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Targets We Can`t Hear


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I'm certain they can.

What if you didn't even have to see the signal, or hear the minute details. What if you were nearly deaf...

I've imagined a machine that could function like we're accustomed but also record a "target signal signature" in high resolution. Slowly one would hunt, scan targets, record them, dig them up, and the scanned target signature is stored in one of two database based on operator input; trash or treasure. The machine would use the database to compare new incoming signals to attempt a trash treasure confidence percentage. The goal being an advanced signal analysis in real time with a known database of good signals to draw from

After a large database is established perhaps one could truly run a cherry-picking program. The more you record the better the machine performs.

A guy can dream, eh?

 

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1 hour ago, Rege-PA said:

Although my hearing is good I have a pretty good case of Tinnitus, and the bugs are always buzzing in my head! I have learned to not listen to them along with the other voices that are trying to influence me LOL.

I think that what I am trying to discover is some way of knowing that a target is there without relying on my hearing. There has to be meters that would pick up these variances in the threshold much finer than my ears are able to hear the variation.

If these machines will pick up emi and lightning at a distance surely they are sensing more than our ears can discern. We just need to find a way to visualize these sounds.

     There is more signal information to be gleamed and some of the easier and cost effective ideas will be built into future detectors ahead of other more expensive features.

     Many experience hunters can sense if it is a big chunk at depth or if it is a small nugget near the surface. In future models more depth and size information might be displayed in a % of probability value.  That would be similar to what the White’s GMT does now for % of probability of the target being iron.
  
     Refer to the many posts by experienced persons stating the best settings to use under different ground and electromagnetic interference conditions. Future models will be able to evaluate those conditions and change modes and adjust to the environment without any operator actions.

    False targets such as clay hotspots and hot rocks have some different characteristics from metal objects.  Another % of probability that it is a real target could be displayed. 

    Digital / computer mathematic and statistical methods will continue to make improvements on these ideas and in other areas.  It is a slow process due to the small market for metal detectors. Small detector companies cannot afford many engineers and computer software personnel. And they cannot spend years in research and development. They have to get attractive stable machines into the market to stay in business. If the market was anywhere as big as cell phones or television we would already have fantastic detectors at low cost.

Have another good day,
Chet
 

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It does all boil down to signal processing, and it can be audio, visual, tactile, etc. The CTX 3030 is an example of a machine that could be used by a deaf person simply by watching the screen.

Several Nokta and Makro models incorporate a vibration mechanism in the handle that augments the audio or can be used in lieu of the audio.

The speaker or headphone jack is just running off electric current. I have a LED headphone plug made by Fisher years ago that plugs into the headphone jack. Red light means target. All manner of things could be plugged into a headphone jack to alert the operator. Here is a device intended for deaf people to convert audio to tactile response https://www.good.is/articles/headphones-for-the-deaf

In fact many old dive detectors used a "bone phone" that create what seems like sound by transmitting vibrations directly through the skull to the inner ear. Similar devices are employed by the military in operation where outputting genuine sound would put lives at risk.

IMG_0159.JPG

More on bone conduction technology

You can buy devices like these here

Blind people are now being taught to "see" by placing special interfaces on the body, for instance, the tongue. We do not hear with our ears. We do not see with our eyes. We both hear and see with our brains, and our ears and eyes are just transmission devices into the sealed box that is our head. This is an area of great study and advances now, and in theory we could make detectors that literally let us "see" the signals in the ground. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/device-lets-blind-see-with-tongues/

Amazing stuff and the sky is the limit. The limitation always as Chet has already noted - tiny obscure market. It is however entirely possible that offshoot technology from sources like the few I have mentioned here could be incorporated into detectors by companies willing to work outside the box.

 

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i always  thought it would be great to be able to put my gpx on"vibrate" like a cell phone.......then you could feel your way around and give your ears ..some time to cool  off.......its got to be a way????

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Hi all from my limited experience l would have to say most of the quiet faint signals have mainly been slight variations in the threshold response rather than the audio response. However there is usually a fair amount of what l would call spurious detector noise going on at the same time but l was able to pick out the slight threshold variation amongst the spurious noise.

It is this background spurious noise that would render lights and or vibrations unusable because mostly the quiet threshold breaks are quiter than the spurious noise but are disernable to the ear.

If you are strugling to hear the threshold breaks because your hearing. I would suggest getting a set of earphones with individual volume and tone control for each ear as like our eyesight we usually have better sight out of one eye than the other and the same applies to hearing one side hears better than the other and it is that imbalance that affects what we hear and what we don't. So by adjusting the individual volume controls to ensure our hearing is equally  balanced will enhance you ability to distinguish the faint threshold breaks.  Balancing out your hearing is better than blasting out you hearing by using too much volume to compensate. Use tones that are comfortable to your hearing.

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I have one of these that I don't really use but the concept is solid.

http://treasureproducts.com/vibraphone.html

It works but it has been made for mounting on a tube when it should be some other type of mount.  I used it briefly with my 5000 by using a splitter for the phone jack. (You can also use it instead of headphones but this was going to take a learning curve ... especially on the faint targets!)  One had headphones and the other this vibraphone.  It does work.  It says on the advertising it doesn't work on Minelabs but I had no problem.

It sits in my box for further testing one day.

Why?  Well ... it does convert the target energy into vibrations that can be felt rather than heard.  What I discovered was that my sense of vibration was not as sensitive as my sense of sound (even with some frequency gaps).  That is my personal choice to abandon use of it but for someone with very limited or no hearing (or if I lost my hearing) I would use this in a minute.

When I bought mine I chatted with the manufacturer and I don't really know why it is not a more widely used product.

Mitchel

PS  Check out the other products.  I've considered one of the pointers in the past but haven't gotten one.

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  • 3 years later...

I just looked on the site and there is a different design of the vibraprobe! 

https://www.treasureproducts.com/vibraphone.html

3B20A26B-57C0-4600-A78C-5FF1752DB259.jpeg

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