Using small metal detector to find lost brass

[Wilderness]

Has anybody used one of the small one handed metal detectors to find lost brass? And does it work on brass in grass?

I am referring to the things they use on us at airports etc, on-line price $30 or so.

I know we probably won't save enough brass to pay for a detector, but the annoyance of losing fire formed brass can be worth avoiding, and the detector might also be useful for other stuff.

I am referring to brass loss in the course of hunting, notably for multi-shot encounters. Being better able to find brass afterwards might allow a less inhibited approach to mob opportunities (pigs).

I have also been playing with shell catchers, but so far not satisfied.

[CastingFool]

I have a "pro-pointer" while it is very sensitive, I wouldn't use it to locate brass. The range of detection is very limited

[M-Tecs]

A prairie dog shooting buddy tried a larger actual metal detector for a while. It was more hassle than it was worth. As to the small ones just looking for one or two pieces of brass I can not answer.

For AR based rifles the higher end brass catchers work very well. What firearm are you using?

[Winger Ed.]

For the common, easily available calibers I shoot, it isn't worth the trouble.

When we had a place out in the country, I'd mow with a tractor, and spread a tarp out on the ground if
we were going to shoot a bunch of semi-auto or Class III stuff.

[Wilderness]

A prairie dog shooting buddy tried a larger actual metal detector for a while. It was more hassle than it was worth. As to the small ones just looking for one or two pieces of brass I can not answer.

For AR based rifles the higher end brass catchers work very well. What firearm are you using?

Thanks to all.

Rifle is Savage 99 .30-30 (no semi-autos here). We're talking hunting. Usually I shoot carefully and catch the empties as they come out of the rifle, but the temptation remains to get stuck into it when the opportunity presents, or when it looks like a position has to be defended. If I can do it all from one spot and there's no ground cover I usually find most of my dropped brass. But it really annoys me when I do lose cases.

[Froogal]

I have been using a metal detector to locate brass for several years now. It works quite well, and WILL find what is hiding in the grass. Mine came with a small, handheld detector also. The handheld unit also works quite well but is not as handy as the big unit.

Maybe investing in a metal detector to find lost 9mm brass seems rather foolish, but I would rather NOT find that brass with my lawnmower.

A metal detector will also find spent lead.

[frkelly74]

I feel your pain on loosing brass. I am usually not happy unless I find more than I actually shot up. I just got done making about 400 pcs of 300 BO brass and they will be looked for when I shoot them. Fortunately the range is paved so brass is easy to find, consequently everyone finds theirs before I get a chance at it.

[jcren]

I use a regular metal detector for finding brass when shooting in the yard, but tall grass makes it useless. Can't sweep an area well and the detector false beeps when you bump a clump of grass. Just my experience with a fairly basic detector.

[Froogal]

I use a regular metal detector for finding brass when shooting in the yard, but tall grass makes it useless. Can't sweep an area well and the detector false beeps when you bump a clump of grass. Just my experience with a fairly basic detector.

My shooting range is basically a part of my lawn, so the grass is mowed short.

[GregLaROCHE]

Someone makes small canvas bags that attach to some semiautomatic rifles to catch the brass.

I once bought a large size detector to look for a diamond earring my wife lost. We knew exactly where is was, but never found it. What we did find were tons of old pieces of metal, horseshoes down to staple size pieces. I was on an old road that had been traveled for hundreds of years.

[tankgunner59]

I have considered a metal detector for collecting brass. But I collect range brass from my guns and any other brass I find. As for once fired, I only focus on once fired from my guns in my rifles, but I also collect and resize range brass for my rifles too. I have only lost one or two rifle cases of my own, but I find enough of the range brass it makes up for it.

[Wilderness]

Someone makes small canvas bags that attach to some semiautomatic rifles to catch the brass.

I once bought a large size detector to look for a diamond earring my wife lost. We knew exactly where is was, but never found it. What we did find were tons of old pieces of metal, horseshoes down to staple size pieces. I was on an old road that had been traveled for hundreds of years.

Again, thanks to everyone for the helpful advice. If I went down the metal detector track it would need to be small, belt carried, and non-short grass (or leaves) is precisely the environment where it would be most needed.

The alternative is to try again on a catcher for the rifle. A Savage 99 is a bit shy on anchor points for a catcher, so a couple of magnetic strips might do to attach a cloth bag, or even a smallish square cross section PET plastic honey bottle with an elongated hole in the side to receive the empties. This would be my Mk 4 catcher. The others have involved plastic bottles, ice cream containers and cloth bags, and all were somehow tied to the rifle, or at least to the scope. They all worked but were cumbersome in various ways. I'm not sure if there's a downside to having magnets on the receiver, but a magnet mounted catcher would be a whole lot quicker to get on and off.

Cases for this rifle are blown out to headspace on the shoulder, and I hate losing them. Ejection distance is four paces.

[Jsm180]

This won't work on the Savage but it's the best I have found for the AR.

https://brassgoat.com/products/brass-goat-bg15-standard-size-hopper

[gwpercle]

If the brass is lying on top or almost on top of the grass , it's easy to spot and usable ...
Once it get's buried in the dirt ... corrosion sets in and they quickly turn dark and green oxide starts to form inside the case ... If buried , they usually aren't wort the trouble to get clean and some will have holes or weak spots eaten into them ... and the ones with weak spots are not safe .

My advice is to just pick up what you can see ... if deeply buried ... let it lay .
Gary

[joatmon]

Why not die your brass pink? Should be easy to see.
Aaron

[dswancutt]

I've had really good luck finding brass with a metal detector. The metal detector I used is one I borrowed from my uncle and is the cheapest one I think you can buy, most likely one that came from the back pages of a magazine. Here is a caveat, I was searching in mowed grass. I was still able to find buried brass.

[Wilderness]

I've had really good luck finding brass with a metal detector. The metal detector I used is one I borrowed from my uncle and is the cheapest one I think you can buy, most likely one that came from the back pages of a magazine. Here is a caveat, I was searching in mowed grass. I was still able to find buried brass.

A pocket/belt sized detector or a big one? This has to be about as portable as a pocket knife. It doesn't take much grass to hide an empty case.

[daengmei]

I used one to find broadheads and blades. Had a dog find the mail and he just had to open it. Handheld and just bigger than a flyswatter, like seen at clubs. I am still amazed those loose blades did no damage to my dog.

[dswancutt]

Full size, but it weighed maybe 5 lbs, collapsed it was maybe 30" long. Basically about a half step up from one you would have built from a kit in the late 60's or early 70's.

[georgerkahn]

"Rifle is Savage 99 .30-30 (no semi-autos here). We're talking hunting. Usually I shoot carefully and catch the empties as they come out of the rifle, but the temptation remains to get stuck into it when the opportunity presents, or when it looks like a position has to be defended. If I can do it all from one spot and there's no ground cover I usually find most of my dropped brass. But it really annoys me when I do lose cases. "

I hear you loud and clear, with one of my neurosis (?) is shooting relatively hard to replace calibres: Notably the Remington .30, .32, and .35's plus .25wcf, .30wcf, .38wcf, .38-55, etc. It always seem "the ground" forever seems to swallow at least one or two cases which I, too, find troubling enough to put quite the damper on a range trip!

So much I purchased a garage-sale Garret metal detector -- happy I didn't spend big bucks on either a new or more costly model. My three disappointments using this to find brass included: 1/so much old (mostly rimfire) brass half-buried through area, too difficult to distinguish sound/meter from my lost brass; 2/too much time to do a "real search" as a reasonable range time IS afforded to change targets and pick-up brass -- but not enough for me using detector; and, 3/others at range would (always at least one! person) wish to borrow it for their spent case search, and would both share same disappointment as I had AND change the settings which were optimal for me to ????.

A senior fellow, many years back, brought a pair of moccasins with him to range, and after shooting did a slow drag-foot over area with the soft bottomed moccasins on. By gum & golly -- IT WORKS!!! I "replaced" the range-taken Garrett with a pair of Cabela slippers...
geo

[Kraschenbirn]

Detector worked for me when I had my own backyard range but that was quite a few years back. Now, wouldn't work worth doodle-squat on our club range. Members, for the most part, are pretty good about policing up brass from the concrete firing lines but tend to let whatever drops in the surrounding gravel and grass lay where it falls. Club bought a pull-behind job-site magnet for the JD we use for mowing...collected something over 200# of steel-case .223/5.56, 7.62x39, and 9mm the first time they ran it over the grounds (we've six open multi-use bays, an 8-station conventional pistol line, and two rifle lines: 100 and 300-yard)...and that didn't include the grass areas areas around the rifle lines inaccessible to the tractor. Yesterday morning, during a 'cease-fire' for changing targets, I raked a couple hundred fresh, once-fired Federal .223s from the slope in front of my bench on the 300-yard line...don't shoot/reload the caliber so they went into the recycle bin.

Bill

[country gent]

With the style used in airports and security I can see being on your hands and knees to get them in "range". Even the heads on the regular one have to be fairly close to the ground.

Common calibers and factory brass I dont mind leaving a couple for seed, but the wildcat that has to be formed by hand is a different story.

[toot]

some people spread out on the ground an old bed sheet to catch the brass. I have done it to find my 1912 STEYR BRASS. as it is made by FIOCCHI and is very expensive! and the pistol throes it into the next county, LOL!

[Davedude]

One of my other hobbies is metal detecting. Been at it about three years. Have three detectors, two Garretts and a Minelab. I am finding brass, fired boolits, j-words and live dropped cartridges everywhere. This is in city parks, public schools and other urban locations. Oh and old shotgun shells too. Have not used them at the range but that is an interesting idea.
My Minelab Equinox 800 is the latest tech---- simultaneous multi-frequency. Serious kit. No brass or lead can hide from me. I do have handheld pinpointers also. The Equinox 800 finds targets the size of a primer anvil easy.
Entry level detectors are cheap and will find brass and lead without issue. Garrett, Minelab, Fisher, Nocta Makro and others offer up inexpensive entry level detectors that pack up small and would work fine for policing up brass.

[gnappi]

Has anybody used one of the small one handed metal detectors to find lost brass? And does it work on brass in grass?

I am referring to the things they use on us at airports etc, on-line price $30 or so.

I know we probably won't save enough brass to pay for a detector, but the annoyance of losing fire formed brass can be worth avoiding, and the detector might also be useful for other stuff.

I am referring to brass loss in the course of hunting, notably for multi-shot encounters. Being better able to find brass afterwards might allow a less inhibited approach to mob opportunities (pigs).

I have also been playing with shell catchers, but so far not satisfied.

I feel your pain, as I REALLY dislike losing fire formed or expensive, hard to get brass.

A local indoor range I shoot at is not very quick to sweep the brass off the floor so in order to recover my formed 9x25 or expensive .38 super I have to use two specific lanes and sweep the area thoroughly before shooting to get most of the brass I shoot.

Outdoors nowadays I now either bring calibers to shoot and which brass I can afford (or suffer) to lose or just write the losses off.

[Wilderness]

Lateral thinking - I decided to go with some sacrifice brass. This is for hunting, where the ground conditions are whatever is under your feet when the action starts.

My good brass (.30-30) is blown out to headspace on the shoulder. I do this with the cases in circlips. Mostly, one shot is enough, but sometimes it takes two or three, and these have to be single loaded to get the gap in the circlip lined up with the extractor.

The alternative is to expand .30-30s all the way up to .375 with a succession of M Dies - .31, .32, .33, .37 (sold the .35 die after earlier using then abandoning this method), and then size back to .30-30 with the shoulder in the right place. I have some orphan cases (different headstamps and history) that I have thus reformed and can use when I am expecting losses.

This approach shortens the cases about .025", which must have been what put me off previously, this .30-30 chamber being about 2.120". A once fired case comes out of this treatment at about 2.000". I had imagined this would be a negative, especially with cast bullets, but recent tests suggest I might be imagining a bigger problem than really exists.

I don't feel the same attachment to these orphans as I do to the main batch of cases formed "properly".

[Tonto]

Brass salvage starts before you shoot. On your own range the various posts suggest how to prepare for your brass landing and recovery. Paving, short grass, a tarp all help. We’ve all done the slow stroll hunched over the find piece number 20 or 50 to fill that MTM ammo box. Inevitably that last one is straight up with the empty hole providing some camo. Different perspectives over the same piece of ground often mean success and we all know that finding that last one is a relief, leave no brass behind. Steel case shooters should remove and trash their empties on any public range. I’ve seen rust in brass buckets ruin a lot of brass cases. I would think a metal detector is well worth trying. I keep an LE range clean and it’s amazing how much gets left on the ground including live rounds.

[georgerkahn]

I purchased a Garrett metal detector exclusively to find my brass -- often obsolete calibres too difficult if not impossible for me to readily replace -- after the ground ALWAYS seemed to gobble a percentage! The two "good newses" are that I didn't pay too much for the (garage sale) unit; and, that it works great! HOWEVER -- at the two ranges I frequent there apparently are decades of others' brass -- mostly rimfire, I suspect -- well distributed in the ground about the shooting areas, in front of the concrete slabs.
Generally -- on average -- I'd shoot lots of 20, and be able to find an average of 17 or 18. A thorough hunt might find that 19th -- but, dang it! -- where ever did that 20th go???
Hence, the metal detector... Truthfully, it has not enabled me to find my missing brass enough to amortize its purchase. However, it has "friended me" many a time by others at range who -- like I did -- assumed their borrowing/using would also find their missing brass...
An old sage at range always had a pair of thin-leather-bottomed moccasins in the bed of his truck, and would don them when done shooting. He professed that gently walking with these in a back-forth pattern upon commencement of shooting generally "found" 99% of his brass. I've tried it with well-worn sneakers, and it works such that is what I've been doing...
geo