What does conductivity mean when metal detecting?
While out hunting you may wish to dig out only certain targets and avoid others. Metal detectors are provided with VDI (Visual Display Indicator) numbers or a meter, such as colored LED in the case of Nexus metal detectors which gives an indication of how conductive the target underground is that your metal detector is detecting.
Here we will focus on the meter readings only.
Metal conductivity simply means how easy or difficult it is for electric current to flow through the metal.
Certain metals do not equal certain conductivity
For example gold do not have a certain conductivity as a rule.
A hammered gold coin may have low conductivity, where as a large chunky gold object may have high conductivity. This means that you will have different meter readings for these gold targets.
The following factors determines conductivity:
1. Free electron density
More free electrons per atom equals higher conductivity
