Testing The Silver uMax -Pictures Added-

Monty

Gold Member
Jan 26, 2005
10,746
166
Sand Springs, OK
Detector(s) used
ACE 250, Garrett
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
I recently attended the Chisholm Trail Hunt II and was lucky to find a prize token. I was even luckier when the token won me a new in the box Tesoro Silver uMax. I thought about just selling it because I have 5 other detectors, but so many people swear by Tesoro, I just had to try it out.

First off it strikes me as being an excellent beginners machine. It has most of the basic controls you need to learn to detect including sensitivity and discrimination, and an all metal that requires the coil to be moved to use. It has no ground balance and I assume is preset at the factory. That is one extra you will need if you hunt areas with a lot of unstable ground. Unfortunately you won't have it with the Silver uMax. The controls are handy and can be reached and adjusted with one hand I found out. What I really liked is that when you discriminated out iron, you didn't get a tone on rusted junk. Sometime it would pop and crackle but no tone. That is not true on some beginning detectors. It only has one tone, but with use you can distinguish between most good targets and trash. I was able to figure it out pretty good in only two hours during this test. I still prefer a dual tone however. That's just my personal preference. It does not have an LCD which I missed, but after all it is a beginning detector. There was no pinpoint mode so it had to be done by exing the target. After few times I got extremely accurate at it.

I took it down to a local middle school that I knew usually had lots of clad just for this test. It usually had a lot of pull tabs also, and I wanted to see how well it would discriminate them out. I started out with the discrimination set at the iron level , that is where everything but iron should give a tone. The sensitivity was set at 5, and I was using a set of Radio Shack behind the head earphones since none came with the detector. I found a lot of junk or junque including pull tabs and it was next to impossible to go a foot without hitting something undesirable, so I moved the discrimination over to the zinc penny setting. And sure enough , I didn't find anymore pulltabs! Not even the bent and big round ones. That's something that fools most other detectors I have used. I did dig a couple of deep aluminum beer and if you still hear the don't done dig worked. However I dug them anyway just to be sure. Then I didn't dig any more. There seemed to be dozens of pennies , so many that I got tired of digging them and didn't have much time so I moved the sensitivity over just short of max. From there on out I only dug quarters and dimes.I could still hear the pennies however as they made a popping and crackling noise but no repeatable tone. When I hit one , I'd stop and turn the sensitivity back and sure enough it would identify a penny. In short order I learned to adjust the sensitivity control on the move to distinguish what my target was. And in no time at all I could call my target nearly 100% of the time.

Results? In slightly under two hours I dig 8 quarters , six dimes and nine pennies and only 3 junk items once I felt comfortable with the machine. I would recommend it for the newbie whole heartedly. Someone else said it was much better than the Ace 250. I have both now and I like the Ace better simply because I like the use of the LCD, a two tone sound, an indicator of the depth of the target and a pinpoint mode. With a little more experience I think it would probably be just as good at finding targets and it discriminates better than the ACE. And that's my short test and opinion and I'm sticking to it. Monty
 

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CWnut

Hero Member
May 9, 2003
591
37
E. Tennessee
Detector(s) used
Tesoro tigershark----Tesoro Conquistador Umax------Fisher FX-3----Master Hunter CX-Plus w/ depth multiplier
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Re: Testing The Silver uMax

Monty, just switch to all-metal for pinpointing. That serves the same function as the pinpoint button found on some other Tesoro models.
 

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Monty

Monty

Gold Member
Jan 26, 2005
10,746
166
Sand Springs, OK
Detector(s) used
ACE 250, Garrett
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Re: Testing The Silver uMax

CWnut, I did try that and it worked ok except when the target was next to some junque bigger than the target and then it would pick up the larger target. That's where a dual tone would come in handy. The coin for instance would have a different tone than the junque and you could tell which one you were pinpointing. Monty
 

warsawdaddy

Gold Member
Nov 23, 2004
5,595
69
Edwards,Missouri
Detector(s) used
MXT - DeLeon - Gamma 6000
Re: Testing The Silver uMax

Glad you like the Silver,Monty.An excellent backup and if you ever get the 10x12 coil for it,it will go deeper than your Ace or your 2500.
 

sqwaby

Sr. Member
Apr 13, 2008
359
10
Re: Testing The Silver uMax

I have a ace250 and a Vaquero. I never use the all metal pinpoint on the V, just Xing in the disc mode works for me every time. The ace pinpoints ok, but the V definitely has a tighter pinpoint than the ace.
 

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Monty

Monty

Gold Member
Jan 26, 2005
10,746
166
Sand Springs, OK
Detector(s) used
ACE 250, Garrett
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Re: Testing The Silver uMax

I've seen a lot of folks post that they have trouble pinpointing with their ACE, but mine has always been dead center of the coil. Monty
 

sqwaby

Sr. Member
Apr 13, 2008
359
10
Most of the time the target is in the center of the coil on the ace, but the signal will hit on the edge of the coil and once in a while it'll fool me.
 

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Monty

Monty

Gold Member
Jan 26, 2005
10,746
166
Sand Springs, OK
Detector(s) used
ACE 250, Garrett
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
I usually pinpoint, locate the spot then pull the coil to one side , wait a couple of seconds and do it again. Sometimes the spot will move an inch or two. But the second time it is spot on. Monty
 

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Monty

Monty

Gold Member
Jan 26, 2005
10,746
166
Sand Springs, OK
Detector(s) used
ACE 250, Garrett
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Took the Silver uMax out for an hour or so again today. Went to a railroad scale house where they weigh cars for shipment. I know it has been there since 1902 when the shortline RR was first built. It paralelIed where the old SantaFe passenger rails use to run. I found a Santa Fe switch lock near here a couple of years ago. What I found was that the area for about 200 yds. in either direction was littered with pieces of old rusted iron. They all gave off a silver signal even though the discrimination was set as high as it would go. It was a hopeless undertaking, but I did dig a couple of pieces of iron or steel strapping that was used to join the rails. What was good about it was that it was almost 10" deep. Pretty deep for a inexpensive detector. With a smaller or mini coil it may have done better, but there was just so much metal I don't know. The standard 9" coil just wouldn't work in those circumstances. Also, it is so light it didn't tire me out even with my back problems and I feel like I could swing it all day. Will report more as I continue to evaluate it. Monty
 

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