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New Minelab Manticore


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19 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

Pretty much everything about this detector screams to me the focus is on deep silver, the one area where it was generally said that CTX has an edge on the Nox. I do think this is intended to fill the empty slot left by the departure of the E-TRAC, but it may also very well replace the CTX for a lot of people. If it hits silver as well, and has better waterproof integrity, in a lighter, less expensive package, why not? Kind of begs the question then of what would be good enough to replace the CTX at $2500? Maybe the direction of the market no longer supports such high priced coin detectors, and Minelab has seen that writing on the wall.

All I can say is that for relic hunting at our western frontier sites, the EQX800 has been a deep silver magnet.  If the Manticore is an even better silver slayer, bring it on 🤠  I know there's some deeper targets hiding at some of these sites, another layer of history awaits  🍽️

 

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2 hours ago, Shelton said:

The CTX 3030 can't handle iron. Here in Europe we have a sea of iron filled with modern trash. Therefore, for me, better separation and identification of iron is an opportunity. It convinces me.

You don't see any serious relic hunters out west using a CTX in heavy iron either.  The EQX800 was far superior in iron vs the CTX.  The 2D disc on the Manticore is a game changer for relic hunters, going to be fun testing it out and see what it sniffs out. 🤠🐍🌵

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2 hours ago, brys said:

agreed and too   heavy for uk users

Too heavy for UK users? Are all UK guys Mr Beans?  I doubt you can speak for an entire population, yes weight matters but for many people performance outweighs weight! 🙂

mr_bean_episode_03.jpg.6cc7e492c7ff4ef4be00ca31fe4dfa9d.jpg

American's may not get the joke 😛

You guys have Weetabix there, although we call 'em Weetbix here, they give you muscles!

I find the CTX a very well balanced detector, it doesn't feel heavy on my arm at all and I primarily run it with the 17x13" coil, in fact I find it easier to swing than my Nox with the 15x12" coil even though I'm under the impression it weighs more.

Yes, I understand some people have health conditions or even age that seek the benefits of lighter detectors but not everyone cares about the weight as much as others do, yes I appreciate lighter detectors as much as the next person but it's a long way down the list of my priorities with a detector. 

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The Legend at recovery at 5 default is not also fastest machine on earth, but it working, so for me it could be a slower a little bit. But yes XP Deus II is fast.

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2 hours ago, Cal_Cobra said:

You don't see any serious relic hunters out west using a CTX in heavy iron either.  The EQX800 was far superior in iron vs the CTX.  The 2D disc on the Manticore is a game changer for relic hunters, going to be fun testing it out and see what it sniffs out. 🤠🐍🌵

Mark Dayton and Ron Swenson would disagree. Both use ctx, and all our sites are loaded with iron. Now Ron did switch to Deus, but not Mark...even though he has a D1 and D2. 

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11 hours ago, GB_Amateur said:

As you note, the CTX3030 misses today's coin detector market in two ways:  weight (5.2 lb) and price ($2500 in the USA).  That's 2 lb heavier than the Nokta/Makro Legend (and even more vs. other modern multifrequency choices) ...

 

3,5 lb heavier than the Deus2 Lite   CTX 5,2 lb , D2 Lite 1,7 lb    .... 

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3 hours ago, phrunt said:

yes I appreciate lighter detectors as much as the next person but it's a long way down the list of my priorities with a detector. 

Simon - Beside that sentence being logically contradictory, curious as to what's the typical uninterrupted duration of a detecting session when you are using the CTX and how far from your vehicle do you typically have to travel to get there? 

I know you hit some pretty rugged sites nugget hunting, but if you are just silver slaying in a park or ball fields with the CTX, I get why weight would be down on the list.  Hiking a couple miles into a site for 8 to 10 hours relic hunting or hours of wet sand/wash beach hunting and walking 2 to 5 miles at a clip and weight goes way up on my list. I ran 1200 miles last year at 60+ years old, so they aren't exactly pushing me around in a wheelchair yet, but a 5+ lb detector is NOT what I'm interested in swinging these days regardless of performance when tech, ergonomics, and modern materials can easily be integrated to get the weight out.  Why should I demand any less regardless of my physical condition?

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16 hours ago, Geotech said:

It's a fairly complicated topic that really requires a whole book chapter and a lot of diagrams to explain*. In the old days all VLF designs were frequency domain (or, more accurately, phase domain) and all PI designs were time domain. But BBS/FBS/FBS2 (all really the same basic tech) created sequentially-transmitted frequencies where freq-domain processing doesn't work because the dead time between frequencies would screw up the channel filters. So ML used time-domain processing which, honestly, looks somewhat similar to normal freq-domain sampling. But it's done on ramped-exponential decays instead of sinusoids. From the time-domain sampling you can still get the equivalent of a target phase.

PI is also time-domain (and always will be) and also samples a decaying exponential but it does so during a TX "quiet time" where the TX signal is not changing. With FBS the TX signal is always changing, just like VLF. And with PI, you can never extract a target phase.

This was a good differentiator until the GPZ came along. In traditional PI the TX current is turned completely off during the RX sampling. In the GPZ it is not, but it is also not changing (the TX current is a bipolar square wave) so the result is exactly the same: there is no changing TX field during RX sampling. So now my definition of PI is a system that receives during a TX dead time, whether current is zero or a DC value. Put another way, during sampling there is no reactive signal.

*Inside the Metal Detector, 3rd ed, Ch 2; pub. 2023 (I hope)

Carl and Steve

THANKS for the further information.  VERY good stuff.  Steve, I know you explained alot of this to me, before, but it's challenging information, so please excuse me that you had to repeat yourself, again!  And Carl, I'll look forward VERY much to reading your new/upcoming book.  Please announce it "far and wide," when it's ready...

OK -- so, then, since BOTH VLF and PI units CAN, if engineered to do so, use "processing in the time domain" to extract information, then is it correct to say that when this is being discussed and it is said that there cannot be a PI/VLF-IB "hybrid," or that a VLF does NOT use "PI" methods, what is REALLY the differentiator is that VLF constantly transmits, whereas a PI transmits, followed by a period of nothing, and then receives, and then another transmit?  In other words, the "differentiator" is continuous transmission coming from the coil, versus sequential/periodic transmission coming from the coil?

I'm still fuzzy about how, with a continuous transmission, a VLF-IB unit can still get some sense of decay/hysteresis -- i.e. how it can extract that information from in-ground targets since you have continuous transmisson occurring, and therefore -- I'd think -- continuous maintenance of induced current in the target, and thus no "decay" of the eddy currents over time, allowed to occur.  It seems that the explanation lies, Carl, in your "ramped exponential decays vs. sinusoids" statement, but this starts to become where my lack of enough EE knowledge becomes my enemy.  I think I understand that VLF-IB uses phase shifts/changes of the EM waves being transmitted.  But the "ramped exponential decays" part puzzles me, as I don't know how there can BE a "decay" if there is no "break" in the transmit EMI, and thus presumably no opportunity for "decay" in a target's EM field to occur.

Steve

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Quote:"I don't know how there can BE a "decay" if there is no "break" in the transmit"

The FBS waveform consists of a burst of 8 cycles of 25kHz ( taking 320 microsecs ) followed by one cycle of 3.125 kHz ( taking 320 microsecs ), then repeat. Note: these are NOT sine-waves, they are SQUARE waves, of 50/50 duty cycle.
The single cycle of 3.125kHz is split as quarter-cycle / half-cycle / quarter-cycle. This middle half-cycle is, I assume, where the 'Pseudo-PI' / time-domain stuff takes place, there is a 160 microsec 'break' , long enough to make use of it.
This doesn't exist on the SMF Equinox waveform, there's barely 10 microsecs before the next edge transition, thanks to the 39kHz component of the transmitted waveform.
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I agree with the weight vs performance thought.  Performance is much higher up the scale...in fact, overall weight isn't even on my consideration list.  I've swung the GPX with DeTech 15" coil for 10 hrs a day, for a whole week.  The CTX feels like nothing compared to that GPX setup.  I've hunted with the CTX from our beach condo to distant features on the horizon.  One yr it was detecting to a pier I could see and back...turns out it was 5 miles one way to it.  I loved every step. Came back to the condo...put it on the charger, went to supper with family, and then back out hunting at night until the sun came up.  I'm 39 and out of shape.  Detecting never has been a strenuous hobby for me.  Civil War hut digging though...different story.  

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