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1/1/23 Important note from Steve H: Chris made this video before the Axiom was finalized using a prototype detector. The sensitivity was significantly boosted in the shipping version of the detector. As far as hot rocks Chris also did not make use of the hot rock rejection window on the Axiom as shipped in the final version.

Garrett Axiom and the SDC-2300 side by side, very interesting.

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Thanks for the video, both the SDC and Axiom did pretty poorly I think on the small gold he was testing with, I didn't realize that the SDC was that bad on small gold as I've never used one.  I can hit gold smaller than that with my 4500 and 5000 going down to 0.05 of a gram or less although certainly not with the stock coils they come with.  With a good coil on them 0.05 of a gram isn't out of the question and even less is possible and that 0.07 would be pretty easy of a target.

Obviously my 6000 and 7000 (with the right coil) go below those sizes down to about 0.03 of a gram or slightly less.  What's not known though is if those particular bits of gold are difficult ones for a PI to pick up, I have some bits .1 of a gram that the GPX 4500/5000 struggles to pick up when it will pick up another bit that is 0.05 of a gram fine. That's where I think the Axiom will benefit greatly though, a smallish size spiral coil like I use on my legacy GPX detectors with the 10" spiral would make a good difference on smaller gold with it.   Hopefully aftermarket manufacturers take note of the Axiom and produce coils for it, looks to have really great potential and I'm sure the right coil on it would improve those results significantly.  As someone that chases small gold if I saw that same video when the 4500 came out with him going over those nuggets with the 11" Commander mono I'd be saying the same thing about it, wow, that 4500 did poorly on the small nuggets. 

Hot rocks were interesting, I guess the SDC was always going to be the winner there, it's touted as the best for that.  Axiom did pretty well though and I do wonder if he had tried to ground balance the ground and do the L shape trick of balancing the ground and sweeping over the hot rock with the balance button still held in would have made that hot rock signal much less or disappear.  All I saw him do was balance the ground and then start testing sweeping over the hot rocks which isn't ideal on any detector unless tracking, but he was in a fixed mode.

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2 hours ago, phrunt said:

Thanks for the video, both the SDC and Axiom did pretty poorly I think on the small gold he was testing with, I didn't realize that the SDC was that bad on small gold as I've never used one. 

I've actually been quite surprised several times on just how small of bits the SDC is capable of. The real beauty is how it handles any hot ground/rocks IN MY AREA(s) and it's also built like a battleship, handles like one too...lol.  The SDC ain't gonna give you any "fits", turn it on, let it do it's thing, and start hunting.  It doesn't give a shit about emi, aircraft, being set down on ground or what position the coil is in, doesn't care about speaker issues or being sent in for the recent fix, etc.  It just does what it's supposed to do all day long.  Drawbacks would be weight, weak speaker, ergonomics and not a depth demon.

You say you like your 6 but constantly whine about all it's current issues?  Those "issues" won't be there with the SDC, you'd have the ones I mentioned above and may have to put a peice of cardboard in between the top 2 batteries...lol.  Anyways...the only reason I'm jumping on you is that I get the impression that because your bud JD doesn't like the SDC that you've kinda taken a dislike to it because of his feelings towards it...????  The only reason I have a PI is to quiet down hot ground/rocks and the SDC does that very nicely imo....   I don't like PI's in general because of the trash aspect but I do want one that'll go straight to WORK without any bs emi crap or having to baby the thing because of the price and how flimsy it was built.  Once again I liked my 6 in between "fits" and was impressed with it but in the end the machine aggravated me just enough because it's so high strung that we parted ways.  There's always trade-offs.  Again Mr. phrunt...not trying to start a pissing match or machine debate but I have noticed from your previous posts that you don't care for the SDC.  IMO the SDC has some real strong points you just might actually like?

PS....now that I wrote all that and maybe pissed you off in the process, I just remembered that you say your ground is very mild so all the above probably moot?....lmao

PSS...I heard the .077 on the vid and would have dug it.....

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All good 🙂 Yea, the SDC for those in the right ground seems a killer machine, hot rocks and difficult ground are it's specialties and I guess you could say prickly specimen type gold where the GPX 4500 lacks the SDC excels, with my milder soils the GPX 4500 seemed like the better choice at the time I was deciding between the two, crank its settings right up with a small coil and off it goes.  It's true JW doesn't like the SDC, based upon him comparing it to the 4500 at the time he was using them he found the 4500 performed better in our ground finding the small gold. He still has his SDC though, just doesn't get used, it'd make a fantastic creek detector I think and a few guys in NZ use it for that purpose.

 Reliability and quality and as you point out just being a little annoying to use are the 6000's flaws and hopefully that looks like being resolved at the moment.    The SDC has remained elusive to my collection though, and it's certainly not because I don't like it, it's more I don't need it.  I certainly understand your love for the thing though, sounds your perfect detector and you do very well with it.  Hopefully my and others whinging is what prompted Minelab to fix the GPX EMI problem, if we just complained about it once or for the timid just kept it to ourselves and shutup forever after they'd be far less inclined to do anything about it, pressure from disgruntled customers sometimes can force their hand.

The Axiom to me looks to have huge potential, runs nice and quiet too.  A small good spiral coil on that thing and it should be great.  Garrett being open to aftermarket coils with no chipping hopefully encourages manufacturers of coils to go nuts on it making a good range of coils.  It was often said the older GPX series were the last of the detectors with a massive range of coils and all the benefits that brings, well, Garrett could be that next detector to take that role on with Minelab preventing and restricting it and Garrett allowing it there is big potential there.  Hopefully the Garrett sells well enough for the coil makers to think it's viable.

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Phrunt....  maybe take JW's sdc out for a couple days.....can't be any worse than swinging that 7000.  see what you think?  

I actually don't use a PI much but REALLY do enjoy hunting with a threshold.  With that said tho....the junk wastes too much of my precious time using a PI so if I can't use it along with the Monster for PP'ing/discrimination to speed up the process I won't use it.  That all depends on how steep and brushy the ground is (most all of it).  I do use it along with the Monster almost always when hunting roads marking targets, chase with the Monster.  Monster still my go-to machine and if I ever lost it you might as well castrate me and bury me now as that Monster is a part of me....lol

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Phrunt and Oneguy ....... A great post both of you have said what I have heard and it does show that gold will be detected in  all types of ground and conditions. That's what makes it hard to recommend a detector for someone that is not detecting in your area. The differences between Victoria, West Aust, Australia, New Zealand and of course USA vary immensely. It was great to see your posts with out the   .......*&*^!*...... that goes on some forums. 

👋 

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He kept mxing up 0.07 and 0.7 at the beginning. But that's ok. I have picked up flakes with the sdc that did not register on the scale. Not sure why this nugget was quiet, but I can asure you the SDC will find really tiny stuff, in particular in mineralized matrix. I don't think surface tests with air matrix make much sense, but that's just my view. Re Axiom run at maximum gain, that is telling. The 6000, even when tuned all the way down to 1 click, would scream on a 0.07 nugget. So would my Z/NF12 in HY, even at low gain. That tells you how to position these detectors. All have their place though, depending on the conditions and your objectives. Re hotrocks, I always thought that this would be the real strength of the Axiom. From that comparison, it surely does not appear that way. However, he did not share the Axiom settings used, so perhaps there are better ways for the Axiom to perform. Although the SDC is really good with hot rocks, I have areas where even the sdc is totally unusable. In these places, only the Z/NF in general/difficult works smoothly with only little to moderate loss in sensitivity for small fast gold. Re NF vs stock coil, I want to be fair. I have not really tested the stock coil for bad hot rocks. It's just that ever since I mounted the 12 Zsearch I never took it off again. 😛

GC

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To me it looked like he didn't even balance out the hot rocks, he balanced the ground and with it in fixed ground balance then went over the hot rocks.  I'm not sure why he didn't try do the ground balance over the ground and the troublesome hot rock to see if it would balance out. 

I wouldn't write off the Axiom on tiny nuggets based off that video, and it will be very interesting to see what the aftermarket can do with coils for it to improve that too with methods like spiral and concentric coils, there is a world of possibilities there without chips in coils.  The SDC has that little 8" round so has the coil size advantage over the Axiom in that video.  As I said earlier the GPX 5000 with the 11" Commander is quite poor on tiny gold, put the right coil on it and the performance changes significantly.

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16 minutes ago, phrunt said:

To me it looked like he didn't even balance out the hot rocks, he balanced the ground and with it in fixed ground balance then went over the hot rocks.  I'm not sure why he didn't try do the ground balance over the ground and the troublesome hot rock to see if it would balance out. 

Not sure what happened there either???  Been somewhat watching this Axiom story unfold and the hot rock part of the vid did it no justice?

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  • The title was changed to Minelab SDC Vs Garrett Axiom Vs Gold Monster

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