My beach finds

[Goldpick]

Low tide generally falls at night, especially the case if it is a lower tide than the daytime one.

 

[rgmhot]

Nice work team, very nice. Are all your finds at the waters edge or in the water ?

I went out Sunday morning straight down off Grand Junction rd to find the beach really has been washed away. Wondered around for about 2 or so hour's. I was surprised that the705 was really stable, only had a couple of false hits, even down on the waters edge.

The best and must expensive item was a sinker followed by a tent peg.
A few bits of rusty metal

But it was a lovely time out on the beach.

Edit: have a strav scoop with a wooden handle and is way to heavy, may try and find a carbon pole.

 

[Paulmarr]

why do you do night detecting? is it so there is no people?

Goldpick is correct - we want to detect the area normally covered by water most of the time - the lower the tide - the more area to detect and the drier we stay... Having no people around is the bonus when the lower tide is at night. But I wouldn't suggest doing it on your own ... Had a "spectator" the other night who sat on the rocks in the shadows so you couldn't see him, lucky I caught his movements out of the corner of my eye and lit up the area he was sitting with my headlamp to let him know I knew he was there ... I then moved towards Bogan for a talk and when I pointed him out he took off. It was 130am so it wasn't like he was there minding his own business - he was minding my business so we made him feel uncomfortable as we felt. It was also Saturday night so more drunks wandering around than normal - but reinforced there is safety in numbers.

Roger - don't want to rain on your parade but you are getting the same results we were until we changed detectors - the 705 didn't perform well on the beach for us either - now it's all good!

A bit of spit and polish - 18k

 

[silver]

That's nice fellas, 18ct always looks nice. well done with it all.

 

[rgmhot]

Bugger Paulmarr, may play in the dry beach and parks. Tax man was not nice this year, so no new toys

 

[Paulmarr]

Bugger Paulmarr, may play in the dry beach and parks. Tax man was not nice this year, so no new toys

I hear ya - I bought my a Sovereign GT second hand and although I ended up having to get Minelab to fix it - it still cost about the same as a new 705 - but I reckon I'd be close to paying it off with the proceeds of the finds it generated already. It's one of those catch 22s - you spend the time hunting (time is money) and it bothered me to think I am walking right over the gold jewellery/ silver coins and can't detect it with the Ace350. (Wet sand) Perhaps it was also my lack of experience at the time but I know once I switched to the GT my finds improved dramatically - Bogan the same with the switch to the Excalibur from the 705. We are only talking the beach here - the 705 and the Ace were coin magnets in the parks and tot lots ... Unfortunately the newbie mistake is to buy a detector before knowing what type of detecting you will enjoy the most. We didn't understand that either and only when we decided we like the beach better than parks and tot lots that we looked at the machines again. If we decided the bush hunt for gold nuggets is the go we'd have to change yet again.

Long story short we sold our old machines to finance the new (second hand) ones. Bogan has upgraded again to the CTX 3030 and is enjoying the new technology detector - but on the beach the Sovereign can hold its own

 

[Goldpick]

These multi-frequency detectors are simply fantastic in the wet sand, very stable and quiet, and with excellent depth. Knowing what I know now, I wouldn't go back to a PI detector or single frequency detector for the beach - too much junk from the PI, and lack of stability and depth with the single frequency VLF. - it was worth the few extra $$. As much as it is tempting to buy an all-rounder detector, it is best to buy a detector to specialise in the area detected vs buying a do it all machine (says he who just bought a G2 :lol: )

In many respects, the ctx, sovereign, explorer and etrac are multi use detectors, but the BBS & FBS technology is a real game changer, and is what sets them apart from your normal VLF detectors - just not really suited to prospecting apparently.

 

[kirkn]

went out on sat after the windy weather, found chain, a knife, few bucks and two encrusted coins, cleaned the big one up to find a penny, the other looked like a 20 cent, had another look just then, broke off the crust to find a 1956 florin, couldnt beleive it. only just started beach detecting but love it. have spent the last year in the bush without a single thing,

 

[Paulmarr]

Well it's another week ... And I decided to go solo tonight as Bogan was working ... Out for a stroll with the Sovereign and here are my finds...

16 Coins - 7 pre-dec - five of them silvers - 1 x Florin - 1 x shilling - 1 x six pence - 2 x three pence plus 2 x five cents and 7 x brown buggers

Also got a button, a Chevrolet badge, and half a battleship - no spoons tonight

I did get a ring ... An unusual one - ladies and I think is silver as it has an "S" hallmark in the inside of the band - not quite sure what it is but looks like a frog on the front of it... or a lizard perhaps?

Of course a bit of junk too ...

No gold tonight ... 8.(

 

[Dogmatic]

Is that a battle ship from a Monopoly game?

Hope you have better luck with those spoons next time out.

 

[Goldpick]

No gold, but I'd be more than happy with those finds, looks like you had a great night. Bit disappointed though, no silver spoons!

P.S. I see a few nice Sovereigns popping up on ebay.us lately, bit too late for me though.

 

[Paulmarr]

Yes thanks guys, the spoons are in short supply at the moment - and the battleship is a little big to be a Monopoly piece...

Here is that ring found yesterday cleaned up a little - says sterling silver on the band

Tonight was a bit of a fizzer ... Here are my finds ...

Eight coins - 4 pre-dec and two were silver - a six pence and a old 1911 three pence

Here is the junk

Plenty of sinkers and lead but no gold - had me hopeful ... Oh well I had a great time just the same!

 

[Paulmarr]

Here is the florin from last night

 

[silver]

That 1936 florin looks in real good nic Paulmarr, the star looks sharp and the visible end of the scroll looks in perfect shape, even the A in Australia looks well defined. You should treat it with love and care, wonderful find.

 

[Paulmarr]

Thanks silver - don't know if you are serious but the coin is seriously toast - obverse is not visible.

At the end of the day it is $6.50 of scrap silver ... As all the silver coins we find are. As long as it isn't a key date no collector would want them. The beach is tough on the coins, they are fun to find, showing us a little piece of history, but scrap metal none the less.

They are a little bonus find - we are really after jewellery so when I don't find any it is a nice consolation prize...

 

[silver]

Righto Paulmarr, are they coming up from down amongst the rocks, or will a bath in salt and vinegar get that sandy crap off of it for you ? I was being serious, as after a good bit of bad weather up this way the deeper silver coins come out with a covering of heavily attached sand that most usually comes away with a bath and wet clean in the salty vinegar solution, I usually hold the coin in the solution as I wipe away the sand so that it falls away with each stroke into the solution and therefore cannot rub against the silver and cause damage to the surface.here is a shortcut to a good example of some of my coins cleaned in this manner.
https://www.prospectingaustralia.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=62168#p62168

 

[Paulmarr]

Yes and no silver - the coin is basically clean and what looks like sand is pitting and wear from the ride in huge sea. We use electrolysis followed by bicarbonate and repeat as necessary.

What you don't see is the other side of the coins which usually are non existant. Every once in while we do get a nice condition coin but the vast majority are cactus.

 

[silver]

I get out there during the storm in the howling rain(no saltwater interference at all) and usually at night, before the old boys like myself(or girls) get out there and get into it, so I'm basically waiting for the worst rips ever(to date for me) to get down to areas lower than I've ever gotten to so that I can retrieve all the silver before anyone else(haha) and before the wave action abrades off their protective coating and leaves them open too the elements, as the ones I'm looking for(when I get the chance) have sat covered not getting abraded and grown their protective coats over a fair amount of time without exposure to the moving sand/rocks. As you can see by the state of the coins in those pocket pages it does happen and they can be found in what looks like a crappy state only to turn out to be pretty good coins. It was just a pity it wasn't the case for that one of yours as the sharp point on the star shows that that particular coin was dropped/lost in a pretty new condition. And as you could see by a lot of those dates I am not yet ripped down into the older silvers, that said ,....here's hoping.

 

[Paulmarr]

Yes I too await the storm of the century to rip up our beaches ... We had one last January which I believe these are all remnants of... Pretty much 90% of what we are finding is old in that it has been buried at least 50 years.

 

[silver]

Yeah I like reading about what you find and seeing the photos, as good as being out there(almost) myself.