x50 ghost targets?

[kybowhunter]

Ok... first real outing yesterday w/ the x50

first two targets went great , pinpoint was excellent... then

I'd get a faint 45, but said it was deep so I'd dig and take off 2/3 inches of dirt, rescan and no signal - double check and bam no signal, nothing... i turned down sens to 12 and had a few more ghost signals...

the area i'm searching is pretty trashy ... any ideas what's going on or how to correct?

also, how do i dig up a square nail that read 21 shouldn't that be -x ??

 

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[neilo]

The machine might be telling you there is a target there but it cant recognise it.Then you dig some dirt out and the machine recognises it as rubbish and blanks it out. Are you sure the nail isnt galvanised, zinc plated or copper these will give signals in the good range.
You say you are detecting in an area with a lot of trash.If you have a good target and a discriminated rubbish target both under your coil at the same time the good target will be blanked out.Have you got your ground balance set correctly? this will give you false signals if not set correctly.If you are in highly mineralised ground try lifting your coil a couple of inches off of the ground and swing very slowly maintaining even height off of the ground, dont swing in a u shape you will get false signals at the end of you swing if you do.
Generally speaking the number I D on most detectors are affected by mineralised ground and in some circumstances the numbers shown are wrong especially for deep targets.The target tone is generally a better more accurate indicator. In time you will know what tones to listen for for your good targets, and learn not to rely too much on the numbers shown. Dig every target regardless and you will soon learn what to listen for. Good luck hope you find plenty seeya Neilo

 

[TomNWMI]

Any time you get targets that read in the 40's you need to switch to all metal and check for iron signals. Iron at depth that reads solid 40's will almost always give a low tone and minus numbers when swept off center in all metal.

Tom

 

[newtocoinhunting]

I'd get a faint 45, but said it was deep so I'd dig and take off 2/3 inches of dirt, rescan and no signal - double check and bam no signal, nothing... i turned down sens to 12 and had a few more ghost signals...

I would recommend that you consider turning down the sensitivity further and re-scan the ground where you received the false signals. If you would like to test that recommendation, after noting what the X-Terra 50 is telling you is there, mark off the section you scanned, dig down 12 inches and verify that the targets reported are there.

I've performed this sort of a test a few times at old farm sites with high iron trash content and the "42" and "45" false target readings I was receiving with sens set at 12 changed into the -3 and -6 correct target readings with sens set closer to 6.

Just food for thought. As with every settings recommendation you will receive, your actual mileage may vary.
-Doug.