What is the best metal detector for your buck?

[Shott1970]

I want to buy a metal detector but I dont have a fortune to spend, so I dont want to sell my srams or legs. Any ideas?

 

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[scrounger d detector collector]

dont fool yourself.unless new detectors have an advantage.tresure folks are smart and wont buy new if it aint better.i own both a tesoro bandido micromax2 and a silver umax.although the older machine still works fine the manual ground balance was more of a pain than a help.and no comparison on depth.buy the silver umax.only 200.lifetime warr.the preset ground balance has been more than adaquate everywhere i went.one place i reduced sens to 6 becuz little chatter

 

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[thompy]

easy don't forget to throw the teknetics t-2 in with the f-75, much cheaper to pick up used, and many of the same features, only there is no small coil available, which isn't really needed, would be nice to physically get in between rocks and brush though

 

[scrounger d detector collector]

The Bandito is basically another Silver Saber, although some people claim it goes a tiny bit deeper than the Saber. The Eldorado is a mining machine, mostly used to ID ores and do a little nugget hunting. It works ok as a coin hunter, but it's not as easy or productive to use as the Bandito. I found a seated libety quarter with one once though.

wow ez.your posts are very authoritive and professional.i sure enjoy reading it and learned a lot.also thats a mighty fine varied stable of machines u own. i can only afford 3 or 4 at a time.

 

[U.K. Brian]

Easy Money, funny to take a pop at the Garrett Aces on the grounds that it has used and enhanced a twenty year old circuit when the majority of your machines have circuits that are twenty plus years old or the machines themselves are older than that.

Brian

 

[U.K. Brian]

Still don't understand I'm afraid. Are you saying you have so many older machines because they had old but good circuits whilst the older Garretts had poor circuit design ? The new Aces have turned the companies hobby side around providing what many people want which is bells and whistles at an affordable price.

I don't want bell tones, voice I.D. or any Garrett features so my last Garretts were the 15 khz Groundhog and the 5 khz Master Hunter.

Much as I liked some Compass models many didn't cut it and the company went under.The Coin Magnums flopped big time, the Challenger series had various faults with the X 70 having circuit board failures and paint falling off. Most models were heavy especially those with the Tri-Planer coils. Scanner range had good sensitivity/recovery speed but was outclassed by XP that did it all better and deeper.

Re Minelab, for most in Australia they are not the favorite brand due to price and reliability but they buy them because they deliver in the field which the Infinium does not. They didn't do well in the U.K. either ending up being reduced in price and finally became a detector you had to have ordered in from the States.
While we are talking P.I.'s the Whites main difference is that they removed a control you do need and substituted one you don't.
Fieldmaster used a double D coil on their motion machines when all the U.S. companies said it couldn't be done.

Innovation (and Compass did have a period as leaders) isn't enough. You need successful innovation to survive. The original question of the best metal detector depends on what you are hoping to do with it, the soil conditions and what can you afford.

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

Sorry Easy but I completely disagree. I have 1 Excal 1000 (had 2), and 2 Sov GT's (one is waterproofed for surf). There is no bubble to bust with Minelabs here.

You can say what you want about not being bias, no agenda and only giving the facts, but it still comes down to your opinion only. I have been installing and trouble shooting telecommunication equipment for over 35 years, but my saying NEC is better then Fujitsu or Cisco is better then Adtran is still nothing more then my own personal opinion.

People who own the Minelabs swear by them as I do. Personally the more people you scare away from buying them the better it is for us. Nothing I hate more then see someone entering the water where I am hunting with another Excal.

Ask Excal owners if they want to give them up and see what the majority of us say. I don't have to "hope" on my Minelabs, they prove theirselves every time I use them, I have dug deep targets,coins and jewelry with both the Excal's and the Sov's, and I dont have to dig all the iron found on the beaches to get the good stuff.....

I traded in my Whites Beach Hunter ID for my first Sovereign GT and was well rewarded with performance. I also have a Whites 6000 XL PRO, Fisher 1235X, Tesoro Conquistador, and Troy X2 Shadow so I am not locked into one Brand, but I will take my Minelabs over the others.

 

[thompy]

"your area soil conditions" reallycome into play on what works and what doesn't for you, and I'm not having any problem following you easymoney, some designs are more advanced than others, but if there marketing is subpar doesn't mean success, or vice verse

 

[Larsmed]

Hey easy money has beenin the business longer than any of us I think..why not listen to him...I can agree about the garrett ace models..good for starters but suck for advanced users..

Larry

 

[JOE(USA)]

I don't see where Easymoney is giving his opinion. He is just reporting what he has seen to be facts concerning metal detectors. He does not come across to me as being opinionated. There is a difference!
"Sorry Easy but I completely disagree. " - - - whats THAT all about? Joe

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

"Sorry Easy but I completely disagree. " - - - whats THAT all about? Joe

Joe I don't see the confusion, I disagree with the comment about busting an imagined "Minelab bubble".

As I said I have worked telecommunication both installation and trouble shooting of systems for 35 years, but if I say Cisco is better then Adtran, or NEC is better then Fujitsu, it will still come down to just being my personal opinion................

 

[JOE(USA)]

Treasure_Hunter,

O.K., sorry if I wrongly accused you. I believe "Easymoney" is one of the most knowledgeable people we have posting here on Tnet. That's why I stick up for him if I think things are going badly. I don't usually get involved with this sort of thing, I love this hobby and just want everyone to get along so we can just enjoy it to the fullest. Joe

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

Joe not a problem, I was not trying to insult or attack Easy, I disagree with his comment was all.

Actually in my personal opinion the more people that are steared away from Minelabs the better it is for my beach and water hunting.

If your going to water hunt buy something else....

 

[LS hunter]

Joe not a problem, I was not trying to insult or attack Easy, I disagree with his comment was all.

Actually in my personal opinion the more people that are steared away from Minelabs the better it is for my beach and water hunting.

If your going to water hunt buy something else....

IF YOUR NOT USEING A EXCAL 1 OR 2 IN THE WATER ARE ON THE BEACH YOUR JUST WASTING YOUR TIME!!!!!!!!

 

[Larsmed]

Em

Maybe they are better suited for Austrailia? Didnt the guy who invented mineleab start making headhunter detectors?

Lary

 

[Larsmed]

Em

Maybe you should post in the political forum..last time i looked we were talkin detectors :P

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

If your interested in Minelabs, talk to the thousands of satisified Minelab owners.....

Go to Minelabowners.com and ask them their opinions, ask if they are still "hoping their detectors live up to the hype" as Easy put it , see how they respond or like their detectors.

Lets please try to keep politics out of this forum section, there is a politics section just for those rants.....

 

[TerryC]

If your interested in Minelabs, talk to the thousands of satisified Minelab owners.....

Go to Minelabowners.com and ask them their opinions, ask if they are still "hoping their detectors live up to the hype" as Easy put it , see how they respond or like their detectors.

Lets please try to keep politics out of this forum section, there is a politics section just for those rants.....

ANY detector that you learn well. A 100 dollar detector you learn well will find more for you than a 500 dollar machine usually left at home. Ace 250 is a good start. Again.... learn it well. Any endeavor worth doing is worth doing well!

 

[EasyMoney]

Well folks, I decided to pull all my posts because talking to a wall of "opinions" is not my idea of showing someone something educational, so I decided to not waste my time any more here..

But here is a different version since my words have somehow gotten lost in the translation: I want to try again to seperate the apples from the oranges. Just one more time.

The Aces are NOT designed for high-iron soil, they ARE designed for LOW iron soil. High iron and low iron are not the same two terms. Their intentional design is why they do such a bad job on high iron or salt beaches and have so much troubles with hot rocks. And when I say "Hot Rocks" I am not talking about those wussie stones found in Virginia, Indiana, Oklahoma, or S. Carolina, either, I'm talking about the ones here in the west from the Rocky Mountains to the Western Seacoast. Cheeeeeze guys, how difficult is that to understand? Why do you think that Charlie Garrett himself posted on HIS OWN charts the fact that the Aces are not recommended for beach hunting? Don't you all realize that he knows what he is talking about? Is that one too tough to understand too? And by now CERTAINLY most people know that the 1200 through 2500 series Garretts need an aftermarket chip (designed by Garret Metal Detectors too) to compensate for the high iron found elsewhere besides the Eastern USA and GB, and that the new ones have that chip in them too, otherwise they would have the same problems. The western USA does not start in Ohio or Illinois, it starts East of the Rocky Mountain area as in just west of Central USA. Most people already know that the Garrett chip didn't quite take care of the problem completely, and that people still have troubles with Garretts in high iron soil. This is no military secret secret folks, it is a fact, and if you want to learn more about it, that's what browsers are made for. Frankly, I'm a bit tired of telling it to closed deaf ears and closed minds.

If you want to hunt the Eastern or UK soil you may well like the Aces because they do much better in those soils, but they STILL are not as good a pinpointer as a cheap White's, Tesoro, or Fisher, period. Nautilus doesn't make a cheap detector and neither does Minelab, except for the xterra-50 which is basically in need of a whole lot of work just to start with anyway.

The question at hand is; "What is the best metal detector for your buck". That is not a difficult question to answer. The cheap $59 one is almost as good as a Tesoro Compadre for depth and discrimination in high iron soil and it cherry-picks almost as well too. It also costs little more than 1/3 what the Compadre costs, hence, it is the best deal for the money in high iron soil. The Compadre is the next, more powerful, and better made choice. However, again, the Chinese one IS NOT as much detector as the Compadre is! The cheap Chinese junk detector functions better as a cherry-picker and small item finder than any Ace ever made though, regardless of the soil, and I know this because I have tested them side-by-side in various soils, so I know this 'personally", not from heresay. In fact I found a silver pendant, a war penny and a silver earring in a small area about 10' X 30' with the Chinese junk detector that NONE of all my detectors had ever found, and that alone should tell someone with less than a room temperature IQ something too. I figured it out and I'm sure someone else can too.

The Ace 150 and 250 get 9" on an air test on a quarter and the cheap Chinese one gets 8", just like the Compadre does, and just like all the Chinese cheapie's reviews say it does too. Go read them, they are written for 4th grade level readers. You will find them at Amazon.com

In bad soil the Aces lose more depth than the F-2, Compadre, and Silver uMax, and even the cheaper White's. And it's because of their really slow processing rate of retune and return to GB. It's because they use an older type of circuitry than the others, much like the very antiquated (early 80's) Bounter Hunter Red Baron, and that's why the tone ("BONG") is delayed, just as the Red Baron's was. Every one of you know what I'm talking about if you own or have used an Ace. This too is not a Top Drawer Military Secret.

I even tested the "Chinese junk" one against the Ace 250 for depth on a BB sized nugget and they both got the same depth at 2 inches.

In milder soil (and I've probably written this more than 30 times already) the Aces do go a lot deeper than in bad soil, but they DO NOT, CAN NOT, and WILL NOT differentiate between a nickel and a pulltab, and if anyone says otherwise then they must not be able to read TID numbers at all..

The cheap Chinese detector I speak of D-O-E-S get better depth in high iron soil than an Ace 100 through Ace 500, and this is not an opinion either, it's something that I discovered after testing oodles of detectors in some of the nastiest soil on the planet, the aforementioned ones too, some soils which have as much as more than 1/4 a cup of magnetite (iron ore) out of a full cup of dirt.

As far as a "rant"?

A rant is a loud and noisey, wild, dissertation done in an extravagent way; violently; rave, and "boistrous". (Webster's New World Dictionary).

My two short and individual sentences were none of the above and were intended to show a relationship between one liar (Obama) and another lesser liar (anyone who makes ridiculously false claims about certain metal detectors). Or which one is the bigger liar? Do I have these confused with each other?

Nevertheless, if someone prefers to give examples by making comparisons between one liar and another regarding a detector's depth it should not matter if he or she is refering to Richard Nixon, Joe Schmoe, Ivana Kruszhneczhek, Barak Obama, Adolf Hitler, Sonny liston or... ? It is our right to write and report as best as we see a reason to, and to copy another person's method is called plagiarism.

Personally, I have no problem with someone else's poor grammer, or poor writing style, because I believe that people should have the right to explain their viewpoint or show facts in their own special way, as long as they are not tossing stones at the immediate group or calling another participant bad names, of which nobody seems to be doing here.

As far as Garrets go, and I have said this nearly countless times, Garrett primarily designs their VLF's with an Eastern US and Central Europe market in mind, save for their mining machines and PI's which are absolutely TOP DRAWER in my book. But meanwhile the Western USA finds that Garrett vlf's basically suck for depth in much of our soil here in the "Far West" (from the Rockies westward), and this is not an opinion either, it's just the way it is.

Years ago, both Garrett and Fisher had the absolute deepest (vlf) all-metal detectors made for hard high iron soil, but that is no longer true because Garrett switched to a higher frequency from around 3.5 to well over 10 Khz. Now Garrett uses ancient technology in their vlf's with a lot of bells and whistles tossed in for fun - and Fisher, Tesoro, White's, Minelab, moved forward with circuitry much better designed for bad soils - while Garrett and Nautilus lagged behind - with circuitry designed for superior depth in much milder soils.

BTW, in mild soils both Nautilous AND the Garrett 2000 and 2500 have the deepest recorded readings of ALL (VLF) detectors ever done. The test was done in Europe in Czechezlovakia, I think.

I hope (again) that this is a bit easier to understand, and that my statements as regard to the above are no longer misunderstood, or misconstrued or misinterpreted again. And yes, the Chinese detector is a litle flimsy, at a mere 1.5 pounds, has a short shaft, but at 6'1" and 210 pounds I was able to use it for several hours without getting a backache, and I am 64 years old too.

Note: If you get 10" on a coin on Florida beaches with your vlf detector, you will only get 7" in California, Washington, or BC, or Oregon beaches. If you get 10" in Ohio in a normal park you will get only around 5 or 6" in normal soil in most of the western USA.

Now have fun all. And I hope you find that $5 gold piece.

EasyMoney

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

 

[cobra 1]

Just bought a Fisher Goldbug 2,after using it a couple times and experimenting with different metals,especially with gold,the goldbug has a distinctly different strong hum. Its like it grabs the gold target very abruptly and louder than with other metals,ya know what I mean? I bought the detector off ebay,it was a used unit,but very well taken care of from a gentleman from Montana.I live in Michigan.Used it in the U.P. and found gold at one of the old mines there.Ended up winning the auction on ebay,at $460.00 and I love it,glad I invested the money for it. Ebay is the way to go. Good-Luck at the auction