New Deus XP just came in

[JVA5th]

This may sound odd, but I think shorter folks (like me) may do better initially detecting. Here is the reason. If you are 6' tall versus say 5'4", like me, before I started shrinking due to age, you cover more ground per stride. That being said, if you walk at a "normal" pace, the coil will operate in a "Z" pattern. All that white space in the "Z" will not be detected. So...the fix is to take baby steps and do a pattern like this - _________. No space between the coil. Miss it by an inch, miss it by a mile. Walk with small steps and move the coil slowly. Listen for deep chirps that if you stop, will repeat themselves. I found a 17th century inch and a half long buckle down almost 11" in a pounded site doing that. And silver quarters down 10" or more, no biggie doing this.

I'm still going to turn the tone volume up to be able to hear those deeper chirps easier

 

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[signal_line]

Many people have the all-metal phobia. As one author says, he makes most of his good finds by going in after other detectors and running in all-metal. Surprisingly many of his finds are not deep at all, just missed by the discriminator circuit. Of course you don't want to learn this is high trash. You want to listen for the short, sharp, signals with the Zip Zip. Some people use IAR at "5". This is going to reduce depth but sometimes you have no choice. May make it easy to start with.

 

[pepperj]

Good point on the UK videos. Their soil is vastly different from what's here with a lot of the south of England being sedimentary.

Done 8 trips over and will round it off at 900-100hrs of digging time total.
Probably could come up with a pretty good # if I reread the daily diaries on my hunting trips.

But I have found heavy clay is heavy clay, sandy loamy soils are similar also.
Though what works is that a lot of the fields are still turned over there every 5 yrs or so.
No till here is a tickle of the top few inches and at most a discing it seems.
In the northern dirt we have the chance of frost moving the soils around some so returning to a site after a few years still brings around a target or two.

Deus fast-still means swinging the coil slow if the area is saturated with targets.
Even out on the fringes of the site in the wide open field I can swing faster and hear the slightest of a chirp, stop, rescan the spot and I'm surprised at the increased sound/ID of the target.

Seriously every site usually has small brass targets, bits of harmonica reeds, .22 cal. short/long, bits and bobs of things that are smaller than a dime, if I am not digging small then I correct my speed to start digging small.
Even after swinging for 5 decades I get carried away with the need to cover it all quickly, which is ok for cherry picking, seeing the parameters of the actual site.

I tend to think you have hit the nail on the head being tall/short Smokey. Being 6'3" me legs can stride a whole lot, but I have that thing of coil scraping or just touching, parallel to the soils, (not heel touching-or what a dragster is doing in the 1/4 mile takeoff), OVERLAP!OVERLAP!OVERLAP! the coil swing. Many yrs of trying to perfect these simple over looked facts will miss targets. 1"=missed something.

Bad habits: Get signal dig set detector down, coil 'shaft bolt a tad loose coil adjusts angle, start detecting, coil doing the 1/4 miler=missed something.
Get up start detecting just ahead of where I stopped=missed again.
Gridding-get to the turn around and start the next row=missed part of the corner=missed another one.

No wonder there are so many targets in a hard hit site.
Seen it on trips where the question would be asked or person stated that there was only a few pieces of lead in a field-it sucked.
Walked onto it and found that there was a fair site just over a tad, could have hit with a rock throw...
That's what I love about this hobby is the getting the missed ones.
Then again I have walked through a large field and found it so quiet it sucked my brains out, arm just a burning from swinging and not digging.
Yet later on many Celtic golds were recovered off the same dirt....1" might as well be 1 acre.....Missed them all.
It's the pace not the race that scratches the itch many times.

 

[Quake]

Setup a test garden till you get use to it.

 

[billb]

JVA5th. Congratulations on your new detector.I look forward also to the learning challenge of the Deus when I also get one

 

[pepperj]

Setup a test garden till you get use to it.

I'm not knocking the idea-but it's something that I have never done. Thought of burying my finds again kind of strikes me as odd. Then again maybe I should make one just to hear or see what it produces, then again it seems like work, maybe I should just go dig something instead.

 

[vferrari]

I'm not knocking the idea-but it's something that I have never done. Thought of burying my finds again kind of strikes me as odd. Then again maybe I should make one just to hear or see what it produces, then again it seems like work, maybe I should just go dig something instead.

It's good you never needed one. If someone is really struggling with a new detector that has audio that is really like learning a new language it is a great tool and I highly suggest it. No need to even bury the targets if you are needing to simply hear the audio rather than testing depth. I use air hockey pucks to cover the targets on the grass so I am not influenced by the visual of the target and makes for easy target retrieval after test. I have a buried test garden to test various detector settings and for detector comparisons even though I can pick up practically any detector at this point and find something with it without even looking at a manual. It takes some patience and a little self control when you are really itching to get out there and swing a new toy, but I think it is well spent rather than swinging for an hour in total frustration as the OP posted above.

 

[pepperj]

It's good you never needed one. If someone is really struggling with a new detector that has audio that is really like learning a new language it is a great tool and I highly suggest it. No need to even bury the targets if you are needing to simply hear the audio rather than testing depth. I use air hockey pucks to cover the targets on the grass so I am not influenced by the visual of the target and makes for easy target retrieval after test. I have a buried test garden to test various detector settings and for detector comparisons even though I can pick up practically any detector at this point and find something with it without even looking at a manual. It takes some patience and a little self control when you are really itching to get out there and swing a new toy, but I think it is well spent rather than swinging for an hour in total frustration as the OP posted above.

Oh not that I haven't thought about it a few times, just too lazy to do it. So I just dig and dig, school of hard knocks.
Crazy how easy it is to get un-use to a detector also. Been running the ETrac for the last couple of months and got right back into the unit.
Got the Deus back-went back to the field I got a few good targets earlier in the week with the Deus-squat/diddly/zippo for any keepers, just the usual small bits of brass.
Have to retrain the brain somewhat again it seems....

 

[smokeythecat]

I was also too lazy to plant a test garden at my house. The one time I did I lost a couple new cents. Never did find them. Must not have done it right.

 

[GeoW]

Can't find it all