Ox Knob found Metal Detecting Atlanta Area Parks

Taylor, Mike and I spent around three hours today metal detecting two old parks in Atlanta. Both parks were within a mile from Grant park. Wow, the first park was literally covered in trash targets! I started the hunt using my 12.5″ coil. That was a major mistake! I quickly switched to the standard 9.5″ coil, but even that coil had trouble keeping all the signals apart.

I’m sure there are some great coins hidden beneath all the trash, but neither of us found one. I did find some interesting copper relics. One of the copper relics hinges on one end and I think I’ll try and bend it back into what I believe is the original shape.

We had a metal detector showdown, my brother and I, about who would find the best targets. I was using a Garrett GTI 2500 and Mike was equipped with a Minelab Equinox 800. My total in clad coins was 70 cents and Mike found 53 cents, so it was pretty close. I think the imaging saved me some time not digging aluminum cans, but I still dug a few, just to check the detector. I’ve also noticed deep coins fool the GTI imaging system, so I didn’t want to pass up a nice deep silver coin. Unfortunately, or fortunately, whichever way you think of it, all the larger than a coin targets were exactly as predicted by the GTI 2500, junk. Here’s a video of the metal detector showdown:

Here are some still shots of our finds for the day:

My finds using the GTI 2500 — the unusual copper “bracelet” is in the upper right hand corner
Mike’s finds for the day using a Minelab Equinox 800

In my eyes there was no clear winner in the metal detector showdown. I found 70 cents in clad and a few copper and brass relics in the roughly three hours of detecting and Mike found 53 cents and a bunch of trash. Neither of us found any old coins, not even a wheatie and that was our goal, at least it was my goal. If we were after clad coins, the local school yards in Forsyth or Dawson county would have probably been more productive. In the end, both machines did a good job.

I have a idea to really pit the two machines against each other. We return to either park and each mark out a 10′ x 10′ detecting area for each machine. I would hunt my 10′ x 10′ area with my GTI 2500 and Mike would hunt his 10′ x 10′ area with his Equinox 800. We would then switch and I would detect Mike’s 10′ x 10′ area and vice versa. The challenge would then be complete and we would compare our finds.

Update:

One of our youtube viewers identified two of my relics. I found a ox knob which was screwed on the end of a Oxen horns to prevent the ox from attempting to sharpen his horns and it also helped protect people and other animals from the sharp horns and I also found a Ford Model T valve stem cover nut! Here are some close-ups of my finds using my Garrett GTI 2500:

I thought everything I found was trash, but the ox knob, Model T nut and copper bracelet are pretty sweet finds!
Ox knob found metal detecting in Atlanta Park.
The ox knob would have been used on oxen pulled wagon’s such as this one. These bovine are not wearing ox knobs, but they look like they need them!

Does moisture affect the depth of VLF metal detectors during metal detecting?

The topic of moisture and how it affects depth is a hot topic with metal detectorists! Everyone has a theory but I’ve never seen a detailed study proving or disproving any of the theories. Many detectorists think moist soil increases depth and some think soil void of moisture increases depth, so who do we believe?

It’s going to sound crazy, but I think they are both correct! The answer lies in the soil composition.

Here in the south we have a lot of mineralization in our soil, so moisture might actually reduce metal detection depth. A metal detecting electrical engineer has this to say about detection depth in southern red soils, “This type of iron oxide, because of its consistency, achieves a solidity or connection between iron particles making it much harder to reject when wet.” Essentially what he’s saying is the iron oxides impede the signal by masking out the good targets by creating one big iron target when the soil is wet!

Highly mineralized soils, in particular soils with large concentrations of hematite, will loose detection depth due to the “clouding” effect of hematite or iron oxide. The iron oxide not only negatively impacts depth, but it also wrecks havoc on discrimination as well! Another negative of highly mineralized soil is what detectorists call phantom signals. The phantom signals are again caused by hematite or magnetite (black sand) and are basically signals caused by the soil mineralization instead of real targets such as coins or jewelry. The only solution to false signals is to turn down sensitivity until they go away. Theoretically, auto ground balancing machines should account for these moderate soils. In severe soil, it might sometimes be necessary to manually ground balance to eliminate these false signals or again reduce sensitivity.

So what happens in non-mineralized soils? The general consensus is moisture enhances detection depth by increasing the conductivity of targets. Non-mineralized soils essentially act like air and your metal detector should achieve similar depths as seen in air testing with the added benefit of enhanced conductivity during high moisture content. So both depth is increased and reliability of discrimination is increased, a win-win scenario for metal detecting in moist non-mineralized soils!

This article only pertains to VLF or TR detectors and VLF type detectors probably suffer the most from highly mineralized soil. One alternative are pulse type metal detectors. Pulse detectors have a single coil for sending and receiving and work on different principles from VLF type machines. In fact, pulse detectors normally don’t have ground balancing, because they are not affected by ground mineralization and sometimes ground mineralization will add slightly to the duration of the reflected pulse thereby increasing depth of detection! However, even though pulse detectors offer greater depth in mineralized soil, they do not discriminate. In particular, pulse detectors have trouble discriminating out iron targets. One way pulse detectors can discriminate iron is by using very long time delays, however since silver and copper have similar characteristics to iron with very long time delays this method is far from fool proof.

There you have it, moisture in soil is either a blessing or a curse. In southern states such as Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, North Carolina and Virginia, you might want to wait to hunt in the drier months for the deepest signals. I’m sure there are other places in the United States such as Idaho or western states where highly mineralized soil is a problem, but these five states have the rich red soil that is a known problem. Up north or areas with little or no soil mineralization might even see increased detection depths when the soil is moist.

Wonderful day metal detecting — Atlanta park, Smyrna park and 1820s grist mill

My dad, my brother, my daughter and I spent the day metal detecting and we had a great time! We spent time metal detecting four locations; an old park in Atlanta, a abandoned lot next to the Smyrna police department, a very small neighborhood park in Smyrna and ended the day at the 1820s grist mill park near my home. The park in Atlanta was built in the 1940s. We only hunted there for about an hour. No silver but some cool relics. My brother found an old copper buckle, maybe equestrian, and a very rustic pocket knife with his Equinox 800. I found what appears to be the wick holder for a oil burning lamp and my dad picked up a wheatie in Smyrna. Here’s a picture of the days finds:

The finds left of the buckle and chuck-e-cheese token were found using a White’s Eagle II SL and the rest were found using a Minelab Equinox 800. The rock my daughter found and just liked it and decided to keep it!

It goes to show you, you don’t need to find colonial treasures or rare silver coins to enjoy the day and spend it with family. We didn’t find anything special, but we created memories that are priceless. Whatever is your passion, gold mining, metal detecting, rock hounding, whatever, get off the couch and get out there and enjoy the day! You won’t regret it.