Metal Detecting Tips (with 10 Easy Tips for Gold Hunting) (2024)

You have decided to buy a metal detector, but do not know how to search with it.

These simple metal detecting tips will help you in practice with your metal detector.

After all, treasure hunting is a whole technology, and if you master it, then your treasure hunting will bring you joy and pleasure and successful finds.

Coin Hunting Tips

Coin search is one of the most common types of searches. After all, for more than a thousand years, people on our earth have been using money, and their paper equivalent appeared not so long ago. And over these thousand years, humanity has lost an enormous amount of various coins. Therefore, searching for coins with a metal detector is very productive.

The coin as a target is great for searching with a metal detector. It has a regular round shape and is made of non-ferrous metals. Even from a corroded copper coin, the signal gets a clear response.

Most modern metal detectors are excellent at finding coins, and some of them even have symbols on the discrimination scale in the form of modern coins. As a rule, these are devices for beach search. If you are considering hunting mainly for coins, you would need to check our best metal detectors list specifically for coin hunting here https://metalpursuits.com/coins-detectors/.

Where To Find Coins?

You can just take a metal detector and go out into an open field or the edge of a forest and look there, the probability that you can find something is high.

The best way to approach this matter professionally. To do this, conduct research, study old maps, and determine the place where there may have been a settlement. When you arrive at the location, explore the area’s landscape, examine the lonely standing trees, look at possible landmarks, and think about where you would bury the treasure.

The coin search locations are as follows:

• plowed and abandoned fields;
• forest edges near settlements;
• old and abandoned paths and roads;
• banks of streams and rivers near settlements;
• outskirts of settlements.

Metal Detecting Tips For Beginners

The next digging season has started, and hundreds of archeology and treasure hunting enthusiasts went out into the fields to fulfill their most cherished desires and, at the same time, enjoy the spring sun. Among this numerous fraternity, many beginners have taken a metal detector in their hands for the first time.

However, they are still just beginning to get acquainted with the fascinating activity of treasure hunting. Not always will you have a seasoned searcher nearby that will give you a tip where and how to start looking for treasures. Often novice treasure hunters have to gain experience from their own mistakes. Useful information will make this task easier in any case.

The first and most important question is the selection of a metal detector. It isn’t easy to rely on other treasure hunters’ advice here, since the preferences and tastes of searchers regarding brands of search equipment are very different.

First of all, you need to decide on your search goals and financial constraints and then proceed to select a detector. The easiest and most affordable way to decide is to rent a metal detector and try different types of searches.

Perhaps you will like the usual ground search for relics or coins, someone will enjoy walking through abandoned villages, and someone will prefer to look for lost jewelry on the beach and combine a vacation at sea with a hobby.

For each type of search, a metal detector must have specific characteristics, but most of the detectors’ leading brands are quite versatile and can be used in any conditions. You can expand the search capabilities and improve search performance by using additional coils, selecting their size and configuration in accordance with the intended search goals.

Each searcher also chooses a metal detector brand independently, without relying on other people’s reviews. The main thing here is to take up and feel what your heart is about. Nevertheless, we have prepared the guide on detectors’ models best for beginners, which will definitely help you choose the right product for your needs.

After purchasing a metal detector, you need to get used to working with the detector before focusing on the finds. This takes time, so at first, you need to try to go on a hunt as often as possible to learn how to recognize signals from various targets, study the soil features and find out how the metal detector reacts to certain conditions.

At first, you should not get hung up on searching for valuables and dig up everything but devote time to acquiring skills, so at first, you should not rush, otherwise, you can quickly become disappointed in treasure hunting.

The right equipment of the treasure hunter is as important as the choice of the metal detector itself. The outcome of the hunt depends on how comfortable the digger will feel during the search.

Batteries must be fully charged, all additional accessories must be placed in a comfortable backpack, clothes and shoes must not restrict movement, and must be suitable for weather conditions. Means of communication, protection, and first aid must be with you, in case of unforeseen circ*mstances.

10 Tips For Finding Gold

1. It is better to purchase a special metal detector for finding gold (see our list of best gold detectors here). If you have a small budget, then at least take the device with the maximum operating frequency in this price category. Study the settings and search modes. Pay special attention to setting the ground balance. Buy headphones so as not to be distracted by the water flow’s noise because native gold is most often found near rivers.
2. Whenever you find a gold nugget, keep searching around. The search vector radius can be very large, but usually, where there is one nugget, there may be others.
3. When you find out about the place where the gold nugget was found, go there to search. Your metal detector with different settings will likely help you find more. For example, deeply buried nuggets may well go unnoticed by other prospectors.
4. It is better not to use discrimination, because in nature, gold is often found in the form of alloys, and by turning on discrimination, you risk missing out on a valuable find.
5. When looking for gold in rivers and streams, use a submersible waterproof coil. Move it slowly with the current. Change the working height if the mineralization of the search site is causing too much interference.
6. When searching for gold in the water, special trays for gold washing and a good shovel will help you. Use a shovel to remove the top layer of pebbles and gravel.
7. When the target is detected, use the scoop to move it to the tray with water. Examine the target carefully. If it’s not gold, throw the water, sand, and rocks back into the stream and keep looking.
8. Gold can be found in oxbows and dry river beds. A good sign for searching for gold is a river valley with steep banks.
9. Dried riverbeds can be found by the moisture-loving vegetation that usually grows along river banks. Of the trees, this is, for example, willow or osier. In addition, a sign of the former riverbed is overgrown placers of pebbles.
10. Always mark the area on the map where you have already searched for nuggets. Maybe in the future, when you will have a different metal detector, you will want to recheck the same area.

In recent years, the search for gold has become so popular that experienced seekers, fearing competition, try to keep “their” places secret. Treasures are searched everywhere: on sea and lake beaches, near rivers, in parks and places of public recreation, at the bottom of reservoirs. A metal detector for gold is becoming a hobby tool for many novice users who want to experience new sensations and emotions.