Cache Test

[badran106]

hi to all........i thank you all for this nice chat....in 1995 i went to a greek site with 4 locators gimini 3 and 2box garret a metadec 3 cscope and pi cscope ...i found a lot of large targets like bronze jugs but only after the beldozer took between 50cm and 3 meter from sites b4 i came few years ago...targets were like foot a ball size and larger,,,they fail all...so i made a 0.48 coil for pi and found a jug at 73 cm that was not seen by all metal detectors....and spot 2 targets and kept them there...till now...one month ago my pal payed 8000$ for 2 metal locators so i took him there to test....trash lcd hunter failed and sound on cigaret foil....ha ha ha.....dam...i can write a book of my old treasure hunting.....yes the coin cash are not unified field and ground will make the signal weak.....

[Funfinder]

Hi badran,

soon you can try the Nexus with 1 meter coil or the already existing Makro DeepHunter (also 1m).
btw. is the winter-time good for treasure-hunting in Lebanon or is it forbidden everywhere anyway?

[landman]

Hi Funfinder, I want to create a test garden for larger objects. No coins. Ok maybe a 1oz silver coin is the smallest. Help me design a test garden for the likes of the Deep Hunter, Golden King, DRS Ground Exper and the like. Already I've collected the following metal objects: 1 kilo copper, 1 kilo brass bar, 1 kilo silver bar, 1 pound aluminum bar, 1 pound zinc bar. I do not have a cup, plate or bowl made of silver, copper or brass. I do not have anything representing steel. At the moment I have one aluminum can buried at 80cm in my garden, that's it. What do you suggest?

[Funfinder]

Salute landman!

If you have some 3 - 5.000 bucks I'd also add some priceworth Easy Rad GPR to the deep-detectors collection
because that way you also can get super cavity-tests!

The idea of course is fantastic - reminds me on the test-stone-wall-bridge from Makro & Nokta at Istanbul!

You can't test different e-smog situations but you can create sandy, loamy, brick-stony etc. layers.

The most simple and perfect way would be if you have already some "hill" nearby.
You cut this hill from one side vertically down or you built some 3m broad and 3m deep trench.

Now the method of course would be that you plug into the hill different thick plastic-pipes.
So those are leading 1-3meter deep inside the hill.

Because its pretty really useless if you bury silver bars etc. - it's like you will lose them.
And for demonstration and video-clip purposes it's also better if you can insert stuff
inside the pipe at different depth levels how you like it.

If you built such trench with a mini-excavator it would be the best to cement some wall
for stabilization, too, so the earth and ground doesn't gets loose.

And afterwards you can prepare the surface below the grass with different stuff like sand,
loam etc. - this way you can test different kind of soils or imitate them to some level.

The whole site should be at least 4 meters long and if you wanna built some large cave
for cavity tests better 8m. You can also built some stairs which go downwards,
at the beginning are the hole-openings for the smaller and not so deep pipes.
But it really depends on the area where you are living - if it's not too rocky there
you can improvise and will find some way.

And if you really just wanna bury stuff better use some alu instead of silver
and: copper instead of gold - even cheap X-large selfbuilt plates made of Alu or copper-foil
will work.


--------------
My test-cache consists of ca. 200 beer-caps at ca. 70cm depth, spread over ca. 15x15cm diameter, below loam.
But it already shows really good which detectors with usual or larger coils can find it and which not.
The only drawback is that first I have to drive 3km to reach this test location.

With the Jeohunter and 45cm coil I could find a 9cm cannonball at 60cm depth below loam and
sand but this was already not easy. Just to show some relation of the "usual" limits of detection.

If you want it the easy way, built three 10cm alu-foil balls and bury them at 70, 90 and 110cm.
Only the best detectors will still detect it at 110cm!

Larger test-objects should be a little bit deeper of course.
You can bury some old 35x40cm tools-alu-case at 1,5 - 2 meter
so you'll get some great simulation of a real huge treasure-cache!

[landman]

Let me think this over. Really great information as usual Funfinder. I really appreciate your posts.

[Funfinder]

Its nothing, just my 2 cents or better: my buried beer-caps!

If you have the chance to built some "underground test-gallery" I guess it would be the
best because you can use it over and over again, you even can fill the plastic pipes
with finds and stuff all together and you can demonstrate different detectors to others.
Just the pipes have to be long enough (ca. 2meters) so the finds are really down under.
You might need some special hook to get them back and to close the pipes on the inner
end so no find gets lost.

[Mark-VA]

I'd like very much for you to do another cache test. Eleven years later and newer technology.

[Funfinder]

It's not that important because we already know which detectors are good
and of course searching for a deep cache means using some larger coil.
You even could put a big metal object on a shelf behind a high
mineralized brick-wall to simulate the ground resistance at some degree.

[Nexus]

I'd like very much for you to do another cache test. Eleven years later and newer technology.

It seems like I'll have to do just that. I have a small hoard of Roman coins 1 kg, 445 pcs. all seriously decayed. I intend to make a demo video of MP getting those at 60 cm (24") under compact soil and with just 13"DD coil, but the trouble is the damn digging work. A proper test requires much more than what is described on Gary's web site.
This demo test will require a large pit at least 1 meter deep, to allow a proper hole to be drilled at 60 cm from the top soil layer in parallel position to the ground surface and deep in the pit's wall, at least 60 cm or so. In this way the hoard will be out of pot holes interference way.

Two years ago I have done this test set up, but last year I got the hoard out of the ground as some small iron pieces came out of there and was not sure who is getting what and I needed to see for sure if the PI's can do something about this test. So the Iron that I found upon recovery of the hoard have spoiled the fun and for now I believe the PI's were getting that Iron and not the hoard as the Iron was way closer to the surface.
The VLF's with bigger coils were getting very good signals with positive discrimination, but with 13"dd coils the discrimination was confused by the Iron bits.

The MP with 1 meter concentric coil is literally blasting this hoard with at least 20 cm above the soil.

Hopefully not long from now I'll bury this hoard again in more accurate set up next time.

[Funfinder]

One pretty realistic test would be to mix up little copper penny coins
with clay (50-50%) and forming soming 5-7 cm diameter ball.

Because a real cache with 100 to 200 coins put into some clay-pot
and buried 1000 years ago also wouldn't be much larger.

For spread vs. single stuff some iron-plate 20x20cm at one place
and small, single, not each others touching iron nails spread over the
same sized area at another place would tell the difference.

However: Usually the corroded coins just sum up seen from their
total metal weight and surface area (like Yagi-antenna elements)
concerning the complete induction-strength of the cache.

So the coin-mud-ball will have its highest induction at the middle.
But this doesn't matter a lot because its just a few cm lower.

Much more important - I would say - is to check out which kind
of metal is how good detectable at what kind of mineralization.

Coins which contain copper, nickel or zinc are easy detectable in
desert sand but not if it comes to high mineralized areas and if
those coins are included in some clay-pot.

Silver coins give the highest contrast factor but caches including
them might be more rare to find. Gold even more.

[erte123]

anyone test a blisstool v6?

[sinclairuser]

blisstool detectors are so 2012, tried an ltc64x, didn't like it found it harsh and chattery, also thought it felt heavy for a "modern" detector.
mate of mine has an ltc48, and to be honest i like it much better less knobs and switches, also the box on the stem and the battery pack under the arm cup feels much better kind of like a fisher 1266, still heavy(imho) but managable.
so take that honest opinion how you like, blisstool sold loads and loads v3 64's and you would think that they are plenty full at a good price, but you dont see as many for sale as you might imagine, and by the same token i dont see many in use at rallies and such, so those that buy them hang onto them even if they dont use them that much.
i think people love the detector, but not setting it up and using it all day, no doubt its good but it has quirks, its a "marmite" detector you like it or you dont.
but if you are really interested try it first, dont just jump in you might find its quirks outweigh its benefits.

[Koala]

I not tried one myself. But I have been out twice with people using the Beast.

Both times once in the Peak District (I was using a Bandido with no problems) and the other in Shropshire (I was using an IDX with no problems) the owners were having problems.
Having to re ground balance several times and false signals. They really were having a bad time. The Peak District was water logged ground but the Shropshire one was fairly typical of around here with plough shear mixed in with coke

Out of the 20 to 30 people taking on each rally their finds rates were towards the bottom of the scale.

That's not to say they are bad. After all it could be operator error, just bad luck or the detector just doesn't like the type of ground we have here.

[erte123]

i anyways don't think the bliss can hit a quarter at 24'', not even a tdi pro with a 16'' coil..maybe 20'', i think only a modded gpx could hit it

[tonemgub]

I tested 50 silver coins with Relic Striker and captured them without any problems at 70 cm