N00B here, please be nice.

[RealJeep]

I got my first Garmin 300 for Christmas and have wandered all over seeing what's under my feet. However, I have some questions:

• Why when I have my detector set to coins does it still find nails and rusty pieces of metal?
• Do buried aluminum cans always make the unit sound like a pinball machine?
• I have my machine set to ignore aluminum but it still goes crazy over cans.
• I have a thousand other questions but they'll have to wait until I see if I get some responses.

Any tips and tricks will be most appreciated.

 

[EmuDetector]

I don't have your detector, but the biggest piece I give to anyone is to remember these things are giving their best guess in the specific conditions you're in. My detectors have both given signals for junk and I've pulled old silver and I've gotten signals for silver and pulled junk. I'm sure someone will chime in who is more familiar with some settings to help you. Welcome to it!

 

[jmaclen]

I'm guessing from your first sentence that you meant to say Garrett ACE 300.

--- Set for US coins, it is still possible for really big shallow or deep iron targets to have audio and target ID responses that occur in the US coin target ID ranges.

--- Buried aluminum cans will very likely have target IDs and audio responses that are similar to a US quarter due the the ACE 300's elongated door bell type audio on high conductor targets.

---Setting your machine to ignore aluminum would mean that you have made a custom program that rejects target IDs from 25 to 99. Aluminum can mean one millimeter sized foil or can slaw with IDs just above 25 up to jumbo sized beer cans that have target IDs in the 90s.

There is no VLF detector produced that can completely ignore aluminum and iron/steel alloy targets without also ignoring good targets. There is always a trade off.

Most coin sized objects will have a different "sized" audio than bigger objects. One tip is when swinging over an aluminum can or big piece of aluminum at say 4" deep, raise your coil as you keep swinging over what may be a can. The audio responses will continue to sound several inches above the ground. Doing the same thing over a coin at 4", the audio responses will stop much sooner and may only be audible for a couple of inches or less.

 

[R_Ruff]

I have an Equinox 600 and a CTX 3030. Both of them are great machines and both of them will still find aluminum cans, screw caps and pull tabs.

 

[hoser]

First off RealJeep welcome to the forum. As you learn your new machine you will find it reacts differently to not only to unwanted targets but also to the ground conditions as well. It all comes into play and you will learn how to make adjustments to your detector to compensate for those issues. Every machine out there suffers from some sort of problem when hunting. Just the nature of the beast. The Sholin monks said it best in the program Kung Foo; "Patience Grasshopper"

 

[MasonDixonMding]

You got a lot of good advice. The only thing I would ad is the more you swing it the better you will know what your machine is saying. Good luck and keep swinging.

 

[IDXMonster]

Another thing you can do, if you have the land to do it, is to bury several different items at 4-6” deep and listen to each one and the characteristics of them. Nails too, along with different denominations of coins if that’s going to be your primary target. A nail and a coin do different things as you rotate around them 360 degrees. Getting a solid idea of what to listen for in the field will help you a lot. I only have one coin buried in my yard just to make sure my machine is working properly for what I’m doing. But for a beginner especially, more information will lead to success faster…in general. Get to know everything about it, spend a lot of time with it. Hunting public ground these days can be a tough thing to do, lots of people do it and have done it.

 

[AirmetTango]

I got my first Garmin 300 for Christmas and have wandered all over seeing what's under my feet. However, I have some questions:

• Why when I have my detector set to coins does it still find nails and rusty pieces of metal?
• Do buried aluminum cans always make the unit sound like a pinball machine?
• I have my machine set to ignore aluminum but it still goes crazy over cans.
• I have a thousand other questions but they'll have to wait until I see if I get some responses.

Any tips and tricks will be most appreciated.

Welcome to the forum RealJeep! No worries, we've all been there at some point...new to the hobby and trying to figure out what the heck the machine is doing. I started out with a Garrett Ace 400, very similar to your 300 - and the good news is, as confusing as it may seem right now, it's actually a very straight forward machine to learn. You got a lot of good input from jmaclen above, but I'll do my best to add some things that might help answer your questions.

• Why when I'm set to coins does it still find nails and rusty pieces of metal?
  • Keep in mind that no metal detector, regardless of the make and model, can really tell coins from any other metal object based on target ID or discrimination pattern alone. Yes, the Ace series has a "coin" program, but all that really means is that you are asking the machine to ignore ID numbers that are less likely to be a US coin, and alert on ID numbers that are likely to be US coins. So, in ideal conditions, when the machine is giving, say, a consistent 89-90 target number, there is a reasonably good chance there is a US quarter under your coil. But in reality, all the metal detector can really do is react to the conductivity of the target under the coil. And the conductivity of a metal item is determined by a slew of different variables, including size, shape, type of metal, etc. To make a long story short, many different items can ring up with the same target ID number, and "fool" the detector. Iron is generally less conductive than copper, but if a rusty washer or bolt is large and thick enough, it will easily ring up in copper penny range.

• Do buried aluminum cans always make the unit sound like a pinball machine?
  • No...sometimes buried cans can sound perfectly like a good target (notice I didn't say coin) in terms of sound! A large aluminum can is very conductive, and as explained above, that means it will show a high ID number. In fact, if the machine sounds like a pinball machine (I assume you mean that the target ID and tones are all over the place), that's a sure sign that you've got junk (maybe a crushed up can) under the coil.

• I have my machine set to ignore aluminum but it still goes crazy over cans
  • Yes, this goes back to what I described above - size is a factor in conductivity, and conductivity dictates whether your machine "goes crazy" or not over a target. I'm assuming that by "setting it to ignore aluminum", you mean that you've discriminated out the segments labeled "iron" and "foil" on the display of the Ace 300 - regardless, the problem is aluminum can come in anywhere on the ID scale. A small, thin aluminum siding scrap can ring up in the 60s, or a larger scrap might ring up in the 80s. A big ol' aluminum can come screaming in at the 90s. In the case of a particular metal, it's all about size. Small aluminum means low target ID numbers, and big aluminum means high target ID numbers. Same thing happens with silver - a tiny silver trime from the mid-1800s is only going to ring up maybe in the upper 60s, while a chunky Morgan dollar is going to scream in the mid-90's. Same metal, different sizes and thickness - therefore different target numbers, and the machine only ignores the numbers you notch out. Notch out the 60s, and sure, you'll eliminate a lot of pull tabs, but you'll also never see a trime or a fatty Indian Head penny. Morale of the story: you can't really "ignore" particular metals - you can only ignore particular conductivity values.

So how can you tell good targets from bad? The easy answer is "experience". But you can shorten the experience curve with a few tips, some of which have already been mentioned. You can start to learn to "size" targets using different techniques like raising the coil as you swing over the target and observing how quickly the signal dissipates or using the pinpoint mode or other nuances of the audio as you swing over the target to gauge size. You'll quickly learn the difference between big targets and smaller targets after a few digs. You can also start to learn telltale signs of junk versus good targets: targets that have compact ID numbers (stays within one or two numbers) are much more likely to be desirable targets than one that swings wildly between half dozen or more ID numbers. If a target sounds good as you swing across it with, say, a north-south swing, then turn 90º and swing across it east-west and see if it still sounds good. If the numbers haven't changed much, it's more likely a good target...if the numbers change significantly (or worse, dip into iron territory) then it's much more likely to be junk. Lastly, learn the basic numbers for the types of targets you're interested in finding. If you're a coin hunter in the US, this is easier than other countries for the more common denominations (which is what the Ace 300 "coin" program is all about). Find an area in your backyard free from interference and place common, modern coins on top of the ground and swing over them and learn how they sound. Do the same with some junk targets, and you'll start to learn differences. And just to keep you on your toes, there's always exceptions to all of these rules of thumb that I just wrote...but they are basic starting points to help you on your way.

 

[RealJeep]

Thanks for all the help guys! I can't believe I called it a Garmin (Geeze). I'm in east Tennessee and moved into my home about a year ago, house was built in 2014. I have 8 acres and over 600 behind me that's undeveloped. I'm slowly learning but like y'all said, there's a learning curve.
I have not found anything worth saving, mostly junk and LOTS of bullets and shell casings. I asked about the cans because I have found so many cans buried in the acre out back. When the ACE 300 swings over it, the tones do sound like a pinball machine, beeping wildly every tone possible. I'm learning when it does that to just move on. I'm tired of digging up 40 year old smashed beer cans.
Bullets, bullets and more bullets. These are harder to discern because there are so many different types, shapes and sizes. I don't know why but I have found so many bullets and casings that if they were coins I'd be rich!
As in many poor, rural areas, I think it was common to bury their trash then burn it. I'm finding a lot of melted metal and black metallic objects.
This new hobby is sure interesting and if and when I find something other than beer cans and bullets I'll post pics.

Thanks again!

 

[John Madill]

Try some other spots too Jeep.
Parks, lakefronts, etc.
Spending ALL your time in junky sites will bring the hobby to a quick end.

 

[R_Ruff]

Try some other spots too Jeep.
Parks, lakefronts, etc.
Spending ALL your time in junky sites will bring the hobby to a quick end.

Yes exactly.