Northeast

1/2 a ton JP - congrats and best wishes for the year ahead

Thanks GoldEn. Heading out again Thursday with the Z but might throw the SDC in for a play. These 'no threshold' settings might be enough to entice the Mrs back out into the bush - listening to the threshold wavering about the place gave her the irrates. Even though the SDC is pretty quiet Adam.

Evening all. I went out yesterday arvo and deliberately took the SDC to try these settings as it seemed like a good idea. Not sure if it was just bad EMI but I just couldn't get it to run with a zero threshold. Was constantly popping in and out with noise to the point where it was just hopeless. Tried a few noise cancels but no good. Maybe dropping back to 3 or 4 sensitivity or maybe running it in the morning may have helped - EMI seems worse for me in the arvo. Interested to hear how others go. And GoldEn - when you have yours on sens 5 and 1 dot of threshold is it dead quiet until you get a target?? Thanks, Adam.

Good question. I think I would be. But maybe not as often. And almost definitely wouldn't have bought a Z and an SDC - maybe just the SDC. It's too horrible to even think about Steve

Coota, what machine are you using?

"Severe is a variant of High Yield so has VERY good sensitivity to tiny gold." JP, it is these little snippets that have me checking this forum every day just to see if you've written anything about the Zed. They are the extra info that aren't in the manual. Thanks (again!!). Adam.

Yep, that is a good point. Northeast Vic and more so central Vic have plenty of hot rocks, hard red clay, etc and I've had switch to difficult frequently. Was in difficult most of yesterday as it was just too noisy otherwise. But I find difficult just knocks out such a large percentage of hot rocks, hot ground that I've never needed severe. Have only ever dug 2 hot rocks whilst in difficult - and yes, I smashed them to make sure there was no yellow inside Maybe severe is used on salt lake beds, ironstone patches like I see on videos from Western Australia, etc. Would be interesting to hear if JP had to use it in testing on various grounds during the development phase of the Z.

Welcome to 'Steve's Utopia' Wombat. I have only been here for a few months and have learnt soooo much. I only frequent 1 other forum, have no idea what's gone on in the 'Oz forum from hell' and don't wish to. Many very pleasant and informative people here and it's greatly appreciated by myself. Thanks keeping us drama free Steve

Fantastic start - congratulations

Do like your vids araratgold - keep 'em coming .

Evening all. JP, that is the second mention you have made about turning off the GPS on the Z. I think the other was turning it off to reduce the EMI...if I remember rightly?? Are you able to expand a bit more about the issues associated with using the GPS please? Obviously there are some benefits to using it but not if it is limiting the full capacity of the machine. Thanks in advance (and hopeful ). Northeast.

Have noticed it on mine from day 1 andyy. Sometimes it takes several presses of a button to get it to select too. I thought it would get worse as time went on but if anything it has improved - or maybe I just don't notice it anymore. Certainly not an issue as far as performance, just a bit annoying. Northeast.

Excellent. Will take a look at the link. Thanks Steve and Swegin

Hi Steve, I was going to inbox you this question but I thought others might be interested in the answer too. When we post pics on here are they automatically stripped of the gps info? I think I have read on another forum that they are but have tried to search the answer for here and nothing is coming up. Thanks, Northeast.

"The iron hat sits atop the golden head." And "dig everything". I think I've seen that one about 762 times since I started looking at these forums

16ft. Crikey!!

It's a fella off one of the Oz forums. Been detecting for about 13 years from memory. A fair few of the forum members have met him. He has held a few days to help people read old diggings, hot rocks, ground balance, etc. Members say that he is a thorough gentleman. Not sure why he uses the auto reader voice. Only joined the forum in Oct last year I think. Handy bit of video if you've got a GPX.

Fred - unfortunately your question is too technical for me - I'm a bit lacking in the technical electrical field - nurses aren't required to know such things I do know that near my house I have the standard, run-of-the-mill power lines. The ones I am detecting near are as tall as a 4 story building and have cable as thick as your arm. Your "super-dooper high voltage transmission lines" is probably correct. But no idea what voltage they actually are. Our power point in the wall at home is 240 volt if that helps?? And a bit of an update to this thread. Tried auto noise cancel in the other modes (general and e/deep) as it was picking up too much EMI on my first run there. After noise cancel they worked a treat. Just didn't think of it first day there as HY was fine. But still found no gold

Yep Rege-PA, The fact that they are cooler than head phones and that I could wear a broad brimmed hat were the 2 main reasons I got them. The open audio thing was a bonus I didn't realise I was getting until I tried them. Good luck out there.

Hi Rege-PA. I'm not sure about the booster on the pro-sonic - I would also suggest to wait and get it and see what the volume is like first. But on the earphones side of things I can only suggest what I use on the GPZ which works well. Philips ear phones that have an ear hook, they are very comfortable, do not move/slip/fall out at all and have an open audio design that lets in ambient sound - for when the Pumas are creeping up behind you . They also come with 3 different types of ear fittings to suit your preference. One thing they don't have is a volume control on them but if you have the pro sonic volume control then that may suffice. They work perfectly on the GPZ with the WM12. Link here http://www.philips.com.au/c-p/SHQ1400LF_00/actionfit-sports-headphones Hope that helps. Northeast.

JW. I am mostly running HY and normal, sometimes flicking into difficult and the Z ran great close to the lines. It was was only in general and e/deep that the problem developed. Now if I noise cancelled in these modes would it have made a detrimental difference when I flicked back to HY? I don't know. Will find out next time I'm there - hopefully in the next few days. Myself and the family are heading to NZ in March for 3 weeks. I won't ask for your gold spots JW but I may inbox you about some good tourist and fishing locations near you if that's ok Local knowledge is important

Thinking about this some more, I didn't try to noise cancel in general or extra deep which may have helped. Will do next time.

Sourdough - I've been out this morning and learnt a few things which may help. (The helpful bits about the Z are at the bottom. The rest is only helpful if you have a wife ) I hit this spot nice and early before it got too hot. Detected from about 0530-1000 hrs. GPZ was running great and only about 40 metres from the EPT lines - high yield, normal, sens 2. Anything higher on the sens and it started to waver a fair bit. Kept switching between normal and difficult as there were a fair few hot rocks and a bit of red clay - but mostly normal. Dug quite a bit of crap early. Dug one very deep hole, right next to a tree, just next to the line of a long cut out section the old timers had dug and got down to some very hard sandstone, clay, rocky mixture. Very confident at this point I was onto something decent. Approx 2 feet deep and onto bedrock - nice!! Couldn't dig any more at this point with my little pick and was positive I have cleaned the hole out best as I could. So I called the wife . It was 0700 hrs. I woke her up. Please bring crow bar, axe (tree root in the way) and the SDC to try and pinpoint a bit. Last time I did this it did not end well - a big steel bolt at about 1.2 metres!! Wife and 2 of the kids arrive. Eldest son gets rid of the root. Turn on SDC. Target in hole. Getting rid of the root put some dirt back in the hole. Scrape, scrape with the little pick. SDC in - target now out . Wife sits on chair (who brings a chair??) A lovely piece of flat steel about the size of a matchbox and maybe 4mm thick. Must have been stuck near the end of the root and that's why I couldn't pinpoint it better. Son must have dislodged it. Unrepeatable words from wife... Moral of the story - take all gear that may possibly be required and let sleeping dogs lie. BUT, the thing I learnt about the Z. Before I really dug much out of the big hole I switched from normal to difficult to see if maybe it was just ground noise or a root - the signal was only weak at the start. Still made noise in difficult so was confident of a target. Then tried to go to general and extra deep ground modes with the thinking that if extra deep could still hear it then it would definitely be a target and it was also going to require a fair hole. But they simply would not work! HY/normal, HY/difficult worked a dream - any combination that included general or extra deep ground modes went crazy with EMI even with sens of 1. Why this is I have no idea but to be honest I minimal understanding of how detectors even work so I'll leave that for others to surmise. Sourdough, not sure what modes you hunt in but maybe when you've tried near the power lines you may have been in general or e/deep? Also, I think my theory is right about that spot not having been detected before considering the huge amount of small steel, lead shot, wire, nails and tin that I found in about 4 hrs all within a 10 X 15 metre area. I'm assuming due to the power lines being there. But no yellow...yet.

Nice Randy. A new 'best present' leader I would think. Best wishes to the family

Thanks for the replies. Think I will hit this a few times and see if I can come up with some yellow. First signs are that I've some trash to dig up as well but them's the breaks. Won't be camping there though - don't need to be closer to those transmission lines longer than I have to be. With the buzzing sound they make you can almost feel the brain cells mutating