advice about totlot media.

[prosise]

I went to a elementary school at the end of the block. It has wood chips surrounding the playground, which is dry on top but the bottom 5 inches is wet. It took me about 1 hour to clean about 3 square yard of debris. I am getting so many hits of small pieces of aluminum that it is conflicting with my other target. Appears the grinder that shredded the wood ate some aluminum as well. Only picked up one dime and the rest is trash. Would the wet wood chips require a different setting other than the normal coin/jewelry on a whites xlt. Heading back today to learn some more. As I am new to the hobby any tips would be helpfull.

Oh, and good morning gents...



Prosise

 

[tabdog]

I've been there.............

Hay Prosise,

One mile from my house is a park with a tot lot like that.

That tot lot wooped my butt from late July, when I started,
until early November.

That's when I decided to woop it's butt. I was determined to
clean all the aluminum that had been shreaded in the wood
chips.

Sounds Impossible you say!!

The wood chips are slower to recover targets than sand and
gravel, so I had to speed the recovery process up.

That's when I developed the Arkie Barky Twister.

It's a fast way to uncover targets in wood chips. I will start a
new thread on it called "The Arkie Barky Twister" later. There
are others who may want to know about it.

It is a Camp Fork from Wollie World Sportings Goods. About $3.
Re-shape it and cut the ends off.

Here's a video on using it.

http://s220.photobucket.com/albums/dd296/dcb1265/?action=view&current=BarkyDemo.flv

I have to pick up my son. I'll continue later,

 

[tabdog]

I some what cleaned that tot lot out.

I found gold ear rings, gold pendants and gold carrms.

No one was ever able to hunt it.

Jewelry had been building up for years.

I can hunt it with ease now.

The things I learned are worth the whole thing.

It took months to do that. Thousands up on

thousands of targets recovered.

Now it's a huntable tot lot. That's one of the

things I did this winter.

I also developed the cordless Arkie Barky for

frozen wood chips. So I didn't have to stop

cleaning out the tot lot when frozen.

Heres a video demo of the Cordless Arkie barkie.

http://s220.photobucket.com/albums/dd296/dcb1265/?action=view&current=MOV04700.flv

After 10,000 pluss recoveries, I have never marked a find.

Can not say that about any other digger.

Only used in wood chips though.

That's what I did.

HH,

 

[RickO]

Those are super ideas for wood chip lots... thanks tabdog.. RickO

 

[Tinfoilhat]

Tab, you rock ! Great ideas.

Hope you feel better soon. Better yet, hope you have an Arky Barky day !

 

[funnyfarmman]

I have a tot-lot like that but it is ground up rubber. Tons of tire stem metal and tire weights ground up by the shreader. The Arybarky may be the fix for that to! I turn sensativity down to the point I can get a clear hit on a coin and ignore the 1000s of chirps from the trash. Since the liner is only down a few inches there is no reason to find targets below the liner, and most machines will sense a target in rubber really well. I may have to try the Ark Barky and see what I am missing!

 

[rcasi44]

Prosise, to answer you question,

Would the wet wood chips require a different setting other than the normal coin/jewelry on a whites xlt.

I wouldn't think so. I don't use the XLT but chips like you describe are no problem for my MXT. I think I would crank up the disc to eliminate all but pennies and up for the first go round. There are some tot lots that just don't produce. This might give you an idea if you want to turn the disc down and try more or move on to better sites. This is just to see if the lot is used much. If people aren't loosing coins they probably aren't loosing jewelry either. Rob

 

[tabdog]

Hay Funnyfarmman

I have never used the Arkie Barkie in anything but wood chips.

I discovered that if the wood chips have roots, it won't work.

There is a town north of here, about 32 miles. All the city
playgrounds have a soft mat that has a fabric holding it down.
The fabric is held down with large steel spikes all over the
place. That is covered with shreaded tires. The shreaded tires
have brass, lead, steel, pot metal and aluminum mixed in.

I cleaned the whole town out. I have a secrete weapon.

In one small tot lot I got two gold rings, two silver rings.
Three with some kind of stones. I also got two 14k gold
pendants. I made a post showing photos. Here's a link.

http://metaldetectingforum.com/showthread.php?t=15282

When I was leaving an old man told me there was some guys
in the neighborhood that had them there metal detectors. He
said they hunted there all the time.

I just use my $70 Speedy. I don't use any discremination.

Speedy can't be beat in the rough like that.

Happy Hunting,