Is lead a good practice sample to memorize the tone of gold jewelry ?

Some say it gives a similar tone on Tesoros due to the density.
Hard to nail down a standardized gold tone though.
It can register any where between iron/foil to zinc on my Tesoros.
So many variables with jewelry, from little chains and earrings to
various sized and alloyed gold rings.
Seems like you just have to dig lots of trash signals and be
in the right place at the right time more than anything.
 
Some say it gives a similar tone on Tesoros due to the density.
Hard to nail down a standardized gold tone though.
It can register any where between iron/foil to zinc on my Tesoros.
So many variables with jewelry, from little chains and earrings to
various sized and alloyed gold rings.
Seems like you just have to dig lots of trash signals and be
in the right place at the right time more than anything.

Thanks Tabzilla !

You did a good job of "wrapping up" the subject and with my years of MD'ing experience I can agree with your last sentence whole heartedly ! :agree:

ToddB64
 
I use an AT Pro and I think lead gives a similar tone/number to gold but so do larger pieces of foil. Lead gives a number ranging from the 40's to the 60's depending on the size just like gold but it varies depending on the size and shape of the object. Sometimes you can tell if it is a small piece of foil but if it is larger or rolled into a ball it is more difficult. You never know exactly what number and tone gold will give but it is usually a pretty solid signal even if it is in the lower range.
 
foil and nickles

In my opinion foil and nickles are the best for gold jewelry. In the last 2 years I found 33 rings of which 27 were found last year with a xterra 705. 2 gold rings and 2 silver. One of the gold rings rang out at -4 to 2 in rough sand and was missed by a detectorist earlier. This ring was a 2.9 gram 18k white gold. This is low foil to iron range on the xterra. A week earlier I found a 8.4 gram 14k gold ring at 9.5 inches that rang in at 24 which can be can slaw ( trust me I know). I personally would dig foil and nickles then pick my battles with all the rest. A good video is Gerrys detectors on you tube find gold rings with the xterra 705. While his settings didn't work for my style of hunting, his testing of 48 gold rings and where they fall on the disc scale helps. By the way all of my rings are dry land and a lot come from tot lots ,volleyball courts and sports fields. My highest mineralized ground is the sand in volley ball court and it does make a difference. Good luck! HH
 
In my opinion foil and nickles are the best for gold jewelry. In the last 2 years I found 33 rings of which 27 were found last year with a xterra 705. 2 gold rings and 2 silver. One of the gold rings rang out at -4 to 2 in rough sand and was missed by a detectorist earlier. This ring was a 2.9 gram 18k white gold. This is low foil to iron range on the xterra. A week earlier I found a 8.4 gram 14k gold ring at 9.5 inches that rang in at 24 which can be can slaw ( trust me I know). I personally would dig foil and nickles then pick my battles with all the rest. A good video is Gerrys detectors on you tube find gold rings with the xterra 705. While his settings didn't work for my style of hunting, his testing of 48 gold rings and where they fall on the disc scale helps. By the way all of my rings are dry land and a lot come from tot lots ,volleyball courts and sports fields. My highest mineralized ground is the sand in volley ball court and it does make a difference. Good luck! HH

I use an ATP so the numbers are not the same and I don't find many nickels here but I agree that foil can sound like gold. I have a 95% accuracy rate for guessing trash in most places. The secret is to always guess that the target will be trash and you will usually be right.

I have never guessed a target would be gold because it is always some random number and tone but they were all pretty solid, but I never really paid attention. It is just a surprise when you see gold. I hunted a big park with so many pulltabs that it was impossible to dig them all and found an 18K gold ring but it was just luck and a lot of digging. I think it showed up as a 53 but I didn't expect it at all. I think I have found about 15 gold and platinum rings and 1 gold coin and it was a surprise every time.

I have to dig all kinds of stuff here because the old coins come in anywhere from low 40's and up on the AT and some of them will sound like a piece of junk. You can't always dig everything but if you only dig the perfect signals you will miss some good stuff. It's better to not spend too much time analyzing the signal and dig until you get too tired. Of course in parks you need to be careful and if possible the best strategy is to return several time and clear a place out little by little.
 
Don't understand why you just wouldn't use gold objects. Surely you have or know someone with a gold wedding band, a watch, necklace etc. Seems they'd be much more realistic.
 
Don't understand why you just wouldn't use gold objects. Surely you have or know someone with a gold wedding band, a watch, necklace etc. Seems they'd be much more realistic.

Definitely good to have some test subjects,
but depending on size and karat, a wedding band
will register anywhere from foil to almost zinc.
Let alone if it's broken:?:

NASA Tom wrote a post about testing with small white gold earring pins.
The little ones that hold a small stone. Its an eye opener.
There have to be a lot of those little guys hiding out.
They barely make it into the foil range on my Tesoros,
 
My Ace 250 will ring in nickel or below for most gold,so lower tone
At pro same in pro mode.
Med low tone on my minelab
Compadre only one tone...:lol:
 
I dunno, but feel anyway you slice it for gold, if that's what you want, you better dig almost all of it. At least notch out iron 1/2 way and go from there. I'm no pro tho...
 
When it comes to gold, theres just too many variables to accurately 'call it'...You can take two rings of the same weight but different diameters and get completely different numbers/tones...Then, theres White Gold, and even a heavy 18k will be a lower TID/tone than a smaller 14k...

Then, theres open filligree, that do not give the classic solid hit, then theres chains and bracelets, open earrings...most of which have seen a coil overhead a time or two but give off such a poor signature they are either disced out or not dug...

Sure we TRY to study the gold signals, for instance a ball of foil or a gatorade top will 'hold' a signal the higher you lift your coil off the ground, whereas a smallish gold ring of the identical TID/tone only has about a 4-5" grip on the light settings I use..so in the right location, that specific target gets dug, and its generally a small piece of foil....

So most gold hunters do one of two things, Dig it all everywhere, or Pull Volumn targets foil on up in likely locations...

Water/beachbabies of course dig it all...Gold is a cruel Mistress, and Dirt gold is by far the greatest and rarest trophy, the White Buffalo...Some Members here seem to have the knack of replicating repeatable dirt gold finds, and those are the ones you want to pattern your style after..so study them and their posts instead...they have already put in thousands of hours behind the coil, sleepless nights trying to figure it out, so you can use their experience to your advantage to shorten your learning curve and up your success rate...

One thing for sure, for a Gold Hunter, you DO NOT want to miss any chains..they generally weigh a LOT, just one can make your entire season, be worth more than 10 decent rings...and is NOT a classic signal that anybody would be digging....Gold Fever is an awful disease, incurable...Like alcoholism, best not to take that first drink and put yourself at risk...:laughing:
 

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I read this somewhere else as I recall, "LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION". I don't specifically hunt for gold, not where I hunt. After looking at whats found, I may have to rethink my goals. Anyway, I only post this to illustrate how true that statement is. I hunt woods and farm fields 95% of the time. Rev stuff. My brother and I never find jewelry. One exception was a beautiful cufflink, late 1700's I believe. Yellow gold. That's it after 100's of hours plodding our sites. I have however found four rings. All four found at parks, by the basketball court and the volley ball court. LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION!
You guys kill me with all the gold you find.
 
I read this somewhere else as I recall, "LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION". LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION!

Quite true!...Some really nice gold is found in totlots, Our Forum Brother 'Detector' just pulled that nice chain a few days ago just kicking chips and running for clad, you dont even need a pinpointer, just a screwdriver to sometimes poke and dig the deeper targets you cant recover with the side of your foot......certainly theres some totters in everybodys area?....Thats a good place to start looking for gold...

I know hunting totters is not as sexy or exciting as pulling a really nice dirt or beach find Gold, or hunting for relics or silver, there is a modicum of skill to it though, running a fleet of totters has its own kind of skillset...and the gold is there...

Heres a little 18k yellow medallion from last Nov that sounded like about nothing....I looked pretty hard for the chain as you can imagine, since the bail was intact...No doubt small and imperceptable...Its still there someplace...
 

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Here are the numbers on a Fisher where gold has come in....

One very thin chain in iron...don't know the number...

From 24 which is small can slaw, foil and especially condiment packages or those round freshness seals up through just about every number to 41.
Then skip to 5 gold class rings that ranged from 48-52.
They can be in other areas too, these are just what I found.
So if you want to memorize the tones just concentrate on the areas of iron, foil, nickel, tabs and zinc.
Might want to do the high tone area too in case you come across a big gold coin or something large that is very high karat.
As far as numbers just memorize most of them.

All tongue in cheek but no, I don't believe memorizing any tones can help you because gold can and will come in just about anywhere and can behave similarly lots of times but can also be heavily affected other times due to conditions and other things.
 
Lead is a perfect example, simply because it can be cut and shaped easy.. has good tone... Take precautions against lead poisoning..

I've scooped lead from near iron numbers from bird shot, all the way up to a great silver dollar impression of a consistent 97, down rigger cannon ball..

But just like any metal, it can be in any range depending on shape and size..

If you want to see how low silver can go start looking for gold...

<°)))>{
 
I use an AT Pro and I think lead gives a similar tone/number to gold but so do larger pieces of foil. Lead gives a number ranging from the 40's to the 60's depending on the size just like gold but it varies depending on the size and shape of the object. Sometimes you can tell if it is a small piece of foil but if it is larger or rolled into a ball it is more difficult. You never know exactly what number and tone gold will give but it is usually a pretty solid signal even if it is in the lower range.

I recently found a block of lead that rang up as silver (85-87 on my ATP) We used 3 different machines and they all rang up as silver. It passed the ice test and the acid test. Took it to a coin dealer with a spectrograph and it's 85% lead and 15% antimony.

Apparently large pieces of lead will ring much higher
 
I recently found a block of lead that rang up as silver (85-87 on my ATP) We used 3 different machines and they all rang up as silver. It passed the ice test and the acid test. Took it to a coin dealer with a spectrograph and it's 85% lead and 15% antimony.

Apparently large pieces of lead will ring much higher

Yeah, that's right. I have found some big fishing sinkers and big flattened pieces of lead that rang up really high. The smaller ring sized pieces sound similar to gold. I have never found a big, heavy chunk of gold so I don't know if it would sound the same as a big piece of lead or not. It would be interesting to compare.
 
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