Deus HF Testing

[Condor]

We had a cold snap in sunny Yuma, low 70's at sunup.  Didn't reach 80 till nearly 9am.  I took the Deus out for a little testing in an area we have absolutely hammered with every known detector.  I didn't find any gold, but the Deus surprised me with some of its capabilities.

Per our discussion on the Notch vs. Discrimination theory, I set up the machine for 3 tones, relying on tone discrimination rather than true Notch or Iron Discrimination.   With the Deus software the first setpoint for Tone discrimination really becomes a null, so 3 tones becomes 2 tones.  It's actually a little more complicated than that, but won't help us for this discussion.  So, I set the first actual audio tone, (2nd notch) for iron ID of between 0 and 20, and made it as low an audio tone as was possible.  The next Tone breakpoint takes over from an ID of 20, where the last one left off, and all out way out to the end of range in the '90s.  That tone is our sweet tone, you can set it at any level your hearing prefers.   During my previous outings over undug targets, gold ID'd in the mid '50s.

If you recall my first outing with the new HF coil, I was underwhelmed with the audio.  Over a test nugget at the time, I missed the dynamic "zip" audio of the Gold Bug II.  I thought the Deus audio somewhat anemic at the time.  That all changed for me today.  Using the remote to access the menu functions, I upped the audio response to 6 from the preset of 4.  Wow, what a difference.  So much difference that the machine got a little "chattery" in some of the hotter ground.  But I live by "chattery" using the Z7000, so I just went with it.  I found half a dozen shotgun pellets that just screamed dig me, showing a VID between 55 and 60, the same as gold.  I buried a .25 gram nugget in some of the hottest ground I could find.  The machine clipped and chirped, but at about 5 inches, the audio over the nugget was bright and crisp.  No mistaking that audio, everything I thought I missed about the GBII audio, was alive and well in the Deus.

Over the same test nugget and same hot ground I played with the other settings.  I was running Sens at 85 and upped it to 90.  While the target sound was somewhat brighter, the resulting feedback from the ground would have negated it for practical use in the field.  Steve H would find a way to run this machine maxed out, but for me less was better. 

Raising the Reactivity helped quiet the "chatteryness", but I wanted to run the machine as wide open as possible.  I settled on a Reactivity of 2. 

I then played with the Discrimination over the same nugget in the same hole.  I ran it from negative 6, to positive 10.  I found no benefit in this ground to running max negative Discrim, but a sweet spot seemed to be around negative 3.  The more positive discrimination above +6 starts to give the test nugget at 5 inch depth, a breaking audio, alternating from the Iron tone to a true gold tone.   No bueno for real life field prospecting, although it would be enough to make you stop and investigate.  The Deus has a separate control for Iron volume, but that is disabled when running negative Discrimination.  So, my current working theory is running Discrimination at +1, setting the iron volume at 1, then using the (Low)Tone feature to handle the rest of ordinary Iron problems out to an ID of 20.

I tried the Deus standard Goldfield Program over the same ground.  It just didn't do it for me so I left off without really giving it a true workout.  Maybe it works, but I wanted to fiddle with all the other features of this machine. 

I'm off to ranch sit, taking care of horses and dogs for the next week or so.  No more moments of clarity with the Deus till I make up to CA gold country.  I might make it out for some beach detecting, so who knows. 

Until then, keep er low and slow.

 

[beatup]

Good luck to you up north Steve

[goldbrick]

I don't have a high frequency coil nor have I updated to ver. 4 as I am away at work for some time so I can not speak from experience. Does not XP recommend a reactivity of 3 in hot ground such as you were in? Were you able to do actual testing on in ground targets using different reactivity? Thank you for any insights you may provide.

[Condor]

9 hours ago, goldbrick said:

I don't have a high frequency coil nor have I updated to ver. 4 as I am away at work for some time so I can not speak from experience. Does not XP recommend a reactivity of 3 in hot ground such as you were in? Were you able to do actual testing on in ground targets using different reactivity? Thank you for any insights you may provide.

I'm sure running the Reactivity up to 3 would have quieted the ground and on coin sized targets, you wouldn't be sacrificing much overall performance.  It has been said that raising the Reactivity tends to shrink your coil coverage footprint.  I don't know to what extent that occurs, but on tiny gold nuggets I'm looking to get all the performance I can out of a detector that was originally designed for coin, jewelry and relic hunting. 

My primary detector will always be the Z7000, but there are times when I would like to jump out and check some exposed bedrock or old tailings piles without the whole suiting up with the Zed.  My other primary purpose for the Deus is to use it as a discriminating pinpointer when chasing deep targets with the Zed.  This last year detecting in Baja involved far too much digging deep trash in hot weather.  It really cuts down the number of productive detecting hours when you burn out on the first 5 or 6 deep holes.  I found myself looking for reasons not to dig obviously deep targets.

I guess my point is I'm looking at a better mousetrap, for some pretty narrow circumstances.  The Deus is attractive to me because of its overall weight and collapsible enough to fit in my pack for 3/4 day hikes in rough terrain.  And, if I ever get excited about coin/relic hunting I have the perfect machine for the job.  

I imagine once the Deus Elliptical coil comes out, we'll see some good comparisons and side by side testing by guys a whole lot smarter than me on this stuff. 

[Steve Herschbach]

Great reporting Steve, thanks!

I think in terms of what detector would I want to have while wandering around in the California mountains. Where I might find an old camp site that I want to detect in for old coins. Or a trash filled mining pit trying to find a gold nugget in the midst of the junk. Also the machine to ride shotgun with the GPZ 7000. A good general purpose VLF with all the discrimination options plus very hot on gold.

Last year or more the Makro Gold Racer has fit the bill for me. My only minor complaint is that it is not quite as compact as I would like, and so the DEUS has been an alternative. Which is why I am waiting on the elliptical. Gold Racer at 56 kHz and 9" round DEUS coil at 59 kHz seem like a match up. The DEUS elliptical at 81 kHz should have an unfair advantage, or at least I hope so.

[Steve Herschbach]

Reactivity is like the exposure control on a camera. A long exposure/low reactivity setting takes a longer look at the target for more depth. However, adjacent targets that are too close by can sneak into the picture also. The shorter exposure/higher reactivity setting has less depth but less chance of nearby objects intruding. It does have the appearance of shrinking the coil footprint although the entire electromagnetic field is still in existence and so silent masking can occur.

The ground itself acts as a target and so higher reactivity settings can help reduce the masking effect of bad ground and nearby hot rocks. However, in a trash free, low mineral environment low reactivity settings are better.

For most intents and purposes you can treat the Reactivity control just like the SAT control for all metal. Both seek to enhance signals from desireable targets while suppressing or attenuating signals from undesired targets. The setting is adjustable/site specific and not a "set and forget" thing.