Having detected and retrieved aluminum cans at approx 3 feet with stock Excalibur ll 1000 and a pioneer 505 vlf detector, both in discrimination mode, I suspect that it may be possible to detect that deep on large oversize targets digging the iffiest of signals, as detector's responses is calibrated against a standard size target such as a US quarter. Included below is a post on a disputed find of Silver Bar treasure in Mexico at six feet with a CTX 3030, a more sensitive and selective detector than the Excalibur with advanced discrimination capabilities. Please note: When it comes to diving and shallow water hunting, I prefer and use the more rugged knob and switch detector any day!
"Is Minelab’s CTX-3030 Mexico Cache of Silver Bars a Hoax?"
A testimonial titled “Minelab CTX 3030 unearths major treasure in Mexico” posted on Minelab’s official website and in there March 2014 newsletter, reports of a very large cache of silver bars reportedly worth over $100,000. (Thats with Silver @$21ozt. at the time of reporting, so that’s comes to about 4,700ozt or 325lb of silver!) It reportedly was found by there new flagship detector, The Minelab CTX-3030. The story as it was told, while very light on information is still a wonderful one and is the type of find every treasure hunter hopes to have one day. But to be honest the entire thing comes off as a little sketchy. First off the silver was supposedly found at…wow 6 FEET DEEP! This was not a 2-Box detector or even a Pulse Induction machine it was just the CTX 3030 a full band spectrum detector. Do you really think a non specialized detector even one as good as this top dog from Minelab will hit a target that deep? Even with a 4ft coil I doubt the CTX will pick up a truck in an air test at that range.
Secondly the lack of information on the find smells fishy, there have been no other reports on the internet of this find other then by Minelab and what was re-posted from Minelabs original story (if you know some independent corroboration of this story please post below)The lack of any information or “glory seeking” by the finder could be put down to not wanting to deal the legality of the find, or with the treasure laws of Mexico however if that were the case, then why contact Minelab at all? Unless you did it anomalously, and if that is case I hope Minelab would not post such an article with no supporting information.
My last issue with there story is the picture of the “cache”, now the sliver does look like it could be 4,700ozts if each of the bars are in the100ozt range, but what really has me concerned the CTX in the picture.. Now we all know that no matter how well we take care of out detectors they just don’t stay clean and pretty even on a nice day in a park or playground they get dirty and grimy real fast, but the detector in the picture looks right out of the box and showroom fresh definitely not like it has been working in the hot Mexico desert, down in a 6 ft deep hole. Now I love Minelab and I am not bashing the CTX I think its a great Detector, but this report does not come off as sounding true, and I am not going to come out and say that Minlab just planted this story or published something they knew to be false just to increase sales. If this does turn out to not be the real deal,then I am just going to hope that that Minelab was duped by a hoaxer and let something slip threw there editorial process that shouldn’t have, and there was nothing nefarious a foot. Then again…. on the flip side this may all be true, and what a wonderful find it was, if so I hope that lucky treasure hunter all the best, as they sit on some southern Mexico beach sipping Margaritas and watching with a smile as some tourist with a sun burn and sand scoop is pulling clad and bottle caps out of the beach
with
....."below" = lower on the beach, not depth.
