Newbie - needs advice

Welcome to the forum Diana, it really depends on the type of hunting you will be doing. Personally, I have two machines that are waterproof and work very well on dry ground as well.

Not to sure about anything on eBay, but there are many good dealer websites on the web, a few that frequent the forum here as well, TonyinCT I believe is one.

I'm sure the guys and gals here from the forum will be able to give many good suggestions, just have to research them for yourself, then decide which will be best for you. Good luck and happy hunting.

Todd

Hello Todd,

I will be mostly searching on land. I just thought if it made more sense to get one that could do both, I would do that. Thanks for the post! I will keep checking back to see what the others say.

I am also going to be reading through the forum. There's a lot to read!

Glad to meet you!

Diana

Welcome Diana! TonyinCT is a good start!

Hi Spitfire and all,

Okay, I am a very impatient person once I make my mind up so this is what I bought, a Whites MXT Metal Detector. If I made a mistake, it's a little to late, but honestly tell me what you think. I really have no idea if what I bought is good. It looked good from what I read but like I said, I don't really know anything on this topic yet.

If anyone has any recommendation on additional tools, etc. that I may need, I would love to hear what you guys have to say.

Hi Diana. I'm sure I can help you out.

Diana said:

Hi Spitfire and all,

Okay, I am a very impatient person once I make my mind up so this is what I bought, a Whites MXT Metal Detector. If I made a mistake, it's a little to late, but honestly tell me what you think. I really have no idea if what I bought is good. It looked good from what I read but like I said, I don't really know anything on this topic yet.

If anyone has any recommendation on additional tools, etc. that I may need, I would love to hear what you guys have to say.

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Where did you purchase it from? Get up with TonyinCT and he will advise. MXT are good from what I hear.

Hi Diana,


You bought an excellent detecor. I also have the MXT with the 6x10 coil. It took me some time to get used to it, but it was well worth the patience. It was my also my first detector.

You will also be needing a pinpointer, and a good sturdy digger. I got these things from Tony.

Also some bug spray and alot of patience. Please feel free to message me anytime, and I will help out if I can.

Good luck.

You bought an excellent detector. One of the best and easy to use. White's products seem to last forever. The 6x10 coil is a good purchase which I would eventually make. First I would use the stock coil to get used to what the machine is telling me. The first purchase which can be made on ebay is for a good pinpointer the one mentioned in a earlier post would be fine. Then you will need a probe I use a screwdriver with a long thin shaft. The one I have is made by Great Neck. it is about 10" long including the handle. The shaft must be very strong as you will put a lot of torque on it. For grassy areas brass is to soft for me. A backup probe I have and like is a craftsman 3/16" flat blade about 10" in length. The way I use it is this. In this case a coil in or just below the roots of sod. Usually the depth will read 4 to 6 inches. Once I find a likely target I try to pinpoint as best I can. With the stock coil use the X method. Once I feel I have the correct position and depth of the target I push the probe in to the ground to about the depth suggested until I find the target. Don't push to hard so that you scratch your target. Now that I know the exact position and depth of the target. I use my probe to pull aside the grass and roots then I put the probe under one edge and tilt it until I can get to it. Coins are often tangled in the roots of the sod. Targets much under the roots of the sod will require digging. I like and use a Sierra Dig-It with an orange handle from Jimmy Sierra. This will be good for targets down to about 10 inches. Anything below a foot are going to require some type of shovel. I use my probe for most recovery. Most parks in my area frown on any type of digging so in my area I mostly use my probe and Dig-It. You can go to the White's site and view videos that show how to dig targets. If parks in your area are really littered with trash the 4x6 shooter coil is great. You will need a pouch for your tool and recovered targets and trash. At first you will want to dig lots of trash until you are sure of your skills at knowing what is under your coil.
There is a lot to learn so keep coming back and asking questions. With so practice you will learn more and what you are being told will make more sense. The MXT is a great detector eventually you can get coils as large as 18" and go after deeply buried cashes. You may one day want to get a sunray probe it acts as a small coil and can give you good data via the detector screen on the target. Hope this helps.

Welcome to the forum. You bought a fine detector. Don't forget to send those treasure pics

Be careful of secondary market super discounted coils. They can void your warranty.

Hi all,

First unrelated question. When you want to reply to a post, do you have to go all the way to the bottom or can you reply to specific people in a threaded manner?

Since I didn't know any other way to do it for now, I just went to the bottom.

Thanks TonyinCT for the warning and I would imagine that I will be contacting you about accessories as I figure things out, you seem to be the man to see around here!

Hey steeler,

First I have to figure out what exactly a pinpointer is and then get one! And a digger, that sounds self-explanatory but probably isn't, too!

RedRockNV,

I really appreciate all that you told me and I definitely will be watching the videos, I pretty much understood what you were saying about your technique, but it is always easier if you can watch someone actually doing something. I am also going to look into the products that you mentioned. I have no idea really where to start but now I have an inkling.

I was wondering if you were allowed to dig in parks. Does anyone know if you can dig in a National park? Not big holes just little ones. I am going to start in my yard, about 2 1/4 acres, the house is fairly old and I don't even know how old the original house is. The general area is rural and settled somewhere around 1795, so there are loads of places I would love to go poking around but what about if it is private property. I know the answer is probably obvious, but where I live, there are acres and acres of woods and old railways and there is no way to know who owns what, if you were to try to get permission, that is.

And last but not least, hello mxtswinger! I appreciate your post and I have to say that I feel much better about my purchase. I was worrying all last night that maybe I should try to return it because I had made a mistake but once I saw all your posts, I decided that I made a good decision. Well, see how that goes...

Diana said:

Hi all,

First unrelated question.  When you want to reply to a post, do you have to go all the way to the bottom or can you reply to specific people in a threaded manner?

Since I didn't know any other way to do it for now, I just went to the bottom. 

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if you want to reply to a specific person or their comment you can click on the "quote" button up in the top right corner of the "box" that that persons reply is in, delete out whatever is in between the quotes that doesnt apply and then reply to the comment under the last quote tag



kind of like I just did here 

Diana
I found this on another MXT forum. I think it has a lot of answers for you. Good Luck.
http://www.findmall.com/read.php?25,408523,408523#msg-408523

Actually in your confusion and haste you made probably the best decision you could have made under the circumstances. The MXT is comfortable detecting almost anywhere except underwater. A lot of people think it is one of the best of the best. check out some MXT specific forums and see what people have found up in Ganes Creek in Alaska. Some people go back year after year and being able to take any detector they want they take their MXT. The sites you described are perfect for the MXT. Just learn it and it will be a great companion giving you many many years of great service. White's are pretty much bullet proof built to the highest standards. You made a great decision don't ever second guess it.

Diana said:

And last but not least, hello mxtswinger!  I appreciate your post and I have to say that I feel much better about my purchase.  I was worrying all last night that maybe I should try to return it because I had made a mistake but once I saw all your posts, I decided that I made a good decision.  Well, see how that goes...

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  GARRETT  "ACE 250" WORKS GREAT AND DOESN'T COST ALOT.
   RICK