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Coil Cover Protection


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anyone else wear there coil cover out yet?

the 6k covers are way to soft and thin.
i think i read, maybe here somewhere. that they epoxied a kind of thin tough plastic? maybe something like Formica
to the bottom of the coil cover.
does anyone know what that material was called. i need some for my next coil cover.

20220725_124218.jpg

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Recycled ice cream containers is what Simon suggested lol Yes its a poor plastic option. NF make an ABS cover which is more resilient but can sag underneath a little over time. Mine hasn't worn out yet but its on its way.... 

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6 hours ago, Bishop said:

anyone else wear there coil cover out yet?

the 6k covers are way to soft and thin.
i think i read, maybe here somewhere. that they epoxied a kind of thin tough plastic? maybe something like Formica
to the bottom of the coil cover.
does anyone know what that material was called. i need some for my next coil cover.

20220725_124218.jpg

PC (Polcarbonate) 0.8mm is the material I use as coil cover glued on with Sikaflex, make sure you rough the PC up to get the adhesive to adhere. Been doing it for years. PC is a tough wear resistant clear plastic sheet, fighter plane canopies are usually made of PC.

 

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Pretty common on 6000's and 7000's as their softer plastic wears faster.  Now on a side note, the sound of the scrubbing coil to the surface is much less with softer plastic.  Some of the other detectors in times past, the coil covers were a harder plastic, which lasts longer, but you get this annoying scratching echo sound coming from the coil scuffing the ground.  I myself prefer the quite softer plastic covers.  Sure I have to send a few bucks more often, but at least I get to hear those faint signals.

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Aye that is a con with the hard tough PC, there is more noise from scrubbing even drumming but my 6Ks coil was developing a wee "knock noise" that appears to have gone with the glued on PC cover adding strength without weight. On that note and defending the 6Ks coil I have never got great life out of coils. lets face it they are swung about knocking rocks, roots etc thus short life has always been an acceptable compromise between strength and weight.

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  • 2 weeks later...

thanks for the idea Norvic, i like it.
i got an 11.5 inch x 1/4 inch plexiglass disk from Etsy, sibe-rplasticssupply.com
couldn't find lexan precut. i went 1/2 inch over coil size , 1/4 all around, so i could get protection on the sides of the coil.
might have been less weight getting the 1/8 inch, but this should last a long time.
used silicone so i can change it out later if i want to.
also used 16 spring clamps to get a solid, tight fit when curing the silicone.
tested it out this morning.
i was purposely rough, putting the coil directly on rocky ground and plowing it forward. swinging around bumping rocks.
the coil cover that came with it would have had a hole in 5 minutes and never had made it through half of what i did with this today.
i did end up with 2 small chips on the edge where the acrylic is squared off.
pic 1 before test.
pic 2 after test.
pic 3 stuff i found today.

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20220807_095346 (2).jpg

20220807_094516 (2).jpg

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Bishop .. Yeah, that chipping is another con of PC but Ive found the long life and light weight easily kill the cons in my backyard. But we all have different backyards thus not for everyone.

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On 7/25/2022 at 1:07 PM, Bishop said:

anyone else wear there coil cover out yet?

I have over a thousand hours detecting with the GPX 6000 using UPC 2 inch 10mil pipe wrap on the still original skid plate. I removed some of the tape to show in the picture that the coil is barely even scratched. This tape suppresses the scratching noises quite well and adds very little weight to the coil. This tape is extremely scratch resistant and has great stretch ability without leaving much sticky tape residue. Patching edges does occur but is Infrequent as I only need to add tape to the skid plate edges after a lot of coil bumping. I can also remove the skid plate for stream detecting by removing the outer tape wrap and skid plate since I have also taped the coil itself and use it this way in the water to avoid the cork effect...

The second and third picture illustrates how pulling lightly to the pipe wrap allows it to mold itself to uneven 90 degree coil angles without any creases or wrinkles to the tape.

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7BE009AB-BBE0-440F-9448-A769D3BD4D69.jpeg

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