Just found this forum, after all these years.
I am Dennis Wynne, a retired Fort Worth Firefighter, 42 years metal detecting, currently swing a Minelab E-Trac, and an AT Gold.
One of the great things about my career, was that I got a lot of time off during the years, and retired at 50, 14 years ago....
I love this sport. Whether it is coin hunting, gold prospecting, treasure hunting, or civil war/battlegounds, it is all something I enjoy.
I have just acquired a fleet of 2 drones, along with a hyperspectral camera, a FLIR thermal Camera, and a full spectrum camera, with the intent to find older places. Incredible technological capabilities nowadays, especially when I think of the old days of BFO's and finding the old timers to question.
I am President of the Texas Historical Consultants, and enjoy sharing with groups about our great state's history. We can't touch the Northeast part of the country, but we can go back a ways. Finally, I have authored a book, 2700 Historical Sites Across Texas, which contains a lot of historical site information.
So, that is my life story.....so far! This is a great place to be, and I look forward to learning from everyone....
Wow, very nice! You had my attention the entire time. But anyway, welcome from south jersey, one to be lucky enough to live in a historical area.
The drones, cameras and the book are all awesome.
I look foward to some of your finds or maybe your best find or top 3, 5 or 10 haha.
We can all use and enjoy some finds wether it was today or 40 years ago.
Glad to have ya along
Gl & HH
Zach
Welcome, Dennis
Wish I was retired, as I would be out swinging 4 or 5 days per week. I used to have an AT Gold, excellent machine. And I'm moving up from a Safari into an Etrac soon, so, looks like we'll be armed with the same weapon.
Hope you enjoy the community we have here
Joe
Thank you Zach and Joe,
I have detected in just about every state in the country, EXCEPT for NY, NJ, Penn, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts. But, hopefully, I will get there before I am done.... The last trip to the Northeast, Barely to the Northeast, was to Virginia, back during Hurricane Irene. I worked as an insurance adjuster....left that out of my bio....but I chase hurricanes a bit.
Anyway, in Portsmouth Va, I got to swing coils in the historic district. Hunted five lots located just off of downtown. Found what is my favorite coin of all time... an 1807/06 overstrike Draped Cent. It has a bit of corrosion on it sadly, but to think, Thomas Jefferson was President when that coin was struck. The wow factor was there, and I have found 3 gold coins in the 42 years, though two were together in a cache.
Glad to be here, and I appreciate the warm welcome. I will be getting acquainted with the group over time. Right now, my time is consumed rather thoroughly, by the website coming up and online, the book migrating from Kindle to printed, and the understanding of the operations of the drones as it will relate to the field of detecting. For that, I am studying for my FAA Part 107 license, in order to commercially use the drone, along with my son and partner. But, that being said, I will be on here as well. Looking forward to contribute and to learn. You are never too old to do either one. HH
(01-02-2017 10:33 PM)gitterdug Wrote: [ -> ]Thank you Zach and Joe,
I have detected in just about every state in the country, EXCEPT for NY, NJ, Penn, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts. But, hopefully, I will get there before I am done.... The last trip to the Northeast, Barely to the Northeast, was to Virginia, back during Hurricane Irene. I worked as an insurance adjuster....left that out of my bio....but I chase hurricanes a bit.
Anyway, in Portsmouth Va, I got to swing coils in the historic district. Hunted five lots located just off of downtown. Found what is my favorite coin of all time... an 1807/06 overstrike Draped Cent. It has a bit of corrosion on it sadly, but to think, Thomas Jefferson was President when that coin was struck. The wow factor was there, and I have found 3 gold coins in the 42 years, though two were together in a cache.
Glad to be here, and I appreciate the warm welcome. I will be getting acquainted with the group over time. Right now, my time is consumed rather thoroughly, by the website coming up and online, the book migrating from Kindle to printed, and the understanding of the operations of the drones as it will relate to the field of detecting. For that, I am studying for my FAA Part 107 license, in order to commercially use the drone, along with my son and partner. But, that being said, I will be on here as well. Looking forward to contribute and to learn. You are never too old to do either one. HH
What separates needing a license for a drone, versus not needing a license? Is it simply the altitude? I know they have all types of restrictions on those things now, and last I heard, they were only able to be used up to a certain height by hobbyists. For your usage, which will be commercial in nature, I'm guessing that doesn't apply. I'm asking because I was real close to getting one about 6 months ago.
Joe
Hello Dennis. Very happy to welcome you to the forum. There are some great MDers here and I know that you will fit right in. Thanks for the bio--you've had a great many interesting experiences and I really look forward to seeing your discoveries and comments.
Welcome from Cleveland Ohio all that tech sounds like fun! hope to see some cool results from it.
Thanks for my first opportunity to respond to a great question. What separates the need for a Part 107 license, is the intent of what you are using the drone for. Just flying around the neighborhood, could be considered hobby use. That same scenario, taking videos or pics of houses for sale, would be commercial.
Up where you guys are, there is a lot of airport no fly zones due to proximity to airports, military installations, etc.
The altitude of 400 foot ceilings are imposed on most drones that sense the height. For instance, my DJI Phantom 4 is limited as far as I know. I have taken it to 393 feet, and you can barely discern it against the sky at that height.
And actually, for my intended use, 400 feet is more than adequate. I will elaborate on that in another post, outside of the welcome new members forum. But here, I will say, a drone is of great use to a metal detectorist. You can simply see things from the air that you cannot on the ground.
I had the opportunity to talk recently with Brandon Neice, aka Dr. Tones 24K on youtube, about his drone use. He hunts the country regions, as I do, and I wanted to get his take on how he deploys his drone. He looks for straight lines, debris, and glints from glass from the ground. That is exactly what I do as well.
I highly recommend having one. But if you do, just as in metal detectors, choose one that is good enough for the job you have. Save money, and get a decent drone. The DJI Mavic Pro is a $1k machine, but it is compact and can be folded up, yet it delivers 4k movies. The portability of the drone is what really attracts me to that one. Think backpack portability.
How many times have you been in the field, looking for one particular location that shows on a Topo map from earlier times, and you just cant quite find it? Launch a drone, and you can see it from the air, in real time. In fact, you can walk right up to it. That has value in terms of quality detecting time. And you don't need to be way high...100-150 feet up will likely get you what you need.
So, to make a short story long, I hope that answers your question and provides a bit of thought for you as well.....
HH
What separates needing a license for a drone, versus not needing a license? Is it simply the altitude? I know they have all types of restrictions on those things now, and last I heard, they were only able to be used up to a certain height by hobbyists. For your usage, which will be commercial in nature, I'm guessing that doesn't apply. I'm asking because I was real close to getting one about 6 months ago.
That right there is some excellent information, thanks for sharing, Dennis. The drone model I was looking at was only a couple hundred bucks, and it had a camera, but I believe only 1080p, which is a far cry from 4k video.
I hunt wooded spots sporadically throughout the year, and I really like your tips on looking for shiny glass, straight lines and debris.
Do you guys attach any type of GPS to the drones, so if they go down you'll be able to easily find them? I was hunting a very large park one day last year, and a child's drone went down and the boy and his mother couldn't find it. I helped them look for it for about an hour, but no dice. They wound up finding it a while later, but I can kinda see that happening often, especially if one isn't experienced flying drones, like myself.
Joe
(01-03-2017 03:51 PM)NjNyDigger Wrote: [ -> ]That right there is some excellent information, thanks for sharing, Dennis. The drone model I was looking at was only a couple hundred bucks, and it had a camera, but I believe only 1080p, which is a far cry from 4k video.
I hunt wooded spots sporadically throughout the year, and I really like your tips on looking for shiny glass, straight lines and debris.
Do you guys attach any type of GPS to the drones, so if they go down you'll be able to easily find them? I was hunting a very large park one day last year, and a child's drone went down and the boy and his mother couldn't find it. I helped them look for it for about an hour, but no dice. They wound up finding it a while later, but I can kinda see that happening often, especially if one isn't experienced flying drones, like myself.
Joe
Concerning the GPS, there are several on the market. I chose "Trackimo", which utilizes 3G technology and cell towers to lead you to a drone. It attaches to one leg via a strap, and can be charged off of micro USB as needed.
The Large drone I got is a DJI Inspire 1, and it is a workhorse. It is also a commercial drone as opposed to a casual user drone. But in my case, it will be carrying two cameras at a time, and possibly 3.
Actually, you shouldn't be losing a drone if you get a model which can connect to a display, such as an ipad, iphone, or android pad or phone.
You can actually preplan a flight, and in the case of metal detecting, that is not a bad idea. If you preplan the flight, using one of several software packages out there, you can overlap your photos, and at 300 ft altitude, get a resolution of about 2 inches per pixel or less. at a lower height, say 150 or so, you can zoom in on an individual grape in a cluster of grapes.
Now, THINK about what I just said.....you fly over an area, say 40 acres which is very doable with a high end consumer drone. Then, you can process the images into an orthomap (Photogrammetry), and do just like google earth, except when you zoom in, you can see a half dollar on the surface of the ground. Or, look very closely at foundation rocks, or even look at fallen down boards, timbers etc.
While it takes a while to do large plots, you can, in real time, fly the drone up and look around as stated previously. Then fly over to the area, and do a closeup inspection, and walk right up to the gps coordinates the drone has. That in turn translates to more time hunting.
We are at the front end of the use of drones in our sport. I am excited to see how the birds I have perform. HH