disillusion

[MrDude]

In all fairness I have logged in under another username.

I have been active on this forum for some time but I feel to get an honest answer out of some of the more experienced among us I would remain unknown. Please I just want honest answers not advertisements for the machine your using.

I took the day off and lined up 5 sites to go hunt, 2 where new and the other 3 have always proved to be productive. I spent 5 solid hours hunting with good results except for the 2 new ones which someone beat me too by evidence of filled in holes.

So here is my disillusion, I have a name brand high dollar machine that I have used for 1 1/2 years and though was the greatest thing since sliced bread. I just received a name brand cheep machine in the mail as a backup just because I thought "hey I need a backup just like everyone else."

Well this backup blew away my high dollar machine, and man I feel sick about it. Grant you the high dollar machine goes deeper by a an inch or two but the new one turned out to be a coin hog that could sniff out coins in a pile of trash. It was like the coins jumped out of the ground with little effort.

The new machine has changed my whole mind set about metal detectors.

All day I was just sick and disillusion about the high dollar machine; but man I had fun with the new machine.

Should I face up to reality and pawn off my high dollar machine on eBay and take the proceeds and purchase the big brother to my cheep backup or should I spend more time learning my High dollar machine that is a icon in the industry?

I won't tell you who makes the machines so don't ask, I just want your honest opinion.

 

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[BuckleBoy]

Okay Easy this does it...I've got to buy the next good Compass I see online.

This is one of the few brands I haven't used in 40+ years of detecting.

What is the very best of the Compass models?

Can you list them in order No.1 being the best?

You never used a Compass? ? ?




Best Machines money could buy--and STILL at the top of the class.  My mentor used one, and I got to use it a lot too.  It put the Spanking on my 1266 in terms of depth, and that ain't easy to do--especially considering that the Compass was already an Old School machine by the time the 1265's stopped rolling off the assembly lines...

It's true that low cost detectors can find 90% of potential finds out there. But personally I want that last 10% because I figure that last small percentage might just include a seated, bust, or even a gold coin. This is why I use different detectors at a hot site.
 

That is why the members of my team always use different detectors when we hunt together:

Ace 250
Silver uMax
Whites XLT
Cibola
Silver Sabre
DFX
1266-X


It's all about making every find we can make while we are there.

See lots of people buy a Minelab or other deep brand and all this listen for are those clear-as-a-bell COIN tones. This is why some of them dig mostly clad.

Same with most ID machines on the market--and even some of the analog non-meter machines. ID for deep targets is not accurate, as expected. Quality of the "beep" on my 1266 is corrupted on deep coins, but after 16 years I know what to listen for.



-Buckles

 

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[bazinga]

That X 200 is a real nice detector i missed getting a X 100 last month been kicking myself ever since...........==Jim==

Ya, I was bidding on the same machine. I missed too.

MB , You was bidding on that X 100 also a few weeks back it was a nice looking detector............. i bid again with a nice bid 7 seconds before it was over and was to late i took to long went over my 7 seconds...............I just got a used ...Minelab Quattro MP... i never used one don't know any body that had one and do not see any thing on treasurenet about them........I thought i would try one out see if i like it or not i could like it.......==Jim==

See, all tone machines only give distinct clear tones down to about 3 to 6 inches deep (depends on the quality of the machine). With the Explorers you're looking at about 5-6 inches deep for a clear easy to recognize high tone with crosshair pinned to upper right cornor. But the actual Explorer coin sized target signal may well be going 12-14 inches deep. The deeper the signal travels the more ferrous sound and the less nonferrous sound is reported back to the detector's receiver.

I dig a LOT of 8"+ deep coins that lock on to what they are. If I get a good / deep target I can usually tell you exactly what is going to come out of the ground. Although a wheat on edge will often hit on the screen closer to silver and bounce back and forth. But then a silver coin will lock on *MOST OF THE TIME*. At most sites it is super easy to tell the difference between an 8" deep IH and an 8" deep wheat. When I've got an IH or wheat under the coil, I know it. And I bet that most other experienced explorer users will feel the same way.

 

[Michigan Badger]

The thing I have noticed about the Explorer XS is the tones work almost to its extreme depth potential.

I think there's only maybe 1 inch of air distance that the tone doesn't fully cover in an air test.

This distance may be much greater on lower cost detectors. The Chinese unit will get an air signal on a wheat at about 10 inches but the high tone turns completely to ferrous low tone at about 8 inches (air distance). When I use that machine I'm listening for the transition point from full high tone to part high tone/part low tone. I get a low tone quickly followed by a distorted high tone. This happens at about the 7 inch mark. In the ground on a long time buried wheat cent this would be about 8 inches.

I used to think the cheap machine could only detect a penny at 6 inches but this was because I was using tones mode and only listening for those clear high tone coin signals.

With the better machines like the Explorer the tone/signal depths run very close. I think this is due to a more sophisticated antenna/receiver system. Once one learns the right sounds (due to distance from coil to target with ground minerals in between) the game is mostly won.

 

[hollowpointred]

That X 200 is a real nice detector i missed getting a X 100 last month been kicking myself ever since...........==Jim==

Ya, I was bidding on the same machine. I missed too.

MB , You was bidding on that X 100 also a few weeks back it was a nice looking detector............. i bid again with a nice bid 7 seconds before it was over and was to late i took to long went over my 7 seconds...............I just got a used ...Minelab Quattro MP... i never used one don't know any body that had one and do not see any thing on treasurenet about them........I thought i would try one out see if i like it or not i could like it.......==Jim==

Jim I've never used the Quattro but I hear all the Explorers are about the same.

There's a whole section devoted to the Quattro on the Finds Forum. But as you know those other forums often don't get much action.

The thing that makes Explorers more of a challenge than most is the fact they have so many different sounds. The cheaper tone machines with only 2 or 3 tones are much easier to learn.

But with all tone machines the secret to finding the good stuff with them is to learn how to interpret the signals when the clear coin high tone begins to corrupt toward a ferrous low tone.

See, all tone machines only give distinct clear tones down to about 3 to 6 inches deep (depends on the quality of the machine). With the Explorers you're looking at about 5-6 inches deep for a clear easy to recognize high tone with crosshair pinned to upper right cornor. But the actual Explorer coin sized target signal may well be going 12-14 inches deep. The deeper the signal travels the more ferrous sound and the less nonferrous sound is reported back to the detector's receiver.

What the guys who use Explorers don't tell is that these clear tones are often junk aluminum, trash wire, or shallow clad/zinc. With the Explorer your listening for that place where the clear nonferrous tone begins to corrupt into a ferrous tone. This means you're deep and maybe dealing with an old coin.

This is what makes the super deep Explorers such a challenge and thus the big learning curve.

See lots of people buy a Minelab or other deep brand and all they listen for are those clear-as-a-bell COIN tones. This is why some of them dig mostly clad.

I'm experimenting now with Chinese low cost machines that have tones (2 or 3) and using them has helped me a lot with the Explorer. The 2 tones cheap machines are great trainers to learn the transitional change from nonferrous tone to ferrous.

My little gumball machine 1023 can pull nonferrous objects from 10-12 inches deep because I've learned that a heavy ferrous tone with a tiny bit of nonferrous high tone spiked into it can be a very deep nonferrous object of some sort. This same basic process is used by the Explorer masters but they also consider the position of the crosshair plus the sound made.

Hope I didn't confuse you too much.

Badger

i think you are right about the real deep coins sounding kind of "warbly" for lack of a better term. i am beginning to see that if you get a deep target that kind of has that sweet high silver tone mixed with a warbly like lower tone you have to dig it. many times i wind up with iron bits when doing this but sometimes its a nice old coin. i have been using the SE for about a year and a half and i am still trying to unlock its full potential. every hunt is a learning experience. for anyone that wants to hear what we are talking about, get a silver coin and air test it with your explorer. hold the coin far enough away from the coil so that the tone is starting to break up. this is what i mean by warbly.

 

[Michigan Badger]

i think you are right about the real deep coins sounding kind of "warbly" for lack of a better term. i am beginning to see that if you get a deep target that kind of has that sweet high silver tone mixed with a warbly like lower tone you have to dig it. many times i wind up with iron bits when doing this but sometimes its a nice old coin. i have been using the SE for about a year and a half and i am still trying to unlock its full potential. every hunt is a learning experience. for anyone that wants to hear what we are talking about, get a silver coin and air test it with your explorer. hold the coin far enough away from the coil so that the tone is starting to break up. this is what i mean by warbly.

Right on!

I'm just getting started with the Explorer and on top of this I keep getting side tracked with other machines. But in a way the lower quality tone detectors kind of help me understand the Explorer. They're less complicated but at the same time they have less potential I'm sure.