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Tom Dankowski Tips For Low Mineral Ground


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The explanation of the Beach mode stability and performance in mineralized ground was put to me, in this way: is a combination of it using lower transmit power and the frequencies are lower weighted than any of the other modes.  Lower frequency machines have traditionally done well in mineralized ground.

For results in the air, the other modes do detect coins and jewelry better. But that comes with a cost in being bombarded with false signals and noise in mineralized ground. A good signal can simply get lost in the noise. On most forums, particularly the Nox forum at Findmall, when people ask for setting help for freshwater, 99% of people will say "the beach modes are designed for saltwater beaches. You will get better performance in the Park or Field modes".  I guess better is a relative term.  If I can use the other modes with stability, I will but it looks like in some freshwater places...probably on land too...where the beach modes seem to do a great job.

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3 hours ago, Daniel Tn said:

The explanation of the Beach mode stability and performance in mineralized ground was put to me, in this way: is a combination of it using lower transmit power and the frequencies are lower weighted than any of the other modes.  Lower frequency machines have traditionally done well in mineralized ground.

For results in the air, the other modes do detect coins and jewelry better. But that comes with a cost in being bombarded with false signals and noise in mineralized ground. A good signal can simply get lost in the noise. On most forums, particularly the Nox forum at Findmall, when people ask for setting help for freshwater, 99% of people will say "the beach modes are designed for saltwater beaches. You will get better performance in the Park or Field modes".  I guess better is a relative term.  If I can use the other modes with stability, I will but it looks like in some freshwater places...probably on land too...where the beach modes seem to do a great job.

Yep, it is all about learning the strengths and weaknesses of each the modes, throwing out the implied meaning of the mode name or taking what ML or the so called experts say about how the modes should be used with skepticism, and with that knowledge applying them appropriately to the situation at hand. 

Dan - I know the following is not news to you but for the benefit of others reading along...

I think it is unfortunate that I hear repeatedly about folks not getting the 800 because they "don't have a need to do gold prospecting", not realizing there is a lot more to gold mode than prospecting (and a lot more that is different between the 600 and 800 than lack of gold mode) or conversely skipping over the 600 because they want to find gold (which the 600 is perfectly capable of doing).  This shows how these somewhat arbitrary mode name descriptors can bias inexperienced or unsuspecting folks in buy decisions or even mode selections during detecting.  Knowledge about your machine AND site is power when it comes to detecting.  The site knowledge piece and knowing what sites hold promise and where to go once you get there is a whole other topic but no less important than knowing your machine.

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  • 2 weeks later...

For beach hunting you can set the IB and RS appropriate to target conditions (higher recovery speed for max target signal separation in thick trash or lower for a tad more target signal elongation/depth).

Lower RS is more susceptible to ground chatter, but that is not really an issue on the beach unless you have black sand. 

IB is pretty useless IMO.  It may reduce falsing a tad but at the expense of masking non-ferrous near ferrous targets (which sort of defeats the purpose of running at a high recovery speed).  If there is not much iron to deal with, then just leave it at the default (since masking is unlikely).  If you are worried about masking then dial it down to 1 or 0. 

The salt signal really has no bearing on why ML chose the default settings of RS and IB in the beach modes.  Bottom line is don't be afraid to do some on-the-beach experimentation by tweaking these settings away from the defsults to suit the target situation and ground conditions, but do so with knowledge of the tradeoffs, some of which I described above.

HTH

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The lower the RS the longer the target sound in the water.   More to beach hunting than the dry sand.   Wet sand and in the water has its own challenges.   Even the dry sand when damp can prevent the use of some of the other modes.   IB.... i was running 2... which will make most bottle caps in the water almost disappear .... running 0 you still catch more of um.   Is that good or bad?   I normally run 3 on the wet sand .... but once in the water i dont care for the odd sound it makes on the hard pan, especially going up a slope.  So in my fairly low mineral locations i run RS4.   Its all about tweaking it to best suit your hunting and getting as good a performance as you can....... KNOWING there is no perfect setting.   Some days im willing to pass up say high non-ferr targets or even lower my settings for a fast recent drop hunt covering a lot of beach.   Sometimes a machine can be just to mind numbing HOT and in the long run your day wasnt anymore profitable.   In the water most of these machines are getting about the same depth....... so it can come down to what you do differently or where you do it.

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  • 1 month later...

Thought I'd push this thread to the forefront.  I just finished (didn't time it but seemed like well over an hour) rereading this thread.  It's up to its 6th page now, much more info than back when I read it end of July.  I recognized a lot of familar poster names there who also post here. 

The thread subtopics have expanded, and in a good way.

 

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On 7/29/2019 at 5:05 PM, Steve Herschbach said:

 The Florida crowd would be at a total loss in the Sierra Nevada greenstone belt.

Not all us Fl guys would be lol.   I used to spend my winters and late fall out West when i lived in an RV with some crazy guys who gold hunted.  You sure learn about hot rocks and changing minerals.   With any machine even with testing there will be no perfect settings.   Test a target ..... change settings.... recover target and it was 5" deep...... next target is 8" deep and there ya go making adjustments again.   Sometimes its just best to get-er-close and stop pushing buttons.

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