New Vanquish 540 - Arrived Friday, March 20th - No Iron Bias Issues...

[Diggin' History]

...that I can tell.

I was only able to use in for 40 minutes on Friday but got it out for a couple of hours today. I can tell you that it is going to take a bit of getting used to the detector but, man, what a machine!

I tried every mode and seemed to get similar results. When I got to the Custom Mode, I noticed the settings there were going to be perfect for what I wanted to do today so I selected it and off I went. There is a MASSIVE amount of Iron in one section of my yard so, when I started hearing a Low Iron Tones along with a 20-22 Signal, I dug it.

I have to say I think I got lucky as I hit right in the middle of the Low Tones and dug a 1952D Wheat Penny. A couple of inches to the left was a Tack Nail and off to the upper right was a 8 Penny Nail. I couldn't believe it - I was shaking my head in awe at the amount of Iron that the Vanquish was detecting.

When going through the Preset Modes, NONE of the modes discriminated out trash, foil and such, as the manual said it would. I didn't bother changing any settings because I wanted to see how it did as a Turn-on-and-go machine. Although it was easy to start telling the difference between most of the trash and other metals after a few minutes of use, it still was slightly disappointing but, not disheartening.

I am VERY happy with the Vanquish 540 - I'm sure this is going to make my other machines jealous.

Oh, my wife had gone out of town the weekend I went to pick up my detector and felt bad for me when I couldn't get it. Yup, she ordered one from my favorite Detector Shop in Texas and had it sent to me. I am certain that I am KEEPING this one (Uh, that would be this wife)! [grin]

I plan on doing extensive testing this coming week and will post my findings when complete.

GL & HH.
-DH-

 

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[Diggin' History]

Late afternoon update - Vanquish 540 and Iron Bias Issue

Well... I have to say I'm not too sure if there is actually an Iron Bias Issue, so to speak. I say that because I almost started believing that I had the issue. Here's what I've found out so far...

OK... There's three (3) areas that I have been hunting regularly for as long as I can remember and they are FULL of Iron and Aluminum Cans and other "trashy" targets. I decided to take the Vanquish 540 over to the worst of the bunch and see if I could get good separation as well as find good targets. After 20 minutes or so, things weren't going well. I was digging up everything that hit with a higher than Iron tone and all I could dig up was very small pieces of Iron.

All the signals I dug were bouncing, and solid at times, from -3 to 34 and all but two (2) targets were tiny bits of Iron like you would see on Garden Fencing. The wire measured 2.6 mm in diameter (0.10 inches). One piece was Can Slaw which was tightly crumpled together and came in at 21-22 solid TID and Tone. The other piece was the closed top to an Aluminum Can (the part the "pop top" opens) and it rang in at 17-19. Again solid TID and Tone. I had the 540 in All Metal Mode the majority of the time and Iron Bias was set to Low. I checked a few targets in High Iron Bias and was getting the Low Iron Tone as well as a slightly higher Tone and then a medium Tone when four (4) or more pieces of Iron were close together - I was not able to find a good target when this happened as I only had my Digging Trowel, not my Shovel, with me and the targets were way too deep. Every piece of small Iron I found was buried anywhere from five (5) inches to over nine (9) inches down and the Aluminum pieces were just under the surface about 1/2 of an inch.

I won't be able to get out until Monday to do any more testing. I will be wearing an Armband with an Action Camera attached to it as well as a Hat Camera. I'm going to try to find someone that will upload them to somewhere that I can post a link to them or I may just do Screen Captures from the videos and post them as pictures on here. For those that don't know, this is the ONLY place that I socialize on-line. No Social Media Giants looking over my shoulder - well, almost none coz pictures that are posted on TNet can be found doing a GAGGLE (intentional spelling) search and, I think, the pictures are stored on "The Cloud".

Anyone that is also doing testing on the Vanquish 540 is urged to post your findings in this Thread (if you wish) or maybe we should start a Vanquish 540 Testing Thread. I'll leave it to the more experienced TNet Members to decide.

Okay all, HH & GL and may you be BLESSED during these troubling times.
-DH-

 

[cairnterrier]

I got my Vanguish 540 on Tuesday. I have been out with it 3 times. I dig less trash each outing. I start out in coin. After I get a strong signal and if it's not jumping around too much, I usually switch to jewelry, relic and all metal while on the same spot to verify tone and ID. If no grunt and the ID stays relatively the same, it will be a coin unless it is a 15. A 15 is usually a pull tab. I am sure that I may be missing some coins but this has worked for me in the few times that I have been out. I have not been able to have much luck in trashy areas that has nails. No matter what discrimination, it will give me a good signal and ID and it will be a dig of trash. Likely inexperience operator error.

 

[Diggin' History]

When I receive any signals now I will do a cross-sweep to determine if it is an iffy signal. Works 95% of the time. I still dig it but, at least I know what it's going to be when I pull it out of the ground.

Yup, 15 is a Pull Tab every time for me so far but, I haven't come across any Jewelry yet so that may change.

I can't say if I am getting less trash than my other detectors because I dig every signal with my Vanquish 540.

GL & HH.
-DH-

 

[pulltabfelix]

guys, some of the stuff you are describing plagues the Equinox 800 also. But doing a cross sweep and getting the same 1 or 2 number spread in the coin range, it will always likely be a coin. In trashy areas, switch to smaller coil and back off on the sensitivity some.

Now when relic hunting, it gets more difficult. You kinda have to dig all targets even iron to find CW relics.

 

[pulltabfelix]

My 540 should be here today. It is my 800 back up and fun machine for the coin and jewelry hunts. Not sure about its relic hunting abilities yet but I plan to find out. AT Pro was a good relic hunter so the 540 should be also.
Of course I am realistic since it is the Equinox junior it will inherit some of the 800 frustrations. From what I have been reading it locks on coins pretty solid and ID's them mostly correct. But like the 800 you will have to use the many techniques to test what is below your coil before you dig. Since I have read all three of Clive Clynick's books on the Equinox many of his target verification test will apply to the Vanquish since it is basically the Equinox with training wheels.

 

[supertraq]

13 is a nickel but a war nickel i dug was a 14 so dig 14's

 

[67GTA]

The default settings only rejects the lower numbers that are usually associated with really small pieces of foil or trash. You will have to manually notch out the numbers for things like pull tabs. If you are running in all metal then you will hear it all anyway. Hitting the horseshoe button cancels out the default notches and lets the trash back in. If you are just wanting to cherry pick then custom mode is a pretty good preset to start with. The Vanquish hits harder on deep iron and nails than the Equinox. The only way to avoid it is to turn 360 on the target in all metal and listen for the iron grunts. 99% of the time a good target will not have an iron tone unless it's at the edge of detection depth. Another method is to make a mental note of where you are getting the high tone and then use the pinpoint button to locate the target. If it pinpoints several inches from where you get the high tone, then it is falsing off the edge of an iron halo. The downside is you will miss the ocaissional good target next to iron. I have a custom mode based on jewellery with everything accepted but -8 and -9. If you notch out the last two segments it will help with some of the ground noise since there is no ground balance. Sometimes they can sound like iron grunts but are just mineralized soil. Drop your sensitivity down one or two levels. The Vanquish is highly sensitive like the Equinox, and will false more on iron at higher sensitivity levels.