• Forum server maintanace Friday night.(around 7PM Centeral time)
    Website will be off line for a short while.

    You may need to log out, log back in after we're back online.

New member in Minneapolis

SteveJJ

New Member
Joined
Oct 17, 2017
Messages
4
Location
Minneapolis MN
Greetings! The Autumn leaves are at peak color now, which means it's time to button down for the long cold winter. I've been a detector user for a long time but mostly in the last 10 years, going on trips with a good friend to mine sites back east.

The first trip, he lent me a Whites something or other with a LCD display and that spoiled me. Not knowing better and listening to others, I bought a Tesoro Vaquero without a display. Dug lots of trash in the mine tailings but did score some copper crystal and nuggets, and silver ores. With my old guy ears, I just couldn't hear what it was telling me very well.

A local in Cobalt Ontario was having great success avoiding trash using a Fisher F75, so I looked to see more about them. As I recall a couple years ago they were selling for ~$1200, WAY too steep for an occasional use tool. But still, I was impressed how accurately he could tell what my Vaquero couldn't.

A couple months ago while planning on a September trip to Cobalt again, my friend shoots me a listing on Amazon for a Fisher F75 for $559. WHAT? That's like half off! And it's improved with DST which helps cut down chatter from interference (lots of that in town). Out pops the card and it shows up in two days. SCORE!

I take it to my friends place near the airport, where he cannot even use his Makro Racer 2 as the radars etc drive it nuts. I find targets he never did in his own yard with his various machines. Not to be outdone, the next day or two he texts me that he's ordered a Minelab 4500! He's into pulse machines for great depth.

While driving up to Cobalt I start talking about my intention to head west next trip, to look for gold. I think he's on board with that now as he's been talking with Gerry of Gerry's detectors (where he bought his 4500) about eastern Oregon, and doing some research already. He's even talking plane tickets to give us more detecting time...

I've been doing research on what machine(s) I can afford and care to use that will do better in the gold fields than the F75, and have chosen White's TDI SL and Fisher's Gold Bug 2. I was going to wait until Spring, saving my Lyft income for them, but found some great deals... I now have my chosen trio.

So, I've used the TDI a bit on a local beach and removed scores of fishhooks and sinkers, but no gold or silver. I guess others have been there before me. It's good practice just the same, and swimmers feet are safer now too!

I'm running out of non-frozen time to get to know the machines better and will be creating a test garden this weekend to better learn their nuances, then once snow blankets the ground I'll turn to old books and maps and mining claim listings online to plan future trips out west.

I don't plan on striking it rich, just plan on enjoying every facet of the effort. Should I find gold, well, just more encouragement to stay fit and active and out in God's garden enjoying creation as long as possible!
 
Steve, welcome from west Michigan!! Make sure you post pictures of all your many finds from travelling all over God's creation buddy.
 
:fmdfwelcome:

You will find that this is a very friendly forum, and it's really amazing what people on here find. Also if you need help identifying something you found, feel free to post it in the Help To ID My Finds forum. Happy Hunting! :mder:
 
Back
Top Bottom