We're heading down to Tathra for a few days to get away, would it be worthwhile taking the detector down and giving the beaches a run? It'll be the first go at beach detecting for me.
You're in the same boat I was a few weeks ago!
1. Get out and use it.
2. Dig everything until you get used to what signals relate to what targets.
3. Towards the end of a day, when you start "cherrypicking" for good signals because you are sick of digging trash, pack up and go home. Go back...
This weekend I was invited to follow a couple of blokes out to Bathurst, after a briefing involving olden days maps we broke out the detectors and without a word of a lie within the first five minutes I have a cracking signal and dig up an 1867 penny! I could almost feel the daggers in my back...
That was an antenna lesson! :)
Does the vertical portion resonate like a G5RV? I have one of those somewhere (not that I even understand how it works!!!) and having experimented with that and a number of homebrew dipoles in the bush I opted for the vertical squid pole version from this page...