How to hunt deeper finds with the ETrac?

[MikeO]

I have had really good luck by hunting with quick mask completely open, manual sensitivity as high as possible and TTF. Looking for the faint high pitched tone.

1. In a productive site, I will hunt in multi-tone, conductive and cherry pick the area.
2. Once the easy targets have been eliminated, I will search using TTF.
3. Then I take my John Deere with a savanna plow and turn the area, you won't believe how well this works, especially in an area with allot of iron.
4. Search the area again in multi-tone, conductive and cherry pick.
5. Search the area again in TTF.
6. In an area with allot of iron I then change to a sunray x-5 coil, works extremely well.
7. Then I will grid the area into 4x4 squares, dig and screen to you hit clay. When I'm done I have found everything.

I only go as far as step 7 when I am in a really good or significant area. Currently, I'm in a confederate Calvary encampment and I will begin step 6 tomorrow.

Good luck.

 

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[MikeO]

Hey, LuckyThirteen08, we have all been in your shoes wondering if the cost is justified. Everyone always says the Etrac is a silver finder, silver magnet...the Etrac is an excellent machine. It will find everything, not only silver. The F 75 and AT pro are both great machines as is most modern day detectors costing over $500.

I have been really successful with my Etrac but it took a while to fully understand what the machine was telling me. If I were in your shoes, I would save up for the CTX 3030 and never look back. I use my AT pro in rivers and ox bows but other than that my 13 year old son uses the pro as it is more user friendly and tolerates water.

My 9 year old son uses a bounty hunter platinum with a F5 coil, it goes deep but you will dig allot of false signals.

The most important factor in your success will be the location of your hunt. If you have a good location an a Etrac with a x-5 coil, you will clean up.

 

[LuckyThirteen08]

Hey, LuckyThirteen08, we have all been in your shoes wondering if the cost is justified. Everyone always says the Etrac is a silver finder, silver magnet...the Etrac is an excellent machine. It will find everything, not only silver. The F 75 and AT pro are both great machines as is most modern day detectors costing over $500.

I have been really successful with my Etrac but it took a while to fully understand what the machine was telling me. If I were in your shoes, I would save up for the CTX 3030 and never look back. I use my AT pro in rivers and ox bows but other than that my 13 year old son uses the pro as it is more user friendly and tolerates water.

My 9 year old son uses a bounty hunter platinum with a F5 coil, it goes deep but you will dig allot of false signals.

The most important factor in your success will be the location of your hunt. If you have a good location an a Etrac with a x-5 coil, you will clean up.

I need to upgrade bro, not downgrade, SO you think the ctx3030 is probably the best route to get all 3 machines in one? I know the price is up there but i could see paying it for the extras,The CTX is almost the price of the these three detectors combine after you add in the gimmes in the CTX box. *sigh* i dont even know anymore!!!

 

[MikeO]

I don't have the coin for the CTX 3030, so I haven't upgraded and I won't sell my finds. I have been truly happy with the etrac. I make my own patterns and never use the ability to download pre-made patterns. For me it comes down to this ( in order of importance), I have to have the ability to use multi-tones, not just 4, the ability to see a cursor (cross w/box around it) move from left to right and up and down according to conductivity and last good VDI numbers.

I would not buy a detector without the above three features at a minimum. You are going to find all the same stuff with the three detectors you mentioned.

If you don't want to spend the $2k (like me), the Etrac is a great machine but plan to spend an additional 2 hundred on a x-5 coil sooner or later. The F75 limited and t2 are both made by the same company in El Paso, Tx. I use to live just down the street from the company, they are great guys and make quality products, like I said just recently bought my son a bounty hunter platinum. But I hunt in such trashy locations with allot of iron falsing, if it wasn't for the cursor placement I would be digging much more junk targets that just sounded good.

 

[Jackalope]

With the E-Trac, and many other detectors, the more DISC you dial in the greater the decrease in depth. My testing shows the difference in AUTO+3 between heavy and light DISC varies by about 120% and in Man-30 switching from heavy to light DISC increases depth about 165%. That is, if in heavy DISC you can obtain a dime at 6.5" in AUTO+3 you gain 1" switching to light DISC. Likewise, a quarter would add 2" by switching to light DISC in AUTO+3. In MAN-30 the quarter can be obtained about 3"+ deeper.

In the ground, the difference may not be as dramatic due to ground effects which minimize field penetration for other reasons. However, if you want absolute deepest depth then keep your use of DISC to a minimum.

 

[Jackalope]

In my opinion the E-Trac is both deeper than many detectors in med-to-high mineralized soil and very sensitive toward silver. It is stable in EMI and runs relatively quiet while having a very useful TID providing accurate ID in mineralization to very descent depth. The F75SE is very sensitive and very deep, but is not EMI stable, does not TID to equal depths or as accurately, and is super sensitive to tiny junk targets, and is not particularly sensitive to silver. The drawback to the E-Trac is it is gold dead to small jewelry and its hefty weight.