Steve Herschbach

They just raised the price of the 5000 by $1000 in Australia, why bother if it was discontinued?

If I was still a dealer here I'd be pissed off if it's still being made but they are withholding them, even if the sales are low.

You and Rob have both mentioned this. Yet it is apparently still made and sold in Australia? What the ???????

It can go as low as 50 years here. We have our own Antiquities Act and such here in the U.S. but coins as legal tender are exempt, and nobody is really chasing detectorists around much anyway. You have to do something pretty stupid like digging in a Civil War National Park to get the book thrown at you and with good reason. Never been an issue for me as I avoid places where I feel like I have to be looking over my shoulder while detecting. Sucks the fun out of it if I'm doing that. And anywhere else I do my very best to be invisible. I hate anyone other than a buddy being around when I am detecting. If strangers appear I usually pack up and leave and I only hunt parks at odd hours or in bad weather.

Yeah what Mark said. And since the thread title might have people wondering....

It's not a coil thing, it's a timing thing. Coils can't overcome electronics and the Axiom is hotter on smaller gold than the 5000 at it's hottest setting no matter what coil you put on the 5000. Will the GPX beat it on bigger deeper gold? Never been in dispute. So it just depends what gold you are talking about.

Not being as good as other things does not make something rubbish. Nobody has ever claimed on this forum that the Axiom outperforms either the 6000 or 7000, yet it suits some people fine. I’m sorry it’s not worked out for you.

I agree, and with First Texas asleep at the wheel it will not be hard for Minelab and the Chinese to gut their bread and butter. Minelab has name recognition nobody will ever get with a Pancky detector.

Let's not forget our home grown First Texas though. They have been the leader in this area for a long time. I wonder why they don't make a little pod to replace that million year old muffler design on the Tracker? Not wanting to mess with success I guess, but it would seem to not be a very efficient design to manufacture, and material costs/labor are everything when you are selling for $80.

Minelab is really pushing that Amazon store - just got this email: I get it. Minelab is going after the low end market ruled by Bounty Hunter and cheap Chinese models. Here are the two best selling metal detectors on Amazon right now, Bounty Hunter #1 and some Chinese thing at #2. Both have sold in excess of 1000 units in the last month. Unfortunately Amazon does not say if that is 1022 or 10000.... just over 1000. The number of rating though indicates the Bounty Hunter selling three times more than the Pancky However, #3 is just a different branded version of #2 called DR.ÖTEK. Same detector different look, also over 1000 sold. And I am sure there are more versions of that same detector, so it is probably the top seller when you add them all up. Interesting to me is that when I searched the best seller metal detectors on Amazon a Minelab sponsored ad for the Voyager popped up in the middle of the results. They are paying extra to make sure they get seen with these other models. And it's working - over 200 Voyagers sold in the last month. Funny as it is the Chinese made model they are obviously targeting - with a Chinese made model of their own! Note the similarly in the package and price between the Voyager and Pancky. The bottom line is that this is smart marketing, as the people who buy this will be getting a better detector than what the others are offering, and if they think about upgrading, chances are high it will be to another Minelab.

The SHOT show is an industry trade show, where retailers go to see manufacturers to look for new opportunities. My old company in Alaska has attended. Basically anyone that sells to the outdoors market is there. Garrett, Minelab, and Nokta will be there, and yes, it is often a showcase to announce new products to retailers. https://n1b.goexposoftware.com/events/ss24/goExpo/exhibitor/listExhibitorProfiles.php

I’ll make a mention but once you open the gates to anything but dedicated nugget machines, well, may as list half the detectors made these days. But I will certainly point out that unless a person is a real die hard there is not as much reason to even have a single purpose detector any more, except for simplicity and focus on a single task.

Hunting with threshold very low or off has lots of potential. I have been lobbying Garrett to fine tune the threshold adjustment range on the low end for this reason in a possible future update. Right now the setting is too coarse. The more people like you that find it useful the better the chance.

It’s not unrealistic at all to have a mode that is not as sensitive to both tiny shot and hot rocks. Yeah, you’d give up some gold but it would be a great option to have. And let’s not forget a manual ground balance instead of being forced into tracking 24/7. If not a manual adjust at least just a lock function.

I’d be looking more at standard DD or one of the old anti-interference or salt coils as they were called. Something with a reputation for being mild and therefore probably not as popular. Commander 15x12” DD might be a good option. We keep this up I’m going to talk myself into a 5000.

My bet is in the 5000 due to the multitude of settings and coil options. Just need to dumb it down until it works. As noted an old school non-ground balancing PI with an available long pulse delay like the Garrett Sea Hunter will work better sometimes. But there is another reality also. I have some large blocks of pure magnetite ore. No detector can balance to them or see through them because you may as well try to detect through a steel plate. There is a point where magnetite black sand is thick enough it gets close to that same level of concentration, and then all bets are off. There is such a thing as undetectable soil, though it’s extremely rare.

That’s some bad stuff. Here at Lake Tahoe I have similar material. The GPX 6000 and GPZ 7000 won’t fully ground balance on most of it, but they are useable with steady coil control. By that I mean maintain a steady height more than anything, and move at a moderately slow pace to let the autotune keep up. The Axiom on the other hand will get a clean ground balance on most of it, though mono coils are usually out of the equation - use the DD. However, in extreme places even the DD will not balance, and if you try to the machine goes into an overload state. The solution is to just do a partial ground balance - easiest way is to do the procedure higher off the ground and do let it hit the overload point. Then simply use it like the GPX or GPZ and through good coil control it will work fine. All three in those conditions act more like a regular non-ground balancing PI as any rapid up and down coil motion will signal. Luckily PI in general was designed for this kind of stuff and so is far more forgiving than a VLF when it comes to being out of balance. In some cases NOT being ground balanced will actually give you more depth as this TDI demo shows. A similar situation exists with the ATX and might be applicable to the Axiom…. This issue is something I’ve been working on for years. The main problem with the Axiom, GPX 6000 and GPZ 7000 are that believe it or not they are too hot on small gold, which accentuates the issues with magnetite. Same issue you saw with the Axiom small FC DD - I wish there were a regular DD for the Axiom as the FC DD are hotter but that hurts with extreme ground issues, the main reason for DD in the first place. I recently got an old Infinium with 14x10 mono coil that will cleanly ground balance in places where these other machines can’t even balance with a DD, let alone mono. This oddly enough is because it’s not as jacked up as the other units, and in the end that works in its favor. That old machine is currently putting a smile on my face as I’d forgot just how unique and fun to use that 14x10 mono is. I can read targets with it better than with almost any other PI combo I’ve used. There are also spots I nugget hunt in the Sierras like you describe. Serpentine bedrock with magnetite soil. A VLF will call a 30-06 brass shell casing on the surface as ferrous and lose the target at two - three inches. People who have never experienced this stuff think it’s all BS but it’s real all the same. The GPX 5000 is still the best machine made for this type of conditions as it has some special timings for handling it. They cut the machine way back in some ways but that is what you have to do in the worst ground. This chart is for the 5000 but looked at it another light it shows how less sensitive modes can work better in bad ground than hotter modes, and that applies to all detectors, not just the 5000. Minelab Mineralization and Timing Example The following chart illustrates the procedure for finding the correct timing for each situation. In general, always start with the Normal timing. If the detector is stable and quiet, try timings on the left - Sensitive Extra, Sharp, or in rare cases, Coin/Relic. If ground noise or hot rocks present problems in Normal, then try timings on the right - Fine Gold, Enhance, or Sensitive Smooth. Salt settings should generally only be used on alkali ground (salt flats) or salt water beaches, but may have applications in other ground. The goal is always to find the most powerful setting that allows for stable operation. Each timing can be adjusted within certain parameters, primarily through the use of the Gain and Stabilizer settings. Adjusting for a lower Gain, for example, may be preferable to going to a less powerful timing. Minelab GPX Timing Selection Chart - Click on image for larger version Finally, each timing may work best with a certain type of coil (DD or Mono) and the timings have varying level of resistance to Electro Magnetic Interference (EMI). The matrix below attempts to show which timings offers which benefits and strengths/weaknesses. Minelab Timing Coil EMI Matrix - Click on image for larger version The simple chart below can be printed out and taped or glued on your detector shaft as a reminder in the field as to which timing may be best. Click on the image to download a large version. Minelab Timing Decal - Click on image for larger version Details Here Final note on all this is I wish I could get a standard DD epoxy filled water coil for the Axiom for wading, just like one Garrett already has the mold for!

Seriously, I'd buy a machine like that in two seconds. Controller in pocket, the rod and coil would probably come in at under a pound, and be hotter than a pistol on tiny gold. A gold snipers dream for pockets and crevices.

I know people have heard me complain about the limitations imposed by wireless coils before, but just imagine what an ORX with a 4x6 elliptical identical the the one for the Gold Bug 2 would be like. The Gold Bug 3 that I always wanted, selectable frequency with three main options for both large and small gold - 14, 28 and 74 kHz

I would not worry about it much as the 6" concentric is the go to coil. The 4x6 DD is weaker than I'd expect. I think that is because White's built a 1/2" air space into the bottom of the coil. I got one as I intended to cut the bottom off, since the windings themselves are actually set in epoxy like the old Fisher Gold Bug 2 small coil. Getting the tiny bits in proximity to the winding is key, and I thought I might be onto something. But then White's went under, and I sold my entire White's package. When Garrett picked it up..... well, now I wished I'd kept the coil to at least do that experiment. But again I think the 6" concentric is the optimum coil, gets better sensitivity and depth than the 4x6 DD.

The 4x6 DD really never had many sold by itself, they mainly got sold with the introductory GMX Sport package. That was neat detector in that it was a waterproof 24K and came with both the 6" concentric and 4x6 DD initially. I've been trying to talk Garrett into selling the 24K stock with the 6" round instead of 6x10 DD. Anyway, this was all right at the end of White's, very few GMX produced, but the best way to get that coil might be to shop for a GMX instead of just the coil itself. Again, because almost none were sold separately.

White's originally designed and made the 24K. They also made an underwater version, the GMX Sport. Four coils were produced, 8x14 DD, 6x10 DD, 6" round concentric, and a 4x6 DD. The 4x6 was only made for the GMX right before White's went out of business. Garrett has since taken over White's and makes the 24K, plus the 6x10 and 6" round coils. They have not reproduced the 8x14 or 4x6 DD coil. The only way to get them is to find a used one. Both are rare since they were made a short while, and the 4x6 DD in particular rare as hen's teeth. I regret selling the one I had.

Of course they do, as well as representatives from the other detector and coil manufacturers. Representatives from Nokta, Fisher, XP, Coiltek, Detech, and Nugget Finder have all posted at one time or another. There are others. Garrett and Minelab watch but if they are members it’s incognito. I tried to get Garrett to actively participate but like Minelab they prefer to watch and listen as opposed to getting directly into the mix. Can’t say I blame them - us detectorists are like a nest of baby birds with endless appetites. If they say anything it will generally be via their own Facebook and YouTube channels.

Just had to quote myself from several pages back. Add Minelab name and marketing plus easy to operate and the Monster sells and sells. You can argue all day long that this or that may be better for whatever reason, but Minelab is what people generally buy. And fact is without them we'd be sitting 20 years back as far as the technology goes overall, so they deserve it for pouring millions into development while other companies tried to milk old cows forever.

The quote was from 2022 as this is an old thread that got brought back to life by accident. And looks like Monster is now $799 with the one coil - $999 with two coils. So I will be double checking all the prices what with price changes all hitting with the new year. But yeah, I agree, the ORX is a killer machine for the price, and still makes the Monster look overpriced even at $799. I'd be getting an ORX with a 5x10 HF coil at $549 before I'd ever consider a Monster at $799 with only a 5" coil. They added a second rechargeable battery pack but since it already had a AA pack for backup, I'd much rather have the 10" coil back and they keep the spare rechargeable. But that's just me. This at $799.... or this at $549....