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Weekends Finds 14 For 3 Grams

kiwijw		Posted : Monday, 9 June 2014 7:34:41 PM(UTC)
Rank: Gold Ingot Groups: Registered Joined: 28/03/2010(UTC) Posts: 1,152 Thanks: 92 times Was thanked: 658 time(s) in 324 post(s)		Hi guys, The weather wasnt supposed to be very good for the weekend, with rain/showers forecast from friday afternoon. I finished work at 5pm Friday & the weather actually looked like it was getting better.... Mr's JW had a wedding to video on the saturday & so was out of action for a detecting mission. I had mentiond that I might go off friday after work to do a night detect, stay the night away & detect saturday & get home late that night. With the weather looking ok for a night detect I called in to home to pick up my detecting gear & bits & pieces, give my belovered a hug & kiss & off I went for the two hour drive. Called in to the sheep station homestead to let them know my intentions & drove off up in to the hills & to the old workings. It had been raining & the ground was quite wet but the sky was clear with half a moon giving a bit of light so no need for the head lamp until I got a signal. I went back to the slope where I got on to a little patch of 8 pieces in a down hill line & Mr's JW also pinged 4 bits off the same location last weekend. The ground being wet I liked the chances of more depth & sensitivity & hoped to get some more....Wasnt to be....BUGGER After 3 hours the fog/cloud rolled in, blanked out the moon & I was wondering around in a fine mist. I drove off to some old surface worked reef workings where I had done quite well in the past. I started at the bottom of the gully working my way up towards the reef cutting & was getting the usual .22 shells & bullet heads. I then got another .22 shell type signal but dug it any way & it was a .55 gram piece of shoty reef gold with quartz mixed in with it. Piece top left in pic. Ended up with 2 more smaller pieces of the same shoty gold & that was it for the night. Broke out the GB2 but got nothing but shot gun pellets. The 4500 gets its share of pellets but nothing like as many as the GB2. The next day was fog & low cloud all day & I went over some very quartzy fragmented ground with the GB2 where I had got a few nice little quartz specimens with the 4500 & joey mono. All I got was more shot gun pellets. Enough of this.... I then headed to some more old alluvial dry gully turned over pile workings. The ground was very wet with a heavy dew from the fog. But boy was the detector running very smooth & hot & I pinged 9 little bits of sassy gold off ground I have been over many times before, with the smallest being .04 of a gram. I had left on the NF 12 x 7. Nothing over a gram but 12 bits all up for 2.55 grams And the usual rubbish I am lucky that I live amongst &/or not too far from some of the richest goldfields in the country. Mind you....thats why I moved down to here from up north. To chase the gold. I love it..... On Sunday I headed out to a local haunt just down the road in the afternoon for a couple of hours. I wacked on the NF 17 x 11 to get a bit more depth, as I have thrashed these workings with the joey mono, 6" mono, Commander 8" & 11" mono & the 12 x 7. I was really starting to struggle to come home with a rattle in the bottle from these workings so I hadnt been to them for a while. Hopefully the gold would grow back. With the 17 x 11 I was hoping to get something a bit bigger at more depth......wasnt to be.... but I got two for just on half a gram It surprised me at the depth that the 17 x 11 got these. Obviously they were just out of reach for the 11" commander which is deadly on small gold at a bit of depth but I may now have to re-think the ability of the 17 x 11 on small gold at depth. The wet ground would have helped as well. So all up for the weekend was 14 bits for 3 grams. Cheers Good luck out there JW :)

NUGGY		Posted : Monday, 9 June 2014 10:30:40 PM(UTC)
Rank: Gold Ingot Groups: Registered Joined: 20/07/2012(UTC) Posts: 267 Location: greymouth Thanks: 85 times Was thanked: 76 time(s) in 58 post(s)		Hi John, Good to see you are still getting some gold down there mate, that lot should produce a good rattle in your jar! Well done. I have only been out once this summer and got nothing with the detector, but did get some small flakes I panned :-( . Was not a great area and ripped the f-$#k out of the neoprene top of my flash muckboots getting in there. May your good finds continue - NUGGY

overdog		Posted : Tuesday, 10 June 2014 12:21:02 AM(UTC)
Rank: Gold Ingot Medals: Groups: Registered Joined: 2/03/2010(UTC) Posts: 418 Location: nelson Thanks: 69 times Was thanked: 82 time(s) in 68 post(s)		Hi John-must have been cold up there gone dark-good effort. Do you get much difference in depth between coils on the 4500? Thinking of jumping ship to a PI to get through the black sand Ive got in some spots up here...

kiwijw		Posted : Tuesday, 10 June 2014 1:28:22 AM(UTC)
Rank: Gold Ingot Groups: Registered Joined: 28/03/2010(UTC) Posts: 1,152 Thanks: 92 times Was thanked: 658 time(s) in 324 post(s)		Thanks Nuggy for dropping by. PM sent :) Hi there Overdog, I am a HUGE fan of night detecting. The detector just runs so much smoother than during the day due to very little to no electomagnetic interference, (EMI) & no solar influence from the sun. Conditions are also usually very quiet with no wind or other outside noises to distract. Being dark & usually operating with a headlamp, unless a full moon, you can only see the immediate ground in front of you that you are detecting so much easier to focus on & thoroughly cover all the ground & its nooks & crannies that gold could be hiding in. Also makes it easier to detect slow & low, always the best way to detect anyway, as you arent tempted to speed up to cover more ground that during the day you can see other likely spots & want to get to them quicker. As to the cold.....you can dress for the cold so no problem there. Not so much in the heat of summer where you can only strip off so much & then it is still stinking hot & uncomfortable with the heat just bouncing of the parched Central Otago schist & dirt. Hot dusty & the bloody fly's... To answer your question re the coils. Yes there is a huge difference in coil sizes & depth verses gold size. You can go over the same ground with different size coils & get more gold with each change of coil. I do it all the time. Depending on the look of the depth of ground will dictate what size coil you start off with. If bed rocky & shallow or exposed schist then a smallish coil would be the call as you arent really after great depth but it will be very sensitive on small gold but will also get bigger gold as the gold wont be to far down for the smallish coil. If in open ground that isnt showing signs of being very shallow then a bigger coil for depth would be the call. The gold would have to be on the bigger size but you would be surprised at how smaller gold a big coil can pick up on too if the gold isnt too far down. Here is a pic of a small piece I got with an 18" Nugget Finder coil on open ground that I was prospecting on. I was gobsmacked. The first pic you cant even really see it. Arrrr....there it is. Here are a couple of pics from a small piece I found with the 17 x 11 coil that I used to find the two small bits in the previous post. Note the size & depth of the hole The small piece of gold I would use a bigger coil if just straight out prospecting new ground that I had no idea of the ground depth if it containd gold or not. That way you can cover more ground quicker & you may hit on to a patch of gold. Once you have cleaned up all you can with the bigger coil then drop down in size & go over the ground again & you will usually get more smaller gold that the bigger coil missed. Mate....if you go to a PI you will never look back to a VLF. :) Are you showing interest in that 4500 on trademe with the buy now of $4700? If you get a PI go minelab...dont get a Whites TDI.... Good luck out there JW :) Edited by user Tuesday, 10 June 2014 1:50:55 AM(UTC) \| Reason: Not specified

Foiled again		Posted : Tuesday, 10 June 2014 11:58:45 AM(UTC)
Rank: Gold Ingot Groups: Registered Joined: 10/04/2012(UTC) Posts: 861 Location: Christchurch Thanks: 459 times Was thanked: 251 time(s) in 192 post(s)		You're definitely onto it re the night detecting. In winter most of mine is at night after work as I get bugger all days off. Your concentration is much better and I reckon detectors run better too. Oh to have gold nugs scattered around the port hills haha
		There's another to find and I'm gunna find it!

overdog		Posted : Tuesday, 10 June 2014 12:53:25 PM(UTC)
Rank: Gold Ingot Medals: Groups: Registered Joined: 2/03/2010(UTC) Posts: 418 Location: nelson Thanks: 69 times Was thanked: 82 time(s) in 68 post(s)		95% of my detecting is on exposed bedrock on the creek banks.Having a lot of trouble with black sand and hot rocks but I can usually recognise those buggers after a couple of passes. Does a PI handle that type of mineralisation better than my Bug? As for the 4500 on tm Ive got a wedding to save for.. and mud tyres for the truck...and and and lol!

kiwijw		Posted : Tuesday, 10 June 2014 6:23:50 PM(UTC)
Rank: Gold Ingot Groups: Registered Joined: 28/03/2010(UTC) Posts: 1,152 Thanks: 92 times Was thanked: 658 time(s) in 324 post(s)		G'day Overdog, The PI will pick up on big concerntrations of iron sand but it is a different sound to a gold signal so no mistaking it. As to the cost of a minelab PI & other costs in life.......you have to spend money to make money. If you invest in a minelab PI & you put the time in to using it there is no reason why you wont get back your money plus more. I have paid off my 4500 many times over & before that I had a GP 3000 & paid that off many times over as well. I loved the 3000 & it has such a distinct audio sound on gold targets. I miss that distinct gold audio sound as the 4500 is a bit different & you can never be sure. I still have my 3000 & have been reluctant to sell it but if you are interested in buying it I will let it go as I dont use it & my wife uses the 4000. PM me if interested. It is in very good condition as I have looked after it & it has always had a control box cover on it. I bought it brand new in Austarlia & still have the receipt for it. On top of all the standard stuff that it comes with I will throw in a signal enhancer & a couple of other coils. It comes standard with the 11" DD but I will also throw in an 11" minelab commander mono & the little 10 x 5 coiltek mono & also another battery.....It also has the fixed/ tracking ground balance button fitted to the handle like the GPX models. This was'nt standard for the 3000 but I fitted it to make ground balancing a lot easier & quicker. I will let it all go for 3K. Cheers. Good luck out there JW :)