I've read throughout the web about metal detecting, and it looks to me that with moderate use that over,,say a few years you can pay for it,,,I've been thinking about getting one,,,,a fisher,,can't remember which one( it costs around $600/$700) works in water, i believe 20ft. i know there are a lot of variables,but is that true? i mean about the payback?
metal detector
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highdesertranger
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sure it will pay for itself, if you put the time in. first there is a learning curve, it takes time to learn your machine. then you need to put your machine over treasure. clad coins are fairly easy to find, beaches, swimming holes, parks are all good places to find clad coins and jewelry. what's nice about these places is they are constantly replenished. then if you want to go for older stuff like silver and gold coins you need to find old gathering places that have not been hunted to death, old fair grounds, old picnic grounds, old city parks, horse race tracks, etc, can be gold mines if you are the first one to find them. also old homesteads, and river crossings. so if you were to find 2800 clad quarters you would pay for your machine or 175 silver quarters, or about 40 silver dollars. see were I am going here. throw in a couple rare coins or expensive pieces of jewelry and you are in the black quick. highdesertranger
IanC
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I brought mine with me and haven't used it once apart from letting some kids in a campground play with it. Just laziness. I once knew a guy who said he made 20 grand a year just on the beaches in Fort Lauderdale and Miami. True? I don't know, but he did have some very nice jewelry that he'd held onto.
FlipperFla
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LOL, that’s the same reasoning I gave my Wife for me buying one. Only around $800 to go until I recoup my money, probably around 50 years. Seriously…..lots of fun, great hobby, especially living in Fl. a few hours drive to the Gold Coast. Check before you use it, illegal in lots of places.
Saw this intriguing video on YouTube recently. The guy who made it does "urban panning". He goes to the jewelry district in a big city (NYC) in the middle of the night and scrapes out everything that is in the sidewalk cracks outside jewelry stores. There's quite a procedure he has to go through to pan that out but in the video he shows how he does it and he ended up with several grams of gold and silver and several real gems, adding up to a couple hundred dollars or more. Of course, this takes time and patience and the equipment and living in the right place and so on which nomads don't have. It's just a hobby for this guy but I thought it was amazing what he found and I wouldn't have thought of that myself.
CoyoteG
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I make part of my living with gold.
If you are in the west, there are still lots of places that still yield decent amounts of gold for your time and effort. Gold on beaches is fun too.
The oldtimers didn’t get it all.
There is a learning curve to gold prospecting and a little education too. But it’s a good fit for some nomads.
Speaking of urban panning, here is a way to mine platinum group metals with just a broom and dustpan, but a vacuum cleaner should up production a little! Yes, it would be a dangerous place to mine, but so would the sidewalk around jewelry stores, especially when the store is being robbed at gunpoint.
RoamerRV428
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metal detectorist here. find it ANYWHERE you can swing and reap those rewards. Of course most is beer tabs and junk but in the end, the treasures are out there!! Love it to no end, definite passion of mine for over 20 yrs! Everyone go get one, they are great LOL
but in the end, the treasures are out there!! Love it to no end, definite passion of mine for over 20 yrs! Everyone go get one, they are great LOLI have all my life kept my eyes on the ground a portion of the time when I am anywhere that people have been, because you never know what you may find, and I have found some interesting things this way. Not all of them are metal, of course. I am particularly fond of the concept of a treasure hunt, whether it be on a beach or in the wilderness or on a street or in a park. I approach thrift stores in the same spirit and find them also entertaining. It's just fun to see what you find, whether or not you even want to have it. My parents taught me to be a treasure hunter when I was a kid. Beautiful rocks, bones, all sorts of things. Playing with a metal detector fits right in with this, of course.
RoamerRV428
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yea I got that in me but don't act on it for a thrift store. I hate shopping ever LOL but for me the metal detector is all 'history relics' which I don't do much or 'hittin' the gold cost of the East USA for whatever might wash up on shore and pirate booty or Queens fleet going down in hurricanes and more. I go big glory but I do find on beaches at water's edge and in troughs the occasional gold ring or diamond bands that drop off the hoards swimmng so I got a nice big ol' baggie of rings of all calibers, 24k, diamond and 18k and more but honestly, I CAN'T sell them or give them up....they are MY booty ya know LOL one day when I am dispatched my kid can sell all my booty and gold might be at 20K per gram? HAHA who knows then but I find I can't sell real stuff I worked so hard but fun to find, but in the end, I still seek that massive spanish or others gold on the coast
I so wanna hit the coastal mother lode I am working on it but then I see out West ya can stop on the side of the road, detect a bit and find surface gold....hmm, sounds good to me
FlipperFla
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This is the Boat and Crew that found over $6 million a couple years ago. I read an article where there was a tight shot of a pix of their location and it showed a few roofs of the condos on the Coast. I got on Google Earth and started at Ft. Pierce inlet and worked North untill I found the roofs that matched the pix in the article. Drove down and there they were! You are allowed to detect on the beach from the dunes to the waterline anything else is off limits. They pay spotters on the beaches and in the air to guard their leases. So don’t even think about getting wet. Big fine $$$$$$. The guy on the tower was setting up a remote camera they operate from their boats.
