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A Few Of Guessologists Finds

Prospecting Australia

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Smoky bandit said:
You've had some nice finds lately... Congrats. :Y: :Y:
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Cheers, I don't really get solid chunks of time to go detecting at the moment but I'm lucky to work pretty much adjacent a lot of crown land with old and apparently undetected sites. Half an hour after work here, a lunch break there...

junkdog said:
I want to do some coin shooting what would be a start up rig. thinking of a go find 66 or 44 .
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I can only talk from my own experience but I found the 40 to be the best bang for buck, I only ever run it at the first level of discrimination to reject obvious iron so the 60's extra features don't mean a lot to me (still haven't used one so I don't know what I'm missing out on). I found mine on Ebay from the USA, about $230 after discount codes and actually packaged with the extras that usually only come with the 60, tough to pass up at that price.

I've flogged it to hell and it's falling apart after a lot of abuse, but it's still my scouting detector. I'll usually go into an area first with it, and then jump in with the GMT when I think I'm reaching the limits of what the Go Find can do within my skill level. GMT's iron discrimination sucks compared to a proper relic detector though so it's often a frustrating experience. I'm running into iron masking issues now at the site where these tokens are coming out of, hanging out for an Equinox now to refresh my worked over sites and make winkling the hard targets out a little easier!
 
Is this a pocket watch winder key? No wheels today, in for a service so a quick swing in the scrub next to the work car park only, wasn't expecting anything at all.
1540435951_ingram.jpg
 
Productive day yesterday with some more structured detecting than my usual spaz attacks, 4 coins yesterday but hard won at the rate of about 1 an hour...

1540594633_4.jpg


An 1854 and a beaut 1840s worn penny, the last digit has worn entirely off but the shape of the very slightest raised bump and looking at the mintage figures points me towards 1841, my second oldest coin so far.
1883 and 1863 half pennies, 1883 was a surprise as it's two decades later than most of the coins that have been coming out of here, although it was shallow and my digging has been hinting at a possible second time period of occupation, it's almost real archaeology!

The 1863 is my new favourite find, it's pretty old, hardly worn, not that cooked and it's just riddled with die cracks. You can see one coming off Britannia's knees in the main photograph, and the portrait side has at least three, although you can really only see the one through the G in the photo below. There's one through the R in Victoria and also near the text on the shoulder. Surely silvers are next...

1540595136_4a.jpg
 
Pulling out some great Victorian coins and relics from your spot, those coins are in great condition. Hoping that you will strike it lucky on some silvers, have found that some Victorian locations can be a bit scant on silvers in the past despite plenty of coppers. Who knows, you might eventually dip into William/George era coins. :Y:
 
^^ They are definitely out there, the second coin I ever found in this part of the world (and with a detector ever) was a bullhead shilling, just kicking around in the leaf litter! The first was about 5 minutes earlier, a pretty trashed 20's penny that I sacrificed to science and boiled in red bull to in the microwave to clean it up! It certainly worked, that coin is ugly as hell now though. I'll post a picture of the shilling tomorrow as it looks much better than it did when I first found it, gave it the spit and foil treatment which I stopped half way as the silver sulphide was pushed into the low points of the very worn coin and highlighted what little detail was left. That area has never given up any relics or coins since, except for foil caps which I assume are milk bottle tops.

edit: while I was thinking about cleaning coins, I've found that the carbon cathode out of the old zinc carbon batteries that litter public land literally everywhere make great electrodes for electrolysis cleaning of your finds. As far as I know a carbon electrode is desirable as it has no chance of plating metal onto the object you're trying to clean. No one reading this in this part of the forum is going to care too much but someone might find it using the search function.

Disappointing afternoon today, I think this site has given as much as a Go Find can take for now. All my finds were outboard of the 'hot zone' of signals this time, trying to work up good signals put of the iron in the area I detected yesterday just gave me nails. Highlights below include an interesting copper brooch, a bakelite cigar holder and an 1861 half penny that was mostly worn flat. I took an action shot of the half penny after I found it with the screwdriver. The ground was hard as concrete and all my progress was with screwdriver levering a centimeter at a time, and my pinpointing was way off. I felt the gouging of it in my stomach! Thankfully it was pretty much worn flat but it did ruin the nice patina on the other side.

1540635484_inthehole.jpg


1540635539_hearts.jpg


Not to worry, still got another couple of permissions to work over!
 
^ yesterdays coin was a full penny, I'm spoiled digging the big chunky ones lately and didn't have anything on me to compare to...

Forgot about this one yesterday, checked out a new area that might come good(er), found this decorative piece about 2" across that I accidentally ripped one side off while digging. Not sure what it's made of, not heavy enough for lead (looks similar, hasn't held up well in the ground), and the plating appears to be silver. Gave it a rub with some foil and it gave a faint sulphur smell, and looks distinct to the nickel plated stuff I've found.

1540675753_silver.jpg


And the shilling I found earlier in the year that I was talking about, the other side is worn completely flat:

1540675770_shilling.jpg
 
Your shilling looks a lot like most of the Georgian coins I've found around here, nearly dead flat aside from a rough outline of the bust.

Nothing worst than knowing you have already scratched a coin before pulling it from the ground, you get that on the big jobs. ;)
 
Looks like hard digging there! Worth it for coins that old. The brooch thingy might be pewter?
 
Dave79 said:
Looks like hard digging there! Worth it for coins that old. The brooch thingy might be pewter?
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I reckon so, the white and clear tiny crystals on the other side look like the lead minerals I see on proper lead objects I've dug so it's more than likely got some Pb content to it.

Located a couple more dozed late 1800's dwellings on crown yesterday, a quick scout gave me some doorknobs and a belt buckle but there's much more iron at these sites so lots of ridiculous falsing. Getting to within sight of dwellings too which I don't like, although I could hardly be accused of sneaking about being in high vis after work! More worried about upsetting stock and dogs to be honest. Did manage a 1900 half penny outboard of the cricket buckle site on the way out so the day wasn't a total duster.

I was investigating a very nice signal in some grass when something moved under the coil, a very solid red-bellied black snake! He would have been 4' plus at least, it felt like someone picked me up and shoved me in the other direction with the way I moved! I think that particular site might be a winter only job now since they are territorial, thankfully they really aren't that aggressive.
 
Slightly disappointing run up at the old's this weekend, starting to get diminishing returns although I'm trying to get permission for the old vineyard next door to give the site some more legs. 1911 and 1958 pennies, 1927 and 1948 half pennies, and a 1918 threepence. The thrip and 58 penny were plow damaged, the lawn area used to be an orchard 20+ years ago.

It's amazing how much weather and ground conditions influence what you find, found bugger all until half an inch of rain on the lawns plus overnight watering. The lawns lit up with good targets which included most of the coins, in areas I've walked over a dozen times and not particularly deep either. It was a pretty good demonstration of how limited the Go Find is despite it's ongoing success as well.

1541537373_long.jpg


Checked out the local defunct harness club , now public RV park for a short while for something different but I could practically feel the eyes on the back of my neck! No point detecting if it's not fun.
 
Got a nice one today... Just starting to check out an new and exceptionally trashy 1860's site that's giving me hell, and turned up half of an American military buckle. Civil war era I guess based on this site: http://www.relicman.com/plates/zLibraryPlate.190.MilitiaTwoPartSash.htm , this one's fully cast instead of those stamped ones, and quite worn so I guess belt instead of sash. I suppose you're not going to be wearing your best sashes on the goldfields either!

1541559480_buckle1.jpg

1541559496_buckle2.jpg


Anyone got any extra info on these? I see that a guy on this forum found an identical one last year. I actually tried to post this to the Australian Metal Detecting and Relic Hunting forum first to give them some love since they're struggling for posts, but I just couldn't get past the Tapatalk login this time no matter how many times I cleared my cookies!
 
Lovely find, probably brought over to Oz by a US prospector previously working the Californian goldfields, has been a few US buckles unearthed recently. I've also stopped posting on AMDH due to the currently format, not sure how long it will last which is a pity.
 
Guessologist said:
Got a nice one today... Just starting to check out an new and exceptionally trashy 1860's site that's giving me hell, and turned up half of an American military buckle. Civil war era I guess based on this site: http://www.relicman.com/plates/zLibraryPlate.190.MilitiaTwoPartSash.htm , this one's fully cast instead of those stamped ones, and quite worn so I guess belt instead of sash. I suppose you're not going to be wearing your best sashes on the goldfields either!

https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/11952/1541559480_buckle1.jpg
https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/img/member-images/11952/1541559496_buckle2.jpg

Anyone got any extra info on these? I see that a guy on this forum found an identical one last year. I actually tried to post this to the Australian Metal Detecting and Relic Hunting forum first to give them some love since they're struggling for posts, but I just couldn't get past the Tapatalk login this time no matter how many times I cleared my cookies!
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I think its in here mate
http://www.hanoverbrass.com/early-militia-buckles-and-plates.html
 

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