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Welcome to the 10x5 club! 😀 🏆 I've been raving about that coil for a couple of years now, I was lucky enough to get one early on thanks to a forum member. I put it on my 600 and never looked back until recently when I tried the 15" for the first time. I put it back on. I've had great success with that coil. I've dug many great relics, found gold rings, and enough stuff deep enough to make it worthwhile over the 11". It's great for getting in tight spaces, I've hit dimes at up to 14" on the beach. One beach I go to produced a silver ring between some large rocks. It's probably not going to find buried hoards, but for pure pillage there isn't a better option. Its separation capability is incredible, and it's great for hunting along fences, under park benches (an offset would have been welcome), and it's a tough little bugger, I have not had a problem with the ears. Yes, you might not get the swing coverage of a larger coil, but I've never thought it had a depth issue although the experts say it is a matter of science that it is slightly less far reaching than the 11". I'll put it this way: if I searched any place with it, going back with the 11" over the same area produced little or no new finds. Good luck and enjoy. 🙂

IMO, you nailed it. Not as deep (in my moderately mineralized soils) as the 11 inch stock coil. (I wrote up my experience here a while back where I flagged targets with 11" and 5"x10" and compared prior to digging. The 11" won.) Very good separation but not surprisingly, in extemely trashy locations the 6" does a bit better. The hits (in audio) do seem sharp for small targets. (Weight and coverage comparisons as expected -- no surprises there.) Bottom line: IMO it's a tweener or a Goldilocks, no more and no less.

Okay, I updated @Brad Plohman's great D2 program spreadsheet for the V1.1 update. The Custom Slots (15-24) are blank to fill in with your own settings. Enjoy! 😎 DEUS II Factory Programs Settings Spreadsheet-V1.1.zip

A 2 box set up is definitely a specialty tool for out of the ordinary treasure hunting. What is needed to go along with the tool is knowledge & technique. Bottle dumps, large Civil War relic & hut sites, substantiated Caches and Post Hole Banks are not common features of most Permissions but they exist. Research and lots of time on the ground is required. You also have to work smarter not just harder. A proper set of ground/bottle probes can save you a lot of unproductive digging as will a big coil on a good VLF discriminator. It is tough to do alone but that is what a lot of the early guys did with less equipment but more time and more opportunities. Can you imagine being able to hunt along the actual Oregon Trail before it was all obliterated or fenced off? There were scores of Pioneer trails thru hostile territory. Or a battlefield or Winter camp? How about Galveston or Padre Island. We have less opportunity today but better equipment. You have to admire those early hunters who were very secretive and successful.

Personally, I can't see myself digging that deep either, but I can see others doing it for their specific types of hunting. There's a guy in my detecting club who routinely digs large holes up to neck deep to find old bottles. So to each, their own. 😎

I had both the Manticore and the 900 until recently when I sold the 900 to a forum member here. For me it was overkill to own both. I'm pretty happy with the Manticore and my experience pretty much mirrors UT Dave's including rolling back to the old version. However, I don't even have the Manticore in my possession at the moment because it was sent back to Minelab. I'm supposed to be getting a replacement Manticore and will be doing some of the same testing I did on the old one to see if it acts any different. Minelab wants to rule out a bad detector before diving into the new software as a possible issue. I will say Minelab does pay attention to forums and YouTube videos. Within a day of posting the video Minelab called me to try and resolve the issue. We'll see what happens when I get the replacement. But even if I end up running the older software version. I'm happy with the way the Manticore performs.

Garrett very apologetically emailed me this morning about the shipping issue and offered to take it back and said they would replace the arm cuff and make sure everything was OK. I declined returning my detector explaining that was most likely just unnecessary extra work for both of us. I also explained my intent was to establish for my record what had happened in case some problem related future issue were to occur and that I preferred they send me a replacement arm cuff I could have on hand if my repair were to ever fail. Garrett replied a short time later acknowledging my message and a new arm cuff with screws is on its way. I continue to be pleased there is little more I could ask of them.

A mineralization meter tells you how much magnetite or other similar ferrous oxide compounds are in the soil. The ground balance indication on most detectors is really just a number generated to help a user properly balance out ground phase (conductivity). It does not necessarily correlate to the degree of ferrous mineralization present in the soil. Even if you have a properly ground balanced detector, highly mineralized soil (often referred to as "hot ground") reflects and attenuates the magnetic field that is put into the ground by the detector's transmit coil as well as the received induced magnetic field by the target which greatly reduces depth capability. Many detectors such as the higher end Fisher and Teknetics models; XP Deus, Orx, and Deus 2; Nokta Simplex and Legend, provide a separate mineralization meter. Minelabs tend to not have this indication although the Nox internal algorithms use sensed changes in ground mineralization as keys to adjust ground balance in ground tracking mode and also sense it in Beach Modes to automatically dial back transmit power in the presence of black sand. Having a separate indication of ground mineralization helps the detectorist identify this hot ground situation so that they can adjust the detector to compensate somewhat for its effects. For example, DD coils are slightly less impacted by mineralization than coaxial or concentric coils, so a detectorist might choose to use a DD coil in this situation (most detectors have now gravitated to solely using DD coils so this is typically a moot point). Choosing a coil with a smaller footprint can also help mitigate hot ground feedback effects, which means you should avoid using large footprint coils as they are counterproductive in these conditions, i.e., you will likely not gain any depth advantage as overall target sensitivity will take a hit for the reasons mentioned above and you will certainly lose small target sensitivity and you take an unnecessary weight penalty (applies only to induction balance vlf detectors, as discussed below Pulse Induction detectors are somewhat immune to these effects so you can gain depth in hot dirt with larger coil footprints). Lowering transmit power (if you have that adjustment) sometimes helps. If you can separately adjust for salt effects (usually a beach mode adjustment) that can sometimes help too. And certain frequencies may penetrate better (usually lower frequencies, but there is no hard and fast determination that lowering the frequency is necessarily always better in hot ground > a lot depends on your desired target conductivity). A lot of trial and error is involved. In really hot soils, shifting to a Pulse Induction detector is the best antidote as mineralization has much less impact on depth detection due to the way they transmit and process their received target signals. There are other drawbacks to Pulse Induction detectors (expense, lack of sophisticated visual target ID and discrimination) and they are primarily used for gold prospecting, beach work, or for relic detecting in hot and/or high salinity ground environments. HTH

It's always a good idea no matter the weather to hit the beach the day after the 4th of July. Brutal day today, 92 and about 60% humidity, no wind to speak of. It wasn't too bad in the morning, and I outlasted all the other detectorists, but by noon it was just plain nasty. The first beach was the large one using the D2. Ran into José operating the beach groomer, I've talked to him before, he has a keen interest in metal detecting and US history. We talked for a bit, he explained how the groomer worked, and said about the only thing it catches is chains, and it mangles them. 🫤 He tried to let me hunt as much of the beach as possible, and worked around me. I was very happy. Despite the groomer being run over the entire beach, the finds just kept coming. Maybe it's the reason I found so much. Second beach was the small one, only a few kids. Over the 4th these beaches got really trashed, but were cleaned up by county employees or locals. Fireworks and trash everywhere. 😵 Here I used my Equinox 600 with a 15" coil that Chase lent me. Didn't take long to find out how much I prefer the Deus 2 with the 13" 😀, it's way lighter and easier to use, also gives a lot more audio information than the Equinox. All I found at this beach was $1.26 in clad, the targets jump out because the beach is clean. I also much prefer the 10x5 Coiltek for hunting here if I'm going to use the Equinox. Trash was very very minimal today. I've got the D2 tweaked so that it really doesn't find much junk: Bottle caps were courtesy picks. Yes that is a live firework. So here's what I got 73 coins, about $8.50, a toy car, an old button and an earring that is just bling. The earring was over a large iron pipe and the Deus picked it out easily. José explained that the replenishment sand comes from a very old county here, so that explains the 1916 wheat I found nearby where I dug a 1916 Mercury dime a month or 2 ago. The button is very old. The little oval was from some sort of brass bracelet. Fun but very difficult day, about as bad weather as I would want to be out in.

This is another teachable moment from the Gary. I won't give away the twist. Enjoy! 😎

One person’s trash can be another person’s treasure over time. Chuck

I'm one who is slow to draw conclusions. As such I've been radio silent (and will continue to be for a while, with exceptions like below). Filtering out opinions from people who have never touched one, only seen one that a friend is using, etc. silences a lot of the noise. The signal that remains seems to be mostly positive, but with reservations. That appears to be true both before the update and even with the update. Interestingly, my responses so far put me in the minority of 1 for the first two questions! For another thing, the question about the update (question #3) doesn't even include my intended response (and the survey forced me to answer question 3 or else not include me at all). I still have not found the time to download or install the update, but now that it's known to be reversible I will get to that and do some testing. (This weekend? Maybe, but don't hold your breath.) My overall impression is that the Manticore holds promise even for those of us in moderate and higher mineralization, but for the most part it's going to take time (for me in particular) to extract the performance improvements over the Equinox 800. Those who want instant gratification, with possible exception of water hunters and the related extremely low mineralziation (e.g. Florida peninsula) detectorists, are probably not going to be patient enough to get this detector to shine for them. But how is that different from other top-end IB/VLF's such as the XP Deus 2?? A lot of detectors can get you 80-90% of the way to top performance. If you want that last 10-20% you're going to have to work at it. Is that different than for any other worthwhile endeavor?

I agree with GB and F350. I have the 15", 11", and 6" coils but when I got 10x5" coil, I pretty much just left it on my Nox. I have used it on parks, fields, beaches, ghost towns, and in pretty much every scenario I can think of. It has laser-like precision in trash and iron and actually performs as well as the 6", IMO, on ghost towns with more depth and more coverage. The 11" has a tad more depth, but with the lighter weight and better separation of the 10x5", I don't use my 11" anymore. The 15" is deeper, but seems like twice as heavy so I only use that when I have to, but that is almost never. The 10x5" Coiltek is my goto for the Nox.

Geologyhound, Thanks for the welcome. I went ahead and downloaded the spreadsheet it is really handy to have it. I will check with F350Platinum for his relic reaper program. Looking forward to getting updated on the new 1.1 beach setting. I really appreciate you taking the time to share the information with me!

Yeah for that amount it wouldn’t be worth parting with. Make an interesting topic of conversation for my grandkids when they get older.

Ah, tappets…. Ever read the book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance? I still have my feeler gauges for adjusting the valves on my ‘68 BMW. It was fun and relaxing, and very spacious, working on that car’s engine! Talking about old engines, when you get around to writing again, consider including an introduction of the first steam donkey to the story! They were an awesome invention, deadly for many forests in the Sierra. I saw one running once during a demonstration. It was very loud, made a lot of smoke and steam. That one was stationary, but they told us how the loggers would have it winch itself through the mountains on skids to the next clear cut. Must’ve been ominous to see and hear such a smoke belching monster dragging itself through the forest like that. Most were used for the mines- cutting timber for shoring and water flumes.

I empathize as I've been in your shoes more than a couple times. Invariably I end up finding whatever I hid, not by exhaustivey looking but just by stumbling across it (eventually) and then saying, "Oh, yeh, now I remember putting it there!" True Story (and metal detector related!): A friend and I were going to Las Vegas to bet (on American football) and got a pile of $100 bills. I had heard the conspiracy theory that the USA government had put metal in $100 bills to be able to track people's money transport quantities as they went through the metal detectors at airports. I was pretty sure this was BS but I decided to do an experiment to check the story's veracity. So.... I went to my then near empty workshop (it had just been built) and set a couple saw-horses up with a plank across them to hold the money. I used my Garrett Groundhog to see if I could pick up a signal. One bill, then 10 bills, then 100 bills,... Yes, I did get a peep but that was it -- just a barely perceptible signal. Given that airport metal detectors are (necessarily) desensitized compared to what we use I confirmed that the conspiracy theory was bogus. But.... After the test I counted the money and was $1000 short. My first thought was that my friend (who had gotten the money at the bank and then handed it to me) had somehow either misplaced that much or (worse) that the bank had inadvertently shorted him. He did a search and even went to the bank for them to do a balance check. Both proved fruitless. So we put in another grand and made our trip (losing it all, BTW, but that's another story. ) Some time after I returned home I happened to go into the shop to get the saw-horses and... there on the floor under them was a package of bills totalling $1k. Needless to say I had a hard time cleaning the egg from my face, and my friend still razzes me about it on occasion.

Here’s a photo of the waterproof compadre without the rod/pole. I call it the SS Minnow 😂😂

I've got my older Alaskan camper setup for sale. 10' non-cabover on a heavy duty single axle trailer. I've been prospecting in this rig for many years. I rebuilt the up half several years ago, including the framing and insulation. Not perfect, but in solid overall condition. Not for the ladies...LOL, but a good rig for a serious outdoorsman. Good cold Dometic fridge, 20 gallon water tank, table for 4 that makes into a large bed. Good tires with newer spare. Rotatable, tilitng solar panel setup on the roof w/150 watt panel. Does a good job of keeping the batteries charged. 3 burner stove. electric water pump, and forced-air furnace. Fridge runs on propane or 120v, though the 120v systems have been removed as I never stay in campgrounds. The trailer wheel track matches my Dodge, so it will follow down any two-track without the wheels being out in the rocks and sagebrush. Includes my shop-built 12v evaporative cooler. This rig is not fancy, but solid. Lots of storage, and LED interior lights. Might take a Gold Bug 2 as part trade. $2500 firm

There’s an old ww2 POW camp in the town I live in in Oklahoma. German prisoners were housed here on what is now the county fairgrounds. I’ve been going over this place for about three months now, found quite a few 1941-45 wheaties and an American coat button with the eagle. I found this last week and just got it cleaned up enough to see it. Can anyone tell me more about these things? Thanks for any information!

JCR, one other critical item that would be imperative in the case of this 75 year old Cav guy is a strong 20 year old to dig the dang holes!!! 👍🏻😂

Hello, I am from Richmond, VA and have just started learning the Deus 2. I picked it up back in March 2023. I was using an equinox 800 during Covid and pick up the mi6 pointer and decided to go with a Deus 2. I still have the equinox but mainly swing the Deus. For some reason I have had more luck with my Deus. If you have any tips or spreadsheets for programming for beach or relic hunting I am game. The family and I have been on vacation this week at Topsail, NC so I have had time on the beach which has been great, we head back tomorrow. I am amazed at the number of fully buried aluminum cans I found, they were in the high 80s- 90 range. I did find 2 rings, one plated and the other might be gold both rang around 80. I did find lots of clad coins. Love this forum and just reading picking up the knowledge.

Thanks for the welcome. I appreciate it! I am running an 11 inch coil on the Deus 2. I purchase both of my machines online from Big Boys Hobbies. I had a positive experience with both purchases, and he was very competitive on the prices. I use full tones in the new high square audio and run full range on the Deus 2 and also use the XY screen. It is great in determining whether to go with or pass up a target. I wish you luck down at Emerald Isle. And yes, it is amazing how deep how many scoops down some of these targets are. To be completely honest, I have not taken the equinox 800 out that much since getting the Deus two. The deus has been my go to. My equinox 800 has the 11 inch coil and the 6 inch coil and I have carbon fiber shafts for the equinox. I also have a Garrett carrot as an original pointer. While using the equinox 800 I bought an M I6 and that’s what got me thinking about getting the deus. The M I six seem to even outperform the Garrett carrot in pinpointing. For a small digging tool I have a lesche hand shovel and a piranha shovel for deeper digging. Look forward to any tips, updates and help that you guys have I really appreciate it!

Interesting

Great photo CPT! In addition to the eastern and local bottles, I have heard of and seen some powerful Western glass such as Bitters,Whiskeys,Sodas and Medicines from California,Nevada and Oregon that have been dug in Colorado.Thanks for posting.

I thought it's time we kicked off a poll to see how happy people are with their purchase if they've purchased one of the new models. The forum limits the number of questions you can ask so it's a pretty simple poll to get an idea of how many people bought one of these new models and how many are finding it as good or better than their old model. Feel free to comment below with other things you're found with the new models, hopefully Minelab reads it and takes not of anything people bring up of importance.

Yes. This is how Steve consolidated essential information, tips, and tricks for the Equinox in this post:

I too went from the Nox 800 to the Deus. I mostly hunt on the beach near Topsail. I have found that the Deus does a better job of sniffing out non-ferrous targets deeper than the Nox. It also will give a pretty accurate ID on the deep targets. Allow some time to learn the D2's "language" and it will reward you.

Let us know what they say the problem was. Can't believe it would be the battery in that short of time. I'm thinking the USB port went bad or the connecting wire to the battery got jostled open. Maybe the circuit that shuts down charging when full went bad.

Perhaps the "Sticky" post could just be a link to that particular post in the original thread. In this way it would retain it's context and may generate additional posts to a useful topic.

Silver coins have been scarce this year. However, I hit one of my park sites in an area that I had only quickly skimmed over in the past with the nox. Yesterday I hit that same area with the D2 in sensitive ft, sense at 94, reactivity 2.5-3, silencer 1, no notch BC at 0, 40khz max freq, disc at 6.8. yesterday I was mainly digging high tones but also a few solid mid tones for nickels or rings. I got a nice 96-97 and about 2-3” deep under a bunch of pines where the soil was pretty dry, I got the ‘53D gw. Then about 10 minutes later I got a 91 mixed in with some iron grunts. Out pops a ‘64 rosie! That brings me to 7 fty. This site will be my future hot spot as there’s more area to cover and I still have a lot of lower conductors to dig.

Haha! Believe me, I’ve hit quite few 1965s!

Easy to get parts. They are the new 350 CC. The older 500 Bullets like mine were dropped in 2020 because they couldn't pass emissions. Google for your closest dealer. I have one about 70 miles from where I live. I don't know much about the new 350's except for what i've seen on Youtube. That's a good place to start. I know the 350's were totally new designs in 2022 with way less vibration than the older singles. Mine is like riding a bike from the 1950's but with electronic ignition, fuel injection, & good wiring and NO OIL LEAKS LOL. They are not fast bikes but they are lots of fun with great torque. The 350's require valve adjustments periodicly but the 500's from 2009 & up have hydraulics lifters.

Yes. I had this thought as well. An index where general detecting knowledge items and nuggets can be collected and saved for reference. A DP Knowledge Base Section. This already exists in some respects in Steve's site with respect to his Guides and Detector Database. But perhaps a wiki style that enables crowd-sourced contributions from forum members to be collected and indexed. Or perhaps "Chat DPT" ("Detector Prospector Tidbits"). Example Topics: Wireless Audio Technologies How to Secure Site Permissions How to Maximize Site Coverage (Gridding and Tracking Techniques and Tools) Use of Online Tools to Research Site History and Geographic Features The Difference Between Induction Balance and Pulse Induction Detectors How Coils Work Lithium Battery Do's and Don'ts and so forth. I'll discuss with Steve. Thanks for the nudge.

No harm no foul RVP, the Maxum was a pig. Great yacht but expensive. Carried 150 gallons of gas at $4.50 a gallon, do the math... 😏 About 5gpm.

Wow Chase thanks. You explained that way better than I could. Even learned a few things myself. Thats why I like these forums, so many knowledgeable members willing to help. Take care. Mark

Ron - Can you confirm that Coiltek has permission to make coils for Manticore. Hadn’t seen that announcement. If Coiltek makes a 10x5 for Manticore then my 900 is most definitely going bye bye.

50 years ago in PNG I imported this Ossa explorer 250 for riding off track in the "Island of Crocodile gold" Bougainville. It did go up vertical climbs all the time.

Thanks VL, thought ya might be happy to see the Equinox out there. I still love it but only with the 10x5. 😀 I posted merely because I haven't seen a heckuva lot of entertainment here lately 🤔 😀

Oh....I see in the second link Gold Seeker posted that one in good condition went for $75. Kind of surprised it wasn't worth more.

I've "heard" rumors of a guy detecting that beach with a foil "Sun"bruaro! Pretty sure it's F350! The reflection blinds satellites, and repels trash targets!! Next he's gonna try a "jiffypop" hat!! Nice haul man!!🏆 Glad "your" beach goers weren't as cheap as mine!! 🍀👍👍

I have been using the 12" NF coil on my 7000 for over two years. I have found ridiculously small gold with it and at depth as well. The weight shift alone makes it worthy, but it's performance makes it a must (in my opinion). I am sure X-coils are good too but the expense and the wiring changes make uninteresting to me. Also, I can't help but smile at all the discussion of tenths or hundredths of a gram flakes of gold. Not sure it really matters much whether the scale measures one or two decimal's, but again, just an opinion. I do know that the gents I learned detecting and dredging from wouldn't even bother to mention finding flakes that small much less make it the subject of endless discussions. Not being dismissive, just pointing out that times have changed.

The 2box was also made by garrett many years ago on the gti2500 model, something similar seems to have been done by XP. definitely with this project xp is targeting the European buying public. As a deep scan researcher who has tested many probes intended for this type of research, I will tell you that power is not enough to penetrate deep, but the most important factor is the correct balance of the ground... personally i believe that in a real investigation deus with this method will suffer from false signals and will not be reliable, of course time will tell what the real facts are.

Dear Chuck, Maybe Coiltek will beat Minelab on getting a small coil out, hopefully a 5 x 10" since they already have the mold.

Both good questions. I am leery of sand and silt in a telescoping rod, but based on nothing but sand and grit getting in my old ATX shaft being an annoyance. Only way to know for sure is give it a go. As far as the coil a case could be made for either. I’d lean 6” round personally for that extra small gold punch, but maybe that pointy nose on the elliptical would be useful in crevices? If the goal is to cover lots of bedrock as opposed to methodically hunting small areas, the larger coil again would be an advantage.

I might add, I know and understand why Dimitar is so secretive about revealing more detailed information on the salt balance (so called)/ threshold interactions and settings. A lot of things can change with just small adjustments and if you get one thing set wrong the machines can be severely handicapped. Yea, sure, there's quite a bit of information here about how people (users) have set the machine up but to be quite frank, some of these settings just won’t work in my area. Every location can be different and some of my sites gives the Tarsacci no leading edge over the Equinox. The essential requirement for the Tarsacci is super bad ground and I'm assuming the salt water beach. But, I'm pressing on, learning more with each outing.

I'm very pleased you are getting the EMI fix done, you won't regret that one. It's hard not to like Garrett as a business, solid products and a good ethos as a business that's focused on their customers, something some other manufacturers lack.

I took a minute to update @Brad Plohman's awesome D2 Program log to make it V1.0 friendly. The new features are added and you might want to punch in your custom user programs before you update. It will make life a little easier. 😏 Enjoy! DEUS II FACTORY and USER PROGRAMS-V1.0.xlsx.zip

That's a great idea! Glad to see someone try that!👍 Funny, the two you have, are one's I haven't owned! Did bid on a Mojave a few times, but the owner wouldn't move off a "too high" of a price! I've seen the Golden umax occasionally, but not as common as some of the others! I think I read that there was a revision of the first Golden umax, due to the two middle tones of the four, sounding too much alike! Some of the European models, like the Lazer, show up occasionally too! but are obviously geared more toward European, and older foreign coins!👍👍

Did you buy the Aliexpress one Dave? From this link? They're the factory selling direct that makes it. It's the same battery for the CTX WM10 too.