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Some time ago I had to make a decision about buying a new coil for my 7000, buying a 6000 or buying an Axiom. I decided to buy a 15" CC X-Coil and it arrived about a month ago. The family is off on a trip so yesterday was my first try with the new coil. The coil was sent by post with a tracking number all the way from Kazakhstan. Here is the coil as I unpackaged it. The coil I've had on for the last few years has been the 15x10 Spirial X-Coil so seemingly there is not that much difference but in actual use I think there is a great difference. I've found lots of nuggets with the Spiral, but I just had this feeling that it could be better based on what Simon has said. Simon was right. My testing ground is a place where I and many others have been for years. When we first started there we were able to find quite a bit of trash and WWII 50 cal and shells. Those are long gone and so are most of the little wires which gave us such good 'potential' among the nuggets and hot rocks. My testing method was to go out with the coil I had on first and then come back and put on the new 15" CC. I marked targets I found but did not dig them. I had three areas/targets marked by the time I made it back to the SUV. I switched the coils by unscrewing the adapter with the chip from the 7000 and screwing in the new coil and replacing that back on the 7000. I didn't change the settings and I tested the new 15" CC on my test gold chips laying on the ground. The sensitivity was at 12. Ground smoothing low, high yield, normal and I use the SP01. The first thing I noticed when going over the test chips was that you had to have the coil directly over the nugget or you couldn't hear it. And furthermore, as Simon had told me the receive coil is smaller than the outer coil so it acted as a smaller coil. I didn't mind because it is a light coil. It seems ligher than the Spiral but I'd have to check it. So off I went to find the 3 marked targets, but I had pretty much of a dead battery in my phone. I put the phone on a charger and took off in search of my 'marks!' Finding the marks proved to be a bit harder than I first imagined. All the pretty flowers and dried bushes looked the same. My first mark was about 15 minutes from the start. I spied it and before I could get there, I got a loud target. It was a little sharp and it could be bullet jackets or the wires. It wasn't very deep so it moved with the light scrapes, but I couldn't see it in the scoop. It got down to a little bit of black sand and then I saw it. A little, flakey nugget! This coil can hunt I said to myself. I had to go back and get my phone so I could take some pictures. I'll have to add I carried it around later and it didn't cause an EMI problem for the coil. When I came back these are the pictures I took. I was impressed by a coil that big finding a nugget that small. The 7000 allows you to mark 'find points' which I have always liked. It asks you the depth which I said was 2" and the weight which I said was .1g. I was on the board and no matter what happened the rest of the day I had a nugget. This was good for me because the last 3 trips I've made to this location I got skunked. I then went to the target I had marked about 10 feet and it was a piece of trash. I went on to check the other marks I had made and could see all of those targets except one. I had dug one target and left it in the hole with the Spiral. It was a wire and the 15"CC did not see it. Another thing the 15 did not see was the hot rocks. That was a good thing. I was learning how to use it as I got into a couple of hours. At first I was worried that I was going to miss things under the bushes because the outer coil would be 'dead' and I couldn't get the center of the coil under the bush. Larger bullet trash and a couple of cans showed me that I could hear targets before the coil got to it. I was digging under bushes. It was time to leave this spot and go to another pounded spot where I wanted to test the new coil for depth. I knew this was deeper and perhaps the main reason why I bought it for $1200. I covered a lot of areas with no joy but I was learning to use the coil. There was one area that held deeper nuggets and that is not something I am good at. I can hear shallow nuggets that scream but deep iffys get the best of me. With that in mind I was looking for a repeatable iffy at this location and I found one. I dug a couple of inches as the first nugget and it was still iffy. I dug more and it brightened a little but not enough to make me think it was a nugget. Now I'm down about 6-7" in some moist desert soil with a lot of iron hanging off the magnet on the pick. I run the coil over the dig out pile and it screams! It is right on top. I scooped it and said YES. I don't remember digging a deeper small nugget than this. The phone was a long way from me so I don't have a picture but once again, this coil can hunt. I'm ready for Rye Patch now. Franconia here I come. Watch out Quartzsite. Here are my results. Notice just to the right of the .06 nugget on the scale a little wire piece. The 15" found that also. The desert revived me and reinvigorated me. For the next few weeks I'll go as much as possible. This was my trash.

With well North of 150 hours on the Manti now I feel much more in sync with the machine . My Nox 800 is definitely a backup machine now . Lets hope we don't have to wait much longer for a small coil . Pics below from some beach and relic trips .

Many farmers swear to this day that crop planting should be done during different phases of the moon for different crops. My problem with detecting under a full moon is the sudden growth of hair gets in my eyes and it becomes difficult to hold the detector with my paws.

Is weed legal in OZ or am I missing something?🤣🤣🤣

The moon DOES have an influence on life here, and people often scoffed about things we now know to be true about that influence. There is an impact on the earths magnetic field, and that in turn might affect detecting. Is it enough I’m going to worry about it? Doubtful, but the real answer frankly is I just don’t know. Weird things happen at times when I’m detecting, and maybe the moons position combined with extreme solar activity explains them. https://www.iflscience.com/even-the-earth-s-magnetic-field-has-moon-driven-tides-67410 https://www.spaceweatherlive.com/en/solar-activity/solar-flares.html

When hunting by the moon light during a growing moon always remember to ground balance often for better results. Then go slow and steady over the areas that you are wanting to clear out, and last make sure that you carry garlic, Holy Water, and a few silver bullets for the werewolves. People do get crazy when there is a full moon so be careful.

Use 1950s USGS topo maps to find mine and prospect symbols in gold bearing locations. Do research to see if they are claimed or not. If not, check them out, if they are, contact the claim owner and make a deal. Chewing people out for asking advice is really not what this forum is about. I’ve given people pointers over the years, and if you can’t or won’t do the same…. silence is just as helpful as the lecture. Especially as regards new people who come here because this is supposed to be a place where people help people.

Loren provides a very interesting assessment of the Manticore after 100 hours of use:

Hey guys, yes the Quest WireFree gear is a paired wireless combo, either Transmitter/Receiver or Transmitter/Headphones. They will work just fine on anything you can plug it into. The standard audio cable is 6.35mm, but 3.5mm is also available for those wanting to connect to a gold monster, vanquish etc. So yes for the SDC, an adaptor cable is required. It's 2.4 ghz wireless, so can't directly pair to other (non Quest) gear. Much the same as Minelab's wireless modules, and the new headphones for Nox 700/900 and Manti. The mate kit with wireless receiver allows you to plug any wired headphones into it that you prefer, but if you want zero cables, then the WireFree Pro headphones basically have the receiver built in. I've had many GPZ7000 users over their years either lose their WM12 module, or drowned it etc and instead of buying a replacement bought the WireFree Pro headphones and have been happy with the results. Quest have Qualcomm Low Latency headphones that will pair directly to Equinox 600/800, Nokta Legend and GPX6000, and hopefully soon will have a standalone receiver version too.

My old White's Eagle 2 SL90 had the best target I.D. of any machine I've ever used. I could predict a coin by the I.D. number and sound 98% of the time. I guess it's the price we have to pay to get better depth and tinier target response that it results in a noisier audio at a given sensitivity. I still think the 900 target I.D. is fine. Sure, there's more numbers to deal with, but, good targets are still more solid and have less "smear" across several numbers than a junk target has. The more I use it, the more I can tell a junk target over a good one.

2 canyons over is just as flogged as anywhere else now. If you really like remote, undetected places with small chances of finding gold, but often little trash, try some raw exploration. If you spend a year or two doing that on your own, and show you have the patience to keep at it, as well as learn how to be successful at it, I'm looking for someone to work with occasionally. Projects where the amount of land to cover via just raw GPS gridding/mapping, daily detecting as if it were a job, low probability of nuggets, and remote living requirements usually mean no one else is interested since it's not really what most envision when they want to do relaxing nugget shooting. You'd really have to show you can bring something to the table though in terms of developed skillset too, not looking for weekenders or greenhorns. Something to consider anyways.

Lowering sensitivity to 18 or below on the 900 does remove a lot of spurious and real clicks and pops along with falsing responses from ground noise including small but visible pieces of magnetite and other very small (hot) volcanic rocks in my area. It doesn't do much for target ID instability so far. It definitely cuts down on the amount of noise that I have to sift through. My normal ground noise is a lot like listening to EMI........Tried it today but the ground was very wet. I will do some more testing tomorrow.

Minelab, What the bleep did you do to my Equinox? This is going to be a rant. Hopefully I will be able to keep it clean and factual. Today, April 25, 2023 I completed the first 100 hours of moderate to high iron mineralization turf hunting for coins and jewelry with the Equinox 900. I also have 30 hours of gold prospecting and 10 hours of saltwater beach hunting so far with the Equinox 900. I thoroughly enjoyed gold prospecting with the Equinox 900 using the 6” and Coiltek 10X5” coils. It performed like I am used to with the Equinox 800 using its two Gold modes set for multi frequency operation. My saltwater beach hunts at Los Angeles and San Diego area beaches were inconclusive, mostly because of bad weather (very few people out) and sanded in conditions. So I am going to try to give a review of the Equinox 900 from my experiences with it on land for coin and jewelry detecting in moderate to high iron mineralization at local parks with varying degrees of steel alloy and aluminum trash where even modern coins can be down to 8” deep. I really like the upgraded shaft system, new hand grip angle design, new arm cuff, thicker 11” coil ears and hopefully the new waterproofed control housing of my Equinox 900. I also really like the vibrating hand grip feature along with its customization provided on the 900. Plus, I really like the seemingly improved iron handling and the definitely improved target separation and recovery speed. Depth seems to be a bit better. Sensitivity has been increased from 25 to 28. EMI mitigation is similar to the 800. The ML85 headphones are a slight improvement to me as far as being less muffled and bass heavy compared to the ML80s. They do not offer the best ambient noise prevention compared to some other manufacturer provided wireless headphones or the most balanced sound quality. They do pair easily. I do notice some wireless signal drop outs if I turn me head quickly, etc. The display, backlight (red) and user interface are mostly unchanged from the 800. I still wish the 900 had more than one User Profile. The onboard pinpoint function is much more stable than the wonky pinpoint activity built into the 600 and 800. It does have a form of real-time target ID also while in pinpoint mode. The addition of Depth Tones or ferrous/non-ferrous 2 tone VCO audio for the Park, Field and Beach modes seemed like a nice addition. I have no problem with the VCO ferrous tone. The VCO non-ferrous tone sounds really bad through my ML85s with lots of incongruous drop outs and strangled, inconsistent, ridiculously high tones. Alright, anybody that knows me personally or knows me from these forums knows how much I like to outright rabidly love the Equinox 800 even with its questionable waterproofing, stock shaft build quality, pinpoint function/non function and its compressed low to mid conductor target IDs. I hunt in many public areas that are drought prone so these municipalities only allow coin popping/screwdriver target recovery. Big fines and possible confiscation of equipment if a person is caught digging with a shovel of any kind in these public areas. Accurate target IDs are essential for me in these areas along with accurate tones and accurate tone quality. So, I spent another 3 hours of my life today, using the Equinox 900 at a very modern trashed park that I have repeatedly hunted over the last four years. I will give the Equinox 900 credit. I did find 11 clad dimes and 13 pre 1982 copper Memorial pennies which were in the 4” to 8” deep range. These could have easily been silver dimes and earlier pennies. I have pulled many silver Roosevelt dimes out of this park along with some Mercury dimes, wheat pennies and Indian head pennies. I also found 6 modern nickels that I had missed. I will chalk those finds up to the improved Equinox 900 target separation and recovery speed. Did I have a good time using the Equinox 900. Absolutely not. If I had been blindfolded and someone handed me a detector that I could only use 5 tone audio for target ID, I would have guessed the detector I was using was a Garrett Apex or the new X-Terra Pro in 5 kHz. Target audio was all over the place even on shallow targets. The actual numerical target IDs were too of course, even on shallow targets. I had my 900 setup for 5 tone operation with tone breaks set at -19 to 0 for iron, 1 to 23 for low conductor aluminum foil, small can slaw and small gold jewelry, a small US nickel bin from 24 to 27, all sorts of pull-tabs and aluminum trash and zinc pennies from 28 to 69, and the rest of the US high conductor coins and silver jewelry bin from 70 to 99. I also double checked many of the clad dimes and copper pennies before digging using the AT full tones audio setting. I was using Park 1 Multi, sensitivity 25 of 28, ground balance and EMI noise reduction performed, accepted -9 to +99 target IDs, 5 tones, threshold tone OFF, iron audio volume level set high enough to clearly hear it through headphones, recovery speed 5, iron bias 1 which was enough to make most steel crown bottle caps have some iron tone audio and tonal breakup. This is what I experienced…….. - 4”+ deep flat laying clad dimes and copper pennies were triple beeping during left/right DD coil passes as if they were on the surface. - Target IDs for those 24 high conductor coins were ranging from 68 to 98 during normal sweeps circling those coin targets whether they were 4” deep or 8” deep with very little possibility of telling the difference between a clad dime and copper Memorial penny. - Those target audio responses were crossing over a user set audio tone break. - The wide target ID range was not caused by co-located targets…..it happened on every one of the 11 clad dimes and 13 95% copper pennies. - Soil conditions were slightly moist but nothing unusual. - Surface to 4” deep US nickels had target IDs from 23 to 28 during sweeps around the targets so tone audio encompassed three user set tone bins. - Switching to full tones had zero effect on tone accuracy or target ID accuracy. - Similar audio and tone behavior happened on various types of pull-tabs, can slaw, aluminum bottle caps and of course steel alloy bottle caps. Basically, I could have had similar results using the Equinox 900 set on 10 kHz. Target ID and tone stability were non-existent compared to the Equinox 800 in Park 1 with similar settings. The kaleidoscope of sounds produced on beginner level basic targets in 5 tones or all tones was a joke. Single digit notching might as well have been 5 digit notching since basic targets had at least 5 or more different but repeatable target IDs instead of the 1 to 3 standard target IDs seen detecting the same targets using the Equinox 800. Sure, I wanted a slightly expanded target ID range update on the Equinox 600/800. Nokta got it just about right by adding an extra 10 target IDs between the ferrous/non ferrous tone break (ID +11) and the mid to high conductor tone break around +40 on the Legend. Minelab, why did you instead go from 50 total target IDs to 120? Whose bright idea was that? Who field tested these detectors for overall target ID accuracy and stability? This hunt today WAS NOT AN ISOLATED INCIDENT or one off. It has been this way for me since hour number 1 of coin and jewelry detecting in my area. I still have an Equinox 800. I have used the new, improved coil ear 11" coil that came with my 900 on my 800 with no issues. Using the 10X5" Coiltek on my 900 does little to improve target ID accuracy and multi tone stability. There have been rumors and some indications that a software update may be in the works for the Manticore. For heaven sakes Minelab, offer one on the Equinox 700/900 too for target ID stability! I am not looking for answers or advice from anyone on this forum about what I wrote and experienced. If you want to agree or disagree with what I have experienced, that is totally fine. Just don't try to theorize, pontificate or otherwise tell me I don't know what I'm doing. Even though I only have 100+ hours on the Equinox 900, I know how to use this detector. Minelab, you are welcome to write a response explaining this detector behavior. thanks for reading if you made it this far. Sorry for the long post and the rant.

I found the Medalion, St Paul winter carnival, Its made of cheep pot metal , I just want to forget winter tho, and this reminded me of winter

As you may know, I've been complaining about beaches being super sanded in lately, and I've been searching for beaches not so affected by this seasonal cycle. Mainly I've discovered that hunting places where bulldozers have stirred up the sand helps alleviate some of the sanding in problems, but the tide will bring the sand back fairly quickly, so there's a short time frame of when the dozers leave and when sand fills the cavities they've left behind. I will also correct myself, from what I said earlier about how I thought beaches where you have to pay to get in are not great hunting spots. They are absolutely great places to hunt; as long as there are swimmers, there's treasures. That being said the area that was bulldozed over had been sanded in again, so I had to look elsewhere to hunt for treasures. Thus, I went an 45 mins south, to a place where I had previous found a coin line before, and had consistently found to have coin lines whenever I went. When I arrived and started detecting, the coins started popping out left and right. That's when I noticed the elevation of the sand was much much lower in some places compared to when I hunted the same area previously. A cut had formed! I feverishly moved along the cut as it rose higher and higher, finding all sorts of quarters, dime, nickels and pennies. The tide was against me this time, as I planned to hunt this area last and it was rising fast! (I was at the concrete ship beach early that morning and found some coins, but not a whole lot) Luckily most of the finds were up against the cut so All I had to do was move along the cut and hit every target I could hit. Eventually I came across a target that I thought was a nickel, oh it was a nickel alright, but not your standard nickel! It was a buffalo nickel, which told me that old stuff was washing up! (or at least being washed out from the cut) "I had to continue quickly, there could be silver coins here!" I thought to myself. So I did, and eventually came across another target with the TID of 44. I was busy pinpointing another target I had pulled up and planned to pull the higher TID target, second. When I finally got around to it, I pulled out a silver ring. Color looked a bit off, and I thought perhaps it wasn't silver, but hey a ring is a ring. (later on I checked and it's marked 925 though it's been pretty worn away) Continuing down the cut, I kept pulling more and more coins. Eventually I pulled up a silver quarter and a silver dime close to each other, as they tend to be. By the end of the cut the targets were few and far between. Satisfied with the finds for the day I turned around and started walking back, while looking for any targets I missed. By this time, it was high tide, and the water was close if not already at the cut, so I had to move quickly. One of the last targets was a high tone and I dug it up, I discovered that I had found another silver quarter! I knew this cause I checked the edge, and even scratched at it with my fingernail to try to expose any copper that may be covered up with patina. Also checked the date and it was from 1964. Overall it was a great haul, and much needed one at that! I will be back down again this week .Hopefully there will still be more treasures to find!

I agree, hunt outside the box. That is where there is real potential for good finds.

Incredible is subjective. I love silver so it's mostly silver! Some gold if i'm lucky! I'm up like almost 30 rings for the year currently at 29. mostly silver some junkers and like 1 gold ring.

I try to be careful about calling BS on people's finds unless I know for absolute certain its faked. Reason being, I found some pretty unbelievable coins myself back in 2012, and if someone else had posted them I'd probably question it too. I've also dug some silver coins that came out of the ground looking like they were minted yesterday. Just depends on the soil I guess.

Here's ya an arrowhead example of what I am referring to.

I had someone from my detecting club question an old Chinese coin I found on Magnetic Island which pre-dated the arrival of Europeans.. I didn't really know how to respond as it seemed that he was saying I had faked the find.. Thankfully another member pointed out that Chinese fleets had been active along this coast for many years before Europeans arrived.. I don't usually need anyone to stand up for me but on this occasion I was stumped for words by the idea that anyone would bother to fake such a thing.. I can't see how faking the find of a worthless old coin can make anyone feel better about themselves, even if they get the admiration that they crave.. I could simply put it down to jealousy because I'm lucky enough to live on an island where there's still plenty of places which have never been searched, but it still left a bitter taste in my mouth.. It's always a horrible feeling being accused of something you didn't do.. It did make me wonder if the dude making the accusation had a guilty conscience.. Perhaps people see my posts and think that every time I go out I find something amazing, but they don't realize that most days I don't find anything at all.. Maybe I should also post pictures of all the crap I find? I must admit that for a while I used to hesitate before showing my finds to the folk at the club, wondering if I'd be accused of faking again.. But now I don't really care anymore about what others think, I know I found all those things in my finds boxes and that's good enough for me..

My D1 11” coil battery is still performing after more than 10 years. When I want to go hunting I always take a look: if battery is half charged I go. If it’s less than half charged I recharge it. My WS4’s battery needs to be changed while the RC’s battery is still performing like the coil’s one..

Not too different, with high conductors, so far, for me, with the Manticore. But, maybe not quite as bad as you are seeing in your dirt Mr. McClendon. I'm only about 50/50 calling copper Memorials from clad dimes and 75/25 calling clad quarters from pennies or dimes so far with the Manticore (but I think I'm improving). But, I'm digging all those anyway. So, it hasn't bothered me much. Low conductors though, different story for me with the Manticore vs. what you are seeing with your 900. For me, my parks and beach, the Manticore calls nickels quite noticeably easier than I do with the Nox 800. And I think the 800 calls them pretty well. They only occasionally smear across three digits, but usually only two and often only one. The actual digits vary slightly by dirt and EMI. But the high end of the worst case three digit smear is below where almost all the square tabs I've dug bounce into. Lead bullets, same thing, pretty tight, solid VDIs. Lead .22LR slugs are common on the beach I go to and they are usually only covering two or three digits even at 8" deep in heavy salt. The only gold ring I've found so far with the Manticore was as solid a VDI as I have got with the machine, a non quavering 25 from two directions. And, for that matter, square tabs hold a pretty solid VDI, just higher than nickels 😁. Mid conductors don't seem too bad either, in between low and high as far as VDI stability goes. Jacketed pistol bullets are a common target in the 40's and they are usually pretty tight on the VDI. But copper pennies and up, I can't call as accurately yet with the Manticore as I can with the Nox 800. Worth mentioning, I never did get super accurate calling copper pennies from clad dimes with the 800 either, but a bit better than I'm doing so far with the Manticore. But same as you are seeing, anything between 70 and 90 is kind of a crap shoot as to copper penny, clad dime, clad quarter or silver coin or .925. I do feel like the high conductors, sloppy VDI's notwithstanding, "jump out" of aluminum trash stronger with the Manticore too though. Not that it really locks on hard to a high conductor comingled with square tabs, but it's easy to repeat the signal and narrow it down - the speed of the machine showing itself I suppose. End result being, with only about 25 hours of park hunting with the Manticore, I do feel that if I'm wanting to cherry pick, the trash ratio is certainly no worse, and probably slightly better than I do with the 800. I'm just less sure of what the non-trash will be before I dig it. None of which contradicts what you are seeing with the 900 on high conductors! And I'm definitely not trying to tell you how to run your machine. Just trying to share how I'm adapting to similar behavior with the Manticore. And, - Dave

I remember showing a big handful of jewelry I found in Hawaii detecting at a show, and a gal approached me and said "yeah, but you really did not find it." I actually was so caught off guard I was flabbergasted. It simply never occurred to me in my life to fake a find. I actually don't care about the stuff I find - it's the fact I found it that means everything to me. Back when I collected rocks people wanted to give me rocks for my collection, and I had zero interest. A rock somebody else found or bought meant nothing to me. I told that gal that no, I found that stuff, but she clearly did not think it was possible to find jewelry like that. Wasn't really calling me a liar per se. More like I was a person that claimed I saw little green men and believed it, when she knew they did not exist. I will say I am extremely cautious on ever calling anyone out - in fact I don't do it. Not my job in life to be the finds police. With the amount of lies and BS that occur on social media faking a coin find has got to rank pretty low on the scale.

That’s just a personal call. If you’ve been detecting since the 70s then like me you are near the end of your journey, and the detectors you have may be all you ever need. There is no genuine reason to ditch them, as they are unlikely to fail. My DFX is not going anywhere. Or maybe like me you just want to try something new. But it does mean going from being expert with a detector to learning a new tool, and your knowledge and expertise with the old tools does actually matter. I’d not get a new model and expect the finds you are making to change a lot. You’ll just be making them with a different detector. So what is it? Stay with the tried and true, the one you are comfortable with? Or try a new toy? Your call, there is no right or wrong answer. Best of luck to you either way, and welcome to the forum!

Did it hurt so much his asking? Like everyone knows everything and that people are supposed to adhere to some kind of "ask anything you want but don't ask that" etiquette? I've given people explicit directions to places to hunt in Alaska and even made a list. And collected more nationwide locations here. Sharing knowledge never got me less gold. The guy was as explicit as could be he was not asking for anyone's honey hole, and then got told, "oh yes, that's exactly what you are doing." And even if he was, what of it? Not everyone is greedy and protective - some people do share locations. Maybe not on a forum, but privately by PM… but you never know unless you ask. I will take the time to thank all the people who generously shared with me over the years! Alaska Akau Alaska Gold & Resort (Fee) - New detect for gold operation near Nome, Alaska. Bertha Creek Panning Area - In the Chugach National Forest south of Anchorage. Cache Creek Cabins - Gold panning and dredging on Cache Creek near Petersville. Caribou Creek Recreational Mining Area - On Glenn Highway east of Palmer. Chicken Gold Camp (Fee) - Gold panning, suction dredging and a real bucketline dredge at Chicken, Alaska. Crescent Creek Panning Area - In the Chugach National Forest south of Anchorage. Cripple River (Fee) - The GPAA operation near Nome. Crow Creek Mine (Fee) - Near Girdwood south of Anchorage. Possibly Alaska's most popular public mining site. Dalton Highway - Gold around Wiseman in the Brooks Range. El Dorado Gold Mine - Two hour mining tour near Fairbanks. Ganes Creek Gold (now closed) - World class nugget hunting locale near McGrath in Interior Alaska. Gold Fever Prospecting - Opportunity to run large suction dredges near Chicken, Alaska. Hatcher Pass Public Use Area - Scenic public mining area along the Little Susitna River. Independence Mine State Historical Park - Gold panning at historic old mine. Indian Valley Mine - Historic mine location on Turnagain Arm. Jack Wade Public Gold Panning Area - Non-motorized only in the Fortymile River region. Kennecott National Historic Landmark - Once the largest copper mine in the world. Nome Beach - The famous gold beaches of Nome, Alaska. Nome Creek - 60 miles north of Fairbanks, 4 mile stretch of creek open to hand mining methods. Petersville Recreational Mining Area - Remote but road accessible site north of Anchorage. Resurrection Creek Panning Area - Popular public mining site near Hope, Alaska. Sixmile Creek Panning Area - In Chugach National Forest south of Anchorage. Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve - Gold pans only!

There have been many great responses to this topic. Some have made corollaries between the Equinox 900 and Manticore. That is fine with me. I have never used a Manticore so I don't know. They do both have Multi IQ tech and they have very expanded target ID ranges that have been more than doubled compared to the Vanquish models and the Equinox 600 and 800. They have improved target separation and recovery speed over the Vanquish and earlier Equinox models also from my experience. Other posters have commiserated with my experiences and observations to varying degrees and also offered encouragement to hang in there. Thank You!!! Some posters have offered solutions to problems that some of us are experiencing. Whether those solutions are universally valid is questionable as they relate to the Equinox 900 being used in a multitude of detecting environments worldwide. This is why I respectfully asked for posters to refrain from trying to "fix" the prevailing characteristics of the Equinox 900 (and 700 by default) which are bothering some new users whether they have prior Equinox experience or not. Everyone that has posted and has actually used the Equinox 900 or the Manticore is reporting wider variations in target IDs on targets that do not have very wide variations when detected with the Vanquish models, Equinox 600/800, Legend or Deus 2. Some of this instability appears to be fairly severe up-averaging on 3" to 8" deep fairly easy targets whether they are coins, jewelry, relics or commonly occurring trash. The other detectors I mentioned may up-average some on those targets but not as much as the Equinox 900. Some of this target ID instability also appears to be a current characteristic of the Equinox 900 to not lock in on a predictable, firm target ID or tone that is readily repeatable or recognizable even on shallower, fairly easy targets. A third possibly related characteristic that some Manticore and Equinox 900 users are reporting is the very large amount of spurious, false positive, audio responses that sound like possible targets even using the most basic search modes with default or even lower sensitivity settings. Otherwise, at least for me, my Equinox 900's physical/ergonomic improvements are fantastic. Thanks Minelab! I am a gigantic fan, supporter and avid user of the Minelab Equinox series since they were first released. Anything I am reporting here needs to be flavored by that fact. I don't have any desire or reason to take unwarranted shots at any detector especially the Equinox. Maybe the learning curve for the Equinox 700/900 is just too big for me right now. I was not expecting any kind of a learning curve since I assumed the Equinox 700/900 would be a logical, seamless transition from the Equinox 600/800 especially for those that have hundreds to thousands of hours on those detectors in a wide variety of hunting conditions. My personal transition from the Equinox 600/800 to the Legend and Deus 2 was truly seamless, painless and took less than 10 hours. The "prolonged suffering" that I am experiencing, to coin a phrase from Loren Lemke's excellent Manticore Early Impressions video posted by Bill S in the Manticore area, is not something that I had planned on dealing with after thousands of Equinox 600/800 usage hours which were tough for about the first 50 hours but have been mostly sublime after that. After another 10 or so hours of prolonged suffering so far this week, maybe a light bulb will be turned on for me tomorrow when I take the 900 out again.....

I thought it worked really well on a salt beach with moderate black sand. There are going to be lots of gold chains found with the manticore. Transitions good from wet sand to wave wash.

Here are some finds from an early 1700s Tavern site that was very active from 1750 to the early 1800s. Ive been detecting it for a couple years now. Found with the Equinox 800 and Deus II. I live in Hanover County VA. Nice to be here. 🙂

Deus and ORX have had excellent ferrous/non ferrous "meters" for a long time. Deus 2 continues that tradition with two excellent meters depending on which search mode display is used. Other earlier detectors have had them too.

Coil covers? Make your own. Or shop eBay etc but since they don’t make them anymore eventually it’s going to be something people have to make. And welcome to the forum! Posts that mention Lexan

ok, my .02 as a new to minelab customer, was a garrett whites sorta guy IF you stick with Minelab and they do make a good product, as good as any company, when they announce a new..whatever, new metal detector, Immediately, sell your old one. ASAP after they talked about releasing the 800, the weeks following the "unboxing" and find vids, the Etrak prices dropped (so I bought a new in box CTX, two coils, harness, books for 1500) in the weeks following the release (talk..of release) and vids of folks diagnosing performance based on the box cover and grainy photos, used 800's dropped a bit..then when they actually dumped the 900s and still did the carrot dangle trick with the manticore, used 800's were going for 500 bucks, CTX's are way down as well. When the announce the release of the CTX4040 or whatever it'll be called, dump your manti's and prepay obediently!! 😁 it was cool they made the 900's take the 800's coil, I lost less money selling the two 800 coils (percentage wise) than I did selling the 800. just a heads up..I'll have a Manticore for sale when they do announce the newest CTX... I dont have a problem, I can quit needing the newest metal detector anytime. yup.

......Old School, no screens. Only you, "your detector" and all the power of your experienced ears. Good job!. I have my eye on a Minelab Sovereign GT. To find good treasures, you have to get into the water. That "schizophrenic flute" (Nokta Makro Anfibio Multi) taught me the rules of the game... Location, location.

For me personally the difference was small, the 5000 has fine gold timing which suits some peoples conditions, it also has coin and relic timing if you're interested in that in VERY mild soils looking for coins. The 5000 also runs smoother and handles EMI better than early 4500's, the newer 4500's are based upon the same hardware and the advantages are less notable than early model 4500's. Some light reading. https://www.minelab.com/community/treasure-talk/the-gpx-5000-compared It's worth reading both links. If they're similar priced the 5000 every day, if there is a substantial price difference the 4500 is the better choice. I've had both, I disposed of my 4500, but nothing to do with performance compared the the 5000, just the 5000 is slightly better. At the time when prices were substantially different I'd say the 5000 over-priced. It's a bit of an Equinox 800/900 all over again, some will understand that 🙂 If a 4500 is in your price range it's a great detector and not all that far behind a 5000.

The combination of fires destroying the business and White's departure would seem to indicate that the coils will not go back into production. Used examples on Ebay are your best option.

Good report Mitchel, wait and see you'll be digging tiny bits deeper than you ever expected so much so that you will think they're much bigger than they will end up being 🙂 I really like that 15" CC more so than any other coil on the GPZ, now you have a spiral for the better edge sensitivity and covering ground better and the 15" CC for going over areas you know gold should be and you're set, a good combination of coils. I see they've included the new polycarbonate skid plate for you as a bonus over the standard one, that's the clear sort of one, they're super tough and will last you a long time. A guy in Australia that detects full time has had his on now for 2 seasons as he bought one when they first were introduced, he was going through standard skid plates like mad prior to getting that poly skid plate. He's an aggressive coil scrubber.

And the answer is- No !!. It maybe soon though for medical usage There might be an underlying theory here about the moons influence. Have you been to a spot and dug more gold from a flogged area ?. Gone back to a spot and the ground is quieter weeks later ? Have you looked at the dates when you found lots of gold and cross referenced it to what the moon was doing at that time ? Check out your skunked trip dates. There maybe a pattern. Cheers Ozgold

I enjoy night hunting on the beaches and the deserts for gold nuggets. I've headed out to watch the moon rise and I've also headed out in the middle of the night to see the meteor showers when there is no moon. It is easier to see with the full moon as you mention but I have not noticed any additional EMI on the place where I night hunt the most for gold. I was just out there a couple of nights ago but it was a time to sleep and wait for the morning to hunt nuggets. It is still pleasant during the day.

I guess for me I was used to the 21/22 target ID on a coin where as now that same coin is anywhere bouncing between 60 and 70, sometimes bigger, the jump seems too big for just the extended ID's of the Manticore. I should also point out that I'm talking about deep targets, I don't care about shallow coins which my definition of a shallow coin is 8" or less they're often my junkers, I want the deep coins and they are the ones where ID accuracy has gone downhill. If I was chasing shallow coins then yes, it's not too far off the Nox accuracy even with the bigger ID range. Other that that its' a damn fine detector. I guess I was spoilt with the CTX and it's deadly accurate ID's too even with an expanded range.

Gold detecting is like fishing about 5% get about 95%, the reason being simple that 5% take little notice of the consensus, they hunt with a mindset discipline/purpose, was that way at the beginning of the electronic gold rush is still that way now.

Hey fellas, It's been a bit since my last post! Still here lurking in the shadows though! I've had pretty crap luck on good finds but detecting is still my therapy and I've bopper around steadily. Combined with point lookin! Yesterday evening got off work in (al) was close to the field of dreams so I headed for her! Got out,shot the crap with owner and set up 2 d2s or one remote and 9" unit and the ws6,wsa and 11×13 strapped my pads on and took off! About 10 steps in 93,94,96 93 signal was sounding much like some frustration materials but that's high numbers so I dug. Probably 13" down this baby popped out and I was a happy son of a buck! Wild this spot is as bullets and many things are 3" deep so this find tells me I need a damn earth moving company to stack the relics! Lol Made my day,week and broke my whiny butt no good finds mentality! Be safe fellas and enjoy

I faked a find a couple of months ago. For a few hours anyway. Dug what I thought was a Peace dollar at the beach. Even showed to another forum member who was detecting there and told him I'd found a silver dollar. Now, it was pretty encrusted, so it was larger than "life size" and details weren't really visible. But I went around telling myself I'd found silver dollar for a few hours before I got home and started cleaning it up and realized it was a Walker half and not a dollar at all 😂. - Dave

I usually let my coil get down to about %40 percent, then charge all three.

Even to a Tasmanian who knows nothing about arrow heads those look fake ! I am with Erik though when it comes to my finds . I have them in their hunt site boxes and anybody that doubts can take a flying leap . I know just how much hard work they represent . Case in point is that I have been extremely lucky to have found 4 gold coins over 12 years of detecting . The reply's , and the look on some peoples faces says it all . For 2 of those finds I have had witnesses but that really doesn't matter . I say don't judge until you have walked the miles in the finders shoes .

I realize that many detector users do not have to worry too much about target ID accuracy or tone bin accuracy. Sometimes I don't have to worry about it either, like when I'm gold prospecting or at the beach. As long as I get a hit or can get a hit with enough information for a ferrous vs non-ferrous determination, I'm good to go. If you have that kind of freedom to dig just about everything that beeps, the Equinox 900 will be just fine. At least 75% of my hunts do not have that kind of freedom. Instead I am trying to pick my way through thousands of modern aluminum and steel alloy trash targets in public areas with high iron mineralization in order to find at least some modern USA coins, maybe some older USA coins and some silver and gold jewelry too. USA zinc pennies can be a challenge on any of these newer high gain SMF detectors like the Equinox models, Manticore, Legend and Deus 2. I fully expect some major weirdness on zinc Lincolns. I don't expect weird target ID related stuff on US modern nickels, modern clad dimes, 95% copper Lincoln Memorial pennies, modern clad quarters or older copper and silver USA coins and I also don't expect any weird stuff on most regularly occurring aluminum and steel trash. I don't get any from the Equinox 600/800, Legend and Deus 2. Their target ID responses and tones on those US coin targets and common occurring trash are consistent and very predictable even in close quarters with aluminum trash if those coin targets are well within the depth of detection. That is simply not the case with my Equinox 900 which is really too bad. I did not buy it as a specialty detector to only be used for certain types of dig it all hunting. I bought it to replace my Equinox 800 and to do most of the heavy lifting between it, my Deus 2 with 9" coil and my Legend. A few months ago I posted a comparison that included a question that went something like "Between the Equinox 800/900, Deus 2 and Legend, which one has to go and which ones get to stay?" At the time I thought for sure the one to go would be Deus 2. That has totally flipped. Deus 2 isn't going anywhere and neither is my Legend. I already sold one of my 800s to buy the 900. My remaining 800 isn't going anywhere either after experiencing this 100 hour test with the 900. Unless the 900 gets a well needed target ID stability software update soon.......it's going bye, bye.

I think the wording is confusing. Metal detectors generally aren't licensed devices like radio transmitters, etc, they are a different class of device since the manufacturer doesn't want to waste money on licenses or risk leaks from the tests. What it's saying is that since it isn't licensed, you can't complain to the FCC about any interference from actual licensed devices like cell towers, wifi, bluetooth, emergency radios, etc. This is why these manufacturers don't get testing on anything but the Bluetooth tx/rx. But you certainly can try to prevent any of that EMI from entering the detector via shielding, or do signal processing, noise cancelling, frequency hopping, or any other noise reduction techniques available. As long as doing them doesn't interfere with the licensed products, and you can't complain if the licensed products interfere with you.

Great reporting Jeff, thanks. I have always and to this day still think the Equinox was the machine that made the clear and undeniable jump beyond what came before. My expectations for anything since have been minimal, and everything I’ve seen has told me I was not wrong in that.

Its always cool to see an xray of the coils dont you think... even though I know exactly what goes in them it allows me to ensure everything looks as it should - which it does and why they are operating excellently! BTW - the black area is our invisible magic dust that ensures people have the best chance of success!! That is our secret sauce recipe! 🙂😉 In regards to the bunch/ spiral type windings all the coils for the GPX6000 are bunched windings. The only coils that are truly spiral windings are the ELITE coils and the Evolution from NF. We refer to bunched windings as the wire is arranged 6 wide by 5 high for example. So if you cross section the windings you would see this layer construction. For the flat windings you would see 1 wire high by 20 or so wires wide. All one continuous strand. From all of us here at Coiltek we appreciate the support we have had for the GOLDHAWK coils and look forward to new and exciting coils to come in the future! Trev

I'm with you on that Simon, I can think of about 20 that were stained badly or black. I have not posted certain coins that I have found for the reason that someone might think or challenge my find. I have found peace dollars that I did not post and recently a 1985 one ounce silver bullion coin. I think most people, Even here would start to think something is a bit wonky about finding the larger silvers. So you will never see any of my big silver coins being posted . I privately post to my three great friends that are forum members. That being said. I try to photo my coins at the site and leave them dirty, followed by a clean up at home. But sometimes they just come out of the ground really nice. I really like to believe that all the coin finds I have seen on DP since I joined are all legit finds.

I had a few people think my silver finds were fake, sometimes my coins come out of the ground looking like they were never in it. Especially silver coins. It must just be my soil type. Here is a quick example, I just pulled up the first photo of a days hunt to find a coin that looked like it was never really lost. Look at the 1940 threepence second from left, looks near new. The others look pretty good too, all I do is wash the dirt off under the tap with a bit of water. I always clean my coins before putting the photos up so they can be seen better, no point putting up a dirty coin photo. I was even accused of this photo being fake having coins I didn't find on it, I found every last one of them and have photos of each ones dig hole 🙂 So while I agree it's sad some feel the need to put up fake photos of finds, and the dodgy Youtube channels and so on that are doing it for some sort of hits financial gain are terribly wrong sometimes people get false accusations too which can be a bit frustrating. It's when you put up photos like this some start to understand it's probably not fake. This was all from one small field, and it's had all the spendable cash removed before the photo being taken, so another hundred or so coins taken away and spent 😛 Successful nugget finds sometimes get accused of being fake too, perhaps because they may seem too good to be true. Sometimes it's jealously I guess. But it goes both ways, yes people fake finds, but people also find stuff and get accused of it being fake when it's not.

In general I just feel sorry for people like that. How sad their lives must be, their craving for attention, that they feel a need to try and impress people with fake finds. The ones that do it to make money… that’s just fraud, and they are thieves. Prosecute them. The ones that are just doing it for attention though, well, I hope they can find some other way to fill that empty hole in their lives. Even the thieves - not for one second would I want to trade my life for theirs. Broken people.