-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

04.19.06  Rods   Gold - Buy, Sell, Hold?
The question is not as simple as “sell or hold”?!! The question should be, “what’s the bottom line if I sell”.
I was talking to someone who recently sold a bunch of ounces to a big refiner.   You can find many good refinery companies in the ICMJ.  He was sure he was making the right decision because they would pay him something like 97% of spot and only charged something like $35 for the assay. Sounds good right?
The thing he forgot to mention is that all refiners pay their percentage AFTER their assay!!
So, if their assay comes in at say 80% gold, they will give you 97% of 80% and charge you an assay fee to tell you what their assay was.   They also keep all the associated minerals they find in the other 20% of your gold.
So, 97% of 80% = 77.6% and that means at $615 an oz for gold, you would actually be getting around $477 an oz. Now this is just an example, and your assay may come out better than that. Please don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying that any of the assayers would not give you a completely honest assay. All I am saying is that when you send your gold off, you are putting it in their hands to trust completely, and you need to realize you won’t be getting 97% of $615 or (Spot).
So, what’s the answer? I don’t know if it’s time to sell right now or not. I have decided to hold my gold for awhile longer. But if you decide to sell, try to get “Spot” or better for your gold. What are the ways to do that? If you only have a small quantity of fine gold, the tried and true method of printing up colorful, interesting “prospecting cards” with a little story of how it is genuine gold from a local area etc, etc. and sell it at swap meets or tourist locations. Sell it in little one gram bags or bottles for a little over spot if you can. If you have nuggets your best bet is to locate a “collector” willing to pay extra for “nugget value” because "that piece would just fit into his collection". For that you will need exposure. You can put it on eBay and hope for the best, or put it in a jewelry or prospecting store on consignment (if you trust the owner). Another method of getting the most from your gold is to make it into jewelry to sell. There are probably other ways to get the most from your gold and if anyone has other ideas on this subject, I would be real interested in hearing how you go about it.
I put this nugget into a simple coin ring and probably doubled it's value.
----------------------------------------------

3.6.06  Drywashing
Today a friend and I were out drywashing with my Keene 12V DW. I figured out a way to strap a backpack frame to it and was able to carry it to the washes we were working, but it weighs about 40lbs and that makes a pretty good load by itself. So, it takes two people or two trips. One for the DW and one for everything else. It can run a fairly steady stream of material if you classify it down to 1/8" first. With 1/4" material it will occasionally clog up. It's a chore to pre-screen your material, but you will get better recovery that way and no plug-ups. The oversize material I dry pan and visually check pretty fast. We were using a Vac Pac vacuume and crevice tools with buckets and screens so only had the DW running about an hour all day. The rest of the time we spent digging material to run. The battery is a 12V gel-cell BMW motorcycle battery and weighs about 7 or 8 lbs, but I haven't run it down in a days operation yet.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

2.25.06
Over this last weekend and the AZO outing, I came across a bit of confusion and a lot of misunderstanding about a couple of things having to do with pin pointers and the cancel mode on our GP’s. So, I though I would post this and maybe clear up a few things.
I have a high degree of respect for Bob D.  However,  he said “he didn’t understand why so many people were having problems with pinpointing”. Then he went on to show everyone how to scrape the ground with your boot and turn the coil on its’ side etc. Finally I had to speak up (which is something I really didn’t want to do). I said, “hey Bob, how about when you have a 20” coil and you are going after a lunker target in a 2 ft. hole???” That is when a pinpointer comes in handy. I glanced over at JP and our eyes met. That was the only communication I had with JP last weekend, but that’s all that was necessary.

Three times in the last year I have dug deep holes while using a large mono coil and been unable to pinpoint the target because the target signal is everywhere once you dip the coil below ground level. This even happened once with the 8”mono. I think I caught Bob off guard because he sorta stammered a bit….then he said, “well, if you use the cancel mode that will reduce the signal strength and you may be able to pinpoint the target”. That is good advise, but he forgot to mention that you can’t use the cancel mode with a mono coil. It will totally blank out and you will lose all signals. That is the second misunderstanding that many people had this weekend. Try using the cancel mode over a target with a mono and you’ll see what I mean. JP also mentions this on his tape. If you want to use the cancel mode you have to use a DD coil.....same as with the descrimination.

So that means if you like to use a large mono to search with and you don’t mind going after the deep lunkers, you have two choices. You can either carry a small DD coil to use as a pinpointer in cancel mode, or buy a good pinpointer such as Coiltek makes. Either way, I respectfully disagree with Bob and like to carry a pinpointer for the reasons stated above........ rf

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

2.21.06  A gold trip with Reno Chris.
It was a cold and cloudy morning about 20 degrees on the front porch when we woke up. Not exactly the type of day you’d choose for a detecting trip. We knew Chris had to check in at the AZO outing by 3 pm or so and that meant we needed to hit the trail early if we wanted to get in any detecting time. I knew the place we were going was only accessible by Jeep if we wanted to get both of us in there with all of our gear, so I hooked up the towbar of the CJ5 behind “Old Blue” (my ‘77 F250 p.u.). Now to check the gas, oil, air, spare, jack etc….you know the routine, all the usual stuff in all the vehicles. You run over all the details in your mind right down to the wire to connect your battery on the detector.  Chris was going to follow me part way so he could head over to the outing later in the day. Ol’ Blue has a 3speed standard transmission which wouldn’t be that bad if it had a second gear! Shifting from low to high while towing a jeep behind you is a bit of a trick - especially on some of these hills around here.
When we got to the jump off spot it was still cloudy and cold. To make things worse, when I got out of the truck I immediately became aware that in my muddled state of mind that morning I had forgotten several important items including a coat, and even my drinking water. Oh well! It was cloudy …I should be all right. We got in the Jeep, I turned the heater on (which doesn’t do a hell of a lot of good in an open Jeep), and we headed into the hills. I won’t post any pictures of the area for two reasons. First, incase anyone is trying to find the location, and second …because I forgot my camera too!  When we got to the spot, we walked over and looked at the creek. It looked like the bank had been undercut and there was some newly exposed bedrock in several places. I said, “you pick where you want to work because it all looks good to me”. Originally I was just going to take some samples for panning, but after thinking about it for a minute I decided to go back to the Jeep and get my detector (good thinking Russ)! Chris had already checked some of the bedrock and we were so close that I had to wait until he turned off his machine because of interference. I hit that first signal on the first swing, and Chris said, it turned out to be a "dwt’er".  It was obvious that there were multiple smaller targets there also. So, we worked the spot together and spent a most enjoyable hour or so pulling out little pieces from the decaying shist bedrock. I think that’s about the most fun I’ve had with my pants on in a long, long time. Chris had the most serious look on his face…..he even found a couple small bits with his eyeballs. He would stop every now and then and I would wonder what he was thinking, then he would say, “is that gold?” as he picked up one out of the dirt with his fingers (and a big grin on his face). After we had all the detectable gold I practically had to pry him from the spot. He didn’t want to believe that they were all gone. I always carry several canvas sample bags in my pack and they came in real handy for the dirt we scooped out of the hole. In fact I even emptied my backpack to carry out more of the dirt. We didn’t have any screens with us and I think there was about 5 or 6 gallons of dirt and rock there. After we were all done and having a bite of lunch at the Jeep I said, “I’m sorry that the day is so cloudy and cool”, and Chris replied, “I’ll take a day with gold any time over a day with sun”. To which I replied, “Yeah, sunny days are a dime a dozen”….and we laughed. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nov 20.05 Rods.

The most amazing coincidence happened this evening. The story starts a few weeks ago when I was detecting one afternoon……. I started finding some small round-ish iron balls with a slight reddish-rust color to them. They weren’t very big. I’d say about twice the size of BB’s and they weren’t really round at all. They were more like spherical. They were very magnetic and easily picked up by the detector and my magnet, but I’d never seen anything exactly like them before. It was very irritating to keep finding these things and I cussed them every time I dug one out. They definitely weren’t buckshot. I mentioned the find to several people, but it all seemed destined to be just another one of life’s mysteries that go unanswered.

Tonight as I watched a program on the History channel it all became clear. There was a program on about Meteor Crater and why no Meteor was ever found. As I watched they were talking about how the scientists started finding small “Nickel Iron Spheres”, and then they showed a pile of them on a table. THERE WERE MY LITTLE IRON BALLS ON T.V.!!!! I don’t know how the show ended because I was so amazed by what I had just seen I jumped up to see if I could retrieve any of them or if they had all been tossed out. They were saying something about how the Meteoroid had hit with such force and heat that only tiny fragments of it survived. I wonder now if these fragments could have been blown several hundred miles south from Meteor Crater??

Not only were my little iron balls identified now… they were nickel/iron meteorites. It’s amazing how the pieces of a puzzle fall together sometimes....rf

-------------------------------------

Nov 9.05 Rods. Sampling today.

I am often asked about the best way to set up a sluice or poop tube or other piece of recovery equipment. When I get into their concerns it usually turns out that they are concerned about not seeing any or much gold in the clean up and they think that there must be something wrong with the equipment or the way it’s set up. Nine times out of ten it isn’t the equipment at all. Usually they don’t see gold because they haven’t found any gold. What usually happens is this:

A person has heard that gold can be found in a certain stream so they take a couple buckets and go out to the creek. They look for all of the famous “indicators” such as: black sand, inside bend, iron stones, etc. When they find a good looking spot, they think to themselves, “this spot has to have gold”. So, they start shoveling and screening into the buckets to take home and process in their sluice. What’s wrong with this picture????

The answer is they skipped the most important step… testing. I keep telling everyone that “your pan is your friend”. It always amazes me that people will spend hours digging and screening dirt (sometimes in 100 degree weather) thinking that gold is in the dirt…. When 5 minutes with a pan would tell them to move on. The most important thing a newbie can do to find gold is LEARN TO PAN. If the stream isn’t running or there aren’t any pools around, take a wash tub and a couple 5 gallon containers of water so you can do your testing. Even really good gold streams like Lynx will be very spotty. You won’t find gold evenly distributed along it banks. You will find long stretches of shoreline with little showing of gold at all and then spots where it will start to “pan out”. Today I tested about a dozen spots in a 200 foot area and found gold in each spot. However, what I was looking for was a match head, or 4 or 5 pinheads to a pan or 40-60 specks of flood gold. This is my “minimum showing” to set up a sluice or screen and take home buckets…..your minimum might be different, but IF YOU DON’T PAN OUT GOLD IN THE FIELD, DON’T TAKE IT HOME WITH YOU! It won’t magically appear just by taking it home or running it through a dredge or drywasher.

I was out sampling today, and all of a sudden I realized, “this is what I’m always telling people”. So, I stopped and got the camera out to show how I do it. Now there is no right or wrong way, but I thought someone might be interested in seeing “one” way to do it. Let me describe my tools.

........ photo 

Bottom row from the left:

Pan and snuffer bottle. 3 gallon bucket. Flexible scoop cut from one gallon bleach bottle, and a ¼” screening bucket home made from stainless steel screen cut into a circle and melted into the bottom flange with a propane torch. I have smaller screens, but these are the ones I had with me today.

In the dig hole from the left:

3 prong garden fork. Large size Estwing rock hammer, and a plastic detector spoon.

Top of hole from the left:

Heavy canvas tool bag with assorted wires, small brushes, trowel, tweezers, and a small chisel. Beside the bag lies a 3” round scrub brush with tough bristles.

I also carry in my backpack canvass sample bags, larger pick and shovel, and my falcon (optional). But, this will give you an idea of a basic test kit. The process is pretty simple really. When you find a spot you want to test, clear the rocks away with the hand fork, break up the surface with the rock hammer, and rake or spoon the material into the bleach bottle scoop. Then dump it into the screened bucket which is inside your regular bucket. Sift the material through and you are ready to pan. When you pan try and do every pan as if you were in a speed panning competition. The idea here is not to retrieved every speck of gold, but to see if you have ANY gold!!!! If not, you can move on. That’s what testing is about.

I did find a nice match head today along with my fine gold, but if I show it someone is sure to say…….. “small gold’ “small gold” ha ha ha ha. Most of my gold is small gold and I’m just as proud of it as if it were nuggets. I’ll bet I’ve got way more ounces of it than anyone else has ounce nuggets to show. Something to think about…........ rf

----------------------------------------------------

9.21.05 rod's

When you use nitric, the mercury goes into solution - the nitric reacts with the mercury to dissolve it (but nitric wont dissolve gold by itself). You then have soluble mercury salts in the liquid - a very deadly poison and fine powdered gold on the bottom of the jar. You can then pour off the liquid, and neutralize it with a bit of arm and hammer baking soda. If you then put a copper penny in, the copper goes into solution and displaces the mercury, but the mercury amalgamates with the copper the same as it does with the gold and you have a hard to separate mix of the two. If you put in iron, the mercury also reacts with the iron, and iron goes into solution while the mercury comes out, but iron and mercury will not mix. The mercury drops off the iron on to the bottom of the jar. After a couple days, you can pull out the nails, and pour off the liquid. The liquid will be brown and full of iron. There will be little droplets of mercury on the bottom of the jar with a black powder which is powdered mercury. You can wash the mercury metal off with water and run it through a chamois cloth and clean mercury will come out. You'll get back maybe 75 or 80% of the mercury you started with. After that its ready to reuse. Iron wont bond to mercury - that’s why iron is better - you don’t have to work to separate them. All that said, I am now using the blue bowl instead of mercury to catch my fines. However when I get gold stained with mercury, I rinse it in dilute nitric acid to dissolve the mercury stain.... Reno Chris

-------------------------------------

12.17.04 AZO:Hi Redbeard,

That’s a very good post. It sounds like a spot that deserves some attention. A course 2mm piece out of one pan tells me you need to do a few more pans. I have often run 5 or 10 five gallon buckets just as a test. But it sounds like you may need to walk and pan for a couple miles to test that spot rather than just working one spot. Fine gold can be disseminated fairly evenly in the benches, but usually there will be someplace that is much better than the rest of the area, and there’s a reason for that! I would recommend that you read "russ’s revolving ring of revenue" last post here on 12.06.04. It would be nice to have a little more info about your area. Is the creek running or are there water holes deep enough to run a small pump and recycle the water? Is the bank material dry? Is there exposed bedrock in the wash? How far from the wash are the mines/prospects? Can you drive your truck to the spot? What are the GPS coordinates? (just kidding). We all would like to know a short cut to walk right to the big detectable nuggets. But good prospecting technique is always the best approach, or you’ll end up going in circles. You are right when you say gold in the creek led them to that spot. The gold will usually be feeding from the side of the hill where the existing mines and prospects are located. One of the first things I would do is detect the wash above the mines to get above of the trash and see if you can find a nuggie or two. If you have a large coil and the ground is suited, you should detect the area between the creek and the mines/prospects to try and find some float or nuggets. The dyke and contact zone is interesting, but doesn’t guarantee anything. It sounds to me like the whole area needs to be prospected, and that may take some time. Be patient. When you use up all your ideas, you should grid the area and just start swinging, and if some nuggets started showing up, take a gps reading for each find and stick with it. If you don’t hit anything after awhile, my preference would be to test the creek and surrounding washes with a HB, or a DW, or just a pan to see where the highest concentration of fine gold is. You could find a spot that would justify working just the fine gold. I would consider spending a few days in that effort and if nothing outstanding turned up, I’d go back to griding and swinging the Minelab. When prospecting for fine gold my old rule of thumb for a paying area was a minimum of 5 or 6 pinheads to a pan with 40-60 speckies for good measure. If you find some match heads or pickers in your pan, disregard that--you’ve definitely got to stop right there and work the dirt. The fastest way to work dirt requires you to be able to drive to the spot, a large highbanker or drywasher will do a pretty good job. Another option is to screen the dirt to a safe size and haul the dirt out to be processed (with plenty of testing as you go). If you can’t drive to the spot and you have to backpack in, the dirt will have to be fairly rich to justify the effort and I’ve found a small backpack version of a DW or HB is usually the best bet. You will find paystreaks in some benches that can be hotter than a firecracker, and then they may play out pretty quick. That can be frustrating. Then it’s back to prospecting for another. If you find fairly good color but not really enough to justify the effort, don’t give up!!! Measure a 50 foot radius and draw a circle in the dirt around the spot. Now walk that circumference and test every 10 or 20 feet. If you find a spot better than the first, repeat the process. I hope this has given you a few tips, and if you need any help, just holler……rf

----------------------------------

11.11.04 Rod’s

Hi Roland,

This is not a political forum, and I don’t want to abuse Rod’s tolerance. So, we probably shouldn’t have a full blown debate about this here. However, you are a friend and so I’ll post once more and see if I can get you to think long range about what you're saying.

People who bring up the Mexican invasion of the Southwest don’t necessarily have “issues with Mexicans”. Personally I like the Mexican people very much. But I think we all (even Mexican/Americans) should have “issues” with anyone who enters our country illegally and it just so happens that the Mexicans are the biggest offenders.

Using your logic, if someone (Mexican laborer or Iraqi terrorist) are sneaky enough to be able to get into our country, we should help them get drivers licenses and make it easier for them to stay so - “we’ll be safer”?????? I don't agree that we'd be safer and, I don’t agree that they should be shot at the border, but we shouldn’t make them comfortable either. Or, maybe you think we should offer all illegals food stamps- we certainly don’t want them to be hungry while they are looking for one of our jobs so they can send their paycheck back to a foreign country. Let’s not forget about free health care for them and all their family. Those poor illegals certainly deserve the benefit of our tax supported health care system. What would they do if they got sick?? Free education would of course be necessary for their kids wouldn’t it? Many of these things are now being done or considered at the expense of the American taxpayer, especially in California. Do you think it would be better to do away with all immigration laws and open the doors of our country to the world? How many billion people do you think would come? Do you get the point I am trying to make here? The U.S. taxpayer deserves to be protected from giving our tax dollars away to illegal foreigners, or ANY ACTION THAT HELPS THEM TO STAY IN OUR COUNTRY. We do have immigration laws for those who “really” want to become Americans. Our government’s approach to this question has been completely upside down in my opinion. That is mainly because the politicians want to get a vote that they perceive to be in their favor. So, this problem will continue to spread like a cancer, and that works right into the agenda of the illegals. Each of us who take a position of sympathy to the plight of the illegals also contribute to the agenda of the illegals. The result of all this a few years down the road will be the eventual takeover of our own country by ethnic groups instead of one America like it used to be. Then the different ethnic groups will begin to fight within our country- just like Iraqi or some of the other Mid East countries are now. That is why I believe so strongly that we should all be Americans- not German/Americans, or Greek/Americans, or Indian/Americans, or African/Americans, or Mexican/Americans. I know this one post isn’t going to change anyone’s mind, but at least I hope it will remove the blinders from some of the liberals who are constantly working to destroy our country. And that’s what I say…….rf

-----------------------------

10.21.04 Rob's

Ron: you are really making me work on this one I went back through this thread from the beginning and condensed what I think to be the most relevant points from each of us. I know a person won't be convinced unless they will allow themself to be, so I don't have a lot of hope for you. I'm in this thread for the guys out there who may be thinking that you are giving them the "excuse they were looking for" to metal detect on a valid claim. I'm here to say- IT AIN'T SO. I think the most compelling statement of fact to set this question to rest is Chris's last statement, so I have posted it in bold. Remember this question has nothing to do with what you are looking for (meteorites or anything else), or whether you actually remove any minerals, or whether you leave the claim with them. The legal question here is what you are doing on the claim. If the legal question were what you were looking for a person could say they were looking for anything, such as: bottle caps, coins, buttons etc. and then metal detecting would be legal on all valid claims. Ron, you say you are for the 1872 mining laws, but can't you see how this little issue could destroy that very law?? It seems to me you want to have it both ways. I metal detect also, and I would love to be able to detect anywhere. But I see this as a moral issue. I can't say I support the mining laws and then say metal detecting is O.K. on valid claims. But I guess each of us will have to make that decision for our self. Here are the quotes...you decide

Russ: 1. When you put foot on a legal claim with a metal detector, you are breaking the law because that is prospecting. It has nothing to do with what you "say" you are looking for, or whether or not you practice catch and release on what you find...

Russ: But this isn't about what you carry off the premises, it's about the activity you are doing while you are there...

Chris: I'd agree with Russ about the detecting on another person's claim - Courts would see going onto a claim with a detector, sluice, pan, etc. as mineral entry (prospecting) which is trespassing...

Chris: Meteorites are not locatable, so are not included in the rights of the claimant, but as you say, you cannot be fully certain what your target is until after you have dug them up...

Russ: I'm not buying it(that detecting for meteorites on a valid claim is O.K.)....If you or Ron can show me some documentation such as a court ruling, BLM reg, or at least an attorney's opinion...

Rob: Most might not agree, but where is the law that says they can't?...

Ron: Does the law actually specify that no one but the claimant can enter the claim with minerals on their mind or does it say that no one but the claimant may remove the minerals?...

Russ: just because there is no law saying that it's illegal, doesn't mean you can or should do it...

Rob: "Meteorites" are not locatable surface minerals...

Chris: The law does reserve all mineral entry to the claim owner and any type of prospecting would be considered mineral entry - not just actual mining and removal of minerals....Prospecting for lodes (just as much as prospecting for placers) is mineral entry and therefore trespass...

---------------------------

Hi PTB, welcome to the group. Nice gold you've got there. Most of us are panners too!. I agree, there's nothin' more relaxing than spending a few hours in nature and your solitude and a gold pan. Most of us got caught up with trying to get more of the yellow stuff and buying equipment and working ourselves to death. One day we wake up and say, "I'm just going to take the pan and hike the creek this morning". That's the day we realize why we got into this hobby in the first place.

"Movin' the Bradshaws, 1 pan at a time."

Glad to see someone is taking over the task at hand. .......rf

-------------------------------------

Nor should the question be whether to use a Mono, DD or specialty coil?

The question should be: in the ground I plan to be working, will the VLF I own leave me frustrated and wishing I had bought a P.I. detector? If you decide to get the VLF and find it isn't working for you in a particular location, don't toss it in the garbage. At that point you have two choices. You can either find another area where VLFs do better, or you can put out the bucks and get a PI. That about sums up this problem. ....rf

---------------------------

08.04.04 Bills forum:

It's bad enough when you start going political around here, but when you go Liberal, well you're going to raise the hairs on the back of a few necks. As far as funding goes, maybe you should consider the possibility of letting the people keep their money instead of taxing them and then handing it out as big brother sees fit to this important cause or that important cause. The fact is that everyone has an "important cause" that they feel should justify having someone else pay for it (the taxpayer). The game is tax the people and then squabble over who gets it by screaming the loudest. I don't want any part of it, and until the tax codes are revamped, I'll take every tax break I can find to keep from paying for "other peoples important causes". Just a word to the wise ........rf

------------------------

07.26.04

Just one final word on mineralization. Of course every area has it to one degree or the other. And no, I'm not talking about black sand although that can be a problem. Picture this: you just put down a large chunk of cash for a new VLF machine and you are out in the field for the first time. You listened to the salesman and bought one with automatic ground tracking (the latest thing in ground mineral cancellation). You are now ready to start your search...except there seems to be a signal right under your coil. You dig for awhile, but can't seem to locate the target. So, you forget it and start to go again. You take a step and swing the coil one time and notice four or five distinct target signals. Now you're excited You think you stumbled into a nugget patch on your very first time out. Wrong! What you've just discovered is hot ground. You look up and for as far as the eye can see there is this same material and a deep depression starts to take a hold of you. This is my story. From 1970 to 1995 each time I bought a new detector I thought maybe this one will work. I was disappointed each time. When I got my hands on my first PI I fell to my knees and thanked my God. After reading this story, if you haven't ever felt like that, then you haven't experienced the frustration of heavy mineralization!

Most AZ goldfield material is made up of cobbles from the size of a grain of sand to large boulders. Each one will have a slightly different magnetic effect on your coil. The problem is that in this area many of them will have wide swings in differences having either a positive or negative effect on the detector. Negative hot rocks are not the problem because they make a "bonging" sound with most models of VLF's. The problem is the positive hot rocks. They contain a larger amount of iron than the others and will make a sound on a VLF very similar to a gold nugget. Now there are a few methods of trying to ID these problem signals. These methods vary with detector and operator, and have been gone into in some detail in previous threads. However, the bottom line is that many times they just don't work and a lot of those hot rocks will have you digging for nothing. Compound that by the fact that in this area they are found every few inches or feet and large ones could be buried deep. A lot of guys think their machine will ID them, or they have the experience to handle them, and that may be true to a certain degree in their local area. But as a rule, these are misconceptions. And besides, that's not even the point. Picture the newbie out there- he's not going to be able to handle even the negative ones. And the experienced guy- well he's spending valuable time trying to ID them one at a time- remember we're talking about finding them every few inches sometimes. Who needs that? That new detector will end up in the hall closet collecting dust for sure. Not all areas are this way, if they were I wouldn't be having such a hard time convincing some people.  Most of the Eastern U.S. and patches of the West are well suited for VLF technology.   Like I said before, it is very hard to convince someone of something they have never seen or experienced. So yes, I'm saying if you plan to metal detect in central AZ you need a PI machine unless you just want to hunt coins in the park twice a year.  In closing let me say thanks for the input from everyone on this topic. I think that anyone who reads this whole thread will come to the right decision. 

Take care out there .......rf

------------------------------