Impact impressions?

[Dawgs241]

Greetings all,

I am getting back into MDing after being gone awhile. I had sold all my previous equipment to pay some medical bills but now I am back on my feet I am ready to get back into it. I had planned on getting a T2, F75 or AT Max but I have been looking at some of this new tech coming out with the Impact, Kruzer, minelab equinox...etc. The Deus looks great, but I want to keep it under 1K. I am interested in the Impact, can anyone give feedback on this unit. I read mostly positive stuff on it so far. I am in Louisiana and will be doing mostly relic and coin shooting. I am trying to make a list of detectors before I pull the trigger.

Thanks All

 

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[chub]

Its a little heavier than the kruzer and equinox. Its not waterporoof and with the sliding shaft I dont know how backpack friendly it is. In my opinion the equinox appears to be more versatile (but its early days). Im not sure what the impact can do that the kruzer cant do?

Rather wait for a bit until some head to head videos come out. Has there even been a kruzer vs impact video?

Chub

 

[Dr. Witty]

I second Chub, these are interesting times. Wait and see if you can what the new breed of detectors will bring. I would at least choose the Kruzer over the Impact since its waterproof, lighter comes standard with Wireless headphones and has a bunch of new features. The Equinox is also something worth looking into for these same reasons and more. Both units will need some further reviews before an informed decision can be made. Good luck on whatever you choose.

 

[Dawgs241]

Watching the videos and reading the manual on the Impact, I feel like im learning to fly the Space Shuttle. Its very intimidating to a new user. Maybe having and operating it is not too bad. Im diffidently going to wait, hopefully by April we will know more about Kruzer and Equinox. Im being patient, but im detector-less. I just got some good permissions and club hunts about to start and its hard not having a detector. I feel like im back in High School without a date to the prom.

 

[chub]

I believe the kruzer is more simple than the impact. I know someone who has both.The Impact isnt being used anymore... On paper the impact has more modes etc but in real life hunting I cant think of a reason to choose it over the kruzer?

Chub

 

[Ammoman]

I have my eye on the new kruzer simply because its water proof. I am also looking at the Equinox for the same reason. The impact is very easy to operate and is very well balanced allowing me to swing all day with no problems. I hear the Kruzer is lighter and is also well balanced but the Equinox is nose heavy which is a problem for me. Another thing i heard on another thread was the equinox may not be a serviceable machine. If this turns out to be true, its a deal breaker.

 

[3cylbill]

who would make a detector thats not serviceable....?

 

[Ammoman]

Minelab...from what i remember, it had something to do with it being waterproof and the box would not be able to be opened. if a person had warranty issues minelab would just replace the detector during the warranty period...after that just throw it away. I am looking for the thread now and it looks like it has been removed.

 

[Dr. Witty]

Well the Kruzer also has lipo battery that you can't change out, but it also has an optional waterproof battery Pod if your lipo runs out while detecting. Both Detectors can be powered off a battery bank as well, but it looks like the Kruzer has a leg up as far as battery options are concerned. I myself am leaning towards the Kruzer for my next detector, unless some outstanding discoveries come about regarding simultaneous multi frequency but I haven't seen anything yet on that front, still it's too early to tell. I have a Racer 2 now which I love, its found me many deep silver coins as well as small gold. The only thing that's missing from it is being waterproof and that's a big thing in my book as I hate rain covers. I'm not sure about what the other frequencies 5 and 19 khz will bring to the table that 14khz wont do, i havent really gotten a good idea about that yet. To be perfectly honest, I am a big fan of Makro, they have fantastic products, are constantly innovating and their customer service is outstanding. They are a constant presence on the forums too, if you pose a question to them they will answer it. Sorry to gush, but they have sold me on their products. I eagerly await the first North American reviews.

 

[Timecop67]

The Kruzer seems like a very good value for the money with the wireless headphones and charger which Minelab does not include. I see the Kruzer as a good freshwater and land unit.... Minelab may edge the Kruzer with it's multifrequency in Saltwater but the Kruzer may also do well. Minelab units have never been well balanced in field use and from the Equinox videos I don't like the ID scale or tonal ranges of the detector..... like the screen layout of the Kruzer and Impact better but haven't tried one in person have just watched the videos.

 

[chub]

+1 on the strange equinox vdi scale? Makro and Nokta are very well thought out. The garret sea hunter is also not really servicable (except for the battery) so I think underwater machines are generally less servicable by nature (for reliability).Is there a difference in weight between the multi kruzer and single kruzer?

Chub

 

[Timecop67]

+1 on the strange equinox vdi scale? Makro and Nokta are very well thought out. The garret sea hunter is also not really servicable (except for the battery) so I think underwater machines are generally less servicable by nature (for reliability).Is there a difference in weight between the multi kruzer and single kruzer?

Chub

Looks like both are 2.9lbs in weight. I would probably use 14khz the most but would be nice to have the 19khz for small jewelry items or those iron nail infested areas. But right now can't decide.

If the Teknetics 3 is around the corner I might wait a little while on the purchase. Build quality: I'm guessing Makro is a little more solid.....but warranty at First Texas is at 5 years instead of 2.

 

[chub]

What is the teknetics 3?

Chub

 

[Timecop67]

What is the teknetics 3?

Chub

A replacement for the T2. Not sure what new technologies they may put into the T3. I think First Texas has some PI patents but not sure if they will be included in the new line.....will have to wait and see...maybe this spring or summer hopefully.

 

[Dr. Witty]

The Kruzer seems like a very good value for the money with the wireless headphones and charger which Minelab does not include. I see the Kruzer as a good freshwater and land unit.... Minelab may edge the Kruzer with it's multifrequency in Saltwater but the Kruzer may also do well. Minelab units have never been well balanced in field use and from the Equinox videos I don't like the ID scale or tonal ranges of the detector..... like the screen layout of the Kruzer and Impact better but haven't tried one in person have just watched the videos.

Having the headphones included is a big plus since to buy them afterwards would cost you 119 dollars. That's what i did for my Racer 2. They are simple headphones but well built, very light and comfortable. I forget i'm wearing them until a tree branch tries to snatch them off my head. I don't know how long the charge lasts since i recharge them often. Mine are the older first generation 2.4 ghz set, but I heard that the new blue series has an audio feature that tells you how much charge you have left which my set doesn't have. The Racer 2 is supposed to be fantastic in Salt water so i'm not convinced that the Equinox will edge the Kruzer out in it even with its multi frequency mode in the salt water, I have never used my Racer in salt water so I couldn't tell you, but i have seen many videos of its performance in it with the Black sand so I'm sure the Kruzer will be at least as good if not better than the Racer2 in that respect.

 

[Timecop67]

On the pinpointing mode of the Kruzer I wonder if it allows for detuning of the audio to narrow the signal? Looks like the Equinox has VCO pinpointing so harder to locate object in the videos I've watched. It looks like the Kruzer has similar but videos don't show it closely. On the detectors I'm used (Teknetics 8500) Tesoro models, I didn't have to use a secondary pinpointer and just narrowed signal to a fine point for easy target locating.

 

[Ballarat Bitter]

I bought the Impact in May 2017 after seeing the Racer 2 on You tube and thought the Impact would be better as it was the latest technology. I bought it for gold prospecting in the Golden Triangle in Victoria as I was used to VLF machines having owned a Whites with 16 inch coil for many years and found reasonable nuggets of 2 to 3 oz and some littlies of a quarter to half an ounce.
First and what has never been mentioned on any forum the Impact can easily handle very high levels of mineralisation without changing any of the settings in the 20 Khz frequency. My favourite mode is DEEP as it will go much deeper than GEN or all metal mode,at least twice as deep but the tone break has to be adjusted to 20 to mask rusted iron as normally it will give a high signal same as gold. DEEP becomes sluggish at 90% on the min.meter supplied,but is ok at 80%.At 90% I found the strongest and most stable signal for gold was the DI3 mode. GEN mode is very good at picking up small gold down to 0.1 gram in weight at more shallow depths and in GEN you can use tracking mode without having to ground balance every 10 minutes. Occasionally i can encounter an extreme patch of mineralisation of 100% and COG mode can be used for that but it is more limited in depth.
The Multi Kruzer is more lighter and waterproof.It seems to have lightning fast recovery on multiple targets.It is a more simplified approach than the Impact and has 6 modes as against the 12 for the Impact.Impact has discrimination in the GEN mode and will give a low tone for hot rocks and a high tone for gold on a 01 setting.