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My Thursday X-coil Iffy


mn90403

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1 hour ago, kiwijw said:

......add the 10 that I found with the Zed & a certain little 10 inch Russian made white coil

The correct term is “Unmentionables”🤠  It‘s like a Claytons drink, the word you use when you don’t want to use the word, or going around a round-about the wrong way!.🤣

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I am now sure of two things -

1.) The flogged patches here are much more flogged than overseas patches which people post great results from.

2.) Even getting up to 3" or so extra depth from a new coil still isn't enough to rejuvinate most old, flogged patches here in the US.

Mitchel saw me at my land and drove in to introduce himself a few days ago. I tried explaining how to find a few old flogged patches (ones which hadn't seen an X Coil yet), not sure if he ever made it as it's kinda hard without drawing a map. Hopefully he had better luck than I've had, but almost without exception I max out at 1 or 2 missed dinks per patch, max. 

Many of these patches have seen 30 or 40 GPZs and 5 decades of every detector and coil type on the planet. I just can't help but feel these aren't the types of flogged patches that overseas people are posting 10 new missed nuggets a day from by putting a new coil on.

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Jasong, this has been my point all along, Australian’s too have totally flogged patches that just do not produce much anymore, some of the most detected places on the planet are in Victoria which has a very large population who know all about metal detectors because of the huge popularity in the golden years of many many people experiencing life changing finds.

In theory if the coils are doing as is being touted everywhere then everyone would be experiencing similar all over the world, in the case of the GPZ the tech has been borne out compared to previous detectors, almost all my old patches have produced something in the way of gold when I went over them with the GPZ, some were spectacular some were average and some were disappointing but most did produce something.

In the case of the coils some ground types (a lot) can actually cause the performance to drop below what’s supplied, which says the extra depth advantage is not universal, so we then come down to the main advantage of the coil options, which is size, weight and shape. The key advantage is having smaller or larger than standard with a weight reduction, so long as the ground doesn’t make things too difficult more size options are the key. 

Clearly the GPZ benefits from a smaller coil, the NZ guys have proven that conclusively.🤠 The problem with going smaller is it opens up the detector to a lot more surface mineral ground variation, so the ground needs to be shallower and less variable to avoid too much noise getting into the audio. If the surface minerals are too extreme the only way to compensate for them is to lift the coil which even by a few mm kills depth on the tiny stuff, so you end up with a Nill net effect or worse possibly a negative effect dependant on conditions. This is why I have always advised caution in this sphere especially when you consider the work around associated with the risks mentioned in other threads. 

JP

Here’s a pic of a nice piece I scored under some brush and dead sticks with the 17” elliptical, the key advantage of the coil in this instance was purely down to shape.

16374702-F41F-4E36-80D8-01C7C6AB623B.thumb.jpeg.77e10d56dce14777cc844a610127dd40.jpeg004441AA-EC68-48A5-9B96-CCE40B8B7123.thumb.jpeg.57319d6da9a049a052e4a95b524ee602.jpeg

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Jasong , as JP has just illustrated population is the key plus patches vary in depth, mineralisation etc.,  like JP I found the Z produced initially on some of the old patches and the X coil Z combos produced also on these same few patches that for whatever reason still had gold the VLFs/PIs left. But this is/was not the case on all patches only a minority so far, I say so far, because who knows what the developer of X coil or other coil manufacturers will produce in the future that combines with the Z as they did with the VLFs/PIs. 

I differ with JP and do not believe the X coils are limited in comparison to the ML coils in that they are suited to particular mineralisation grounds, and not more to general use, I have found no basis for this, thus the extra sensitivity/depth they give I feel is universal. However we all seem to agree naturally the varying sizes and shapes have given us better type ground coverage. Plus X coil are advancing in refinements wheras MLs Z coils are going nowhere as it does not appear they believe the  Z can be a better performer with better coil technology., but I can to an extent understand that as their strength has been in detector tech. advancement, that`s how they keep their shareholders happy, individual after market coil builders do not suffer from this constraint.

Buh...………...whatever I just know I`m loving the extra performance and varying sizes and shapes of coils we suddenly have for the Z.

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Jason’s is spot on. Everything that follows applies to the U.S. only. Most U.S. patches are shallow surface deposits and more depth often produces little or no more gold. The GPZ brought old patches to life by targeting specific gold types that were invisible to or had very poor depth with the previous Minelab PI detectors. It had extra benefit in the U.S. by being able to run settings that would not work well on a lot of ground in Oz. The GPZ with stock 14” is a deadly combo for both depth and sensitivity. Just to pull a number out of my posterior I’d say they cleaned up 90% of what was left. The new coils do fill in some gaps but it’s just the last scraps of the leftovers. Yes, there is still gold to be found, but only newbies or eternal optimists can ignore the reality I am seeing. We are scraping the proverbial bottom of the barrel here in the U.S. and I don’t think new coils or even new detector models are going to do much to change that.

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2 hours ago, jasong said:

I am now sure of two things -

1.) The flogged patches here are much more flogged than overseas patches which people post great results from.

2.) Even getting up to 3" or so extra depth from a new coil still isn't enough to rejuvinate most old, flogged patches here in the US.

Yes.  In the US, for me, it is mostly whether I think I can:

1) fit the coil into areas I could not with the 14x13

2) Cover more ground area (depth is not as much an issue)

3)  And of course getting smaller gold a little deeper REALLY applies in the AZ deserts (but is not going to make me rich)

For example, for me to go 17x15 Xcoil, may not benefit me much more when I can get a 19" coil for a 40% discount price, unless we are talking really tight rocky gullies (in which case I'm moving rocks, anyways).  We all have different terrain, different types of patches.

Now we have an option that makes our detector like a man's Barbie doll.  Dress her as you see fit!!   (and no, I don't play with Barbie doll's … I have a daughter...  that's my story and I'm sticking to it!) 

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6 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

 Yes, there is still gold to be found, but only newbies or eternal optimists can ignore the reality I am seeing. We are scraping the proverbial bottom of the barrel here in the U.S. and I don’t think new coils or even new detector models are going to do much to change that.

Very much agreed. I believe though that hiking to remote areas that are not within reach of any ATV holds good promise. Hence, a lighter GPZ would make a difference (even though I hiked with the GPZ 12 miles yesterday....I feel like dead)

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I am with you Gold Catcher.  I have to drive and then hike so much farther to find fresh patches.  I would not want to be a newbie trying to learn, today.   It gets harder and harder each year and there are fewer signs to learn by.  Jason has put this into good perspective in one of his past videos, and  it is true.  Technology isn't opening up that many more areas in the US.   

But don't give up Mitchel... I'm still rooting that you find some big ones missed!!   

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