Just Got A Golden uMax...

Smudge

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Location
Central Florida
Detector(s) used
A Propointer tied to a stick
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
...and I am amazed!

You guys know I've been swinging the Compadre over a year now and have owned several other detectors (and sold them all), but it is possible, just possible mind you, that I may have finally found the Compadre's replacement for my regular use. Shocking, but true. :laughing7:

I know, its normal to gush over a new detector, but I really think the Golden deserves it. I was debating between it and the AT Pro and had a chance to play around with both. Now that I have had a chance to really work with it at home, I'm glad I bought the Golden (not knocking the ATP at all, it came in a close second!).

This notching discrimination is incredible and my compliments to the Tesoro design team that came out with it. :icon_thumleft:

Before I attached the coil to the shaft, I set it on my desk propped up with a couple of towels and got a bunch of targets I keep for air testing.

This included clad and silver coins of most denominations, a Chuck-e-Cheeze token, costume jewelry, a silver charm (3.2 grams), a small 14k band (2.4 grams), a mens 10k ring (5.8 grams), a large 14k ring (7.3 grams), a Tungsten Carbide ring (11.4 grams), and an assortment of pull tabs, screw caps, and bottle caps, and of course, a rusty nail.

I spent a couple of hours playing with the notching and trying to get used to the tones. The low and high tones are easy enough, but the two middle ones are very similar and I can't tell them apart yet. But it doesn't matter really. Once you set your notching, you will dig every repeatable signal regardless.

I was impressed with the Golden's range when air testing and am anxious to try it in the ground. And like most Tesoro's, it's so light weight its ridiculous (and runs on just one 9 volt battery). I think I'll be adding the Clean Sweep coil and a small coil very soon!

Just to give you idea of what this machine is capable of, I believe I have found my sweet spot for the notch setting, at least for now. This is with the factory recommended discrimination in place (at the arrow mark) and a Sensitivity setting of about 8.

With its present setting, the rusty nail is gone (that was easiest). The costume jewelry is gone. The zinc pennies are gone (that was one thing I didn't want to lose, but so be it). Incredibly, the Tungsten Carbide ring is also gone.

The pull tab is gone. Completely. Amazing. But the beaver tail pull tab still rings out loud and clear. There is no way to get rid of those things unless you really crank up the discrimination, and I don't want to do that. Bottle caps have been reduced to an easily recognized chirpy, broken tone. Most screw caps have been eliminated, though a couple, depending on their metal composition, ring out loud and true. So the only junk still coming through on these air tests were the beaver tails and some of the screw caps with the bottle caps being easily recognized by their lousy signal. Wow!

And what remains in? Copper pennies, clad and silver nickels, clad and silver dimes, clad and silver quarters, and clad and silver half dollars (don't have any dollar pieces to test right now). What also remained is the silver charm and all, yes, all of the gold rings in my test, from 2.4 to 7.3 grams! Even the small gold band rings loud and clear. And the pull tabs doesn't make a sound, mind you. ;D

Incredibly, I'm told the Golden is Tesoro's weakest selling model. I cannot imagine why.

Don't let the notch discrimination worry you, it is simple to grasp once you play with it a bit!

I'll let you know how the field tests go. I have to admit, I'm pretty excited to try it out.
 

As a tone machine i will say the golden is one of the most accurate in my book i just wish at the time it was a little deeper but then i had the older version and i can tell you too it did not like the 12 x 10 coil at all it even rearranged the tones on targets but i did have better success using the brown donut on it! :icon_thumright:
 

Smudge .... Let us know what kind of depth you get on the golden .... And how it handles different coils........... Vaq44.... said the older ones were not deep and did not like different coils................. I hope it works out good for you i have been thinking about a Tesoro ...But what model i don't know yet.........
 

I've also talked with those who owned the Golden, sold it, and....regretted selling it! I love my Vaquero and won't be selling it for any reason. I used to own a 64 and then a 67 Ford Econoline Van and miss them both TERRIBLY! Was just too hard finding parts for them.
 

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I liked the Ford van and sitting up front was a real treat. Not good in a head on crash, but we're not suppossed to crash. Lots better than my old VW van.
 

Well, had my first hunt in with it for a couple of hours and I have to revise one thing: I said in my air test that all pull tabs were knocked out (except for beaver tails). Well, yours truly forgot a cardinal rule: never assume all pull tabs are the same.

The second target I dug was a pull tab that was nearly impossible to knock out. But I will say this, the Golden still eliminated A LOT of junk. I dug far less trash than I normally do.

I also noticed that deep large metal, like piping, tends to sound off like a coin. So I'm learning to expend my coil sweep and if the signal continues, I'm learning to ignore that particular high tone.

The Golden is going to take some time to learn, but I'm loving the process.

Hello Keppy. Can't tell you much about depth as most of my targets were 4" or less. Not overly interested in great depth because I've noticed most of targets, even really old ones, are 6" or less. And I believe the 9x8 standard coil on the Golden will easily hit that mark.
 

I have also been interested in the Golden for a while. And I don't always care to dig down a foot for a rusted can. I'll always keep the Tejon for the isolated or farm field sites, but in town, I would prefer an option. Please keep posting your Golden impressions\experiences.
 

smudge, if it helps at all when i had mine when you get a rolling tone 90% of time it will be junk or some deformed peice of metal its the solid tone that you want to dig for sure if its stays high and rolling to next tone down and slightly broke up, long and thin could be silver chain necklace i got one one time out a ski area parking lot this way ok good luck on the golden :icon_thumright:
 

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