LowTide

Well since you "missed it". Here is a quote: "The Manta has two key characteristics which aim to make it a deadly gold hunter. First and most important, it claims to be more sensitive to ALL gold than any previous salt water detector. It does this by having an adjustable pulse delay control which goes down below 10 microseconds pulse delay - this has two effects, it enables finding smaller gold than any current detector in salt water and second Manta has more depth on all gold. All this sensitivity would be no good if weak target signals were swamped by circuit and ground noise. The Manta’s design has been refined and every design trade off made in the direction of extremely low noise, letting weak signal be heard." Please pay particular note to the phrase: "it enables finding smaller gold than any current detector in salt water and second Manta has more depth on all gold." It's really not an inference, I was being kind and gentile per Steve's desire for this forum's level of decorum, it's a direct quote of a claim with direct reference to "in salt water". To me the that phrase refers to a detector coil submerged in salt water. NOT on a saltwater beach or shoreline etc. Here is the link where you will find this: http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/metal-detecting/580704-new-fisher-pi-ricks-manta-manifesto.html

For a very long time this detector’s great claim to fame via forum postings was the ability to simultaneously ground balance against Black Sand AND Saltwater. The timings on the control panel would lead one to believe that there was a True Saltwater ground balance capability. That coupled with aforementioned hoopla would infer that those timings could be used in the surf with full sensitivity against small gold targets. A True Saltwater ground balance capability would also infer that the detector was immune to wave action and poor coil control. Apparently this is now not the case and there is a Saltwater “Compensation Function"(Desensitizing). So it now appears that “in the water” this detector will provide little additional benefit against existing products. With this in mind, price point is now going to grow in importance, especially compared to used PI’s where this may end up at a 3X or 4X multiple.

And in North America the Canadian coins with their composite cores!

This may turn out to be somewhat of a mute point. With the initial released info that the detector was rated for 1 meter depth, it appears that this was designed as a shoreline detector meant to be used at waters edge. The 1 meter rating would provide protection if dropped into the water. The later 3 meter figure suggests an attempt to turn this into a wader type detector which would be fine in fresh water. Because, further info reveals that the detectors ground balancing system will not be able cancel saltwater and allow detection of small gold, with the coil submerged in saltwater. So the question remains open as to how stable will it be in say waist high saltwater with waves rolling in? Will it's depth be similar to existing PI's? How stable will it be compared to existing PI's? What about the salinity levels at various geographic locations?

Perhaps a Spreadsheet showing the differences and similarities of ground response, target response, and target depth etc. between the new detector and the other Foster variants could be provided. I am sure that during development many comparisons were made versus those older units and recorded in a scientific manner. And since this unit is so close to official release there should be little risk in providing that information. I'm sure potential customers that are TDI owners would like to see a clear and simple presentation to assist in a purchasing decision. As opposed to scattered postings with information being provided in a stream of consciousness format.

There is a difference between Beach Detecting(relaxed, pleasurable) versus Beach Mining(you carry a worn out D-handle shovel). I think Steve likely has a collection of worn out D-handle shovels. 😁

And a survey of what a reasonable price "is" would be interesting. TDI or SDC price tiers, or maybe a little more. There is a very long development cycle to be taken into consideration, as well as production costs. Will the coils be machine wound or have to be laid up by hand? Two forward looking warranty concerns, 7us tolerances(drift) & waterproof. There are a lot of knobs on this unit and everyone of them is a potential moisture entry point. You have to cost these factors for worst case projections so in essence you are paying for insurance up front should disaster strike.

It's great to have Dimitar available and I own what I believe are two of his previous designs the Fisher ID Edge & Excel. The Excel being one of my favorite detectors ever made. It's ability in iron was never appreciated as much as I think it should have been. His newest 8000 provides an important benchmark for any other Flagship products to be produced including PI's.

The art of detection shares common issues whether it be audio, optical, rf or electromagnetic. Some of the common issues are: A: Sensitivity B. Noise C. False signals and also the problems that filtering or mixing creates in trying to solve the above issues. A radar detector faces many of the same problems as a metal detector, and has up until this point in time used similar techniques to provide solutions. A radar detector manufacturer named Radenso has now applied AI to solving these issues. And some of their methodology could have applications in metal detecting. They are taking signal samples to identify good and bad targets and feeding them to a Super Computer, that then creates a signature which is programmed into the radar detector. So the super computer does the heavy lifting creating a library, and allowing the processor in the detector to simply do a lookup from a library. Some terms for those not familiar to aid in watching the videos: CW = continuous wave similar to a signal from a VLF metal detector BSM = Blind Spot Monitor are radar based collision and lane change units which emit radar and drive radar detector users crazy(think bottlecaps). Door Openers = Equal microwave(radar) motion detectors to open the automatic doors at retail stores etc https://www.vortexradar.com/2019/11/radenso-introduces-artificial-intelligence-in-radar-detectors/

The next big advancement in PI is going to be AI("I’m sorry Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that"). And you can tell your grandchildren that you read about it here! Via Temperature sensors, Accelerometers, and Magnetometers etc the detector will learn about it's environment. EMI, ground noise etc all handled behind the scene. And I have a sneaking suspicion that there is code already being tested below the Equator.

Welp...... Looking over their consumer product line, and based on their recent coin machine releases they now have Multi-Freq covered from $200USD to $2.5KUSD. Not much to be more to be done in that area except for possibly a CTX replacement centered around an Equinox sized mechanical platform. VLF gold detector they have a recent release, not much to be done there. So a new GP model OK...that's a singular design project. They have a bunch of PHD level physicists and engineers hanging around which I'm sure they'd like to keep busy. Aside from some possible Military de-mining items, about the only hole I can see in their lineup is a consumer level PI, as opposed to the High End Prospecting units. A market busting Equinox equivalent PI seems like a pretty fair bet. And by that I mean weight, waterproof, feature set, and price point. And anyone who thinks that they don't have PI experience, technology, brainpower, and funding to once again disrupt the market is doing some wishful thinking.

I posited the question and I feel the replies have been wonderful, Kudos to the time and detail in your replies. I believe perspective buyers will have learned a great deal, especially in the reply from LE.JAG. My question is based on experience of detecting black sand beaches filled with gobs of iron/steel trash. Once in a great while a PI detector will be spotted in these locations, but you only see a person use them one time because the digging becomes intolerable. Based on some past postings my perception is that an Executive Summary of this detector would be: A detector capable of detecting deep gold on black sand saltwater beaches while ignoring and seeing through/past iron/steel trash. This perception was created by the level of exuberance centered around this capability. Thank you one and all!

After reading the above I was under the impression that iron and steel could be rejected by the user once they had become familiar with it's tonal clues. Elsewhere LE.JAG had posted a photo of an outing showing all of the recovered targets. I have cropped and resized that photo which has created the graininess. My concern are the number of rusty steel crown caps to the right in the photo. Beaches I detect are heavily littered with these and multitudinous digging 15-20 inches is not going to help efficiency or my back.

I may have missed any information already posted here or elsewhere concerning the Vanquish series versus Bottlecaps. I am not referring to aluminum caps but rather steel caps with their various coatings and Aluminized Mylar type inserts. Information on orientation, inner part of cap facing up or outer facing up would be helpful along with stage of corrosion. The depth and where appropriate the Hi/Lo iron reject would also be interesting. The above inquiry came to mind as I wondered if noobies with a Vanquish will be able to move across the landscape and not become discouraged by digging Bottlecaps? For experienced users I also wondered if this series might become a go to picnic area hunter leaving just the Aluminum trash to be dealt with? In situations where I have wandered into picnic areas, having Bottlecaps go away would be well worth the sacrifice of losing some depth by not using a higher gain machine!

If this is the case then the Chinese copiers will be licking their chops waiting to reverse engineer this. The potting compound had better be J&B weld with some phony decoy circuitry thrown in for good measure.