DetectingWales.com

                                   Well, having sacrificed my opportunity to attend the Leominster rally and fulfilled my duties as personal chauffeur so my wife and her cousin could attend the United / City game on Saturday, I was rewarded when the wife said "why don't you and R2D2 get out for the day and do some beach detecting". Perhaps I should pray for Manchester United to win more often!  ;D

                                   Come Tuesday, I decided to put in a few hours on a small permission that I new could perhaps produce some WWII brass and maybe an odd civilian artefact or two and then drive down to my regular beach and introduce the Safari to an area that I already knew to be heavily infested with WWII projectiles.

                                   With the Safari cross saved from coin and jewellery, all metal, and manual sensitivity on 20; I made a start on a field that I knew had upset R2D2 when I gave her a couple of swings there last month. The first couple of swings produced a few .303 brass cartridge cases that had given me an indicated signal of 35. With six or seven .303's in the bag, out popped a 50 cal case with an indication 37!  I then decided to ignore all signals that may have been .303 and dig only 50 cals. I soon learned that a group of .303's would produce a signal that imitated the 50 cals. I then decided to ignore the .303 and 50 cal signals, hoping that anything else would be something of more interest, but soon learned that rotting .303 cartridge cases of differing lengths produced different signals.  ::)

                                   The beach area that I later chose to detect, I knew, was going to be something of a nightmare and I anticipated being "strafed" by countless .30, .303, and 50 cal projectiles; and so it was. By lunch time I had 3kg of lead filled projectiles, two copper maritime nails, one brass screw, a 1937 penny, nine pence in decimal coins, and three lead mini-cones. Oh; and a bad back!  ::)

                                    Although I missed the rally, came away from the beach without any gold or silver, and suffered a bad back; I enjoyed the morning and fealt that I am getting to know the Safari a little better now.  8)

Excellent report Chris.  So pleased you are getting up close and personal with R2D2 it's a really great machine once you know it. Nice thing about the Safari is that is knows iron when it meets it, which is more than be said for the Deus.

I always said about mine, 'if I walk over it, I'll find it'  It just loves silver but sadly I didn't walk over very much and not the sort I wanted anyway.  I might have fared a little better if I'd taken it to the rally but I decided I needed the experience with the Deus. ::)

At least you'll get some return for your efforts. Another pack of pain-killers and some change  ;D

Val

Hi Val,
            I forgot to mention that I dug very little iron all morning.  ;D

            It's great to be able to ignore the confirmed iron signals and to be able to move from dry to wet sand and back again, without any problems with the machine going daft when you show it saline beach sand. I also like the way the machine nulls out when you pass over signals that you have discriminated out;  gives you a chance to investigate the item if you are getting bored of not finding good signals to dig.

            Interestingly, I didn't have any problem with my right arm on Tuesday. Looks like shortening the shaft has improved the sore upper arm that I had been suffering since starting to use the Safari. Not sure if the root of the problem was with the Safari, or the statins that the specialist put me on. Perhaps a combination of both?  :)

You're really getting to know the Safari now Chris. I agree with all you have said about it.  Unfortunately the Deus can't hold a candle to it for discrimination of iron.  I'd like to say you can't discriminate to high for far of missing something worth while but you can discriminate the iron out but you can't.  So far I've found the Deus loves silver foil and iron, the bigger the better. What is so annoying is it registers big iron as conductive with a dig me signal which seems to continue till you've dug almost to touch point.
I dug several on the rally only to find iron. As far as I know there isn't a threshold tone.(I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong) Still it's early days yet. Remember I hated the Safari with a vengeance for months and then finally started to understand it.
If someone could come out with a machine with Minelab software and Deus weight I'd be at the top of the waiting list.
Still onward and upward. I'm going to investigate a little field full of iron tomorrow. That'll be a tester for us both.

Val

                            Hmmmm, I have been out detecting with Chris ( Dungbeetle ) on his permissions a couple of times and have also been on club digs with him, but I can't recall him ever complaining about his Deus having a love for iron. Perhaps Chris knows something about the Deus that we lesser mortals dont!  ::) 

                           I wonder if someone could run a Deus day, where a knowledgeable rep could give people an depth introduction to their machines? Perhaps Regrtons , Crawfords , or Joan Allen could organise such a day? At a price, of course!  ;) Or perhaps Deus reps would be prepared to visit clubs and give informed talks on their machines?

                           Personally, I'm not a Deus fan but I think I will have a peep on "YouTube" and see what all the fuss is about!  ;D

I believe Regtons do training days Chris. I remember Nigel mentioning it when I was asking about the Deus. I have no idea where though but probably all up in England.
It's one thing having a hand book but much better when someone with experience can show you. At the moment I'm fumbling my way through things on my own and hoping for the best.
That's what I did with the Safari. No wonder it took me so long to get to grips with it.

Val

                                            Thanks Val; I think I will drop Nigel a line and see what they have in the pipeline, as far as training is concerned.  :)

                                 Just got a reply from Nigel at Regtons and they only do training for XP and Garrett machines. I imagine that he would send you details if you ask him to. I imagine that their training events would probably take place at their place in Birmingham.

Thanks for your effort Chris but unless he'd like to call in on me for a bacon butty and a cuppa I'm afraid lessons are out. I just couldn't face another long journey.

To be honest I don't think I'm missing much. There isn't much there anyway, not in my fields. Been out this afternoon and found a 1919 halfpenny, a clog clasp, an early matchbox car, 2 x 5p, a strip of lead, numerous ring pulls, bits of foil, 2 bottle tops, a horse shoe, and, of course, dug several holes only to find iron at the bottom.

For me that's not a bad 3 1/2 hours, even if I'd used the Safari. I think I'm getting there but I do keep mentally comparing the machines.

Val