Test nugget

[apw5746]

Hello,

This may sound like a dumb question , but the dumb question is the one that's not asked.

Having said that; what's the simplest way to make a test nugget?

h20prospector

[adam]

I think you can buy them on ebay attached to a poker chip or something.

I would just go on goldbay or ebay and buy a 3 grain nugget...

[hendo]

Just super-glue a dinky nugget to a poker chip. Presto!! Hendo

[Dakota Slim]

If you don't have a nugget just use pieces of lead. Try a variety of sizes.

[whats4supper]

Buy a nugget on ebay or from a prospecting shop. tape it between clear shipping tape or blue 3m masking tape. bury it, then look for it.

you may try an assortment of sizes in order to cover all bases, so to speak, hey anything from BB size to 5 or 6 pennyweight, even a larger one if you have the budget.

Try burying it at different depths and with variable trash or bullets to get the best field for detecting conditions- sad to say it, but since day one on US soil, white people have been notorious litter bugs. All the rest of people types picked up on our habits and no matter where one goes, its foil, bullets, change, chain links, hobnails, nails, rusty iron or cans- well you get the idea.

You can also use your test nuggets with variable sizes of coils.

Best medium: get some mineral dirt from your sluicer or drywasher friends, including black sands, as that will best represent the realities of gold producing areas. simple garden dirt, sharp sand, stucco material, pea gravel, just ain't gonna cut it.

[El Dorado]

pm me your address and I will mail you an appropriate nugget.

[DOC]

.177 lead pellets are very good for training purpose as they approximate a 1 gram nugget which seems to be what the average prospector finds a lot of.

As many of the guys have already mentioned taking a small nugget and gluing it to a brightly colored poker chip makes an excellent test nugget that is easy to find, if for some reason you have problems pinpointing the target. Make sure it is a plastic chip and non-metallic.

I remember years ago when we were all using SD2200d' the old green machine, and before the days when signal enhancers were popular, and it was pretty well accepted that if you were using one of the old Green Minelab 18 inch fiberglass coils you would not find small nuggets. The 18 inch went crazy deep, but just wasn't really hot on small stuff. Since that time with the advent of more advanced coils, smaller gold is possible even using old machines and one of the new 18 inch coils.

Anyway, I am about a mile away from my truck and I am still very much a newbie, trying to learn the ropes, the best settings, etc. I remember I had detected for quite a while with the 18 inch and NOTHING. So I thought it was time to break out my test nuggets to make sure I still remembered what the gold was supposed to sound like. I had two nuggets in a little wooden box, a small dink; sub gram piece, and a 1 pennyweighter. I was going to throw the pennyweight nugget on the ground and swing over it. Well in the process of being clumsy, I dropped the sub-gram piece. Nothing I could do would make that 18 inch coil hear that nugget and I couldn't see it on the ground. Back then when I had only found a few nuggets they were all so precious to me that I couldn't stand the thought of losing one.

So I tied a Kleenex to a Creosote bush and walked a mile back to my car to get my little 8 inch round coil. When I got back of course the 8 inch coil found the little nugget with no problem. However, I had probably wasted an hour and a half, farting around trying to find it then the walk to and from the car.

The point being.... treat your test nugget like they do the bathroom key at the gas station..... NO don't chain it to an old tire, just make sure you glue it to some non-metallic item that is brightly colored so if you drop it you can easily find it.

BCOT!

Doc

[Frosty]

Hello,

This may sound like a dumb question , but the dumb question is the one that's not asked.

Having said that; what's the simplest way to make a test nugget?

h20prospector

I have used a piece of velcro with a string attached, place a small nugget between the velcro strips then bury it. Just remember to not bury the string, that way you should be able to find your au by locating the string if you didn't beep it.

Take care and watch your back - Frosty

[gosthi]

I remember years ago when we were all using SD2200d' the old green machine, and before the days when signal enhancers were popular, and it was pretty well accepted that if you were using one of the old Green Minelab 18 inch fiberglass coils you would not find small nuggets. The 18 inch went crazy deep, but just wasn't really hot on small stuff. Since that time with the advent of more advanced coils, smaller gold is possible even using old machines and one of the new 18 inch coils.

BCOT!

Doc

Thanks Doc, in 1997 we bought 3 new SD 2100's. The first 2 came only with the 11" DD but the third one was bought a bit later and came with a green round 18" also. I borrowed that 18" and found nothing with it. The other two people with the 11" DD were finding lots of about 1 gram nuggets, I was skunked. I felt badly that I was not contributing anything to the gold that we split 3 ways. So I for a long time I disliked, was turned off, and had a very bad taste in my mouth about large mono coils. I was into a round CoilTek 14" DD after that with my SD 2200 that I loved. Now maybe I should give a bigger coil a chance with the new advanced coils.

For a test piece, also a person can use a US nickle(5c). For smaller targets, if you do not like to handle Lead(pellets, sinkers, etc.) with your hands, then use Brass or Aluminum(the same conductivity as gold) objects of the required surface area. You can very carefully cut with scissors the various desired sized aluminum circles out of a beer can, for example 1/4", 3/8", 1/2", 5/8", 3/4", or 1", etc. diameters, glued on a plastic red poker chip for your test piece. That way if you lose it, it is not worth much anyway! David.