How do u set your sensitivity on your explorer?

Obviously one of the most important settings...how do you set yours?

I recently purchased an explorer II and am having a little trouble. I've read a tutorial that says you want to have a quick recovering threshold immediately after a target...does that sound right? Knowing that every state is different as far as mineralization, what is your sens. set to for an 8" and a 10.5" coil?

Thanks for your help.
Aaron
 

Jeff In North Georgia

Hero Member
Aug 23, 2006
541
107
Suwanee, Georgia
Detector(s) used
Minelab CTX 3030, Fisher F75+
It really depends on your ground. Manual sensitivity will give you the most depth. Adjust it up until the machine starts to chatter or become unstable then back off a few numbers. I usually end up around 20 - 24. Auto works well if your ground varies a lot and will be more stable but may not give you maximum depth.

You can usually run higher sensitivity with smaller coils as they are look at a smaller foot print of ground with an 8" around 24-28 in manual.

Jeff
 

Ron B

Hero Member
May 11, 2007
961
4
Trinidad, Colorado
I OWN THE SE!

I run SENSITIVITY as high as allowed, preferring 32 MAXED. If I have interference issues, I first lower GAIN one numeral at a time. I normally manually adjust SENSITIVITY but if in a noisy area have learned to trust AUTO. I was MD'ing a totlot today that was covered with about a foot of bark. I could really tell when I lowered GAIN as the noise was immediately dampened.

Jeff is absolutely correct, smaller coils allow higher SENSITIVITY-GAIN settings generally.

Good luck with your new toy!
GRB
 

Born2Dtect

Bronze Member
Jun 11, 2004
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Hurlock, Maryland
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XP Deus, Excalibur II
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As GRB said, run it as high as you can. By this I mean only turn it down to make it not false and you have it set perfectly. The sensitivity is a fine adjustment and the depth is not effected as much as you think. So do not be afraid to adjust the sensitivity as needed.

Ed D.
 

Iron Patch

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Sep 28, 2007
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Dirtyville
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27 man. and gain at 10, noisy as hell but works. (6 or 7 year ears help)
 

mastereagle22

Silver Member
May 15, 2007
4,909
31
Southeast Missouri
Detector(s) used
E-trac, Explorer II, Xterra30, Whites Prizm IV
I find my machine works well between 24 and 27. I usually keep gain at 6 because any higher than that and it starts getting squirrelly!!!

Hope that helps.
 

Ricardo_NY1

Bronze Member
Oct 24, 2006
1,330
3
Bronx, NY
Detector(s) used
Explorer XS/II & Garrett ACE 250
I normally set mine between 19-21 in manual mode and have not really cared for it much because I realize that even at a setting of 16, the explorer can get down there. Imagine this.......the other day I wanted to test something out in the house so I lowered the sens to 11. I'd forgotten about it and the next day started hunting with a manual sens of 11 and managed a wheatie past 8". I realized my setting only after I decided to move to another spot that was less trashy and was about to raise it a couple of notches.
 

DFX-SE Gregg

Silver Member
Feb 6, 2007
2,865
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Equinox 800 SE and DFX
been running mine from 22 to 24...seems to be a nice stable area for me.
 

Captn SE

Silver Member
Apr 1, 2007
2,774
13
Southern CA
Detector(s) used
Minelab Explorer SE; X-1 Target Probe; Pro Coil, 6x8 SEF, Coiltek Platypus Elliptical, Sunray X8, Expl. 1050 coils
Detector: Minelab SE
Sensitivity: 23 Manual (Auto sens. in highly mineralized ground will cause your sensitivity to drop tremendously (you don't know what sensitivity the machine will set to), thus losing all the depth capabilties of your machine).
Gain: 8
Sounds: Conduct
Coil: Stock Expl. II 1050 coil.

That's been my settings for the past 6 months for park turf hunting in my area. I've been real successful with this setup. Different size coils will react differently with the same sensitivity/gain adjustments, so adjust accordingly. Smaller coils = higher sensitivities....larger coils = lower sensitivities.

HH,
CAPTN SE
Dan
 

Born2Dtect

Bronze Member
Jun 11, 2004
1,683
68
Hurlock, Maryland
Detector(s) used
XP Deus, Excalibur II
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
A word abuot "GAIN". Some are confused about the Minelab EXP II "Gain" setting". The "Gain" setting refers to the setting of Volume. The max limit sets the over loudness (DB). The Gain refers to the target signal strength that will give you the max limit volume. See page 53, 53 and figures 5-16 and 5-17 in the EXP II manual. This is the same for EXP-SE. A setting of 1 for gain give a max volume level at the strongest signal level. The advantage of a a lower setting say around 5 gain, would be a louder signal for weak and meium siganls as you would expext from deeper targets.

My point: this gain setting does not directly effect the sensitivty or everall stability, only how strong a signal is needed to achive the max limit set for the volume settings.

Ed D.
 

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