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Testing Various Detectors On Some Nz $1 Coins In My Front Yard


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Really good test. Usually you can hear the emi as a flutter if you have an all metal mode. I think the emi basically interupts the signal so the machines have difficulty settling in on an id. Higher frequencies help. When I ran the Gold Racer 56khz it was pretty much immune to emi and very handy. The Orx seems very emi resistant as well and for me the Kruzer is the most sensitive to emi with any both coils I use but the Nel coil seems just slightly less sensitive and smoother.

Of all my machines I think the Orx is the surpising one where everything on it is wireless and how smooth it seems to be.

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5 hours ago, phrunt said:

I'm amazed with detectors being able to ID targets. 

Nice article and great information on the detectors, with that said all I can say now is thank you for the information.

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For those of us in the USA, the coin Simon is using would basically equal two US quarters stacked in size and weight. The first time I found an NZ $2 coin I thought it was going to be a shallow aluminum can. It was about 2" deep in a local park. Totally blew my headphones off my head.........I think I was using an XP ORX. 

The Vanquish are really amazing detectors for coins and larger jewelry. If that was Minelab's goal, they really got it right.

The simplicity of the often maligned "compressed" target IDs of the Vanquish and Equinox is one of their best features in my opinion. When they lock onto a tone and number and the target is non-ferrous you can count on the conductivity range being dead on no matter how deep the target is.

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13 hours ago, kac said:

Really good test. Usually you can hear the emi as a flutter if you have an all metal mode. I think the emi basically interupts the signal so the machines have difficulty settling in on an id.

EMI is so much more. 

If one is able to hear the EMI pulses there is much more of a malfunction than just Id of the target.  Depth will be severely limited as well when EMI is heard in the detector. 

Tom speaks of silent EMI. I would like to say it is there [not totality silent] but most people won't pickup on the subtle hints.  As in, the only time you hear the EMI on the Equinox is in the all metal mode with an acquired target. Then slight pules can be heard when over the target.

Even with this silent or slight EMI, loss of depth happens.  

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Yes these NZ $1 and $2 coins are simple targets, they're similar to the Aussie $1 and $2 coins except we got ours around the right way with the $2 being the bigger coin than the $1, they made their $2 the small one 🙂

EMI is a depth killer, I've noticed that a fair bit in the past, I know if my detector is being bombarded with EMI not only are my target ID's messy I'm also losing depth.

The Vanquish for some reason handles local EMI conditions better than the Equinox.  I've displayed this on video in the past.

5kHZ is a troublesome frequency for me with EMI, I wonder if seeing Minelab were experimenting with 4kHZ and released that 4kHZ update for the Nox that for their Multi-IQ variant on the much newer Vanquish they used 4kHz instead of 5.  Just a thought.

I've always said the Vanquish is better with EMI as I really believe it is.  I guess it could be the elliptical coils helping?

I really like the Vanquish/Nox ID's too Jeff,  The T2 having more ID's and so jumpy makes me far less likely to dig in a park situation when I don't want to dig many holes where I rely on ID's more for dig decisions as I can be more confident the target is good on the Vanquish/Nox, if it's jumpy on the Multi-IQ machines for me it's less likely to be a good target.  If it's jumpy on the T2, it's either good or bad 🙂  If the Vanquish or Nox lock onto a target, life is good especially these $1 and $2 coins as they're such easy picking.  You do have to do some pinpoint size tests sometimes as you can mix them up for a buried coke can. 🙂

If I left the CTX in Auto sensitivity it struggled on the deeper of the two targets, manual sorts that out.  In my nearby park I can run the CTX in manual 25 before EMI causes me trouble, as apposed to 16 at home.  I don't have recovery deep turned on due to the nails, once in the field I have it turned on.  I'm finding the CTX outstanding for depth so far, beating the Nox in default park 1 gain of 25.  My little 6" coil should arrive for the CTX today or tomorrow, that'll be the depth tester as the 6" on the Nox will not hit the deeper of the two test targets in this video.  Will the 6" on the CTX? I hope so 🙂

The idea of my post wasn't to say detectors are better than each other or anything like that, it was just showing how well a new to detecting person could do using even entry level detector in my hunting grounds, the higher end machines with their extra features isn't really going to be much of a game changer for them.  It's a shame the coil the Ace 300i came with is relatively useless on these deeper targets as it would be serious bang for the buck if it came with a Garrett made Tornado alternative and I'm sure there are plenty in Europe that would agree, those Europeans are who inspired me to get a Tornado for the Ace as based off their forums and Youtube it's a very popular Ace coil for deep coins.

These coin depths I've got the coins at are quite shallow compared to coins I usually find, I would say 10 to 11" would be near average around here for coins.  The reason I've put them in a little shallower is the EMI from my house.  I should put another in at 11" and another deeper one I guess for my challenging tests but when I need to know that I just take the detector for a spin and the local field and let the detector show it's stuff.  I'm not big on buried target testing when so many coins are available in their natural habitat so close to home 🙂

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Great videos/tests!  Here in the US, I’d pass up all shallow 21/22 ID’s in our local parks...There’s an abundance of those id’s, which are mostly pennies and other larger aluminum trash...They’d  have to be whispery for me to dig them (for a possible early wheat or Indian penny), unless I’m dealing with disturbed/turned over ground, trenching, or gopher action.  All our dollar coins ID in the 30’s on the Vanq/Eqx.  
 

When I used my Explorer SE, it would be a mortal sin to run it in auto sensitivity (especially for a deep coin hunter), simply because you never knew what the true sensitivity of your machine would be after the machine automatically reduced the sens for quiet operation.  It’s been many years since I used a CTX, but do you know the “real” sensitivity the machine goes to when in auto sens (or auto +1 or +2)?

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I think in Auto the CTX was settling on 14, it was quiet as a mouse with no EMI but struggled on the deeper target with that sensitivity.  Manual certainly seems the way to go, I tried Auto +1, +2 and +3 ,they do alright but I'd just rather set it myself based on conditions than worry about Auto doing it for me. 

I forgot to include the Go-Find 40 in my test video above about why I like certain detectors for their Target ID's, it's a prime example of why I much prefer detectors with an ID than without, having these 4 segments for ID on the Go-Find is useless.  It has to be a very easy target to get a good segment to be stable and even then a massive range of targets fall into each segment.  People complain about the Nox having 50 ID's, well the Go-Find has 4 🙂

You'll see on the deepest coin the Go-Find actually did better than the AT Gold, while also reporting it as junk quite often it flicked across to the correct ID segment to say it's likely a deeper coin.  If you really learnt the detector you'd get used to the indicators of deep good targets.  The nail response on the depth meter is very shallow, while the times it hits the coin it shows as very deep.

1183879319_GoFindscreen.thumb.jpg.c1875ef35c47c45c43a4aacdfacd3c2b.jpg

I've marked the depth meter in Red on the image above, watch it when on the deep coin to the left while looking at it's ID.

Now, to give the Go-Find some credit, it does do reasonably well on the deeper targets for such a small coil but it's really a dig it all detector, certainly not suitable for cherry picking in parks, unless you're just after modern near surface finds but how many modern coins are there these days? Nobody uses them anymore so you'd mainly be digging modern junk.

I'm not overly versed on US pricing but I'd imagine Minelab want a similar price for the Go-Find 66 to an Ace 300 which has full target ID's and a range of coils including aftermarket options and the  Go-Find 66 just has 4 segments of ID and a fixed coil.

The real competition to the Go-Find is the Nokta Mini Horde kids detectors which have similar features and specifications, and the same ID segments.  I'd never want my kid using one though, what a way to put them off detecting forever by digging so much junk with the limited target identification.  A hundred bits of junk later they'll hate the hobby, with an Ace 300 or Vanquish they could cherry pick NZ $1 and $2 coins quite effectively and fill their moneybox in no time.

The Go-Find was built off the same V-flex technology as the X-Terra series though, it does work quite well and even works pretty good at the beach on dry and wet sand.   The real downfall for it is the lack of ID's which they resolved with the Vanquish as a more realistic entry level machine, in fact a really good one.

We had a warm day today and the frozen ground melted 🙂

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My CTX 3030 6" coil arrived today so I thought I'd compare it to some other detectors with small coils including the Nox with it's 6" coil and the Coiltek 10x5" Nox coil. 

I was pretty happy with the CTX, in fact I am pretty sure it did the best by a significant margin, the only issue is even though it was giving a pretty damn good ID on the deepest coin it wasn't giving any sound on it, other than the break in the threshold.  Perhaps I have a setting wrong or something I have no idea what I'm doing with the CTX although I found the default profiles useless for deep coins so I just made my own based off the coin program and changed the ground type to ferrous coin and it seems to do pretty good.

I tried recovery deep an the sound doesn't work on the deep coin, I haven't messed around with any of the audio settings.

12 38 is what it should show on an air test on the $1 coin and it is often showing 11 38 on the deep coin but no audio, weird. 

The rest of the detectors do poorly on the deepest coin.  The Gold Bug Pro surprises me, it's quite deep but reports it as iron.  The Vanquish did semi OK, it at least had the audio tone of the coin, It occurred to me after doing the video the Vanquish was in jewellery mode, so I went out and tested in coin and in relic mode and neither did any better than jewellery mode, it's been my favourite Vanquish mode on coins in the past so I just leave it on that all the time.

I didn't bother with the T2 and it's 5" coil, it wasn't worth my time finding the coil to put on as I already know it can't detect the deeper of the two targets with the 5" on, again it's just iron to it and that's when in all metal.

Any advice on the audio issue with the CTX would be appreciated. 

The deepest coin is on the left at 8", with the other target at 6" and I put white stones on the grass to show where they are.  They were buried about 2 years ago, who knows how deep they are now, the ground is very soft in winter so they may have sunk lower since then.

 

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I tried tweaking the Nox a bit more and using Park 2 and Field 2 and adjusting recovery speed and ground balancing to try get a better hit on the deeper coin with no joy.

I maybe wrong but it appears to me the Vanquish with V8 8" × 5" coil goes a bit deeper than the Coiltek 10x5" coil on the Nox in my mild soil conditions on this coin.

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