First ... and only discovery ... Pierce Arrow Medal

[marc.durante]

So I'm thinking if I dug a hundred random holes I'd probably find something just by chance ... which is basically ow I came across my first find :D I tried to learn how to use my metal detector a little better today and it basically beeped constantly :dunno Obviously I need to adjust the sensitivity but I'll figure it out eventually. Anyway I did end up with my first "discovery" although like I said it might have just been by chance and not so much to anything do with the metal detector :l

Looks like Sunoco put out a set in 1968 which has their logo on the back ... this one just says 'Pierce' and I think have been from a Franklin Mint set from the same year?

[Daniel]

Nice for a first find, but metal detecting is about digging a lot of holes, and the only part that isn't luck is choosing a location with some research. No one can know what will be in the ground or exactly where, unless they have a specific and easy to understand map, or someone told them exactly where something was.

[Nolifeking]

Congrats on the first find! A very neat coin to say the least. Just keep at it. You will get it eventually. What kind of metal detector do you have maybe me and Daniel can help give a few pointers to make it quiet down.

[marc.durante]

Thanks. I've never had one before but grew up at the shore watching people using them and always said I would get one one day. I think it's towards the lower end of the scale but I got it for a decent price and figured be good to learn with ... it's a Bounty Hunter Quick Draw II.

[Nolifeking]

Well the quickdraw II is very close to what my first metal detector was. I had the bounty hunter sharpshooter II growing up. The best thing you could do is do some tests with it. If you have a basement with a concrete floor that may be a great place to start. From the knobs that I see on your machine it looks as though your discrimination mode and all metal mode are on one button. First off take the discrimination knob on the right hand side and turn it so it is pointing almost directly at the screw in the upper right hand corner of the display. Then turn it back slightly. In either discrimination mode or notch mode sweep the coil over a coin. It should give a high pitch tone going over it from right and back over from the left. If your not getting this you may be in all metal mode. Now the most important thing is that usually unless the detector is making a chirp both directions as you pass over a target otherwise it is probably just trash. The detector is set up to chirp only once on trash items. If you get a consistent high chirping that is your coin :thumbsup: Give it a try and let me know if you have any questions. Just PM me anytime.

[marc.durante]

Thanks a lot for the pointers!! I will try what you said and give it another go this weekend hopefully. Let you know how it goes. Thanks again!

[Daniel]

Good advice on MD's.

[marc.durante]

I had let my father-in-law borrow my metal detector to try and find some pipes in his lawn. He said the same thing when I asked him how it went and he said he must have buried treasure under his house because it beeped everywhere. :l Anyway I got it back from him today and tried your recommendations. Doing some testing in my basement it's working a hundred times better now. Did exactly what you said, thanks again!!! After setting the discrimination knob to point to the upper right screw I played around like you said had to move it back a little in order for it to pick up nickels. I have it set just a hair beyond the end of the orange arrow. Looks to be setup much better now and can hopefully give it a try outside tomorrow.

I read your other post about checking woods and the "secret" pond my friends and I fish at is in the middle of acres of woods. Not many fixed trails but used to all be Indian land reserve so maybe there will be something cool. It's hundreds of acres so I'll check around the pond area. I know I'll find some fish hooks at the very least :h

Thanks again for the help!

[marc.durante]

Wanted to let you know the pointers helped and my MD is working MUCH better now. Went out in the woods yesterday just for half hour or so and didn't find anything good but it wasn't beeping on everything and I was able to dig up everything it hit on. I'm excited to start using it more now, thanks again!

[Nolifeking]

I'm glad that I could help out. Trust me I've been exactly where you are now about 8 years ago. Metal detecting can be frustrating, but once you get the hang of it it gets a little better. :l One suggestion though that might help out if you start having trouble digging and recovering the target would be to get a pinpointer. If you haven't check out the thread on the cen tech pinpointer that I started on here it might be a good place to start. Hope you find something good! :thumbsup:

[marc.durante]

Thanks again. Went out the other day with my brother in law who's home from college, just to try and get more familiar with it. Worked out great since he insisted on doing all the digging :thumbsup: A pin pointer came with my MD but I haven't used it yet as we were able to find everything we hit fairly easily. Most of it was old cans which I think I can tell the difference with now. Mainly dug them up to make sure we were right. The first thing we dug up was this little Disney charm so wasn't a complete bust plus learned a lot.

I do have a couple other questions about MD in general. I live in NJ and reading up some on the metal detecting laws from what I understand you can use a metal detector pretty much anywhere outside private property (unless you have written permission) .... but you can't dig basically anywhere. My county parks & recreation website says in nice big bold letters NO METAL DETECTING stating they don't want holes in the trails ... which is understandable. I've still gone in the park woods both times but way out off the paths and fill in any holes we make. I've lived around here my whole life and other than at the beach I can honestly say I don't remember ever seeing anywhere anywhere using a metal detector. Where do you normally go and can you dig anywhere where you are, parks, fields, schools, etc..? I've been really busy with work but am itching to get to our shore house to try it out on the beach. Might try and go tonight if I finish work early enough.

Also read that there are some antiquities laws that say nothing over 100 years can be dug up from anywhere and only an archeologist or something is allowed. Is that true? What if you don' know how old something is? I think I'm going to try and register as an archeologist :l

[Nolifeking]

I've ran into that in a few parks around where I live, but most parks don't care. The problem is that there were probably people in the past who wrecked it for you now. This isn't the best view to take and I haven't done it yet myself, but sometimes if you talk to your local police you can find out what they think about the law. Just because there is a law against digging doesn't mean that they would enforce it. I would just try and talk to a police officer and ask him for permission to metal detect a park. State that your very careful to fill in all your holes. They may say yeah go ahead nobody cares. Another thing you can try doing is taking to the parks and recs department and seeing if you could just use a probe instead of digging. This would involve some practice of course, but instead of digging you would just use something like a screwdriver to pry/pop the coins up out of the ground. Kinda tricky to do for a beginner though. Hope that helps.

[marc.durante]

Brother in law and I got out to the beach on Thursday to try to get more familiar with the MD somewhere we we could dig easily ... and legally. Although there were about 8-10 people out searching in the same few block area we were it worked great and we found a bunch of change mostly. Was mainly trying to learn more but now that I understand the settings it's much better. It was correct in identifying every single coin we found (tells whether it's a penny, nickel, dime or quarter and how deep). By the end we could easily tell what it was just by the sounds. Had a a lot of fun and can't wait to go again! Want to do some more testing so I know how to configure it properly so things like gold and silver don't get discriminated.

Thanks again.

[Nolifeking]

Looks like a good haul for the day! Glad your getting to know your machine better. That really is the key to this hobby. There is a county fair up in my area that is about to be over and I can't wait to get me MD out there! :thumbsup:

[Daniel]

I noticed the key, I bet it's for a safe.