A Beginner’s Guide To The Nokta / Makro Legend

[cjc]

A Beginner’s Guide to the Nokta / Makro Legend

Clive James Clynick has detected for over 40 years and is the author of 24 detector “how to” manuals, numerous articles and product reviews. Topics include:

• Customizing the Legend for your Sites and Type of Hunting.

• Navigation: “Fiddle Less and Find More.”

• Getting Results with the Legend at Tough Sites.

• Coil Control Target Testing and Other Skills.

• Understanding Fast Digital and Multi Frequency Detectors .

• Bottle Caps and Other Problem Targets.

• The Legend as a Gold Jewelry Hunting Machine.

• Understanding the Updates.

  …and Much More…

  (Softbound, 101 pgs)

• Ordering: http://www.clivesgoldpage.com/shop/publications/a-beginners-guide-to-the-nokta-makro-legend/

[Jeff McClendon]

Hi Clive,

does your new book include the features added in software update 1.08?

[cjc]

Well, I didn't go into blinking cursors and mineralizaton meters but the performance related ones (adjustable iron bias, how to use VCO to get more target info) are discussed in detail.  Audio Gain is nothing new.   My readers expect more from me than a regurgitation of the manual.  The focus of this book is on how to understand and get results with the overall Legend platform--"fast digital" and "mutifrequency" and its most effective features.  Also--its' not a book of "settings" that work in someone else's conditons.  "A Beginner's Guide to the Nokta / Makro Legend" is a book designed to teach readers to think for themsleves based upon the condtions they encounter. 

It would be nice to  pretend that the 1.08 is the last upgrade but events today  have shown that its not--the book has to come out sometime.  I'll tell you this for sure:  there's more in the book than not. 😁 

 I wrote this book because I like the machine and as a gesture of respect to Dilek and there it is.  I will not be jamming it down anyone's throat--and as always--will let the reviews speak for themslelves. 

cjc

[cjc]

Book Excerpt:  

The Legend’s Discriminate Modes

These pre-set modes illustrate the precision with which the Legends processing defines what’s under the coil. It’s able to subtract the numeric values that basically correspond with ground minerals and iron. So you can run hearing everything (A), settle the machine down in tough ground (G) or only hear non-ferrous metals (F). The “C” mode allows you to custom notch in (or out) any part of the conductive scale.

However, these notch / Discriminate settings only run in “C” mode.

Let’s look at each of these modes:

“A” This setting lets you run the machine wide open, hearing ground noises and iron. The volume of the iron is adjustable though the Tone Menu. In effect, when you give the signal a broader look at what’s under the coil--the “jump” to reporting a non-ferrous target is less work for it to perform. The downside of this is that small “micro-conductors” and partial responses will come in better. Using this setting increases your ability to hear small gold but requires more testing to weed out those responses that are too small to be anything of value. Overall, it’s the deepest way to run the machine, but requires a better “ear,” more accurate tuning and some patience to sort through the array of sounds. Running 2 Tone is a good way to moderate the number of sounds and by working with the first Tone Break (or Stability control in the “Beach” modes) it’s possible to run high Sensitivity for maximum depth.

“G” This setting is kind of a “midway” point that lets you smooth out any ground noises while still getting more depth than knocking out the wide swath of conductive range that iron occupies. So you are hearing just metal. This can help you to hear or test responses by examining how much iron is present in the signal tone. In dense iron, look for which tone “dominates.” This setting also alerts you as to when you are in dense iron and should slow down and use the coil to try and acquire masked targets. The “G” setting can also help you to parse out a partly masked target by using the coil and watching for which “side” the iron is on to direct your coil movements.

“F” This setting brings the signal to up above the level of iron. Doing this creates a big, broad reject block that has the potential to reduce performance. With a slower, less sophisticated detector--this subtraction would be impossible but with the Legend, these iron responses are “chopped” off quite effectively. At the same time some iron may sound off initially, but then tune out with repeat coil passes as the various frequencies kick in. This setting has the potential to tell you a lot about how distinct from the ground something is. The faster and more readily something “locks on”--the more distinct from the ground it is. Coil control is an important part of this. Once you get a feel for how fast you can sweep over a target without it tuning out--the “F” mode is a great iron checker. (This is limited by the Recovery Speed setting though, as at a certain point you are getting the same “tune out” by overrunning). The problem though (as touched upon above) is that where you are dealing with mixed targets--what’s left of the signal can sound better than it actually is. This often includes bottle caps. The more rust they have-the more broken (or incomplete) they will initially sound. In dense iron this setting does sound off on big ferrous pieces--but a quick Pinpoint test shows the size if it’s not already evident.

“C” As touched on earlier under “Navigation” this setting lets you accept or reject any part of the conductive scale that you choose to. Overall, with a detector that’s running multiple frequencies, running “notch” settings has the potential to confound the signal as the machine is being asked to do more processing work. The smaller the “notch” window that you want accepted targets to fall into--the harder it will be to acquire them. This kind of setting may require that you use lowered Sensitivity, a slower sweep speed or a faster Recovery speed. With some practice it’s possible to get a “feel” for how the signal is hitting targets within a notch space--based upon how delicately you have to move the coil to hear a full tone from the target. When you are working with an exact notch, watch out for targets that the broad multifrequency signal will “tune in” with repeated coil passes--ones that would otherwise be rejects. This is also a good illustration of how a multifrequency signal operates.

“C” also lets you adjust what I call the “rust line”--that is the level at which targets are accepted as non-ferrous or begin to break up as iron. (More on this later).

“C” can also be used as a target tester. To do this practice drilling the number of Discriminate button presses needed to take you to “C” from the mode you are searching in and then do your “ID-ing” pass. Overall it’s my opinion that Discriminate and notch type methods work well with this type of (high gain, fast process) detector--keeping you off weak, partial, “mixed” type, “transitory” responses and narrowing down your search to the most promising signals. Because of the Legend’s speed--there’s less of a difference between a setting with rejects than one that’s “wide open.”

I use “C” mode to knock out problem targets or to put in a reject block so as to be alerted to when a target is moving around on the reject scale (alloy or “mixed)” or knocking up against a high reject block (above say “43)”--indicating something that’s definitely not gold. Remember that if you are having trouble with bottle caps or corroded metals such as tin--running “F” has the potential to make these signals sound better. As with our cross sweep and pinpoint mode target testing--the idea is to hear as much of the signal as possible--not just the clipped down “snapshot” that a “no iron” setting or single direction (axis) sweep gives you. In effect, knocking out the iron causes the detector to see more of the “hard-to-distinguish” part as non-ferrous--and sound better. It’s “pulled up.” Running higher Sensitivity increases this effect.

No detector is perfect and it’s this kind of fluidity in the response that makes being able to defer to the simple physics of basic target testing so important to have in your “bag of tricks.”

Anyone who has ever re-hunted a section of ground in all metal mode knows that while detectors do a great job of separating metal from ground--it’s never a complete job. Hearing the iron (and ground) will always bring up more targets. So when selecting and using the Legend’s Discriminate modes keep in mind that chopping out the iron may make the search quieter and easier-- but it represents a trade-off.

From "A Beginner's Guide to the Nokta / Makro Legend" by clive james clynick (2022)

[cjc]

Something from the book.

cjc