• Forum server maintanace Friday night.(around 7PM Centeral time)
    Website will be off line for a short while.

    You may need to log out, log back in after we're back online.

Pull tab discrimination

1960DPenny

Junior Member
Joined
Apr 11, 2011
Messages
93
Location
philadelphia
Are there any machines that pride themselves as being the best junk discriminators?

(I would trade a good four inches of depth reach for a machine that could better ID junk)
 
Best I've used is the White's DFX. Very accurate of ID'ing down to about 6". It will go much deeper than 6" but the VDI starts to loose accuracy beyond that.
 
I am digging pretty much everything and have found that gold rings usually read a 12 or 14 with my machine which is the same as nickels. I hardly ever dig pull tabs if I don't want to but unfortunately some gold rings ring up higher so I just dig everything because I don't want to miss a larger gold ring.
 
I found a 14K gold ring a while back that rang up like foil. If I would have been in a trashy area I would have never dug it.
 
discrimination

It has been stated and a proven fact. You can discriminate pull tabs out "BUT" you are going to also probably be discriminating out nickels and some jewelry.Depends on the size and make-up of the jewelry but some gold rings will target as pulltabs and even foil.
 
it took some getting used to but I don't dig junk with my AT pro anymore I think deep aluminum cans and bottle caps are the trickiest targets for the AT pull tabs are no problem at all but I agree you will miss out on some of that gold
 
Are there any machines that pride themselves as being the best junk discriminators?

(I would trade a good four inches of depth reach for a machine that could better ID junk)

TOTAL FACT: no matter what you're hunting for unless maybe you're a Civil War relic hunter or a beach/underwater hunter, there is NO way -- regardless of whether you have a $250 detector or a $1,000 detector with a meter (VDI), you're GONNA dig tons of junk simply because a lot of really "good" stuff has the exact same metallic profile (in other words, rings in at the same level on your detector, even if you have a $1,000 metered machine) as "junk." And no matter what, you're gona be digging plenty of "junk" no matter WHAT detector you buy. Total fact. Still, it depends on what you consider "junk" at any given spot.

But still even there, "junk" pops up under coils regardless whether we have the Discrimination dial set almost to Zero (small/medium/large) iron, "1-4" (tin foil gum wrappers, kiddie juice bags in tot lots/sandboxes), "5-7" (beaver-tail pull tabs, modern pop tops), "7-9/10" (Snapple caps, 2-liter screw-top caps, zinc Mason jar lids) etc etc.
 
Not only that, if you try to discriminate out everything below pull tabs (and we're talking the old-time "beaver tail" pull tabs as opposed to the the newer square tabs meant to stay bolted on to the can) and you discriminate out old nickels and ANYTHING gold.

But even there, depending on the kind of place(s) you're hunting -- you can ALWAYS tell the difference between a beaver tail and a square tab. The beaver tails discriminate out lower, and gives a statc-y response on one of the two passes of the "X" over the target.

Personally, I have no problem cherrypicking everything above the beaver tails. None whatsoever. But if whoever I'm hunting with comes up behind me with their discrimination set at, like, 1 or 2 and he finds a gold ring I missed because I was cherrypicking for anything over a pull tab, well, that's my problem and my huge loss.
 
Well yes there are but as you know the more junk that goes,the more good stuff goes as well.You will never dig anything you dont want to dig with a Sovereign.Its the one machine Ive had which will always disc out everything you set it to,large aluminium cans excepted.
 
one word Ace 250, However I like using a detector that had a numerical read out so I can see if it is junk. My F70 and at pro have the vdi.
 
I almost never discriminate anything out. Unless there is so much trash that the detector is constantly sounding like machine gun on full auto, I always want to know what is there. When I hear the target I can decide to dig or not.
That does not mean that I dig every pull tab that is out there either :) I am good for digging up to about 200 targets in a day which includes junk, so choices have to be made like anything else in life.

Jerry
 
Lately I have been spending more time digging everything that is a good possible signal no matter how bouncy the signal. I used to let what i thought was a pulltab pass by and YES i dug a whole lot less pulltabs. The ones that ranged in the teens to the 40's on the whites machines. Sometimes i still got fooled on the ones that would ring up higher.

Since i got the V3i i decided to dig more of the pulltab signals because my ring total was not very high. Up until i rechecked a small kids ring i had found years ago with the MXT that i thought was junk (which turnes out gold) my ring total in 5 years was 5 rings, 4 silver and the one gold kids ring.

Three months with the V3i and only about a month concentrating on the pulltab signals a few things have changed. I have for sure dug many more pulltabs but have 2 Silver rings and 1 10k gold ring. The only thing i know is no that i'm digging more of those signals rings are popping up at a faster pace. May just be luck but i would have more then likely walked right past them before.

I dig the pulltabs until i hit 50 or 60 of them then i might quit on them for the day. To me it is well worth the extra time to dig these signals if you look at it from a different prospective.
Silver coins are great, Indianheads are too. Old nickels are a thrill to find but no doubt but you (for the most part) could dig 10 silver dimes in one day vs digging pulltabs for a week which would depress most people:lol: but you hit that 18k gold ring with the 36 diamonds that values for $4,000 and you will see how important digging those pulltabs are.

I like digging coins as much as anybody but latley the good ones have been few and far between so i have had to alter my hunting style. The three rings i have found in the last month will easily value for more then all the coins i've found in the last three years. When I look at it that way it makes me want to go for more pulltabs signals. Just my prospective.
 
I pretty much agree and I have been digging more tabs this year than in the past. However the tabs I do dig are the sort that give a pretty tight VDI from each direction. Have not dug many that jump around. I have found many silver rings and they tend to be up in the copper penny/dime or higher VDI. The few gold rings I have found have registered right on pull tab.

Jerry
 
Are there any machines that pride themselves as being the best junk discriminators?

(I would trade a good four inches of depth reach for a machine that could better ID junk)

Your ears are your best discriminator
the numbers on the screen can be affected by to many things
to be accurrate all the time
plant a test garden of coins,rings and trash
then test and practice
you will see the numbers change from day to day somewhat depending if its has rained or something but the sounds dont normally change much
plant some of the coins with a pull tab right with it or real close
do the same with caps and foil

or go hunting and pay close attention to sounds and make a mental note of what you found and what it sounded like
only use the ID numbers as a cross reference that you cant trust 100%
on most mid level and up detectors you wont lose depth when using more discrimination you will just not get gold or nickels at all
there just isnt any machine yet that finds only good stuff :)
 
I dig most signals - there's lots of junk but the occasional gold or silver pops up also. 13 solid gold items / almost 3 K coins this year so far.
Sometime try putting a gold ring in a dab of pla do on the floor and see what it gives off on your detector. Then put it in different angles & see if you would dig it. I just go on sounds so no tips on read outs.
Dig em all, steve in so az - Fisher 1266 X.
 
Back
Top Bottom