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Beach Hunting Australia

07 Feb 2012

On Friday the maximum temperature was forecast to be 22c and low tide at my favourite beach would be just before 5:00pm. For many years using my Sovereign, then Quattro MP and Explorer SE I had thrashed this old swimming beach until unable to find another single target. Thursday night I had the battery pack charging and planned to take my brand new Minelab E-TRAC which I purchased from Swan Hill Detectors to this beach for a first trial. Also at home I altered the audio settings to have SMOOTH Response, tone variability 30, this setting is just great for my hearing because the good targets stand right out. In the morning I woke just before 7:00am, and lay there thinking about what would be the best time in the afternoon to drive to the beach. The sun was up and I could have gone for a walk, but it occurred to me that the tide would possibly be ok for detecting about this time of day also. Soon I was dressed, no breakfast and E-TRAC in the car, heading to the beach when most were traveling to their work. At the beach carefully negotiating the embankment to avoid a fall, then turned on the E-TRAC and do a noise cancel, there was no time for considering any discrimination pattern so I selected coins and started carefully swinging. The tide was in a long way further than I expected so I had a limited area along next to the wall to detect. Straight off I believed the E-TRAC was a quieter machine than my Sovereign or Explorer SE and basically apart from my own audio settings it was as per standard. At the point where the water meets the wall there are a few lumps of bitumen which possibly came from the nearby walking track, I had previously found a number of good coins around this spot so I carefully swung near to the wall and to my amazement there was a good sounding signal. On digging down next to the wall a target came up and I realized by its size that it was a half penny. Later and further along a guy walking past asked had I found gold, I laughed and said no not here but I have just got another good signal, as he watched I dug up a very nice threepence to add to my collection. And this continued until I reached the other end of this small old beach. At the end of the beach is a corner which used to be a car park many years ago, so I went over that as I normally have done, I heard some good signals and dug those and was rewarded to find a coin. There are signals still there which sound OK and I will return another day to discover what I believe will be coins in amongst some old boat nails. At the old beach I wasn’t there all that long but to my amazement I found (8) coins right where I had given up with my other detectors: (4) Threepences. (1) 1887 Bronze halfpenny (cartwheel) (1) Sixpence (1) 5 cent (1) Mystery coin (bronze/brass/copper) a big number “6” on one side, I could believe it was a gambling token The E-TRAC that I received is a very good detector; somehow it has less ground noises and feels like it has better signal gain than my Explorer SE? I love the coil diameter at 11” and am enjoying the digital read out on the same screen as the smartfind. Graeme – Victoria, Australia

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