Steve Herschbach

You are in a roll Paul.... keep going!

One of the most balanced posts I’ve seen on the X Coil. Thanks Jason.

That’s what Ski-Doo does. They build the machine for you, then ship it to your dealer for delivery. The difference these days unfortunately is that many detector dealers just take orders and drop ship from the factory anyway. They provide no backup or service and refer the customer back to the manufacturer when there is a problem. Any manufacture can live without that finger in the pie.

Hoping and praying that’s the Minelab supplied chips that will allow these coils to be used directly with the GPZ without modification. Since Nugget Finder makes their own coils there is not much else it could be.

If they are the black semi-inflatable floats inflate until firm and no more. Overinflating could blow the valve out. Another way to gauge is that when inflated properly they fit the curve of the frame perfectly. I think some of the hard gray floats have valves that are to allow you to deal with either elevation changes or cold water deforming the floats by adding or releasing a little air.

I have a note from a friend who swears that he is able to use that number to identify some trash items more accurately. I'll have to experiment with it myself as I've never paid attention to it. Half the time I never even engage the pinpoint button as I do well just eyeballing the beeps and digging.

Someday I hope to wake up in a world where I can order the detector directly from the manufacture with the coil I want. Right now White's and Teknetics are selling factory direct. OK, so where is my advantage? It's the factory. Let me order the detector and coil I want and stick it in the box and ship it to me. I can understand dealers not wanting to open already boxed units but the factory should not care. Keep some units unboxed and waiting for my order and ship me what I want. It is only a matter of time before somebody gets gutsy enough to do this and more. When I sold Ski-Doo snowmobiles you used to get what you got. Now you can pre-order machines and have them shipped from the factory with all kinds of custom options. Like custom decal sets... another good idea that detector companies could steal. It would be a blast to have a website where I could go, pick a detector, have a couple rod and handle options to choose from (S rod, straight rod, tall man rods, fat handles and skinny handles), different color and/or decal options, and of course whatever coils I want. Build it and see it built online and then order and ship. If this means I wait a little longer or pay a few more bucks, that's fine. Want to see it in action? Go online here and build your own Ski-Doo. It gets real fun when you get to the accessory page and you can see your model change as you add and subtract options. Where is the company that will break the mold and think out of the box when it comes not just to building detectors, but marketing and selling them in new and creative ways?

Yes, beach hunting is easier in multiple ways. I can only offer a general observation. Most people I have detected with are not nearly as patient as I am. They cover ground far faster, and if they do not see gold after a few hours or a day, want to go to an entirely new location. I do the basic research. Let's say there are a half dozen patches in reach that I am familiar with. I find that if I am with someone they want to hit them all. A few hours here, and then it's "let's go there." I subscribe to an old rule. Don't leave gold to find gold. If I know the place I am on has produced gold, and in general I have no reason to think the other places are any better (that's why I went to this one) then I do not like moving. It wastes time, and it wastes money in the form of fuel if nothing else. I like spending days and often an entire week in one location. How in the world can I spend so much time in one spot? Because I am methodical. I always hunt in a careful pattern with a GPS. My goal is to hunt any 10 square feet so well on the first pass that I never have to hunt it again (though I often do ). I work slowly and carefully around every obstruction, and move loose items aside. My coil control is my best tool. I may not tune up perfectly but I do keep the coil under complete control at all times. If anyone was to ask me why I am doing better than somebody else, it's methodical hunting and coil control, not magic settings. I do also have an ear for whisper signals, what I call imaginary signals. The ones where I go a foot or two before my brain says "was that a signal?" and back up and check. Even then I'm often not sure, but removing some material then let's me know, yup, that was a signal. I hunt patches that have been considered worked out by others and do pretty well on them. I have one patch I've hunted methodically with my GPS for several years now, and there are still gaps in my master GPS map that I need to go fill in. Once the core is filled I extend the perimeters quite a way beyond the last nugget. I don't mind hunting outward from the perimeter for a day and finding no gold. From my perspective it just needs to be done. I GPS mark every nugget so I can follow and extend any trend I see, plus rehunt areas where I found concentrations with a different detector or coil. The bottom line is that when you hunt like this, even a small patch can keep a person like me busy for a long time before I'm willing to give up on it entirely. Fred mentioned jack rabbits. That is how most detectorists do appear from my perspective. No patience, moving too fast, poor coil control, getting bored and wanting to hop locations quite regularly. It is why I prefer to hunt alone, as I tend to accommodate other people, but that then has me not doing what I really want to do.... stay put. For me an ideal detecting scenario is one week on one location. My on the radar sites with the most potential are probably the ones I like hunting the least, the ones that are full of trash. My theory on patches is that they are not hunted as long as one signal remains. That means I have to dig up every target, and I do mean every bit of trash, not matter how tiny. But it just wears me out. So for those places I have to use the old saying about how you eat an elephant - one bite at a time. I just have to keep going back and digging trash until it wears me out, then go back again sometime in the future. Any bit of trash can be a nugget that reads like trash, or which is masking a nugget. The most gold left out there right now is probably in the trashiest locations. A mixed blessing if there ever was one.

They were up a couple weeks ago and as a very popular forum I think this is more likely a mistake than a forum dying out. My guess is they will fix whatever is wrong soon.

Something tells me there has been a detector or two in there already.

Gold just cracked US$1700 per Troy ounce.

That's good to hear. I guess I'm getting paranoid since I have given up hope of ever seeing an official Minelab small coil for the GPZ 7000 or any more coils for the Equinox.

I got to wondering what a small coil for the Vanquish sold for. And found no dealers selling any Vanquish coils at all. A couple have placeholders as if they are anticipating coils, but that would just be forward thinking at work. I notice the spec sheets and manual do not mention accessory coils. Coils are not listed as an item with a part number on the Minelab Parts website. They do show on the main Minelab website but it's pretty vague as to if you can actually expect to buy one. We all know Minelab has been limiting accessory coils as part of a "compartmentalizing" strategy that keeps it's units in distinct "boxes" so that one Minelab model undermines another as little as possible. I wonder if this has been taken to the final end game of such a strategy, where the coils are part of why you buy a certain model. Each Vanquish model has a successively larger coil, which inherently adds a little depth between models that would otherwise have identical performance. And what if the only way to get a small coil for a Vanquish was to buy the Pro Pack? I am not saying this is the official strategy but if it is I can see how a marketing person might love it. So here is my scavenger hunt assignment for you all. Can anyone find a Vanquish coil for sale with a Minelab part number and price? Or any reference on Minelabs site or in their literature that says one might expect to buy accessory coils? Minelab Vanquish 540 Pro Pack

The ideal spot would have been the Tucson Gem & Mineral Show, which has just gone by for the year. At this point I would Google and contact the larger Arizona gem and mineral dealers.

Great thread JP!

That's the way it is done Keith, good going!

Having owed several CZ detectors and the Equinox the depth difference is not enough to worry about. The Equinox easily has the better target separation. I lean Equinox simply due to the lower weight and lower cost, but if a robust waterproof design good at depths far in excess of 10 feet is important, then the CZ-21 is the obvious winner.

Check out the condition of this 2000 year Roman dagger when found and then after nine months of restoration work. https://ancientcoins.market/roman-dagger-uncovered-by-teenage-archaeologist-on-work-experience-is-restored-to-former-glory/

More snow usually just means a later spring and so more days before a person can get out prospecting. Snow melt means high water which is usually bad news for dredgers. I can’t think of any reason why more snow would make me a happy prospector were I still in Alaska, with the sole exception of it possibly aiding those with winter overland travel permits.

People say they want more depth on coins and an ATX used properly can nail silver coins in highly mineralized ground that a VLF can’t touch.

I really like the 6" concentric and would recommend it to most people as the small coil to have for the Goldmaster 24K and GMX. It is very sensitive to the smallest gold while retaining very good depth for a smaller coil. It is however a measured 6.5" in diameter. The 4" x 6" DD coil can get into much tighter locations, like deep crevices and pockets in bedrock, or between rocks and brush on deeper ground. You can't find gold if you can't get the coil immediately over it. The DD design is electronically less reactive to more mineralized ground than the identical size concentric coil, and the 4" x 6" coil is both a DD coil and small in size. It will therefore be able to retain higher sensitivity levels on highly mineralized ground than the concentric coil, be less reactive to hot rocks, and be less sensitive to electrical interference (EMI). However, in head to head tests in mild to moderate ground the 6.5" concentric will have more punch. For slightly better ground coverage and best depth in most ground the 6.5" concentric should be the first choice. But for highly mineralized ground or those very tight physical locations the 4" x 6" DD is a tool worth having.

Bedrock for sure. Why does a 4x6 coil seem inappropriate for bedrock?

Be interesting to see if they can get you one... hopefully they do!

Ok, it’s March.... where are the coils? 🤷🏼‍♂️