Re: 4' 11" and need a light weight MD...suggestions?
SC, here is (part) of what I know about Garretts;
The Infinium is the best PI on the market, bar none.
The Aces,, ALL of them, from the 100 to the 550's are NOT designed for bad soil, they are designed (by Garrett, by virtue of their need to reach a more profitable market) to be sold (and used) in western Europe and the deep south and east coast of the USA. Those two markets far overpower the smaller market here from the Great Divide, and westward.
Most White's are the same, with exceptions, just as with the Garretts. The Minelabs are mostly designed for beach hunting, and most people know that too. Tesoros are the best all-around detectors to work well in a very wide variety of soil conditions, and Fishers (usually) get the deepest depth in highly mineralized soils. This is not my opinion, they just do..
By virtue of Garretts own admission, the 1250, 1350, 1500, and 2500 are all being upgraded with an add-on chip to be able to handle bad soil better, but still are a bit lacking and feeble in that regard. This is not my "opinion", and in fact Garrett now installs the upgrade in a small chip in their newer VLF's in order to help with this problem somewhat. You can get the upgrade if you send your detector to them. This is no joke.
The Garrett GoldStinger is a real HONEY, a bit troublesome for some to handle, but one of the only two detectors made that I would buy new for hunting nuggetts. It has such an unbelieveably sweet ground balance that it amazes me. It will work ANYWHERE ON THE PLANET, something that few other detectors will do. And it's an excellent coin-hunter too, in mild soil.
The original Garrett Deepseeker and the Fisher 400 and 500 series detectors were the deepests VLF detectors ever made, with the Garrett having a slight edge in cherry-picking and the Fisher a slight edge in depth. I used to commonly find old rusty pennies at 12-14" in extreme black sand/salt soil on Washington State beaches with the original Garrett DeepSeeker, something that no other detector has allowed me to do, to date. Ask Joe (the dealer) if he gets that depth with his 550d, and you get a real education about the old Fishers, they really were a super-deep workhorse .
Now you know exactly what I know about Garrett detectors, and as to how I feel about them? I don't. I don't have any opinions on anything, I just deal with the facts, nothing more. In the facts, I also include a vast array of electrical and electronics experiences too, when I make a statement.
As far as running down a detector, I only tell things like they are, nothing more. The Aces are not well-designed for hard or high magnetite or high sodium, or high black sand soil, and that is the truth, not my opinion. It's just the way it is.
The Ace 250 I had? I gave it to my daughter. She lives in the State of Washington, and it doesn't work well there either. I seldom see another Garrett around here any more, it's because they can't handle the soil.
Oh, one other thing. On an enormous battery of tests done on dozens of detectors, the Garrett 2000 and 2500, Compass GoldScanner Pro /Relic & Coin, and Compass x-200/x-100 were found to have the VERY DEEPEST all-metal AND discriminate depth of ALL current vlf and multi--freq detectors tested, including Minelabs, Fisher 1270's, and Red Heats. This of course was done in mild soil, not high iron soil.
If you want the site, I can get one of them to you. Not sure about the other one.
