Tone Deaf? Help please!

[Mammothman]

Recently ordered my first detector, the Ace 350. I have taken it out once to the park to search for coins as practice, but too many darned beer tops. So I came home and set up a few coins, metal washer, beer bottle lid and pull tab. The Beer bottle top and the coins all ping the same sound. I cannot hear a single difference between them and neither can anyone in my family. I know I have a good ear for tones, but this is frustrating. Any advice? Am I doing something wrong or is there no difference in the tone between a quarter, dime, penny, nickle and a beer cap?

 

[Chug And Red]

Im partaially tone deaf to certain tones because of multipule surgeries on both ears!!! When I am congested up I depend on the vibrations in the handle and the screen display!!! My hearing aid helps some times when I remember to put it in But mostly the slight vibration in the Handle from the speaker, I probably dig more trash but still have a blast!!! Back ground noise is disturbing most of the time But I deal with it by waiting a few minutes for the Plane or loud car to go by!!! HH Chug

 

[Chug And Red]

Your post was worth more than one post, I know the 250 had the ability to change the sound of the tones! I hunted with a guy a few times that had one and he was able to change the tones on it. I thought about getting one Until i got used to my whites!!! Hang in there an learn what your detector is telling you through sound and the screen If you can change the sound tone like the 250 try finding one that cause the most vibration in the handle and watch the screen and learnyour machine!!! Hopfully this helps Chug

 

[lastleg]

If only the detectors manufacturers would put out a reasonably priced unit that
would only respond to non-ferrous targets plus tabs. The detector would null over
small iron trash. The constant 'ping' would be replaced by an welcome increase
in 'beats'. They could call it a Revised Beat Frequency Oscillator metal detector.
With ergonomic styling, a fiber stem and durable plastic housing with a heat
resistant lightweight open coil the casual detectorist could pop out targets with a
simple screwdriver from the turf without leaving a trail of severed plugs.

 

[Chug And Red]

try this previous post it has some good info in it Chug

http://forum.treasurenet.com/index.php/topic,301907.0.html

 

[lookindown]

Your ACE 350 should have different tones.
penny,dime,quarter=high tone
pulltab,nickel.........=mid tone
iron......................=low tone

 

[deepskyal]

The older detectors only had one tone. You had to interprete what the tone was saying by how it sounded. Did it crackle, did it only beep on a swing in one direction, was it really loud or faint, could you hold your detector off the ground several inches and still get a loud beep?
After practice, you knew what that monotone beep was telling you.

When I got my first detector that had a variable pitch to it, darn thing almost drove me crazy with high squeals and low braats....I switched it to single tone ID.
Every once in a while I'll switch it back to the variable ID...but still having a hard time getting used to it. But there again...where I work I have to listen for warning sirens, horns, bells....just jangles my nerves. Something soothing to me with a steady hum and beep of the same pitch.

And yes, a lot of times bottle caps, even in the good discriminating detectors, ring like a dollar and signal as such. My Vision has a specific setting for bottle cap rejection just because of their unique way of tricking machines.
Bottle caps ring somewhere around 94 on the VDI almost identical to silver dollars...quarters around 80...dimes 78...all very similar when your detector is varying in high pitched squeals...

Not to many other objects will fool you like a bottle cap, unless your looking for gold which rings in the same as pull tabs. People that find gold rings and such dig a lot of those tabs.
If you want to find silver dollars, you may have to dig quite a few beer caps.

Al

 

[oldcoon]

Back in the old days it was always beep and dig. You heard a beep, you dug. That's the way we liked it. Of course I was living on the farm then and sometimes it was hard to hear a beep over the moo of a cow or the oink of a pig. I will not discuss turkeys here. We didn't have earphones back then but we had those little ear plug in things that we used with our transistor radios so we could listen to World Series games in school. They used to play the World Series in daylight. I would sit there in school with my little radio bringing me all the action coming through my little ear piece and there wasn't no cows or pigs to disrupt the action from Ebbets Field but then that isn't a field anymore but an apartment complex that is crumbling and not even a turkey or guinea hen to mark it's passing. Personally I would not detect there but you can do as you like.

So there you got my advice as I see it. Take it and use it wisely, grasshopper.

 

[U.K. Brian]

Try good headphones and if no improvement look round for an adjustable signal booster. These were intended to increase depth but also allow adjustment of the pitch to better suit your hearing.

"Lastleg" the problem with BFO's was little depth even with the later Variable Frequency versions. You can always get one of Europes best sellers for several years, the XP Goldmaxx. You can detect in all metal and just turn an iron adjust knob to allow as much or little iron as you want to hear. At minimum iron detection is deactivated.

Years back the "Pulse Analyst", a P.I. discriminator, had the option at a flick of a switch of stopping the iron audio so you only heard the non ferrous. Not that deep but a good idea.

 

[lastleg]

Brian, I see you own a wide array of metal detectors. When I began THing the
BFOs were still popular. There was one brand that excelled, the D-Tex Coinshooter.
I assume sales were fairly limited to the north Texas area. It was extremely easy
to operate. It was deadly on coins and rings in the top six inches of ground. Back
then silver coins, buffalo nickles and wheatbacked pennies were plentiful and within
reach of this dandy machine. Non-ferrous targets gave a signal every time without
squawks or screeches.

 

[swingin4clad]

Im partaially tone deaf to certain tones because of multipule surgeries on both ears!!! When I am congested up I depend on the vibrations in the handle and the screen display!!! My hearing aid helps some times when I remember to put it in But mostly the slight vibration in the Handle from the speaker, I probably dig more trash but still have a blast!!! Back ground noise is disturbing most of the time But I deal with it by waiting a few minutes for the Plane or loud car to go by!!! HH Chug

Hey i am just a new new guy to this hobby but have you maybe tried a set of head phones to help with hearing trouble?

 

[sqwaby]

Never used a ace 350, but I can tell you the ace 250 I had would hit high tone on Quarters, dimes, some pennies and most bottle caps, Can't say why the nickel is not at mid tone though. Check to be be sure where you did the testing that there isn't other metal or EMI interference affecting the test..

 

[Daedalus]

I have almost the same problem that you have , and I have a hard time telling one tone from the other. It is hard for people who do not have this issue to understand what we are hearing .
The one thing that I found that helped me the most was the headphones like stated in the post above. I tried about eight types in till I found a pair that worked for me and made the tones or sounds were I could hear the changes .

You might go and try or test headphones till you find a pair that helps . As the set that worked for me might not work for you . But I do think this will help . And I found that the ones that had the Cups that covered the whole ear did the best and kept out the sounds from around me .