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Gold Racer Help Please


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I've been playing with the G.R. at home testing it out with different size nuggets in the ground etc. First time out in the field with the Gold Racer yesterday. I was at a hydraulic pit in the area where the Scott River meets the Klamath River in Siskiyou county Ca. To get a stable threshold the settings were: Sensitivity 69, Threshold 35, iSat 3. The mineralization was 1 bar from max. The ground I started in was about 1/4" dirt over shale. The GR would lock hard at 99, the non-ferrous bar all the way to the right. I dug into the shale/Copper stained soil, kept checking the hole with GR then no more target. I checked the dug out material w/no target. Ok so I thought a glitch and kept swinging. Not more than 8 feet away and same target readings, same rusults.  This happened three times .  It was getting dark so decided  to quit for the day. Steve or any other Gold Racer owners have any thoughts ?

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I've had a GR for a couple months now and been out with it a few times. 

The first thing I saw was your threshold at 35.  I usually run at 17-20.  At 25 or more, I know I can't hear the faint stuff anymore.

Running your sensitivity at 69 doesn't seem like too much, but in some conditions, you may have to turn it down more.  Try it at 50 and see if things improve for you.

When I was trying to run with too much sensitivity, I would get a lot more false signals and the readout would go from 1-4 to 98-99 on ground mineralization.  Once I started running the 'gain' lower, I had less issues and more stability.

I haven't played much with some of the other features, so I can't be of much help there.

Good Luck !!

Luke

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Luke, thanks for your suggestions. I'll be going back up there this weekend and get it dialed in. 

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You never mentioned what you were doing for ground balance. May as well throw all the other settings out the window if you don"t keep your GB correct on your VLF when in hot ground like that. Many areas in Siskiyou county have clay domes that were once iron pyrites. These drive even PI's a little nuts sometimes. You dug the clay dome up and scattered the mineralization viola disappearing target!

JMHO

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On many VLF detectors the highest target id reading is a kind of dumping ground for unknown targets. Large ferrous targets and extreme mineralization can read at the highest end of the scale. Some people like to think of the VDI scale as circular instead on linear, with low end readings "wrapping around" to turn into high end readings.

Here is the probable id chart from the Makro Gold Racer owners manual:

makro-gold-racer-possible-target-id-chart.jpg

Notice 90 - 99 can be hot rocks, or intensely mineralized spots.

The trick is it is almost impossible to get a gold reading in the 90s. I have a relatively pure 6.5 ounce gold nugget that reads a solid 88. A silver dollar reads 91. Most gold on the Gold Racer is going to read in the 40 - 50 range or 60s and 70s for large nuggets.

So assuming you do not have a defective coil or something else going on I am with the others on it being a mineralized hot spot. One thing I tried to get on the Gold Racer was the ability to either notch readings in the 90's, or a second ID Filter that starts at 99 and eliminates items in a downward fashion (99 - 96 or 99 - 93). Allowing extreme high VDI reading to be blocked would eliminate this tendency of some hot rocks and ferrous to bounce super high. The only good items you might miss would be silver bars plus extremely large brass, copper, or aluminum items. As it is you have to eyeball the readings.

Again, this is another area where having an on screen target VDI can be very helpful while nugget detecting. On the Gold Racer readings of 95 - 99 can be ignored as being almost certainly not gold. If the area you hunt has a reputation for one pound or larger nuggets it might be another issue so just be aware and play the odds as seems best for your situation.

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Gold B, I think you called it with the clay dome theory. When the shale was broken up it looked more like metal than mineral and the clay was a copper color. 

Steve, your response was VERY informative. I knew the Gold Racer would have a higher learning curve than some of the other machines out there but I'm very pleased with the unit. 

Thank you both Steve & Goldbrick. I'm new to this site but have been lurking for a few months before signing up. There's a wealth of information and the member's always seem eager to help without talking down to a newb like me.

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