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Detailed Review Of The Nokta Fors Gold Nugget Detector


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Thanks for reposting here Ray. I cleaned it up for you. Nokta did a great job on the FORS Gold and I will definitely be keeping an eye on them in the future. First Australia, then France and now Turkey, plus I am hearing some good things about some Russian detectors. Detecting has gone worldwide. Much as I hate to say it we need the competition because as usual US manufacturers get complacent. Repackaging the same stuff eight different ways is not going to fly anymore.

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Guest Paul (Ca)

Great write up Steve and Ray, Appreciate the two of you taking the time to post your recent Fors Gold experiences and finds. Very encouraging for those interested in getting a Fors Gold, I'd like to try my luck again with gold nugget hunting next year but for now relic hunting will be my main source of detecting.

Do know a couple of property owners that allow me on 1000 plus acreage which once had an early 1850's stamp mill and a china town, But mainly hunt there for relics maybe next time in the fall or early winter will see if I can try nugget hunting instead got to be a few keepers left in there, A friend of mine once found a 5 gram nugget here by accident searching for relics, So I know it has to have more in there.

Thanks again Steve and Ray, Very encouraging!

Paul (Ca)

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One of the items that was not touch on by Steve or Ray and most likely they do not have this problem with the FORS. Once the FORS was in my hands and adjusted for my height my forearm did not fit into the armrest once my hand was gripping the handle no matter what position the control box was mounted on the handle. I have to admit I have huge forearms. I assume the FORS is being marketed to be adjustable to all users. The armrest was not wide enough for my forearm, this may be something that Nokta may want to address as I had to bend the forearm rest outward to fit my forearm. What really bent was the rail that the two piece forearm bracket attaches to. Also the included nylon belt was not long enough to go over my forearm then fold back over the top to secure to the other half of Velcro, the belt needs to be 4 inches longer for those that have large forearms such as I do.

 

The FORS shaft length can be adjusted a total 9.750 inches or 24.765cm in 2.125 inch or 5.3975cm increments. A nice added touch would have been to offer adjustments in 1 inch or 2.54cm increments.

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Thanks Steve and Ray and everyone who commented on the Nokta FORS Gold.  I can think of a completely unlimited number of reasons why I should buy one today, but before I let loose of the money  I'll play the devil's advocate and ask myself why I shouldn't buy one.  No particular order or priority.

1.  It's likely that 30 days after I get my detector, Nokta will come out with a new and improved version, incorporating the suggestions in this thread and other improvements. 

2.  It looks like KellyCo is the only place in the US to get one and I just don't like buying things from a sole source vendor. KellyCo seems to be a reputable company and they've been around longer than I can remember.  But I believe in some level of competition and I have a knee jerk reaction against buying something when I have no choice where to get it from.

3.  I'm a little bit suspicious of a high performance detector that's only powered by 4 AA cells. Granted, the Pro version comes with NiMH AA batteries but still...it seems to me that detector performance is to some extent dependent on the power of the power supply.  That may be more true of PI detectors though.

4.  I was gearing up to order a Minelab SDC-2030 and the FORS Gold has got me wavering.  Of course, the only real solution is to get both of them.

5. As a courtesy, I'll have to explain to my wife why we need another detector.  This is a slam dunk because I made some extra money this month and a new detector purchase won't come out of household money or deplete any reserves.   Well, the SDC-2030 will.

I'd sure appreciate any thoughts anyone may have.

Thanks,

Bob

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Guest Paul (Ca)

Once again good job Steve and Ray with the Fors Gold,  Scoring gold at the beginning is encouraging. Plus, Has allot features for a Grand.

Want to comment as Ray did with the battery charger missing the adaptor to convert to a USA outlet, My Fors Gold Pro package arrived today and like Ray it was missing the charger adaptor, So I called Kellyco and mentioned this and mentioned that another Fors Gold user had the same issue and had already talked with Kellyco.  They're sending me an adaptor (no charge) and were very appreciative to hear about the missing charger adaptor and that they will correct the issue with future orders.  

Was playing with 2-tone boost mode and it is deeper than 3-tone mode,  Buried some lead shot at different depths comparing the three modes with same sens settings.

2-tone boost mode is deeper than 3-tone,  No question and the deeper signals were so weak or not even heard in 3-tone mode.  Haven't compared it with the Deus or other top end Relic/gold detectors but will say one will not be disappointed with purchasing the Fors Gold from what little I have seen, Has the makings of a great gold jewelry detector using boost mode for those that enjoy hunting for gold jewelry.

I wonder if Fors CoRe 2-tone is as sensitive as the Fors Gold 2-tone feature?  From what I understand the Fors CoRe 2-tone is for depth and has a slower recovery speed?  Sounds to me it's very similar to Fors Gold Boost mode only renamed?

Anyway,  Next stop will be a relic hunt with the Fors Gold. Can't wait.

Paul (Ca)

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it will be interesting to see how the two new Fors machines compare - the Gold and the CoRe.

Also

Since it looks increasingly like folks are finally realizing that for most of North America, small gold is about all you can expect to find, and since Minelab has now brought out a PI detector optimized for it, i suspect a lot of reconsideration of what to "take hunting" may occur.

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On 10/14/2014 at 1:28 PM, EZMoney Bob said:

Thanks Steve and Ray and everyone who commented on the Nokta FORS Gold.  I can think of a completely unlimited number of reasons why I should buy one today, but before I let loose of the money  I'll play the devil's advocate and ask myself why I shouldn't buy one.  No particular order or priority.

1.  It's likely that 30 days after I get my detector, Nokta will come out with a new and improved version, incorporating the suggestions in this thread and other improvements. 

2.  It looks like KellyCo is the only place in the US to get one and I just don't like buying things from a sole source vendor. KellyCo seems to be a reputable company and they've been around longer than I can remember.  But I believe in some level of competition and I have a knee jerk reaction against buying something when I have no choice where to get it from.

3.  I'm a little bit suspicious of a high performance detector that's only powered by 4 AA cells. Granted, the Pro version comes with NiMH AA batteries but still...it seems to me that detector performance is to some extent dependent on the power of the power supply.  That may be more true of PI detectors though.

4.  I was gearing up to order a Minelab SDC-2030 and the FORS Gold has got me wavering.  Of course, the only real solution is to get both of them.

5. As a courtesy, I'll have to explain to my wife why we need another detector.  This is a slam dunk because I made some extra money this month and a new detector purchase won't come out of household money or deplete any reserves.   Well, the SDC-2030 will.

I'd sure appreciate any thoughts anyone may have.

Thanks,

Bob

Bob,

4 AA should not scares you away. It all depends on how the circuit is designed. Here is an example I see and hear all the time. Years ago rechargeable drills were 7.4 VDC and over the years the the voltage has increased up to 32VDC. Higher voltage means nothing other than the drill has more battery cells at the cost of having lower milliampere-hours. If the internal motor is designed to run at 12VDC and the battery pack has ten 1.2 volt cells with each cell being 2400 mAh and a drill that runs on 32VDC and the battery pack has twenty seven 1.2 volt cells with each cell having 1600 mAh the 12 volt drill will have longer run time. Now if you get into the torque of the drills this breaks down to the gear reduction. I have an old 12VDC Ridge drill that has more torque and last longer than the crap thats on the market today due to the cells holding more mAh.

The Fisher Gold Bug Pro runs on a single 9 volt battery. Depending on the chemistry of the battery it can deliver 300 to nearly 600 mAh. This 9v battery can power the GBP like 18 hours I believe. I have never really checked as I throw a new cell in every outing.

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I could of course be wrong but I am guessing the FORS CoRe and FORS Gold are the same detector, one tweaked slightly for the Coin/Relic market, and one tweaked slightly for the prospecting market. But 95% the same 15 kHz unit.

Paul, I must be the lucky guy. My detector came with the 110V adapter, 12V adapter, and USB adapter.

The manual at http://www.noktadedektor.com/dl/fors-documents/fors-gold-en/fors-gold-user-manual-en.pdf does state that Boost is deeper than the 3 tone Disc mode. A late change in Boost Mode involves the tones. Boost is defaults to Tone 4 which is the two tone ferrous/non-ferrous setup. Switching to Tone 1 will make it into a single tone mode. All targets sound alike, and the Iron Mask is used to set where iron breaks up or is rejected. I have not experimented with this yet.

Iron Mask does seem to be used to quiet Boost and DI3 down as the default setting is 10 in both modes. I want to try running Iron Mask at 0 in Boost Mode to see if it gets noisier and possibly if there is more depth. If you beat me to it let me know Paul.

Tom, I retired from sales. Bottom line for my serious nugget work I use a PI. I use a VLF mainly to deal with extreme nail situations and recon work. But once an area is shown to have gold, a PI is the way to go. The main thing I am using a VLF for now is tailing pile recon, where a PI would get bogged down rapidly. Once an area pops a nugget, I go back with a PI and dig everything in that spot, even if that means 100 nails. If nothing else the nails could be hiding a nugget.

A good review does not mean the FORS Gold is the be all and end all of VLF prospecting detectors. Each company makes a similar unit. For overall performance and feel, the Fisher F75 is about the closest mainstream unit and similarly priced. And guess what - the F75 uses four AA batteries.

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Guest Paul (Ca)

Hello Steve,

That's great yours came with the Adaptor,  I believe others who order theirs from Turkey will get the adaptor as well.  At least kellyco is aware of the issue and will correct this minor issue,  That is great!

Was reading the manual last night, The settings can be saved and last night after reading the manual figured out how to save settings.  That's great! Now one can save settings so the detector can be a turn on and go unit, Was worried it didn't have this feature.

Yes indeed,  Going to lower the Iron Mask setting see if it enhances separation in iron or adds depth, It should help with reducing iron masking but based from the manual it's set at 10 to help eliminate hot rocks which one may not encounter at all sites.  So for relic hunting, A lower Iron Mask setting may be beneficial and for gold nugget hunting maybe a plus?

Heading out this morning to one of my relic sites up in gold county, See how the Fors Gold performs.  Hopefully do both a combination relic and nugget hunt if we can get up to a certain area were we know an area that nuggets have been found.

So far like the unit,  Maybe the best detector out there for under a grand.

Will share todays experiences here in the near future, Hopefully have some finds to share as well.

Paul

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