Little Gold Patch Using GPZ & 15" X-Coil

[phrunt]

My friend and I were struggling to think of a place to go detecting, he had a day off work and was keen to go for a detect. We ended up just going back to an old spot we've done so many times it's not funny, once we got there we decided to go to an area about 10 minutes from the Car park, it's got some old timer workings but the time we went there previously he found 4 little nuggets and I found nothing, he was using his GPZ and standard 14x13" coil that time and I was using my GPX 4500 and Nugget Finder 14x9" Evo. Seeing we didn't do overly well there a couple of years ago we've since gone further afield thinking this spot must be done to death and not worth detecting.

Now we are armed with new coils and me now having a GPZ thought it worth another try.

He detected the old working and got one small piece, I went off to the side and detected the hillside next to them, and popped out a nugget, then another, then another, it just kept going. I ended up with 39 nuggets over the 3 days with about 8 grams in this small area, I let him have an afternoon on the patch and he also got 12 nuggets out of it for a total of about 3 grams.

Here is the gold he got.

And here are my 3 days totals.

I took quite a bit of video on day 1 and day 2 showing the target responses on in situ targets and though out the digs, I'm amazed how well the 15" Concentric coil does on small gold at pretty good depths. It made it very easy to give the patch a good work over, I just can't understand how after all these years and so close to the car park and some workings all this gold was still there.

[video=480,360]https://youtu.be/qs-e8HO7xdU[/video]

And this photo shows the entire patch, every one of the nuggets was found on the ground in this photo.

And a couple of photos of some nuggets

I will go back and give it another go yet, but targets are getting slim on the area, I'm sure there will be a couple of nuggets we have missed, I might try the 8" X-coil next just to see how it goes on finding any left over crumbs, although the 15" Concentric really seems like it's similar in small gold performance to the 8"

 

[Smoky bandit]

Well done Mate,
That would of been an excellent 3 days :Y: :beer:

 

[Mackka]

Excellent work phrunt. That coil is working well for ya.
Cheers
Mackka

 

[A-team]

Nice crisp signal from the x-coil, similar to the NF12 inch, but nothing like the original 14 inch. Can certainly start seeing the necessity of updated coils for the zed.... That's a nice haul for just a short time! Keep up the good work, and appreciating your input around the forums - your experience is gold layful:

 

[phrunt]

Yes, Thanks A-team, this was with the GPZ in High Yield, Normal, gain of 18 and audio smoothing on low, I found that the ideal settings for this place, I normally have smoothing off but seeing I was detecting 3 days straight I preferred some smoothing and I knew I wasn't going to miss much if anything at all having smoothing on low. The concentric coil keeps the detector running smoothly too.

It was a bit of fun, I'm sure there are a few left over nuggets in the patch that I'll go get another day, I wasn't methodically gridding or anything, just walking around randomly within the area.

 

[phrunt]

We went back to the "patch" again a couple of days ago to see if we could squeeze anymore nuggets out of it, I was confident I'd get a couple more. It ended up successful. JW the friend who came with me managed to get over 15 nuggets out of one hole. His hole started by using the GPZ with 15" concentric coil which found a bigger bit of gold, then he was sure there was more signals in there, so he used his Gold Monster to get them out, they were tiny bits that appeared to be down to 0.001 of a gram, he just kept digging the hole deeper and getting more and more of these tiny bits.

I didn't worry about doing that sort of thing with my holes, I was aiming to get the bigger pieces. One of which I detected through a big rock, it was a good signal too, It took me quite a while to move the rock which was probably about 25cm thick and then once under the rock I had to dig down to get the bit of gold out, it probably weighs .4 of a gram, I don't know which piece it was now ? Moving the rock was certainly hard work but I knew I had to do it, what else would be under there, certainly not junk.

At one point I changed over to the 15x10" Spiral X-coil as the 15" round concentric was to big to get in between the sage bushes and rose bushes and I knew there would likely be gold there as I'd got a few nuggets around the perimeter of the bushes, this proved the right thing to do as I got one nugget from in the sage bushes that I'd have missed if I left the big coil on and another nugget that was underneath a rose bush that the tip of the 15x10" was able to detect when pushed up against the bush. In the photos the sage bush and rose rush are removed as I destroyed them by digging them out to get the gold under them. I was using my Mini Monster to help recover the targets to speed things up.

Another one of JW's nuggets he detected the other day but it was too far down in the bedrock to get out with his pick however I'd buried it again when I did my tidy up before leaving the previous time I was there, he was prepared and brought along his jack hammer tool to smash up the bedrock but just had to find it again Smile It turned out to be a .4 of a gram nugget.

A few photos of some of the nuggets

So now, almost another 2 grams out of it for me, and I also got my JW's weigh in which ended up slightly more than mine, all his tiny nuggets added up to a decent weight after all.

And the total for me for the day....

And the total for JW for the day....

We came very close to getting the same weight.

The patch will be starting to run low now, I'm sure there is lots of very tiny bits in the soil however detectable gold is running low, I'd imagine I could squeeze a few more out of it.

The Patch!

 

[Mackka]

Nice gold but i am not sure about using the battery operated Kanga,
Mackka

 

[phrunt]

It did a great job, it ate up the bedrock in seconds, it would have destroyed the pick if we just kept hammering at it until it broke apart.

 

[Mackka]

I am sure it did mate but I am not sure that battery hammer chisel is classified as a hand tool. I thought it was a mechanical device and subsequently not part of your Miners Right. I stand to be corrected as I would love to be able to use one .
Mackka

 

[phrunt]

I'm not in Australia

 

[Tathradj]

What State is this in.?
rules vary considerably between them.

 

[RM Outback]

What State is this in.?
rules vary considerably between them.

And Countries, I sent Phrunt a pm regarding the battery operated hammer and I also reported it thinking Phrunt was in Australia. Turns out Phrunt can smash out rocks to his hearts content given he's not in Australia erfect: :heart: lucky fella's :beer:

Enjoying this report either way I hope you get to smash out more rocks and find a mortgage breaker :beer: ickshovel: :goldnugget:

 

[Mackka]

Go phrunt, you need a bigger jack hammer.
Mackka

 

[phrunt]

My mate and I have been hitting this patch for about a week or so now, I've got about 15-16 grams off it and I have no idea how many pieces it was, probably 70 or so and he's got 8.26 grams over 78 pieces, he hasn't done as many days and he's stayed off the top part of the patch mostly letting me get the bulk of it seeing I found it, the bottom part of the patch mostly had the smallest gold.

Here is a video I did on the second last day going there, I was there for 3 hours that day and used the 8" X-coil to get in between bushes as the 15" was too big for that sort of thing and it's lucky I did as I'd missed quite a bit of gold with the bigger coil due to not being able to get it into small spaces, those who use a GPZ with only the 14x13" coil are really missing out on gold if they hunt in bushy or rocky areas as what a difference a small coil makes.

[video=480,360]https://youtu.be/tppU5XZe77o[/video]

And my 8" coil total mostly from inaccessible spots with the bigger coil.

The patch was a bit of fun, now to find another one.

 

[Guest]

What State is this in.?
rules vary considerably between them.

I guess this Phrunt will not answer the question

Land of the long lost clouds

 

[Gem in I]

What State is this in.?
rules vary considerably between them.

I guess this Phrunt will not answer the question

Land of the long lost clouds

Overseas but not Tasmania.

 

[Northeast]

What State is this in.?
rules vary considerably between them.

I guess this Phrunt will not answer the question

Land of the long lost clouds

South Island, New Zealand.

 

[phrunt]

Yup, New Zealand, I don't have the Kiwi accent as I moved from Australia.