maxxkatt
Forum Supporter
I have been metal detecting off and on since the late 80's. Back then you just maybe read a brief manual and then picked up your new metal detector and started hunting. Of course they were rather basic and there wasn't a lot to learn about the actual metal detector.
What I didn't know that there was a lot to learn about metal detecting like site selection, coil technique, techniques for hunting trashy sites, obtaining permissions and learning the subtle differences in tones. On on the beach the many skills involved in reading the beaches. Heck, on vacation we just grabbed our detector and started hunting the beach with few clues to why our VLF detector was so noisy. Yes we did find some things, but we could have found a lot more with beach reading skills, beach selection and using a metal detector designed for salt water.
Back then there were maybe 1 or 2 books on detecting and a few gold or treasure magazines that might have a very general article on metal detecting every so often. Any mention of finds were typically fabulous types of treasures or huge nuggets that the average Joe would never find.
But now we have a handful of metal detecting forums to browse with real world questions that more often than not get answered by true expert metal detectorists responding to our posts. On top of that you can private message very specific questions that you may not want the world to see like info about a specific place you are hunting.
This forum and one other metal detecting forum are my "go to" forums" that I browse every day. I have learned more about metal detecting since March 2018 than everything I knew before. Does that make me an expert? No, but it does make me more competent and confident. What spurred this learning was my purchase of the Equinox 800. I came from using the AT Pro for three years to the Nox 800. Whoa! what a surprise. For the first couple of weeks I thought the 800 was broken it was making so much chatter.
Little did I realize the many fine attributes of the 600 and 800 allowed you to hear darn near every thing that was passing under your coil. If I had not had these forums and more specifically these sub-forums on the Equinox models I would have sold the 800 withing a month's of it's purchase and probably gotten out of the hobby.
By reading what Calabash digger had to day and especially his videos, and Vferrari, BufordCityDog, Tom in CA, Tnsharpshooter, Mudpuppy and others who make thoughtful and informative posts I learned so much about the 800 and metal detecting in general and did not give up on the 800. Thanks guys I was able to tame this beast known as the Nox 800.
On these forums there was and is a lot of back and forth on the merits of one brand/mode over the other/one. Especially with the Equinox series. It was supposed to kill this brand/model or that brand/model. I notice they are all still in business and that is good.
This back and forth will tend to keep all honest. If I were to come out with some wrong in formation, I would be corrected by others who knew the facts. The last thing we need on our forums is people learning bogus information.
So this is basically a cheer to the administrators of this forum who keep the conversation civilized for the most part. Still there are a few grouches who slip in their strong opinions from time to time with a bit of rudeness. But some of that is the nature of the forums, people often get a little too direct in the forums than they would in person. Another good attribute of these metal detecting forums they are mostly free for the political discussions that rage everywhere else on the Internet and on tv news.
And finally thanks to the many readers and posters who make these forums work for us. A true and valuable resource for all of us.
What I didn't know that there was a lot to learn about metal detecting like site selection, coil technique, techniques for hunting trashy sites, obtaining permissions and learning the subtle differences in tones. On on the beach the many skills involved in reading the beaches. Heck, on vacation we just grabbed our detector and started hunting the beach with few clues to why our VLF detector was so noisy. Yes we did find some things, but we could have found a lot more with beach reading skills, beach selection and using a metal detector designed for salt water.
Back then there were maybe 1 or 2 books on detecting and a few gold or treasure magazines that might have a very general article on metal detecting every so often. Any mention of finds were typically fabulous types of treasures or huge nuggets that the average Joe would never find.
But now we have a handful of metal detecting forums to browse with real world questions that more often than not get answered by true expert metal detectorists responding to our posts. On top of that you can private message very specific questions that you may not want the world to see like info about a specific place you are hunting.
This forum and one other metal detecting forum are my "go to" forums" that I browse every day. I have learned more about metal detecting since March 2018 than everything I knew before. Does that make me an expert? No, but it does make me more competent and confident. What spurred this learning was my purchase of the Equinox 800. I came from using the AT Pro for three years to the Nox 800. Whoa! what a surprise. For the first couple of weeks I thought the 800 was broken it was making so much chatter.
Little did I realize the many fine attributes of the 600 and 800 allowed you to hear darn near every thing that was passing under your coil. If I had not had these forums and more specifically these sub-forums on the Equinox models I would have sold the 800 withing a month's of it's purchase and probably gotten out of the hobby.
By reading what Calabash digger had to day and especially his videos, and Vferrari, BufordCityDog, Tom in CA, Tnsharpshooter, Mudpuppy and others who make thoughtful and informative posts I learned so much about the 800 and metal detecting in general and did not give up on the 800. Thanks guys I was able to tame this beast known as the Nox 800.
On these forums there was and is a lot of back and forth on the merits of one brand/mode over the other/one. Especially with the Equinox series. It was supposed to kill this brand/model or that brand/model. I notice they are all still in business and that is good.
This back and forth will tend to keep all honest. If I were to come out with some wrong in formation, I would be corrected by others who knew the facts. The last thing we need on our forums is people learning bogus information.
So this is basically a cheer to the administrators of this forum who keep the conversation civilized for the most part. Still there are a few grouches who slip in their strong opinions from time to time with a bit of rudeness. But some of that is the nature of the forums, people often get a little too direct in the forums than they would in person. Another good attribute of these metal detecting forums they are mostly free for the political discussions that rage everywhere else on the Internet and on tv news.
And finally thanks to the many readers and posters who make these forums work for us. A true and valuable resource for all of us.
Thanks Maxx
