If you were to look at the short 15 yr. period from .... say .... the very early 1970s, to the mid 1980s, you would see LIGHT-YEARS of advancements. The early 1970s saw companies still selling, and people still using BFO's for instance. A mere few inches in depth, poor in minerals, no disc, etc.. Or they were selling and using all-metal TRs (66TR, 77b, etc...). Poor in minerals, no disc (barring small iron), poor depth, etc...
But then just a few years later, by the mid 1970s, TR discriminators came out, and everyone cheered that they could effortlessly pass foil and tabs in the junky parks! woohoo! Also VLF disc. came out, and now you could effortlessly reach super depths (without any form of disc. however).
Then just a few years later, by the late 1970s, vlf disc. came out, and now you immediately gained several inches in disc. mode (verses the earlier TR disc). woohoo!
By the early '80s, the sweep speed was being slowed waaaayyy down, and TID was starting to be seen on all the brands, and depth was increasing. Wooohoo!
So you see, a person at any time in that 15 yrs, who had a machine that was only 3 or 4 years old, had a DINASOUR!! And believe me, the results were easy to see: your friends would leave you
WAY behind in target and goodie counts
But contrast all those new innovations, with the LAST 15 yrs, and you will see that the only thing that's been added, has been whistles and bells it seems. All I can figure is that a ceiling has been hit. The technology known has been exploited to its max, and no new technology has been discovered. Like, perhaps science just doesn't allow more depth, or allow composition to be known (verses conductivity). The physical laws might not allow for any more. Just like computer speed, and chip storage space: there comes a time where laws of physics just don't allow for any faster, or more, or whatever. I don't think price has anything to do with it, as there are MANY of us who would pay 10's of thousands if we thought there were a machine that could tell, for example, aluminum from gold (and not just conductivity as it is currently).
There is technology that can tell aluminum from gold BTW: Westinghouse, for example, developed a system of bombarding an object with radiation or whatever, that would tell the exact composition of the item/target. So for example, they aim the machine at a refrigerator sized item filled with contaminents, pollutants, or whatever, and it will read back to you the exact composition (xx parts this, xx parts that, etc... Kind of like a star-trek tricorder, eh?). I spoke to one of the lead engineers who worked on this project (an item for the military), and he told me, in response to my asking him if such a machine could tell a pulltab from a gold ring (assuming they had the exact same TID conductivity). He said that yes, it would certainly tell 100% aluminum verses gold, etc... The problem is, it cost multiple millions of dollars (at this time 15 or so years ago when we talked), and you had to wear a lead suit to operate this bobcat tractor sized machine. Add to that all the governmental emissions controls, FCC stuff, blah blah blah, and you could see that it is not practical one bit.
I've got an etrac and have well over 2,000 hours on it. If I'm in a spot that is turning up good targets and I think Ive thoroughly gridded the spot. I'll go over it again with different machines. One of which is my old Minelab and I'll find things I missed with the Etrac. Good stuff! I'll think to myself "how the heck did I miss that?" So, I know I am not "wrong" But, if you want to buy one I'll be glad to sell you one. Just saying.
