A Message from the Prez.

At our January meeting we had the largest number of members and guest show.  I am hoping that we will see more members coming to the meetings.  We also had another three new members that joined and 6 guest were present  The outing on the 7th , 23 members along with guest showed, we held the outing up out of Pumpkin Center at the location of Camp Reno .  The weather held up for the group it was sunny and about 60 degrees. .

Please read the Calendar page it will have all the upcoming dates of meetings and outings plus pictures of the outings

January is renewal time for membership, dues are $25.00 for the year.  See Roberta for your renewal slips or send your dues to 7415 Baywood Ave, Mesa, Az. 85208

We are going to hold another Special Raffle a 2.2 nugget will be raffled from Jan. 2012 to March 2012.  Tickets will sell for, 6 for $5.00 or a $1.00 each.   The monthly big nugget drawings  will be cancelled from Jan to April so we can raffle this big nugget off.  May we will start the big nugget drawing again. 

We still have T-Shirts  available

Spring Big Hunt will be held on March 24, 2012  more details at the Feb. meeting.

Happy Hunting

John

·         Did you know 11% of people are left handed

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·         Did you know unless food is mixed with saliva you can't taste it

·         Did you know the average person falls asleep in 7 minutes

·         Did you know a bear has 42 teeth

Santa Fe Dip

Ingredients:
1 lb ground beef
1 package taco seasoning
2 cups water
2 tsp. chicken bouillon
1/4 cup flour
1 cup dairy sour cream
1 can (7oz) diced green chilies (4 oz is ok and what I normally use)
1 package tortilla chips
2 cups (8 oz) grated Monterey jack and Chedder Cheese
1/2 cup sliced green onions

Directions:
Brown beef in medium skillet, drain fat. Add taco seasoning, blend well. In a small bowl combine bouillon, flour and water. Add to meat mixture, bring to a boil to thicken slightly. Stir in sour cream and green chilies, blend thoroughly.

Pour mixture into a 13x9x2 inch baking dish. Top with cheese and green onions. Bake in 375 degree oven until cheese is melted (about 5-10 minutes). Serve with chips.

The Joy of Dowsing

Dowsing is the art of finding something that is hidden, usually something concealed underground. Dowsing is most commonly used for water divining, but there appear to be virtually no limits to the number of applications it can be used for. Over the years I have dowsed for water, minerals, arrow shards, oil, lost objects, and even a parking space in the central city.

I learned how to dowse when I was ten or eleven-years-old. Every year, our family rented a holiday home at a beach resort. We were having lunch one day when a crowd of people gathered on our front lawn. We went outside to see what was going on. A man, holding a forked stick, had wandered onto our property, followed by a group of people who had no idea what he was doing. Our next-door-neighbor asked the man what he wanted. “Water,” he replied. She fetched him a glass of water. This broke the man’s spell. He was embarrassed, and quickly left without answering any questions. My father missed the excitement as he was out fishing. We spent all afternoon on the beach waiting for him to return home so we could tell him about the strange experience. Much to our surprise, he knew who the man was. He invited him back the next day and over the following few days the man taught almost everyone at the beach resort how to dowse.

I, and my friends, found it easy to dowse, but our parents found it much harder to get started. Of course, they had no problems either, once they had experienced the dowsing response. I have noticed over the years that children are usually better than adults at picking up skills such as dowsing, as they have yet to gain the skeptical attitudes of adulthood.

Some people are able to dowse with their hands, but most people find it easier to learn the art using angle rods, a forked stick or a pendulum. Angle rods are probably the most useful tool to start with, as the movements they create are easy to see and interpret. My first angle rods were made from two wire coat hangers, but any wire will do. You need two pieces of wire, eighteen to twenty-four inches long. Bend the wire into an L-shape. One side needs to be about six inches long, leaving twelve to eighteen inches for the longer side. The longer the long side is, the more noticeable the dowsing response will be. However, you will become tired more easily with longer rods.

Hold the angle rods loosely in your fists with the longer section of the wire pointing straight ahead. Your arms should be relaxed, and your hands should be approximately your body width apart. The two rods should be parallel to each other. It is a good idea to practice walking with the rods, so that you get used to the feel of them, before starting to dowse. Keep your eyes focussed on the tips of the rods as you walk. The rods are likely to move slightly from side to side as you do this. The dowsing response, which starts shortly before you are directly over the item you are dowsing for, is a marked and distinct movement of the rods. Your rods will cross over each other, sometimes ending up parallel to each other in front of your body.

Once you have become used to walking with the angle rods, it is time to start dowsing. A good first test is to go outdoors and use the angle rods to find the water pipe leading into your home. Think about locating the water pipe, but remain as relaxed as possible. Any tension will prevent the angle rods from moving. A few deep breaths before starting helps eliminate any tension. Start walking slowly across the front of your property. Feel confident that the angle rods will work for you, and will ultimately cross over each other, when you are directly over the pipe. If you feel skeptical about the whole process, try to suspend disbelief. The best results occur when you are quietly confident of success, and maintain a feeling of positive expectancy while you are dowsing.

If the rods produce the dowsing response by crossing over each other, make a mental note of the spot where this occurred. Keep on walking across the property, and then turn around and walk back again, this time about a yard away from where you walked before. The rods should produce the same response again when you are over the water pipe.

Many people are successful the first time they attempt this exercise. Others need to practice to achieve success. The most common problem I have found is that many people grip the wire too tightly, and this naturally prevents it from moving. If this appears to be the case, place the short sides of your angle rods inside short pieces of plastic tubing. The plastic casings from ball point pens work well for this. You can grip these as tightly as you wish, without affecting the free movement of the angle rods. Most dowsers find it hard to locate still water. Moving water is easier to detect. Consequently, if you find it hard to locate the water pipe, turn on a faucet for a couple of minutes to get the water moving.

Your first dowsing session should be no longer than thirty minutes. Several brief sessions will produce much better results than one long session. Dowsing requires concentration, and it can be draining, both mentally and physically. Once this occurs, your results will become erratic, and you will start making mistakes. Even professional dowsers pause every now and again to avoid this.

Children make excellent dowsers, but adults often make it more difficult than it should be. The best advice is to relax, and allow the dowsing response to occur. There is no need to fight, or help, the dowsing response. Relax, focus on your goal, remain slightly detached, and allow it to happen. Dowsing is a skill well worth mastering, and you will find many uses for it.

Ground balancing

There are two independent ways to adjust GB depending on the method you plan to search: When searching in all metal or a combination of all-metal and checking the target in discrimination mode, you want to use a perfect GB. When searching in the discrimination mode, you will want to use a slightly positive GB to reduce ground noise. In other words, you will GB to the mode you choose to search in.

If you choose to hunt in all-metal, you might try setting your GB slightly negative if you want to reduce ground noise. Something else you might try is lowering the threshold tone slightly below the audible level to further reduce ground noise.

A suggestion for starting out is to hunt in discrimination mode to get a feel for the soil, and then make a decision on which mode to hunt in.

It’s important to check your ground balance frequently as the soil can change from area to area.

Coil Size Recommendations

We strongly recommend using one of the three coils in the following order: 1) 10 x 5 DD 2) 7” concentric 3) 5” concentric. You will need to experiment to see which works best for you.

The reason we suggest these coils as opposed to the 9” concentric is because concentric coils don’t work as well in mineralized soil. Plus, the 9” concentric has a bigger footprint and sees more mineralized soil, which causes a masking problem for deeper, smaller targets.

No matter what size coil you use, it is EXTREMELY important to slow your sweep speed way down to about 1/3 of your normal speed so as not to over swing a target. Also, don’t scrub the ground with your coil, as it will cause it to overload from the mineralization. It’s better to swing it about 2 inches or more above the ground.

User Control Settings

The settings for searching in all-metal or disc would be sens control between 5 and 9 and disc control slightly below 3. Don’t be afraid to use the black sand mode and/or the beach mode. The black sand mode is for hunting in all-metal, and the beach mode is for hunting in disc. This type of soil is the reason these switches were put on the X5, as they will help to reduce ground noise. Don’t worry about losing depth because depth is not the name of the game in this type of soil. Actually, you’ll probably get better depth using the black sand mode or beach mode because you’re reducing the coil footprint.

VCOpinpointing will only be useful if you’re using a perfect ground balance. Otherwise, it will most likely scream at you in this hot soil.

Determining Iron Targets

In this type of soil, the Shadow “wiggle” (moving the coil quickly in short sweeps over the target in an effort to make the signal spit or pop) will not work well when trying to determine small iron targets because in hot soil most signals will be iffy to start with. The best way to check the target will be to size the target for iron and/or remove a few inches of soil from above the target and re-check the target in discrimination mode. Of course, large iron targets will still be large, broad signals – especially in the all-metal mode. It’s a fact of life in this type of soil that you will have to dig more targets than usual, but typically you won’t have to dig as deep as usual.

General Tips

If a signal is trying to repeat in the discrimination mode, remove a few inches of soil above the target and check it again. If the signal improves, dig it. If it gets worse, move on.

It is vitally important when hunting in hot soil to slow down your sweep speed. In hot soil, most signals will not be strong and clear like you’re used to while hunting in good soil. You will certainly over swing targets if you use a fast to normal sweep speed if searching in the discrimination mode. You don’t have to necessarily grid an area, but if you do find a concentration of targets you will need to slow down considerably.

Hold coil approximately 2 inches or more above the ground when swinging to avoid overloading the coil due to the high mineralization (this is something you’ll need to experiment with to get optimum performance without ground noise).

Realize that the signals will not sound like what you’re typically used to. Investigate all low-volume signals that are trying to repeat.

Remember that hunting in hot soil is similar to driving a car in heavy fog. Using your brightest headlights won’t be as effective as using your dim lights. When hunting in mineralized soil, a detector set for hunting good ground won’t be as effective as using your “dimmers” – in this case black sand mode or beach mode for seeing through the heavy mineralization. It’s very important to understand that when hunting in hot ground, adjustments need to be made not only to the detector, but the operator must also make mental adjustments requiring a change in typical searching techniques by swinging slower, walking slower and paying more attention to iffy, weaker signals.

One thing you can do prior to searching in hot soil is to practice sizing targets using various sized steel washers, square nails, military buttons, minie balls, coins, etc., and familiarizing yourself with the signal footprint each target produces in the all-metal mode. This can be done by first making sure the ground is clear of targets and then placing each target on top of good soil or mineralized soil. Move the search coil away from the target a foot or two and then move it back slowly towards the target-taking note of when the all-metal tone increases in relationship to where the target is located. You will see iron objects will always produce a larger signal footprint than non-ferrous targets such as lead, brass, silver and gold.

What Should I Look For In A Metal Detector?
 by: Simon Oliver

If you are planning to buy a metal detector, you should check out the features of each before buying one. Metal detecting is a fun hobby but having the wrong equipment can cost you time and money.

When buying a metal detector consider the price. If the metal detector offers the best features of a then expect it to be expensive. If having fewer features is all right with you, go for a less expensive one. Metal detectors can run from as low as $50 to higher than $400.

Some metal detectors use BFO (Beat Frequent Oscillation). This technology contains two coils of wire. The two coils are represented by two wires which is the large and the small. The large coil can be found in the search coil of the detector while the small coil is found on the System Control Pack. The coils are connected to an oscillator which produces pulses of current. The pulse passes through the coils in order to generate radio waves.

A receiver within the System Control Pack receives the radio waves causing it to make a series of tones which is based upon the frequencies coming from the radio waves. Once the detector search coil encounters a coin or any metal item, it is surrounded by a magnetic field which causes interference with the frequency. The tone produced by the receiver is then changed. In choosing the best detectors, you should pick the ones with BFO. This technology is the easiest to use and the cheapest to own.

Metal detectors using PI (Pulse Induction) technology often makes use of a single coil or even a series of coils that works as a receiver and the transmitter. The short bursts of electricity are allowed to pass through a coil or wire which causes magnetism. The magnetic field will reverse its polarity if the bursts of electrical current are stopped.

More pulses are created when sharp electrical spike is created. Then the whole process will repeat and works like a series of echoes, giving it a different report which depends on the metal it has encountered. Therefore, this type of detector is not that ideal for discrimination between the various types of metals or coins. This is appropriate to use in areas where salt-water and metals can be detected.

VLF (Very Low Frequency) is a metal detector having two search coils. The two coils are the “transmitter coil” which rapidly transmits electricity and the other coil known as the “receiver coil”. The activity of this coil is implied in its name already. It is responsible for receiving frequencies that bounce back from the object that the coil detects. This type of detector is best for identifying different types of metals.

Now that you have learned the three different types of metal detector, it’s up to you to make your choice as to what type of detector you wish to use for your searches.

About The Author

Simon Oliver has an interest in Metal Detecting. To access more articles on Metal Detecting or for additional information and resources visit this Metal Detectors related website http://www.metaldetectorresources.info.
Article provided by Articlecity.com.

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