800 Depth Gauge

[Dug D]

You may find it helpful to just raise the coil, if you loose the target at about 4 inches, above ground it's likely is more than 4 inches deep. (of course depending on the target size) It would be easy to test on the next target you dig. This has become common practice for me in parks to insure I am not digging a can that is 12"+ deep.

[Cabin Fever]

I have adjusted to the Equinox and it gets a little easier to gauge depth each time out.. It was just a bit of a disappointment to see the Equinox take a step backwards with this feature.. Those of us who have a lot of hours on the E-Trac and CTX have been spoiled.. For those who relic hunt or dig almost all non ferrous, the depth gauge and accurate modulation are not important..  If your hunting deep old coins in a nice park or yard this gets to be a more useful tool..

I don’t want Minelab to change the depth modulation if it will affect its depth in a negative way.. Depth is more important.. I think just adjusting the calibration to a penny instead of quarter might be enough to tame down most of the complaints..  

Bryan

 

[Mark Gillespie]

I thought I had a similar issue today with the depth meter.  Almost always 4 bars were showing and thinking deep target, I dug a nice plug just to find the target in the plug.  After an hour of this type depth indication I decided to find out why the depth meter was indicating deeper than the target actually was.  Trying to adjust my hunting I started getting a very accurate pinpoint of the target in question. 

As I rotated around the target I noticed the ID would be a little jumpy , never locking in on a solid number, this was my first clue.  Decided to open up the discrimination and check around the target and found part of my answer to the incorrect depth indication.  Iron audio reports very close to the target, or rather within the range of the outer rim of the search coil.  By this I mean, more than one metal object under the coil at the same time.  This adds to the seemingly depth meter being wrong, but not really wrong since the machine was trying to determine depth by the total return signal from the target.  Keep in mind, any metal object in the same area of a good target changes the return signal and causes erroneous type VID, audio and or depth indications.  The following video show what I'm trying to say.

 

[Cal_Cobra]

For deep turf hunting the two things I see that need improvement are:

1. Shallow target identification - some surface targets will give the double blip, but not all and if their coins at the surface or just under, IMO they don't generally give a great indication that their shallow.  Been fooled many times.
2. The depth meter - Over the holiday weekend I took the EQ800 to a site that I've been working for 10-12 years.  Anything left there is either masked, deep, or both.  I noticed at this site the depth meter was crucial, and at this particular site it seemed, for the most part to work OK.  This hasn't been my experience at other sites, but I keep learning the machine so perhaps I'm gaining on the learning curve.  At any rate, at the site I was working on over the weekend, anything that reported as 4-5 was in fact 8" - 10" deep.  The audio wasn't awesome on most of these targets, but by doing the ML wiggle over them I would get a bouncy mid 20's to low 30's TID and pegged depth meter.  This site has been tough for any detector I've taken there.  For the most part the top 6" have already been cleaned out and any surface targets tend to be recent (last year or less) drops, so I wouldn't say it mimics deep turf cherry picking in a trashy park.  I don't know how it would do at such a place, I feel I'd be overwhelmed by junk shallow targets.

[mn90403]

I have an 8" diameter beach scoop.  I get about half way down on a normal dig.  I use it with my left hand and left foot while I swing with my right hand.  When I see all the arrows in the depth indication then I know I'll have to take a couple of scoops and it will still be in the hole.  It is 'relatively' accurate for all the coins I dig at the beach.  Once understood it is consistent on coin objects and inaccurate on especially small targets.

Mitchel

[StevenB]

I love my 800 and still on the learning curve but I have to say the depth indication issue is its greatest weakness, particularly the lack of audio modulation on anything five or six inches deep or shallower.  (And yes I realize that this can be seen as a positive feature, not a bug.)  I spent part of the weekend searching an older local park which has been heavily detected for decades.  I was lucky enough to dig two IHP's which is a good testament to the Equinox's abilities, but they rang up almost as loudly as the carpet of zinc pennies throughout the park.  I found that lifting the coil seemed to be the best strategy to determine depth.  Of course I do this with my AT Pro as well but not nearly as much, and probably the AT Pro might not have found the Indian pennies so there you have it....  (also found my first Civil War era musket ball, so yeah I'm loving this machine!)