GoldnJules said:I took myself out yesterday for the first time on my own, and only the second time with my own detector. I did a little research for locations on GeoVic, but nothing really prepares you for finding your way when you are actually out there. I might have got myself a little lost :lol: , but that was okay - I broke out the detector anyway, only to find mostly rubbish. I felt a bit like an imposter out there with my detector pretending I knew what I was doing.
How do people decide which sounds are worth investigating? I got a lot of really sharp and strong signals, and after locating ring pulls and bits of scrap metal many times, I decided that those sounds are not worth investigating. Did I do the right thing?
GoldnJules said:I took myself out yesterday for the first time on my own, and only the second time with my own detector. I did a little research for locations on GeoVic, but nothing really prepares you for finding your way when you are actually out there. I might have got myself a little lost :lol: , but that was okay - I broke out the detector anyway, only to find mostly rubbish. I felt a bit like an imposter out there with my detector pretending I knew what I was doing.
How do people decide which sounds are worth investigating? I got a lot of really sharp and strong signals, and after locating ring pulls and bits of scrap metal many times, I decided that those sounds are not worth investigating. Did I do the right thing?
Teemore said:Geovic & Australian Geology etc sites will put you in generally well known old diggings ...... information that people have been using for years ..... like most things 1st in best dressed and most of the "easy"gold will have been found.
Success will come by looking for the areas on any of those diggings that others may have deemed too difficult to be bothered with, move logs/sticks, get in close to/under bushes and scrub, move aside deeper leaf piles etc. anything to get that SDC into areas others may have missed. With the SDC a general rule would be to stick close to old timers diggings, search on and around these areas, especially if access appears difficult. Gold will also be found off/between diggings but he ground there will usually be to deep for the SDC.
Until you really get the hang of the SDC it's better NOT to run it flat out, stick to around setting 3 and 4 or so lights on sens.
The secret is to listen for sounds that make you think "was that really a signal??", go slow, move an inch or so of dirt and check again, hopefully it will increase in volume, if it doesn't it may have been ground mineralisation or a small hot rock .....
Sharp/loud signals shouldn't be ignored, check and clear and rust/pellets/etc/etc and check again, while they will usually be shotgun pellets the next one just may be gold (that someone else didn't check thinking it was junk).
Unfortunately we're now faced with many watching gold shows/youtube thinking it's easy ..... sadly it isn't and those extra numbers are all out there competing for the same scarce resource, you just need to be more confident than the last person to walk the area (and expect around 25 junk targets to each piece of gold).
I've switched from an SDC to the 6000 but managed to find gold with it on close to 100% of the time, they are a great detector.
Enjoy your time out there, enjoy the occasional wildlife encounter and stay confident.
Cheers T.
Oh, if you hadn't considered it think about joining a detecting/PMAV club in your area, you'll learn a lot.
GoldnJules said:I took myself out yesterday for the first time on my own, and only the second time with my own detector. I did a little research for locations on GeoVic, but nothing really prepares you for finding your way when you are actually out there. I might have got myself a little lost :lol: , but that was okay - I broke out the detector anyway, only to find mostly rubbish. I felt a bit like an imposter out there with my detector pretending I knew what I was doing.
How do people decide which sounds are worth investigating? I got a lot of really sharp and strong signals, and after locating ring pulls and bits of scrap metal many times, I decided that those sounds are not worth investigating. Did I do the right thing?
Moneybox said:GoldnJules, take a look at this video. The film quality is quite poor but I've done my best to show you what a nugget sounds like.
[video=480,360]https://youtu.be/G6lu3QfMhcE[/video]
It runs for 13.5 minutes so sit back and enjoy
GoldnJules said:Went out again today, this time with a friend who has vastly more experience at detecting and where best to go than I do - and I found my first two pieces of gold. I was so excited when I got down to those last few bits of gravel expecting to see another piece of lead shot and could almost not believe my eyes when I saw a tiny piece of gold. It weighed in at 0.13 grams. The second piece I found quite a few hours later and it weighs 0.11 grams. Not huge pieces but Im happy with that.
Thank you everyone who told me to dig every target - I did that today, found a lot of rubbish and got a few blisters, but I also found my gold.
https://www.prospectingaustralia.co...2876_d8879399-fe53-4576-992a-8b58ee44815a.jpg
Enter your email address to join: