Hi (from Stawell/Mornington)

[Bingo]

Over the last few months I've been thinking about getting started in this hobby.

I grew up in Stawell, although now live in the mornington peninsula.

I'm thinking about buying a detector that I would use around Stawell and Ballarat for gold and on the beaches around Mornington.

I'm not sure weather I should buy a Garrett at gold/minelab xterra 705 or go for an old XT17000 or similar.

I've already read a heap of info on this forum but any more information would be great!

Cheers

Ben

 

[Ozjono]

Hello my suggestion would be the 705 in the duel coil pack. good for the beach and gold field and very easy to use

 

[Bingo]

Thanks for the tip.

Are the xterra 705's better than the garrett at gold?

 

[the duck]

Id agree probably the best combo but gold needs a PI machine if your serious

 

[Paul]

welcome to the group mate

 

[Bingo]

Cheers guys! Looking forward to getting out there and giving it a go

 

[Bingo]

I've been doing some research on which areas to look for gold around Stawell on the Geovic website, using deep lead and also workings detail. I've also been looking on the parks vic website and it seems like a lot of the old workings fall in either nature reserves (ironbark's) or look like private property.

My question I suppose i'm asking is, how do you find a spot that is worthwhile prospecting without going into a nature reserve.

Does anyone have any experience prospecting around Stawell?

 

[Bingo]

Well I picked up my xterra 705 on Friday afternoon, which I got 2nd hand off ebay.
The machine was bought in January and barely has a mark on it. happy days!

Well I got it back to my girlfriends house and everyone was keen to see what it could do, so after a quick read of the manual it was off to the park over the back fence.
Within around 10min I had my first $2 coin and a few bottle caps, was starting to get dark so called it quits.

Saturday we headed to the beach, didn't really get many signals so headed to a park. This turned out to be full of rubbish and was digging a lot of foil etc. (hadn't played around with the discrimination too much).

Sunday went up to Red Hill and had a bit of a play found an old button, buckle and other bits and pieces (no coins). Went out again later in the day, this time after reading up more on the discrimination abilities of the machine. Had the machine on pre-set pattern 2 which I read was good for trashy areas. Found an earing and 2 x 5c pieces. Wasn't much, although I felt a lot happier about this outing because I felt like I was digging proper signals, not trash.

Got home and did some tests and realised pattern 2 rejects 10c, 20c & 50c pieces. Because of this I have used pattern 4 and mimicked pattern 2 but left the signals open for the coins rejected on pattern 2.
I'm looking forward to giving pattern 4 a shot tonight.

Ben

 

[Nugget]

Good work Ben, the treasure to junk ratio will definitely improve with practice. Be sure to let us know how you go tonight and best of luck.

 

[Bingo]

Will do nugget...i'm feeling more confidant every time I head out.

 

[Bingo]

Well got out their for about 20min after work before it started to rain. Found a 20c piece and a 2c piece which I'm pretty happy about because my pattern 4 I set up seemed to work well. Can't wait to get a few hours out there swinging and find a few more pieces

 

[GTOZ]

Hi Bingo,

Your doing well mate, keep it up and keep me up to date with your 705. I have one too and love it..
I have just been studing Stawell and the shallow working, looks like a good place to start working on, I am from Horsham so lext time your home give me a call and we can catch up.... could work together if you like...
I have also been studing St Arnund area....

Best of Luck

Cheers
OZ...