One Detector - One Setting - One Pass - Gold Gone

[Rick K - First Member]

 Is such a thing possible? 

I think we still have a ways to go to get the optimum gold nugget detector.  

Why is it that 2 or even 3 detectors might be needed if you want to succeed?  Well, you need discrimination on a lot of sites due to ferrous trash - as of today, that means you need a VLF. Unless you have a GPZ, you probably need both a GPX and an SDC to cover the spectrum of tiny shallow to deep large nuggets.

VLF's can discriminate but mineralization kills their depth in many areas.  GPX machines can do most of it, but don't discriminate (much) and force the operator to choose between several very different set-ups (Each with its own set of trade-offs) depending on conditions of ground and likely targets. SDC kills on small gold and is easy to use but can't discriminate and is depth limited. Even the GPZ, for all it's depth and versitility is not easy to master and costs many ounces of gold.

Can a new technical approach give us a detector which deals with all these issues at once? What would this miracle detector have to do?

Ease of use - It would have to be "turn on and go".

Mineralization - it would have to deal,with the most highly mineralized ground -  without use of adjustment and without danger of "tuning out" small targets.  

Sensitivity - It would have to have sensitivity to small gold at least equal to the best current VLF detectors.

Depth - it doesn't have to equal the GPZ or even GPX in raw depth, but it would have to deliver more depth than the SDC - and equal the depth of the best VLF's - and do so in any ground.

Will those of us who are over 60 ever see such a "Wunderwaffe"?  ---- I have my hopes.

What would you pay for such a machine?

 

 

[Tortuga]

Being able to discriminate would be nice, but not 100% critical to me. I do pass on many areas that have too much trash with my GPZ but then I can still find gold in other areas with less trash. If a spot looks really good that's covered in trash you have to do things the hard way and dig all targets. And while the SDC is very easy to use I've gotten to a point now with my GPZ that I find it very easy to use, just turn on and go after I ground balance if I'm in a new area. The menu system is a big improvement over the GPX. The only thing that would make the GPZ perfect in my mind is if it had the same weight as an SDC...

[Reno Chris]

Keep on dreamin'. Technology slowly improves.

[Ridge Runner]

With some of the new coils that has came out  put us near to our goal on what you've said..

We hear a lot about people finding gold at two feet or more with some of the new coils. They will detect small gold but they come with a high cost. If you be the lucky one to live in gold country maybe that would be the way to go for you. I've said before it's only money

I'm over a thousand miles away from any gold and won't spend over two weeks nugget hunting. I'm asking myself now when ever did I justify the money put out for a detector are coil.

May be one day it will be a detector like that and at my age I don't think I'll ever see it. Right now I want grass that will grow only two inches high so I'll never have to cut it.

Chuck 

[Gold Seeker]

The only detector I know of that will do what you want only works on sunbakers, it's the human eye!

[Rick K - First Member]

Used to find flint flakes and ostrich shell fragments in saudi - not to mention clear quartz pebbles that way in the flat - plant free desert pavements in Saudi Arabia.

[Desert Dawg]

A new detector with a non-electromagnetic ground balance system would be what your looking for. Fisher claims to be working on something sounds similar right now. Maybe a digital ground filter, just guessing on that? Would not affect depth of targets like normal ground balance methods do in hot soils.

[jasong]

Well I think a person can break EM based metal detection technology down into what are fundamentally noise problems and mineral problems.

Lower the noise floor far enough and you can detect a weak EM field from the next galaxy over. We do it all the time with radio telescopes. EM fields decay fast, but they decay to infinity.

Permeable minerals like iron will "absorb" static em fields though, and conductive minerals from salt to metals will reflect EM (dynamic) radiation. We have to deal with dielectric attenuation too.

So there are the stumbling blocks. Modern tech does wonder with dealing with noise. And there are other ways to deal with it if you get rid of the coil on a stick philosophy too.

But minerals will always present a problem I think when dealing with EM signals.

I don't even really care about discrim myself anymore when it comes to gold prospecting. Give me a perfectly stable threshold with a noisefloor waaaaay down south and an RX gain I can crank as high as the ground will let me, and THAT'S a detector I'll be willing to pay good money for.

[Steve Herschbach]

13 hours ago, Rick Kempf said:

Depth - it doesn't have to equal the GPZ or even GPX in raw depth, but it would have to deliver more depth than the SDC - and equal the depth of the best VLF's - and do so in any ground.

The question was how much would I pay for such a beast?

If it does not equal or exceed a GPZ or GPX for raw depth then it fails the "One Detector - One Setting - One Pass - Gold Gone" concept. You would still have to go back over the ground with a GPZ afterwards, so why not just start with the GPZ or GPX and dig everything like I am doing now? Unless trash is the issue. In which case this just replaces my VLF as a better VLF?

Looked at another way you say better performance than an SDC plus discrimination?

So not as deep as a GPZ or GPX but outperforms the SDC plus adds discrimination? That being the parameters, it is a better machine than the SDC but does not replace a GPZ. I would price it at $5K in the current scheme of things.

[Ridge Runner]

I wouldn't pay a dime for that detector. My reasoning is the cost of paying someone to dig those deep holes is going to override the cost of that detector.

Just how many holes would you be willing to dig at over 3 feet to find trash ? Maybe one but after that maybe not so much..

Here I am just asking for a small 6 inch coil to coin hunt and I can't get it..

Chuck