Steve Herschbach

It was covered in detail here some time ago. Bottom line as phrunt said you are just fine.

I had a Vaquero with a Cleansweep coil at one point. Nice little detector, and I even found some gold nuggets with it. Good luck with yours!

It’s not a “Minelab Outing”.

Yes, many people here including myself have used it. One of the owner/operators, Clay Diggings (Barry) is a very helpful poster in these forums. Here are his recent posts.

For those who skipped the first post this is an Equinox with the 6x10 coil from the Gold Monster. No, it won’t function, but a coil like this would help take the Equinox up a notch as far as gold nugget detecting. Others have noted a desire for an open spoke type style as preferable. I’m fine with either. I just wanted to revive this thread to say I’m still hoping and dreaming......

The Excalibur will almost never identify ferrous as non-ferrous, but the extreme bias against ferrous comes at a cost. It will null over ferrous and since it is a slow machine masking is its main Achilles heel. That is not to say you can’t hunt ferrous with it and make good finds. The key is to hunt with Disc 1 very slow and from multiple directions. The Excalibur is basically a Minelab Sovereign in an underwater box so tips for the Sov generally apply to the Excalibur also. Excalibur Relic Hunting Tips

Finds are nothing without a great story... and that’s a great story and photos!

One with an on/off button that only finds good stuff would suit me

Previous thread with links to even more previous threads... Best Methods For Cleaning Unrecognizable Coins

Your post hit the nail on the head Lackey. The “more depth” hook has been a red herring for ages. Single frequency detectors get no more depth now than my old Compass Gold Scanner Pro did back in the 80s and that’s a fact. I’ve seen a lot of neat features and ease of use added since then, but more depth in single frequency VLF... not really. People who genuinely need real depth do not use VLF detectors, they use a high power PI or a GPZ. Single frequency VLF is old, mature tech and any company with even minor engineering chops can make a good one. The ONLY thing that can be offered in single frequency VLF now is VALUE in the form of better packaging and lower prices. The high end future belongs to multifrequency/hybrid detectors now. And with that I really am getting off my soapbox!

I would change that to target id may be wrong. One of the most potent weapons in the Equinox tool box is the target id, versus the many VLF nugget detectors and all PI detectors that have no such tool available. Digging everything sounds great until you get into old campsites, hydraulic pits, and miles of old tailing piles full of junk. The fact is the target id numbers are accurate more often than not on “normal” size targets. Certainly, the weaker the gold signal and the more mineralized the ground, the less reliable the target id number. It’s not a size thing, it’s a signal strength thing. A deep larger nugget that is barely reading in bad ground is every bit as likely to return a ferrous result as a tiny nugget near surface in the same ground. If you can dig everything, by all means do it. Especially when chasing the tiniest gold bits. But if you have two hours in an old campsite littered with trash sitting in the middle of gold bearing ground, you had better learn to use and trust the target id system. With use you can tell when it’s a good reading or not; it basically boils down to how strong the signal is and repeatability. When in doubt, dig it out! In some areas particular pesky hot rocks with give a consistent target id number that can be used playing the odds. You can detect nuggets in a location littered with .22 shell casings. There are many locations where the reality of limited time and massive numbers of unwanted signals where target id is your friend and secret weapon against those swinging a machine with no such capability. Will using target id increase the risk of a missed nugget? Yes. Using target id in parks and beaches will also result in good targets being missed. The feature for time limited individuals or people whose backs are not made of spring steel can be invaluable however. Rather than avoid it I recommend becoming expert in its use. That’s best done in a dig it all scenario by observing the target id before every dig and predicting the target each time to develop your skill for the time when you really need to rely on it. Thread added to Equinox Essentials as More Equinox Gold Prospecting Tips

I thought it was just a great discussion where one idea leads to another and some great commentary that actually all does relate back to your original question. I appreciate it Chuck as it was kind of my last shot at getting up on a soapbox and pontificating about an industry in which I have had a near life-long interest. It’s been a lot of fun over the years being a gadfly trying to push and nudge things when the opportunity arose. There are a few places along the way where I was able to make a difference and I am happy about that. Going forward I am content to just sit back and watch what happens, more observer than involved party. For years we were caught in this place where companies thought a new coat of paint, a new decal, and a different coil made for a new detector. It was making me kind of crazy watching other tech industries make huge gains while the detector industry offered this lame excuse about being a niche industry where expecting that kind of progress was unrealistic. The only thing that can fix that kind of thinking is real competition, and thankfully I think we have now entered a new phase where that actually exists. Individual companies may suffer but it can only be good for us, the metal detector users. The irony is some people liked getting what they decided was “the best” metal detector and then being able to feel comfortable for years they had the best machine. Now I have actually seen complaints of too many new models coming too quickly for them to keep up! Might as well get used to it as times have finally changed in this quiet little backwater of an industry. Personally, I could not be happier with where we are as consumers and end users right now. Happy Days!