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Help: What Am I Doing Wrong?


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So we practiced with my Equinox 800, on a simple yard, lawn. We read in the manual (pages 39-40: https://www.minelab.com/__files/f/326548/4901-0249-1 Inst. Manual, EQUINOX 600 800 EN.pdf) about auto ground balancing and noise cancellation, and we did that. We tried Filed 1, multi and all other frequencies. But the detector sounds wherever we search on the ground, so it gives the sound and shovel symbol and so on. It also sounds and runs crazy when we hold it in the air and so on.

A few weeks ago I tried it on a field, and used Filed 1, then it worked well. I did not do auto ground balancing and noise cancellation then, but it worked good. When I sweep around it, it was sometimes quiet, then it made a sound when it found an object, and then I dug up metals, so it found good.

But now that I tried on a simple lawn, and to learn auto ground balancing and noise cancellation, I do not understand at all what is happening, or what I am doing wrong. Whenever I sweep it, it sounded all the time, and I could not find a single place where it did not make a sound.

I do not know if ground balance worked properly, although it seemed to work, same with noise cancellation.

On page 40 under Auto Ground Balance, point 3 it says: "Raise and lower the coil repeatedly over a clear patch of soil that does not contain any targets."

But if I do not find a clear patch of soil that does not contain any targets or that is not making sounds? Wherever I sweep the coil, it sounds like it has found a target, even when held in the air.

What do you think I'm doing wrong?

Thanks.

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Long shot here, but what you describe sounds like what you might experience if the pinpointer is turned on and you are detecting with it turned on.  Do you see changing VDI numbers or do you think the Nox is stuck in pinpoint mode?

As 67GTA states it could be heavy EMI.  Are you under a powerline or hunting over a buried powerline?

Is your cell phone turned off or are you near a cell tower?

Is your coil cable connector clean and tight?

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I'm thinking EMI. I can't run the Equinox in multi frequency in one of the parks close to me because the EMI is so bad. You should try using it in a single frequency like 15 or 20 KHz and see if that makes a difference.

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I'm basically a beginner compared to most of the folks here, but if my machine starts getting too noisy, I usually turn down the sensitivity a bit until it calms down. One time it went crazy and I just turned it off for a few seconds and turned it back on and it was all good.

Hope that helps.

 

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4 hours ago, Renegade_Arts said:

I'm basically a beginner compared to most of the folks here, but if my machine starts getting too noisy, I usually turn down the sensitivity a bit until it calms down. One time it went crazy and I just turned it off for a few seconds and turned it back on and it was all good.

Hope that helps.

 

Generally the icon You see on the screen with a shovel inside, means coil overload...

Now, supposing that You don't have around the most common EMI sources like powerlines and other machines accidentally working on the same frequency, I can only think to what's under the soil...If this thing happened to You ONLY in that particular place, I would think to multiple massive objects buried in little depth...I talk about car sized things, with a meter or so of soil above....In my mind this can explain the overload...

Conversely, if you talk about a simultaneous overload signal when You move the coil side to side I starts to think about coil's wire insulation failure or in the worst case water leak inside the coil housing...

Long story short, all of the above prove nothing if this happen only there...

Maybe you found a buried car cemetery, like an old scrap yard🤓

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You have not mentioned what sensitivity that you have been using,many times it can be such a simple thing as running the sens to high and just needs throttling back,try using sy 15 as a baseline starting point and then gradually walking it up till it becomes noisy again then back off till it runs stable again.

On one location you may be able in the right situations run the Nox almost on full sensitivity but other sites reducing it down is the only way of taming it.

Must admit on most of my permissions i can run my sensitivity up pretty high as i dont in general have problems with EMI only occasionally when i go under very high voltage powerlines and even then its just for a few seconds i get some form  of EMI.Just glad i dont detect in any form of city environment and have constant problems from electrical equipment.

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All the above answers give you good clues to try and figure out the issue.

Is it happening everywhere or only at your simple yard?

Shovel symbol = overload of metal signal. 

Sensitivity too high? In my yard, powerlines are 30 feet away. I have to cut sens below 15 to clear up the chatter.

Use one frequency to test if it is only in multi or in both single and multi.

I wold add one I did when new, coil management. Bumping the coil,, esp. at high sens on a bit of grass or ground causes what sound like signals. Sweep as evenly as you can in grass, on a beach I can lightly scrub the sand with out false signals. 

Keep trying, this happens to all of us at first. The crew above are experienced and helpful. Thanks to all.

If you haven't done so, you might want to plant a few coins to give you an idea of targets in the ground.

Happy hunting!

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Thank you all for the answers.

The pinpointer was not on. Also we got two cell phones on.

When you say EMI, it may have been EMI interference!  Powerlines maybe 50-60 meters or so, from where I was trying to detect. Something like this: https://lrf.imagevault.media/publishedmedia/owsse6zjb6kddcq2rriy/ElledningKlyftamonALH.jpg

When I think about it now, it is electricity network I guess, which goes through a fairly large town with 5,300 inhabitants, so may have to assume that it is really strong and powerfull powerlines, and that it therefore disrupted the detector.

I did use it on Field 1, multi, but also tried 5, 10, 15, 20 KHz but still making a lot of noice.

The sensitivity, I think we tried from 25, to down 15 and below, but still we heard a lof o noice. And also tried noise canceling and ground balancing.

It happened all around the yard, and in the forest near.

 

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Wifi signals can also cause it to go crazy. Just about every house has a wireless network. You can try holding the coil in the air and noise cancel a few times to see if that helps in trouble spots. Can't remember how many frequency offsets the noise cancel has off the top of my head.

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