The Australian Metal Detectorist thread

Since there seems to be some interest, and to save clogging up the images thread,I'll kick this off!
I have been a long time keen, but not avid,detectorist for quite some time
Never been gold detecting, not interested, my thing is history!
Love finding an old site and combing over it for historical artifacts
Heres just one site
I found this paddock and thought it may have had some sort of building on it once, although there were no fruit trees or pine trees, which are the dead give away that a dwelling had stood there once
So over a period of time I walked the entire site,no sign og household goods, I came to the conclusion that it was just a remote paddock, but had obviously been tilled and crops planted
The satisfaction of digging up an object is huge!!!!
And my weapon of choice at the moment, a $100 Aldi unit, perfect for what I do, I have friends with multi thousand dollar units, but they are chasing(and finding) gold






Lets hear your stories!!

Detectorist?

My Basketball Team I am the Team Manager of won the NBL1 Grand Final against Bendigo on Saturday night - I found a chunk of Gold that will make me smile for quite a long time to come.

I have a Compass yukon 94b ( nearly as old as me ) and am not heavily into detecting but expect to be upgrading later this year

I'm in
What once was is often no longer. So much has been & gone before us, barely leaving a trace. You can find the most interesting things in places that often leave you wondering why they were there? It's extremely satisfying when you follow your gut instinct, put in the time & get rewarded for your efforts.

I was an avid watcher of the Time Team series, the history they were digging up and putting background to was fascinating, UK based so no end of history under the ground. On the topic of detecting in the UK, long retired bass player from the rolling stones Bill Wyman has been an avid detector for decades, actually he's quite a fossil himself.

“Detector” - the apparatus
“Detectorist” - the operator of the appararus

Most of you have probably heard how Larry Perkins ( yer the Bathurst winner ) recently found Barclays missing cache in the Simpson desert which was stashed there in 1905 , many people have searched for it since then . After finding traces of it Larry found the rest with his metal detector . There`s a good write up about it in Australian Geographic . As we are adventurers there is a lot out there to be found . Ludwick Leichhardt and his team disappeared in 1848 ( I think ) while trying to cross Australia from east to west pretty much without a trace and it`s one of Australia's biggest mysteries . Bones leather from saddles etc would be gone , but he had supplies for approx 2 years . Guns, bullets, brass surveying instruments, axes , steel in the pack sadles etc etc . There has to be traces of it out there somewhere and I`d love to find something like that .

Dave, is that where you got that Yamaha 250 from? The paddock not Aldi

He's probably using it to find his dentures, can't remember where he left them

I found this in the creek at Newnes.

A 1863 or 1868 Three Pence.

But I bought my metal detector to find this:

Anaconda have a sale on detectors at the moment.

You will find thousands of them, I'm sure. At least half a dozen of mine out there

Having seen your shed Woody, I'm not surprised!!

I lost one this week from my favourite 1/4" drive set, it never leaves the shed, which is surprisingly tidy at present.