any other type of detector. They just can't discriminate. Seeker, I think it will do fine since they find plenty of gold on the beaches with dual fields. Your coil may be a little large for finding the tiny nuggets but should work well on larger ones. I know some folks out west use Garrett Infinium PIs in the gold fields and the Tesoros. Get out there and find a big one!!

 

[2cmorau]

test your detectors with lead shot or lead fishing weights ( go as small as you can ) it's just a bench test but it helps knowing what your detctors can do
if no lead shot, just take a chip off a larger lead weight and place in a glass or plasic vial with some beach sand that has some black sand in it
happy hunting

 

[Steve Herschbach]

Technically speaking any detector can find a gold nugget if it is large enough and/or shallow enough. In practice nugget detecting is the hardest detecting there is, and beginners with the best machines struggle to find their first nugget. All you are doing is taking difficult odds and making them even more difficult. I hate to discourage anyone, but that is just the way it is.

 

[Reg]

The Surf DF doesn't have any form of ground balancing so there will be places where the ground will give you fits if you try to operate at the minimal delay. Your options will be limited at such locations.

In the bad ground areas, you can lift the coil to reduce the ground signal or you can advance the delay sufficiently to where the ground response is tolerable but when doing so, advancing the delay will also reduce the sensitivity to small gold. On the upside, if you detect gold it should be large enough to cause some excitement.

If you advance the delay, hopefully, you will have sufficient adjustment to minimize the ground response. When you do advance the delay, the size of gold you can find will change and most very small gold in the few grain size, maybe up to 6 grains or so will be ignored. A 10 grain nugget and even a gram size may only be detected a few inches deep.

With luck, most rocks will be ignored, but much of the old trash left behind by previous gold seekers will be detected. So, you will experience some of the difficulties that serious nugget hunters will deal with.

On the upside, if you do find any gold, it should be large enough to cause some excitement. Better yet, you will experience the thrill the old timers felt when they found gold and then you will better understand the driving force that caused them to continue.

As Steve said, you will have a handicap because of the detectors you have to work with so the difficulty you will experience will be greater than someone tackling an area with a better detector. However, if this is to be a one time trip, it is still worth it to try, in my opinion.

Reg

 

[theseeker]

Hi all, just got back to a computer after the weekend. I want to thank all of you for taking the time to provide input. It is greatly appreciated.

63bkpkr, this machine handles black sand quite well and can find deep small lead targets. I find tiny split shots on the beach all the time. It's the chasing of them as they sift through my long handled sand scoop that is problematic.

Gunsil, thanks for the encouragement. I am getting more excited by the day to make that trip. Getting back to spend a little time in the Sierras after living on this sandbar (Florida) for more than 25+ years is what I am looking forward to. If I happen to find any color that would be a bonus.

2cmorau, I have done that bench test before with solid black sand and many different types of targets. The dual field machine handles the mineralization of the black sand quite well here in Florida. I will just have to see how it handles the hot rocks in NorCal. Appreciate your input!

Steve, hopefully I get lucky enough to put my coil over a nug that is detectable by my PI machine. Despite the poor odds and low percentage of even finding anything at all, there is still a possibility. Honestly, whether I find any gold or not, just the adventure of being back in the mountains will be reward enough! Thanks.

Reg, thanks for your technical input. The lack of ground balancing capability will be a disadvantage for sure. I will keep in mind your advice to adjust and advance the delay to minimize the ground response in the hot rock areas I come across. Since this machine has no discrimination, I am used to having to dig every signal in trashy areas. It is the nature of this machine. One good thing is I can take this unit in the water, so I will do that as well. I will do more research to see if I can find more ways to optimize its limited capabilities in the mountain environment.

When the time comes, I will provide feedback on how this machine handled the environment there and any results on finding any AU. Thanks again to all of you !