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Manticore In Arizona


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Good video. All were shallow surface targets though that the pinpointer easily picked up. It would be interesting to see the target IDs at some depth and how well this would work by comparison. I am personally not a relic/treasure hunter and don't care too much about discriminating metals, but I can see how this machine could be a real value addition for those who are into it. Amazing the plethora of settings and graphic displays. Makes my 6000 with virtually no settings to choose from look cheap....😉 Nice job ML!

GC 

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1 hour ago, NAGANT said:

No mention there about nugget detection. If it can do better on the gold field mode than the Equinox, it would be worth it. If it’s just about the same, I’ll keep my Equinox 800. I don’t care as much about relics and coins. Beach and jewelry some.

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It all comes down to the 50% more power to the coil, I guess small gold detection would really put that to the test.  I'm expecting it to be no better than the Equinox on small gold, It'll be nice having the small elliptical though, I just hope Coiltek come out with a 5" or 6" round for it too.    I'll know as soon as I can get my paws on one 🙂  I hope this announcement on the first of December is saying they've started shipping to dealers, if they drag it on much longer it will be painful.

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1 hour ago, phrunt said:

It all comes down to the 50% more power to the coil, I guess small gold detection would really put that to the test.  I'm expecting it to be no better than the Equinox on small gold, It'll be nice having the small elliptical though, I just hope Coiltek come out with a 5" or 6" round for it too.    I'll know as soon as I can get my paws on one 🙂  I hope this announcement on the first of December is saying they've started shipping to dealers, if they drag it on much longer it will be painful.

I hope some of you prospector crossover guys post some nugget performance results. I want to upgrade my GM 1000 to a good discriminating VLF that I can also use for relics and coins for fun.

I'm so hopelessly behind the times on VLFs, all the acronyms, and everything else that I don't even want to try figuring out the difference between them all now myself. I figure these VLFs are so cheap relative to gold machines that I might as well get the best though, whatever that is, as long as it's good for prospecting too.

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It looks very thought out for simplicity.  No continuous menu scrolling, etc.  I'm not sure why you'd want a semi multi freq machine for gold prospecting though...just doesn't seem to be in its wheelhouse.  Especially with all the gold specific machines already on the market.  This ticks all my boxes though for a multi purpose relic/beach machine though.

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1 hour ago, Daniel Tn said:

I'm not sure why you'd want a semi multi freq machine for gold prospecting though...just doesn't seem to be in its wheelhouse.  Especially with all the gold specific machines already on the market. 

The Equinox is a killer gold prospecting machine for gold other machines even if you spend $10,000 can't find.  Some of us look for gold for the challenge, for the fun of it so any size piece of gold is an exciting find, in fact my smallest piece of gold I've found with a metal detector I consider to be my best find and it was with the Equinox, bigger gold which is often much easier.  It all comes down to why you do it, for the monetary value which I do not, or for the fun and challenge which is why I do it.  I even find the 11" coil on the Equinox good in my conditions, it can find really tiny gold.

If the Manticore can somehow better the Equinox, perhaps by it's extra coil power then I'm all over it, I'll love it.  At the moment my two favourites in the VLF's are the Equinox with 6" coil and the Garrett 24k with the 6" Whites concentric coil, each for different reasons as they both have different strong points.  I really hope the Manticore can match the Nox on small gold, it's really nice having a do it all detector you have a lot of confidence in to use for anything and everything and don't feel like you're missing out by using it.  I own a Gold Bug 2 which technically on small gold is the best of the bunch, and I know it's the most sensitive and it has an awesome little coil that has no bump sensitivity but I haven't taken to it like the others, I also find it lacks the depth of the others.

VLF's destroy the GPZ even with my coil selection and the GPX 6000 on VERY small gold, especially in my mild soil, so they very much still have a place and make outstanding pinpointers for when using the big heavy duty machines as no manufacturer yet has made a good prospecting handheld pinpointer.

The milder your gold area soil gets the more viable VLF's become, I am in rather mild soil, and then there is bedrock and creek detecting especially creeks that are nothing more than bedrock, VLF's are great, waterproof and all.,

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People wondered why anyone would use the Equinox for gold instead of the GM1000 too, but in the end I think the Equinox is a better prospecting machine, and a lot of other serious prospectors agree. I have a hard time personally seeing any value anymore in a gold-only VLF with none of the fancy extras all these other VLFs come with today. I'd rather have the options available to me than a dumbed down machine with almost nothing.

If I'm using a VLF for prospecting, it's only because I want one of two things (or both): ultra sensitivity for ore/specimen gold for hardrock work or general prospecting in lode areas, or very good discrimination for trashy areas I can't stand to work with the 6000/7000, so I want the best discrim possible. I personally don't have a desire to use it to hunt for tiny nuggets, but that's just me. 

On top of that, I flip houses for a living (when I'm not mining or prospecting anyways) and work on a lot of investment properties for spare cash, I want something to detect the yards with, most are silver coin-era houses. I have a Deus which I like but I don't want all these VLF's sitting around, I want one machine, and the Deus is ok but I have a few dislikes with it and want something newer and deeper. I also find a ton of old historic spots, abandoned ranches/homesteads, and all sorts of stuff like that which I want to start detecting for fun. And since I keep my prospecting machines in my truck with me at all time, I want it to be the best at those sorts of sites too. It's rare for me to find anything older than a wheat penny any shallower than 5-6" in some of these places due to soils so I also want something powerful.

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I too am interested in its gold mode ability. Will find out next week. Debbie is supposed to be at a local show with it, I will bring some small pieces, play with it. I hope the smaller coil is out at same time. My Deus is on its last legs, I'm ready for a new machine. Prefer a gold capable relic machine. I got a monster...but most the time, I'm hiking around in middle of nowhere, relic hunting gold rush camps...running across a nugget patch is a nice bonus, happens every now n then.

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