Tesoro vs. Whites

[-Jones-]

My best friend Tommy (left) and I (right) recently met at Henry Clay Kritser Park, Raytown, MO, for what I call our 1st SHOW-ME classic.

Tommy works a Tesoro Lobo Super Traq and me my Whites Classic ID. We detected for 45 minutes.

The Whites beat out the Tesoro by 8 cents!

The Whites found 2 quarters, 2 nickels, and 7 pennies. The Tesoro found 5 dimes and 7 pennies.

 

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[Wetgreenie]

Looks like the Discrimination was better on the Tesoro.....No pull tabs.....

Go Tesoro!

 

[sendin]

Machine + Digger = MDing

Machine + ? = null

 

[TreasureTales]

I own a Tesoro Lobo Super Traq and I often find more than my detecting buddy with his Bounty Hunter (don't remember the model) when we're coinshooting. I've also found more rings with my machine than he finds with his White's (again -- can't remember the model). Seems to me that it's the detectorist and his experience with a particular machine rather than the machine in MOST instances. Sure, some detectors are better than others, but the best machine is only as good as the detectorist using it. In fact, my buddy spends so much time "playing around" with the meter on his BH trying to determine what his target is, that he is working on one target while I've dug 3 or 4 targets in the meantime. Yeah, I find much more trash, but I also find much more good stuff. I guess it all depends on how much physical work a guy wants to put into detecting.

Your head-to-head contest is a great idea. Thanks for posting your results.

 

[-Jones-]

I own a Tesoro Lobo Super Traq and I often find more than my detecting buddy with his Bounty Hunter (don't remember the model) when we're coinshooting. I've also found more rings with my machine than he finds with his White's (again -- can't remember the model). Seems to me that it's the detectorist and his experience with a particular machine rather than the machine in MOST instances. Sure, some detectors are better than others, but the best machine is only as good as the detectorist using it. In fact, my buddy spends so much time "playing around" with the meter on his BH trying to determine what his target is, that he is working on one target while I've dug 3 or 4 targets in the meantime. Yeah, I find much more trash, but I also find much more good stuff. I guess it all depends on how much physical work a guy wants to put into detecting.

Your head-to-head contest is a great idea. Thanks for posting your results.

Treasure tale,

GOOD WORDS! "the best machine is only as good as the detectorist using it".

My friend bought his Tesoro Lobo Super Traq and took it to CA and detected for gold in various areas around death valley. He didn't have much luck but had an adventure...... 8)

 

[dahut]

Nice idea, poor test.

You cannot place two random detectors (quite different, in fact) in random spots in a random location and expect to draw definitive conclusions.

Now if the two of you followed each other, target for target, and took notes, then that might be considered an evaluation - loosely.

Otherwise what you got was one guy either more skilled, or luckier, than the other.

 

[U.K. Brian]

I agree Dahut
Had several machines on test a fortnight ago including the original Explorer, the Mk II and the SE. All used by their experienced owners.
Whole strip down the edge of a productive field (ferrous and non ferrous) was set aside. During the day everyone had a set 40 minutes to detect the area. Short bits of stick dropped where a signal was detected (numbered).
Note made of the number, whether signal good or bad and the level of audio. Not perfect as the later machines had targets located for them but a true note of the detectors performance had to be made ie if the signal was so weak it would not have been picked up in normal detecting.
The first machines got ten minutes to check the targets they had missed that others had found to allow for bad sweeping but were not allowed to continue further down the field than they had managed first time round. (so a detector thats deeper but takes time to I.D. the target could loose out to a fast audio I.D. machine thats managed to cover more ground though at less depth).
Then all that remained to do was to relate the results to detecting straight down an 'in ground test bed' which though years old had constant mineralisation and all targets lying flat.
One interesting thing is the little (if any) depth increase in the new Minelab over the previous version and that in the field the original model that had a eight inch SunRay coil fared better than the newer machines due to target masking.
Eventually the targets were dug and checked against the good/bad target notes. Finds went to the person whose site it was.

 

[dahut]

Here, then, is a better test. As many machines as you care to compare, and each having the chance at the same targets. Including allowance for variance in user tempo, style, etc.

And for conditions as they exist in that spot, wherever it is in the UK, this is a good indicator as to what you can expect, performance-wise. Now, move those same detectors and testers to another place in England, or the US, or anywhere else for that matter and you can expect to have completely different results.

That then is the point, I suppose. Makers try to create a detector that is either:
A. Suited to a certain set of conditions, or...
B. Adaptable to a wide range of conditions

Either way, you will be compromising performance somewhere along the line, depending on how, where and when you use the unit. Such tests, then, are only so good, and can carry you only so far. Beyond that, what YOU experience, where you hunt may be vastly different.

Good test, though, and now Im dying to know: What was the outcome and what did you find!

 

[larrybass]

I like detector tests too. One time I was out on a hunt with a buddy who was running a machine that cost roughly four times what I payed for mine. Being a bit of a cocky fella, he suggested we check out each others targets so he could prove to me what kind of junk I was actually running! Well, the first target he located, he calls me over, says it's about 6 inches deep and I probably wouldn't be able to pick it up on my el cheapo unit. Wrong, I got it on the first sweep. He digs it up and it's a cheap ring with a black stone of some kind in it. Appeared to have been in the ground for a few decades at least. Next, I hit a target and call him over. He gets nothing. Then he says, wait a minute and starts fiddling with some of the knobs on his expensive unit. After at least two minutes, he finally reads something and says, it's very likely a piece of junk, because it was coming in very weak like. I dig it out of about 5 inches of pretty mineralized soil and it's a tiny (kids) silver ring. Then I moved to a bus loading zone, at the front of the school yard we were hunting. As I pass my coil 2 or 3 inches from the metal sign post for busses, I get a nice tone. I call buddy over and tell him to see what he gets. Well, all he could get was the signpost itself. He could not get any closer than 8 or 9 inches from the steel post. After much fooling with his knobs again, he managed to get within 5 or 6 inches of the post but not close enough to detect my target. I laugh a little, probe the soil a bit and out pops a 1962 silver dime about 2 1/2 inches deep and out about 2 inches from the steel post...

Not very conclusive I suppose but it was enough to convince him that my little cheapo rig was not a piece of s**t afterall. What I also found neat was that he had to change his set-up just to try and locate what I had already found in my normal set-up config. How many targets had he missed in the past by having the "wrong" settings while in the field, thinking he had the right settings all along?

At the end of the day we had almost the same amount of targets but my little pile had more interesting things in it than his did. I love variety! Then I noticed he only had two pull tabs, whereas I had five so I guess he was trusting his machine (settings) to think for him more than I do. I use mine to locate stuff and I'm not afraid to dig questionable signals and have found two small gold rings in the past that read as pulltabs on my unit.
So maybe there is way more to "how" you use a machine and not what price you pay for it, that gets more good stuff?

Thanx for readin'

later,

 

[relikhunter]

Well said and so true larry!!!!

 

[Wasabi]

I like detector tests too. One time I was out on a hunt with a buddy who was running a machine that cost roughly four times what I payed for mine. Being a bit of a cocky fella, he suggested we check out each others targets so he could prove to me what kind of junk I was actually running! Well, the first target he located, he calls me over, says it's about 6 inches deep and I probably wouldn't be able to pick it up on my el cheapo unit. Wrong, I got it on the first sweep. He digs it up and it's a cheap ring with a black stone of some kind in it. Appeared to have been in the ground for a few decades at least. Next, I hit a target and call him over. He gets nothing. Then he says, wait a minute and starts fiddling with some of the knobs on his expensive unit. After at least two minutes, he finally reads something and says, it's very likely a piece of junk, because it was coming in very weak like. I dig it out of about 5 inches of pretty mineralized soil and it's a tiny (kids) silver ring. Then I moved to a bus loading zone, at the front of the school yard we were hunting. As I pass my coil 2 or 3 inches from the metal sign post for busses, I get a nice tone. I call buddy over and tell him to see what he gets. Well, all he could get was the signpost itself. He could not get any closer than 8 or 9 inches from the steel post. After much fooling with his knobs again, he managed to get within 5 or 6 inches of the post but not close enough to detect my target. I laugh a little, probe the soil a bit and out pops a 1962 silver dime about 2 1/2 inches deep and out about 2 inches from the steel post...

Not very conclusive I suppose but it was enough to convince him that my little cheapo rig was not a piece of s**t afterall. What I also found neat was that he had to change his set-up just to try and locate what I had already found in my normal set-up config. How many targets had he missed in the past by having the "wrong" settings while in the field, thinking he had the right settings all along?

At the end of the day we had almost the same amount of targets but my little pile had more interesting things in it than his did. I love variety! Then I noticed he only had two pull tabs, whereas I had five so I guess he was trusting his machine (settings) to think for him more than I do. I use mine to locate stuff and I'm not afraid to dig questionable signals and have found two small gold rings in the past that read as pulltabs on my unit.
So maybe there is way more to "how" you use a machine and not what price you pay for it, that gets more good stuff?

Thanx for readin'

later,

Yep it's true, what's stated above.

I found it kind of funny when I went on a club hunt and guys are looking at my little Tesoro Golden Umax and wondering if it really finds anything then on the club meeting night I bring in a 1879 Indian Head that is barely even circulated and one comment from one of the members is...Well it looks like you can finds stuff with that detector.
I think because it is manufactured in such a small compact little package that most people get a pre-conceived notion that it is a toy.
My next detector when it is in back in stock will be the Fisher F75. I want to give it a try against my Tesoro and see how the two compare.

 

[Boilermaker27]

The White's found more money, but the Tesoro found more small money. Any detector can find quarters, but dimes? The Tesoro is a deep machine.

 

[JR in Hohenwald TN.]

I once knew a kid that had an old Garrett Ground Hog. I seen the kid with my own eyes dig a Barber dime at around 8". Its just a matter of proficiency, perseverance and practice. The more you use it and dig with it, the better it gets.

 

[dahut]

I love reading the tales where one guy bests another with his "el cheapo" unit. Usually it's "proof" of the old saw that "a good operator with a cheap unit (or one that's old, or raggedy or....) will beat a bad operator with a costly instrument." How we love to jump on the wagon and wave that banner, eh? The downtrodden beats the wicked oppressor, etc...

I always notice that we aren't told brands or models, we're not told ground or environmental conditions or even approximate geographical locations, either.
All we normally ARE told is 'El Cheapo' beat the Big Bad $$, with the inevitable better haul of goodies. I mean c'mon, that's kind of self-fulfilling, aint it?

By the same token, I could tell about the time my low-end Tesoro Silver Sabre II lost out to a high-end, big money Garrett CX. Same moist, residential yard in summertime SC, same verified target being detected. End result?
My Tesoro, in the hands of a seasoned and accomplished user, barely picked up the target. Sorry, but there it is... low-dollar detector left me hanging.
Meanwhile, the Garrett CX, which was being used by a rank newbie for the first time, hit that target hard and solid, ID'ing it as a dime, at 6". I'll never forget his question at that point, as it still haunts me to this day :
"Is it supposed 'boing' so loudly, with the needle stuck on dime?"

The recovered item? 1842-0 dime at 6".

Features aren't the only things that matter, but they are there for a reason... and suckering buyers isn't usually it. Most features actually have a designed-in purpose, and while they may not always be the final answer, if used properly they can make a difference. I've been detecting for over 20 years and if theres one thing I've learned, it's this:

Don't be lured into thinking that low end detectors will always beat a high end instrument.
Just because someone says he came out a hero, one time, doesn't imply you will. Try and probe and test under closely controlled conditions. Then test again until you find out what works for you.

 

[dneyedli@res1.mts.net]

Well I can't add to the comparison in the exact way that it is intended, but I can add that I have blown away every Whites I ever hunted against with my 1266X. This is not just at relic hunts, but for clad, old coins and beach hunting as well. At the beach out here on a large lake, I have gotten deep coin or ring signals numerous times where the DFX, XLT, Eagle's, 6000's, and Prisms would not even tick. This was against guys who have been on the scene as long as me and have been using their detectors for while. I've gone head to head in air tests against the same detectors and the old Fisher humiliated those machines for depth. This to me, is also about meters v.s. sound and I will pick listening to sounds any day. No offense to White users, I have owned 2 Whites before and used them for 10 years. In this comparison I think the winner is Tesoro, because the Whites didn't find one dime. To an experienced detectorist, any machine that is sweet on dimes, has a capability of more sensitivity and depth. In Canada, this test would be more one-sided as Whites are not good for Canadian clad. Quite often a $2 coin will read as a penny and the more recent steel clad won't even pick up on a Whites. If I'm competing with a Whites at a park, I can go in and leave all the pennies and dig all the loonies and toonies, while the Whites user is stuck digging the pennies. Whites are designed for U.S. coins, which are copper based.
Anyways, My vote is for the Tesoro.
Dave.

 

[BuckleBoy]

Well I can't add to the comparison in the exact way that it is intended, but I can add that I have blown away every Whites I ever hunted against with my 1266X. This is not just at relic hunts, but for clad, old coins and beach hunting as well. At the beach out here on a large lake, I have gotten deep coin or ring signals numerous times where the DFX, XLT, Eagle's, 6000's, and Prisms would not even tick. This was against guys who have been on the scene as long as me and have been using their detectors for while. I've gone head to head in air tests against the same detectors and the old Fisher humiliated those machines for depth. This to me, is also about meters v.s. sound and I will pick listening to sounds any day.

17 years with my Baby, and I'm not going to change machines unless something comes along that can Repeatedly kick my butt in a head-to-head hunt.

Yes, that meters vs. knobs issue is one that I have spent some time on. The nice thing about a knob is that you can--at all times during a hunt--see what your detector is set at. Anyhow, I believe we're on the same page with this one.

http://forum.treasurenet.com/index.php/topic,178510.0.html

Best Wishes,


Buckles