When I was a kid, I had a super cheap metal detector. I thought it was great fun and netted me a couple keepsakes.
Now I'm a 40 year old kid and want another one. The choices are endless. Help me narrow it down.
I want a good one. I see they have some that can discern between different types of metals; copper, aluminum, silver, etc. Are they accurate? I plan on taking it to the beach, scouring our back yard, and generally wasting time looking for metallic archeological things.
Given the insane price range, I haven't set a budget, but I would say I want to spend no more than $150-200.
I had a Garrett for years that worked pretty good. I never did find anything really cool or valuable with it, but it was fun to play with. That was 15+ years ago so I'm sure they have changed a bunch.
Yeah... a BUNCH. There are detectors ranging from $40 to over $4000 and I can't tell what features make them good, better, and best.
After looking around, I think I remember that mine was a Mettler Toledo. It was as simple as you can get; one dial that controlled on/off and gain, and a gauge with a little speaker. I think I remember that Grandma paid $17 for it used in about 1977
I have no idea what model my Garrett was. Off the top of my head it was about $150. It had the water proof coil and a couple of dials and a LED graph that was supposed to tell if it was picking up iron, aluminum, silver or gold.
I don't remember the graph being very accurate. Mostly you just listened for the beep. I found a bun of unidentifiable iron scrap, some door hardware from a house that burned down in the 1900s. I think a lot of that has to do with location.
You need to spend as much time doing research as you do detecting and a lot of the really cool spots are off limits. Even the beaches around here are off limits which is kind of stupid if you ask me.
I got my wife one, and she's messed around with it a little bit, but she hasn't had a chance to take it down to her parent's land yet.
We got a Bounty Hunter Tracker IV, which was supposed to be a good entry model. I think the detectors are like bicycles: once you hit a certain point with features, you're paying for just lightness and refinement after that. We figured if she got really into it we could get a better model and pass that one on to one of the kids.
I've always wanted to try this.
My feet in the machine shop. Or in the garage after using a carbide die-grinder burr on steel. Owee.
I know a guy who's into it and swears by White brand detectors(he's actually a dealer for them, but only so he can get a new one at cost every few years). He has his finds all over his office, and some a really cool. I remember him telling me about several he'd found at a former 1800's horse track(now field) that I had no idea existed, and other unique/unexpected locations.
I picked up a ~$150 detector used for $25 about a year ago, and it's still on my workbench in more or less the same spot I put it when I got it. 
Can any of them be used reliably to locate old galvanized pipes buried with in the first 2 feet of soil? The po (probably the pppo actualy) buried some gas line and I only know where it starts and stops.
