So what are you missing?

[Easylife]

New permissions cause great anticipation and are naturally quite exciting to check out, but can often be quite disappointing. It's very easy to hoover up all of the so obvious shallow stuff and leave behind the often better deeper finds if you fail to interpret what your detector is actually telling you. It may sound scratchy and even pretty awful so maybe easily dismissed, but wait! There is clearly a target present but what? Is it iron? Iron and non-ferrrous together? Or is it just a very deep non-ferrous target that your detector is struggling to ID? But maybe you just walked on as the response wasn't so crisp! But now begin to wonder and are curious to find out so toy whether to back track? So either just walk away and leave it for the next person or dig it out of curiosity and perhaps be pleasantly surprised? It's the only real way to really get to know your detector. Of course sometimes we just can't be bothered to dig it and accept any potential loss as that is our own choice, even if we really know better!

[Saffron]

Rule nr 1. If unsure dig it

A few months back I gained a very small permission. Soon found out that there were a significant number of shooties, due to most being fairly shallow and heavy load (hence more brass than a standard load cartridge) they all rung in on the Nox giving a lovely clear "dig me" signal and TID of 20.

Towards the end of the one session got a typical clear dig me sound and TID of 20. Groaned its going to be another shottie. It was
Turned around and got an identical signal I am certain its where the person has fired both barrels and this new signal is the second shottie.

Consider walking away but think "I will only find it another day, so might as well remove it now", but as digging wonder why I am bothering and wasting my time.

But the shottie turned out to be a William III 1697 sixpence in very good condition.

I would challenge anybody to have told those two signals apart.

I have also had several nice finds when signal has been very poor and I could have walked on by.

Evan

[Easylife]

I have also had several nice finds when signal has been very poor and I could have walked on by.

Shotties can often sound quite scratchy though fortunately are seldom finds on my permissions. I thought I had covered a field pretty well with GPS tracking too. But then randomly wandered over it and pulled a really unmissable William III shilling, just goes to show how easy it is to miss stuff. An extremely useful lesson to take on board. Maybe slim odds but just shows what a bit of lazy swinging can miss.

[Rah7265]

I remember when I was starting out metal detecting, watching videos and reading posts on forums about this metal detectors superior discrimination and how that detector didn’t pick up hot rocks, I was fascinated. Then I read the best discriminator is a spade, words of wisdom indeed.
On my Deus I quickly found out that good targets don’t always follow the rules, in fact they never read the rule book at all, you don’t always get consistent numbers, or any numbers and you don’t always get a lovely diagonal line on your X Y screen. Some of my best finds were confused, rubbish signals that the Deus didn’t like but my spade liked them. I have an Equinox as well, it’s the same story, I’ve come to realise that all metal detectors just give you their best guess as to what a target is and generally speaking the man who is prepared to dig the most holes on iffy signals finds the most rubbish but he finds the best things as well.

[Steve_JT]

One simple rule I go by

If in doubt, dig it out

Otherwise it’s easy to miss a good target from tiredness, distraction, and more importantly misinterpreting the signal and ignoring it, or relying on what the machine tells you from visual or audio cues

If you don’t dig crap now and then your not doing it right and missing things
IMHO

Regards Steve

[Rah7265]

This coin is my best example of a coin that didn’t read my very extensive Deus instructions.

This was found in a heavily mineralised field, I tried everything I could to get the machine to work well but nothing seem to help. The first few targets sounded bad and were, then I got a target that on a normal field I would have dismissed but on this field it was a bit better than the first ones and turned out to be a old penny. Then I got another horrible buzzy signal with a bit of a ping at the end, dug down about 6” and found this half sovereign.
The only gold coin I’ve ever found and everything about the signal from my Deus was wrong, bad sound, no numbers and far from a nice diagonal line on the display.

[figgis]

With a new permission it's advisable to dig anything vaguely promising and that way you'll get to know the ground conditions and how they affect signals.

My best site is iron-infested and I rarely if ever get a totally "clean" signal on the good stuff (though that of course depends on size and/or orientation). But it's only the many many hours I've spent on this site which have given me the insight needed to make the decision to dig or not, though even then I've probably walked on by from what would have been a decent find and will almost certainly do so again. The thing is not to stress it and accept the fact that you will make mistakes - and the beauty of it is that you'll never know you've made them

[Kenleyboy]

In my early days of metal detecting I had the Ace 250 and I was ignoring the signals bouncing around the ring pull icon . One day I decided to dig it just to see and it turned out to be a tiny hammered coin . That was a huge learning curve and lesson for me . From there on in if in doubt dig it out . All part of the learning curve and not too long ago while using the Q40 I had one signal that I dithered over because it just didnt sound right . I dug it and found a 1918 shilling which was on its side in the hole . Even when you think you know your machine it still surprises you .

[Blackadder43]

This coin is my best example of a coin that didn’t read my very extensive Deus instructions.
This was found in a heavily mineralised field, I tried everything I could to get the machine to work well but nothing seem to help. The first few targets sounded bad and were, then I got a target that on a normal field I would have dismissed but on this field it was a bit better than the first ones and turned out to be a old penny. Then I got another horrible buzzy signal with a bit of a ping at the end, dug down about 6” and found this half sovereign.
The only gold coin I’ve ever found and everything about the signal from my Deus was wrong, bad sound, no numbers and far from a nice diagonal line on the display.

I dont own a Deus, but a few months back i was browsing youtube and i think it was a guy called Gary (a deus guru apparently)
Anyways, he was invited to someones field who couldnt get his deus to run quietly and actually find stuff
It was a mixture of ground noise, the fact that the lower part of the field held more water than the higher part of the field and a few other variables
Anyways, he spent the morning twiddling with his own deus and actually made some changes that were actual game changers for this guy
He quitened the deus down, made it react and hit targets and started finding roman coins in what the other guy considered a bad field...

Now, my memory is awful and i cant find this video again, but i'll see of oxgirl can find it as i know she saw it too and link it here for you

He did a few tweaks with the "silencer" i think which from what i gathered is a setting that few either understand or bother to fiddle with
It might help you tame your deus on this field, or any other troublesome field....

Even though i dont own this machine i still found it interesting as i love people who are willing to fiddle with settings to get the best out of a field...

[Oxgirl]

I have one permission (well rotted stubble) where everything like tombac buttons and even solid copper things like knife stops sound very dodgy, with a very irony tone to them. The same finds on a different pasture permission ring in clearly as good finds at much greater depth. The points above about digging dodgy signals on new permissions is incredibly important.

The other thing I’ve really noticed is that very deep copper items can sound very much like iron. But even then it’s slightly different to a standard iron tone. It’s hard work, digging them knowing most will be iron - but it can play dividends too. I found a lovely 13th century heraldic mount at 12 to 14 inches after dismissing the signal as iron twice before. On the third time I went over it (it was near the gate where I went in and out of the field) I swung over it from a different direction and something niggled me. On pasture I dig a lot more iron now as the rewards are worth it. I don’t like digging deep targets though (on moral grounds as well as being lazy) but other copper items, like crotal bells, can be good at sounding like iron even when not that deep.

[Jamesey1981]

My best ever find, sounded scratchy and horrible with nothing on the xy screen and with jumpy numbers, but it was quiet and I forgave it as that often means either small or deep, field was littered with foil and general crud so I wasn't expecting a silver unit, rather glad I decided to dig it.

[stanslad]

Years ago when out with the old chap, I learnt you got to dig some crap to get some good & keep going when getting only rubbish finds, we were in a field next to a big old tudor house, detecting in the wet stubble & finding some tudor bits, when we got to the corner near the river all the signals were shotties giving a reading on the whites spectrum detector between 41-45,for a couple of hours it was shottie after shottie, I said to Dad bugger this I'm going to notch out the numbers 40-46,but he said don't as you never know what you'll miss, so fed up I carried on digging more of the annoying things saying here's another one bloody things, then just before packing up got a signal of 45 & while swearing away Dad pulled out the stubble clump, turned it over & a tudor gold ring was tangled in the roots, there was the start of a telling off from the old chap that you got to dig crap to get to the good.
Clint

[Oxgirl]

I dont own a Deus, but a few months back i was browsing youtube and i think it was a guy called Gary (a deus guru apparently)
Anyways, he was invited to someones field who couldnt get his deus to run quietly and actually find stuff
It was a mixture of ground noise, the fact that the lower part of the field held more water than the higher part of the field and a few other variables
Anyways, he spent the morning twiddling with his own deus and actually made some changes that were actual game changers for this guy
He quitened the deus down, made it react and hit targets and started finding roman coins in what the other guy considered a bad field...

Now, my memory is awful and i cant find this video again, but i'll see of oxgirl can find it as i know she saw it too and link it here for you

He did a few tweaks with the "silencer" i think which from what i gathered is a setting that few either understand or bother to fiddle with
It might help you tame your deus on this field, or any other troublesome field....

Even though i dont own this machine i still found it interesting as i love people who are willing to fiddle with settings to get the best out of a field...

It’s this one