Iron Bias - What It Is

[Chase Goldman]

From the Minelab Equinox Owner's Manual page 52:

Iron Bias (Advanced Setting)

The Iron Bias setting adjusts the likelihood of the detector to identify a target as iron if it presents both ferrous and non-ferrous signals.

All ferrous targets produce a combination of a ferrous and nonferrous response. Large ferrous targets can even present a stronger non-ferrous response. Also, a ferrous target adjacent to a nonferrous target can produce a similar response.

The Iron Bias Setting provides some control over the Target ID response. A lower Iron Bias setting will allow the natural response to dominate which means that the target is more likely to be classified as a non-ferrous target. A higher setting will increase the likelihood that the target is classified as iron.

The Iron Bias setting has a range from 0 to 9.

Iron Bias is only available when the operating frequency is Multi.

Iron Bias adjustment is local; only the current Detect Mode Search Profile will be affected by changes to this Advanced Setting.

In environments with dense iron trash, a higher Iron Bias is recommended in order to mask them. In areas where you do not want to miss any non-ferrous targets amongst iron trash, a lower setting is recommended. This will cause more ferrous targets to be detected and identified as desirable non-ferrous targets.

Adjusting Iron Bias
 1. Use the Settings button to navigate to Recovery Speed in the Settings Menu.
 2. Press and hold the Settings button for 2 seconds. A line will appear beneath the Recovery Speed icon, indicating you have selected the Iron Bias setting, and 'FE' will appear on the Frequency Display.
 3. Press the Minus (–) and Plus (+) buttons to decrease or increase the Iron Bias. Adjustments are automatically saved.
 4. A long press of the Settings button will return you to the Recovery Speed setting.

Click to enlarge...

[NOXaholic]

This will be fun to experiment with in those really trashy parks and home sites where iron abounds! Just one more useful tool.

[dewcon4414]

Im just wondering if this will be a set and forget for MOST beach hunters?   It maybe something to play with if you rotate beaches.   Ive got a couple that have more small flakes of iron that others.   Something to be played with..... ill likely turn it much lower for beach hunting and tweak it.  May well be different near shore vs deeper too.

[Chase Goldman]

On 2/3/2018 at 6:31 AM, dewcon4414 said:

Im just wondering if this will be a set and forget for MOST beach hunters?   It maybe something to play with if you rotate beaches.   Ive got a couple that have more small flakes of iron that others.   Something to be played with..... ill likely turn it much lower for beach hunting and tweak it.  May well be different near shore vs deeper too.

Depends on how much and the type of iron on your beach.  Since beaches vary in that regard, you will probably have to experiment on each beach.  But I suspect, once you have it dialed in for a specific beach, you can probably forget about it. 

[midalake]

45 minutes ago, Chase Goldman said:

Depends on how much and the type of iron on your beach.  Since beaches vary in that regard, you will probably have to experiment on each beach.  But I suspect, once you have it dialed in for a specific beach, you can probably forget about it. 

 

I am not so sure the iron bias will make a difference or "see" black sand at all. After all it is multi-freq that cuts black sand in conjunction with sensitivity and threshold. Once a detectable target is passed under the coil then iron bias will come into play. Even Minelab's own definition mentions nothing about soils conditions.

[Chase Goldman]

To be clear, I was referring to iron trash infested beaches (many exist, probably not an issue for most beaches though) not black sand. Can't speak for Dew, but he did say "most beach hunters" and I suppose that since most beaches are not iron infested, this setting would not come into play.  It may have some impact on filtering corroded crown caps, though.

[dewcon4414]

There isnt a hugh amount of iron out there compared to say dry sand or even near shore.   So im going to play with a lower setting hoping to pull some stuff near iron.   Ya ill have to play with bottle caps...... but those at least the fairly shallow ones are learned quickly.... and from what i saw will hit or jump around the nickel range.   Some of you may have hunted with a DFX...... they had single digits.  What we did there was disc the highest digit it cut out a good bit of response from wrap around and hot rocks.   I may try that as well just to see if it will allow a lower bias.   Im guess 4 is usable.  This seems to be much like IM on the Sov ...... it was on or off...... now we have the ability to adjust it to our tolerance.

Dew

[Vez]

From reading all this and letting it digest, it sounds like I would personally want it on the lower end.  I do not get upset when the iffy is an 8" deep square nail or iron bearing.  In parks this is especially true.  Good read yall thank you for that!

[Chase Goldman]

Hard to remember everything that everyone has posted even in a single thread.  We were talking about study habits, too.  My apologies.

Hope we get a lot of 600 AND 800 users providing input because of things like iron bias and recovery speed settings are a little different on each machine and may slightly affect performance.  For example, I thought it was interesting that the default iron bias setting for the 600 for Park 1/Beach 1/Beach 2 was "2" vs. the 800 settings for Park 1/Beach 1/Beach 2 was "6" (which corresponds to a "3" vice "2" 600 setting per the comparative scale on page 52 of the manual).  I wonder if the default difference is because of who ML envisions using the 600 vs. the 800 or because of some performance differences between the two machines...or none of the above and is just what Minelab thought would be a good default point for each machine.

Even though Steve has provided us with A LOT of answers and clarifications, some of the mysteries of the manual will not be clarified until we are able to have the unit in front of us.  So it makes sense to hold off on calling for instruction manual changes or claiming manual errors, or even speculating too deeply on how things work until we have had a chance to run through it with a detector in hand and can understand it fully, I suppose.  I leave the above question in the "parking lot" so to speak, until we have a critical mass of new 600 and 800 users out there that can verify how the machine is behaving, including these slight performance differences.  That will be an exciting and crazy time.

[Chase Goldman]

Take a look at the new thread I created as a Parking Lot for unanswered questions and tell me what you think.