Just Bought (real cheap) Minelab Eureka Gold.......... Help

[nuggy]

Hi all, been wanting a gold detector for a while - was pretty much going to get a Gold Bug Pro (when I got the money together) ------- and then............. along came a bargain.......... 2 years old - never been used Eureka............... I was caught at a weak moment - it was way less than half new price - it's in "as new" condition. A cupboard detector.

Well, I was offered it - I had to make up my mind quickly, So I bought it, I thought........ I can use it for the summer - if I don't get on with it........ Sell it, should be easy to get my money back

I know it's no competition to minelabs PI machines, but it didn't cost anywhere near that sort of money.

Is this detector just no good? I don't mind spending the time to learn quirks, but would like to think it will work ok for me. It has some good features, and on paper it should be a pretty good machine - BUT?

So I've read the threads, mostly I've seen negative comments, but has anyone out there used one in the field, nugget hunting - really got to know it - and can pass on some tips?

 

[XT18000]

you will get some feed back about how bad the Eureka is but if you give it half a chance
( you taking the time to learn it ) you will find that it is a good detector. Go to you tube
and do a search for the one on it ( this is a test video put out by MineLab I believe ) that
has all the information you should need on it. The one thing you might want to add is
an AMP or a set of Black Widows. I have and use a XT18000 ( the model that the Eureka
replaced ) along with a few others and if I am going to the gold fields it go's along as not
only as a backup but as a scouting the area out machine. This ( the Eureka ) machine
is and was designed for hunting gold ( small and near surface ( to say maybe 9" ) ) nuggets
and flakes. It is not as good as the GB2 but is close. It was never meant to be used as a
coin machine but will find it's share if you learn how to use it. You can get several larger
coils for it ( 11" dd from MineLab and a 15"dd from Coil teck ) if you want more depth
than what the 5x10" gives. If you go that route you will find that you will want to hip
mount it ( I hip mount mine all the time for comfort ).
XT

 

[nuggy]

Hi XT, yes I found the video thanks. Some very useful tips in there for sure. Good explanation of how to get the most from the sensitivity control - and the tone control was well explained as well. None of these finer points were covered in the manual.

I actually like the idea of the three detection frequencies, I will be tempted to hunt the best looking ground in all three. Better coverage always gave me better results in the past, going over the same ground 3 times sounds like extra work, but it should improve results.

I had a Gold Bug 2 ten years ago, but the constant ground balancing annoyed the h3ll out of me. My Bounty hunter tracker four is more pleasant to use. Gotta love that auto ground balance. Just a few pumps and it's away again!
Nuggy

 

[Gravel Hog]

Good deal, nuggy. You can never have too many gold getting tools at your dispense, trust me.

I really do like this new Gold Bug Pro, very much.

 

[patches63]

learn your machine,did you get the manual with it?3 frqs on those i think.higher freqs more sensitive to flyspecks.probly info over at golddetecting.4umer.aussies mostly,different ground yea,but lots of good reading.equipment info.camping section bears a look 2.dont dis a top vlf.if only still had my gmt or earliers,that would be the one 4 me.must have confidence in your machine.folks jumping straight into a pi,digging involved,does not seem hobbyish attall.about 30 holes,thinkin about the truck myself,an im fairly athletic.pi means big digger on off shoulder,wires,web gear,digging thus attired comes at a cost.depth ie spendy.

 

[nuggy]

Hi G. H, yep it was a great buy, for sure. Am finding out that there are people out there that like them too! Found some more positive reviews on google.
It is another tool in the arsenal. LOL - if you could see the arsenal ha ha it's getting bigger alright. Am taking some days off to get out gold chasing, it's our summer now and while today and tomorrow are full Sunday on gives me some days to play. Have a great 2011

Hi Patches, I will look at the Aussie forums which I haven't found yet. Yes as always with a detector there is that learning curve, fully expect that to take some time. Read the manual twice so far, more to come ........ Hey I only got it yesterday!
Not sure about all the webbing and truckload of gear but I try to keep to a small pack of necessarys and my homemade pick - otherwise I get too dang hot humping unnecessary gear around. Have a happy 2011
Nuggy

 

[kiwi jw]

G'day Nuggy....Happy New Year to you & all. Sounds like a good score you got there. I have read many a negative report as well on the Eureka too. I think they were just too impatient to learn it properly & as we know ....a bad tradesman always blames his tools...or something else....or some one else. Human nature I guess. A person that knows their machine inside out is a deadly combination. Good luck & keep us posted on how you do. By the way, not sure if I have asked you this before....but do you know anything about DOC (Department of Conservation) pulling the bridge out of the Moonlight...& if they are going to reinstate it? I bloody hope they are going to but from what I heard before they actually did pull it out was a big NO. As they dont want people going in there. What a bunch of tossers. Good old Government department aye. Lets just take something away from the tax paying public (who fund DOC) so they cant enjoy a bit of recreational gold fossicking & camping activity in their leisure.

Happy hunting

JW

 

[nuggy]

Hiya J.W, happy noo year to ya.
Yeah I've had a wee play with the new machine and it's a bit like a border collie - clever and willing to work, but sensitive as all hell..............
The controls are not like most detectors I have used, they actually work in quite different ways. If I had not read the manual and watched the video I would be in heaps of bother with it! The volume knob does not change the loudness of a small target - just limits the peak noise of a large one.
Another thing is, the manual has a couple of key points wrong! It says to hunt with sensitivity turned all the way up - but if I do, detector is unstable as hell, hard to tune, and will miss targets too!
The video XT put me onto and another article I googled made me aware of this, and I thought it strange too - after all, if it's always full on why bother with a control at all. I'm having to study up on this machine quite a bit even though I've used many others.
You might have missed what I wrote to you in the NZ hunting thread about the Moonlight bridge etc. (my old stamping ground).
Hope we get a chance to catch up this year, and you keep on getting good results with your gold trips. Nuggy

 

[goldinmyear]

I had to change this material..I was talking on another web page,and for some reason, Quoted it in the wrong place.
Sorry about that..real cheap Detectorest... (what can i say,,,Opps'')
I love that machine, The XT 18000..rocks....very dependable, and so ez to use. THANK GOD'' THERE NOT POPULAR!!!

 

[nuggy]

Hi Goldinmyear, Interesting thought, had a look on the Coiltek and Minelab sites neither list a mono coil for the Eureka as far as I can tell, Minelab doesn't say whether their accessory ones are mono or dd? As you know the standard one is dd.

Will have to ask someone - maybe a dealer about that one, or perhaps there are other sources for coils?

Thanks for your input, Nuggy

 

[Gravel Hog]

Nuggy, sensitivity? sounds like the Fisher GBP it is wicked sensitive but unlike what your saying about the Eureka, it is extremely stable when tuned for the highest sensitivity. Very Impressive for such a low cost unit.
Might want to keep messing around with the settings, ground balance, or try a smaller coil.
I really like this 5"DD it fits the way the GBP works, very well, but would want to try out the 11"DD before I say which I prefer.

Did you find any nugs while you were testing it out
The true test.

 

[nuggy]

Hi G H, No nuggets yet, unfortunately it's been raining whenever I've had free time to get out, we had a six week drought not long before I got the new detector!

So air tests and the back yard is as far as I've gone so far. Funny responses to my little picker in the air tests, not zit zit like the G B 2 and most others, it's a quiet woooo ey ooo oough warbling sound thats strange to me, though I hope to hear it a lot

I like the the shape - size of the standard coil, for the sort of ground I'm going to work it should be ideal. A mono coil is something I would consider though.

Yes I had the feeling the G B Pro would be a good machine. I will give this one a good trial though, if I can get a few fine days.

good luck for 20011. Nuggy

 

[nuggy]

Took the detector out yesterday, the first fine day for a few weeks.... Went with a friend who has just started detecting, to a place he thought would be good. I picked him up at 9am and we drove about ten minutes to a spot near the creek he wanted to check out.
The sky was cloudless and the heat was already building when we arrived. The first few hundred meters went through a series of swampy channels and over a couple of low hills. The ground was rough, and extensive old timer diggings have left it pot holed with piles of spoil all around, the undergrowth was very thick, and each step meant moving a branch or twisting myself around a standing tree. The detector was a hindrance to progress catching on branches and vines and needing constant turning to keep it from jamming between trees. When at last we got to the creek, I was as saturated with sweat as if I had just got out of a shower.
The creek it'self was not what I had hoped for, where I had been told there was a lot of exposed bedrock there was very little, and the water was deeper than my friend remembered. Going upstream we had to constantly leave the stream bed and climb back into the jungle like growth we had come through, to get around the deeper holes. After what seemed a long time, he said we had gone further than he had ever been before, and conditions were unlikely to improve. We had a bit of a detect here and there in the creek - finding a couple of spent bullets, a large rusty bolt and an unidentified signal that came up as iron on his Explorer 2 but kept disappearing further into a pile of loose rocks in the water, more each time they were moved.
At this point I'd had enough of the creek, and suggested we relic hunt among the old diggings where it was clearest.
This we did for a couple of hours until the time of our departure arrived. Many of our signals were not dug as thick tree roots prevented digging down to them. The first signal I managed to unearth was an old shovel head, rotten with rust. I have not got my head around the discrimination on my Eureka yet, and the targets I located were all rusted lumps of iron. The Explorer was very good at letting us know the depth and if it was likely to be ferrous metal, they are pretty good for relics. The heat had only got worse and the humidity was pretty high too. I had promised the other half to mow the lawn that day so we struggled our way back to the road.
I thought I would include this sorry episode, even though not much gold detecting was done, to let you guys know I'm not just working at home and leaving the new detector in the cupboard. Next time --- we go to a place I pick --- we may go back to that creek, but with the dredge or creviceing - sluicing gear as there is definitely gold still there. Luck to you all, Nuggy

 

[nuggy]

Just got email from Minelab, they say there is no mono coil available for the Eureka, and infer (without actually saying so) that monos won't work on it. So I guess that's that for the mono idea. Nuggy

 

[Lanny in AB]

Hey Nuggy--I enjoyed your little story about your detecting episode. It reminded me of the many crazy things I have gone through to chase the gold, and the many, many times I've been skunked and missed that sassy gold to boot!

I hope you get settled in with that little detector and that you soon get it singing over some sweet pieces of gold.

All the best,

Lanny

 

[goldseeker4000]

Nuggy, hello. I have five friends who have the Eureka Gold and it is a very good detector for gold. A friend of mine finds over 200 pieces of gold with his every year. It is prone to wire problems in the coils. for this reason I ended up buying X-terra 705. A friend of mine sets his threshhold to quite just below where you can hear it, then sets his sensitivity to maximum and hunts in 60 Khz. He does very very well with it set this way. Another friend found a 9 oz. nugget at 18 inches down. It had 6 oz of gold mixed with quartz. If you want to know more about it, I know more.

 

[nuggy]

Hi Goldseeker, Yes I am keen to learn all I can about this machine, pleased to hear someone saying good things about it. I wonder if those coil wiring problems are what has given it such a bad name. I read the thread you wrote in further down the page.
I found a gold in quartz specimen with it a week ago, but the amount of gold in it is quite tiny, and the signal change was very minor, so I was lucky to get it. Hope I don't get any deafer lol. That was only my second trip out with it as I'm having to work - pay bills - do repairs - etc etc, seems like my summer is fast disappearing with not much time spent chasing gold.
Good luck, Nuggy

 

[snakejim]

I had to change this material..I was talking on another web page,and for some reason, Quoted it in the wrong place.
Sorry about that..real cheap Detectorest... (what can i say,,,Opps'')
I love that machine, The XT 18000..rocks....very dependable, and so ez to use. THANK GOD'' THERE NOT POPULAR!!!

I just picked up an XT18000 that is like new. I agree "The XT18000 rocks!" I have had several over the years and I like it better than the Eureka Gold that I just traded off. The Eureka Gold is great, but I favor the XT18000.
Best wishes and best of luck!
RSJ

 

[kurvinipuh]

Minelab Eureka Gold

Nuggy, hello. I have five friends who have the Eureka Gold and it is a very good detector for gold. A friend of mine finds over 200 pieces of gold with his every year. It is prone to wire problems in the coils. for this reason I ended up buying X-terra 705. A friend of mine sets his threshhold to quite just below where you can hear it, then sets his sensitivity to maximum and hunts in 60 Khz. He does very very well with it set this way. Another friend found a 9 oz. nugget at 18 inches down. It had 6 oz of gold mixed with quartz. If you want to know more about it, I know more.

tell me if your friends will be selling Minelab Eureka Gold
I'm ready to buy it because this summer I will go to Russia to collect gold , m-ai-l
kurvinipuh@gmail.com Really need such a device

 

[nuggy]

Interesting that this should surface after a year, as I just a month back sold the Eureka for a nice little profit - and then got a very good deal on the (used) Gold Bug Pro that I wanted in the first place. I got both coils and a Garrett Pro pointer (might find a use for it?) included. Still left enough cash to buy the TDK wireless headphones as recommended by 63Backpacker.
So I have ended up with the unit I wanted just in time for the winter :-( . The least said about my counter productive summer the better - I should have gone gold mining lol.
The Eureka never really appealed, as I couldn't get used to the warbly noises and it just did not quite suit me.
Have not had a chance to more than air test the GB pro yet but I prefer the stable threshold and the zit - zit noise of a detected target. Never had a screen on a detector before though, and this could make relic hunting a hole lot more productive.
Later Nuggy