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Noise / Falsing While Hunting In Saltwater


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Sorry about the abbreviations--I hear others calling them as such and do it myself without thinking.  Not on Geotech here wherein I would be the one asking for clarification....

cjc

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On 6/25/2019 at 7:57 AM, midalake said:

Pinpoint mode to me is completely worthless. It has a broader spectrum signal than Disc mode and the water  seems to drive even more noise/chatter in pinpoint.  I have learned to "X" the target  in Disc mode and recover.  The more important part of the conversation is the loss of detection. How do I go forward with moving water and expect to detect targets?  The answer is: I am unable to.  

Dave

I just came back from our low tide beaches in Southern California.  I had read both of these threads before I went.

Let me just say that I have 'lost' my fair share of targets in a dig hole but later to be found with more digging.   It is annoying but somewhat understandable.  I also think that certain targets don't sound loud enough in the preset modes.  Neither of these happened to me tonight.

I was using the 15" coil without a coil cover.  Sensitivity was up to 22 in both B1&B2.  I normally hunt in the wet sand but sometimes I go out to the targets in my calf boots.  Tonight I wanted to test B2 in moving water.  It gets a high passing grade from me on moving water up to 1 foot.  I found it to be stable and fairly quiet.  Speed could be as low as 5.

Last night in B1 I went fast to make the same coil go quiet.  I was on 7 most of the time but I didn't do any moving water.

I hope you get it worked out.

Mitchel

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I think a lot of us miss pitch hold.... which gave us longer sounds on targets.   I cant run 7 on a recovery speed here.... ive found the tones are just to short... and if i have selected the wrong pitch or target volume i can completely miss near targets.   I have no problem in moving water knee deep either...... but i believe hes referring to the oat meal area..... fluffy soft sand where black sand and minerals or tiny flakes accumulate...... right there at that low tide line surf... where its pulling your coil going back out.

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  • 2 weeks later...

This is a great and interesting topic that encompasses a large number of the things that the Equinox does.  To address this problem --there isn't a single "tweak' it takes a full understanding of detector basics and then specific knowledge of how to apply these basics to the Equinox.  The  main culprits are high salinity, bottom contours (including inclines) and fast water.  There are some good tips in the manual--a faster Rec. Spd. as offset by more sens and Ground Balancing with a side to side "boost."  I've also used something that draws from my Excal days--recognising that there are three distinct "zones" in many salt environments--the high "draw", the "lower swish" and the lower flat--each with different balance points.  To move the coil while you balance is really just bringing in more randomness.  Making for a higher balance point.  It's not a bad idea to balance for and hunt these three "zones" separately--so as not to be over balanced for the less challenging  levels.  I've done a fair bit of testing with the Rec. Spd. dynamic and while some of the speeds I see suggested here (3,4) are pretty low, when you do go up higher there is a risk of depth loss.  This is more of an extreme measure--good for hills or rough bottom terrain.  How increased Gain factors in here is a tough call--conditions dependent.  Trying to get more depth by clipping down a high powered signal doesn't really make sense when you look at the "bitty" audio that signals the Equinox not handling fast or deep salt.... 

My strategy is just to bring up the TB enough to assign more ground noises down.  (1 or 2)  I've also experimented with some overtuning methods (Manual -9) that seem to help as well--producing a general smoothing effect with good responses standing out more.  I also run 2 Tone--to simplify things.  An alternate for the 800 is to use the "Pitch Gap" in 50 Tone.  These two methods allow decent Gain settings and let me avoid this constant chasing of half sounds.  Sweep speed gives some lee-way to respond to changes instead of some high Rec Spd.   Too many hunters think that the  Equinox will "quick tweak" for any situation--whereas no detector can.  It  takes trial and error and a broad based approach to tuning to address the demands of a fast, varied salt environment. 

cjc

cjc

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