Tony

Much respect to you....Go big or go home.......you do know the coils can be swapped out or did you need an excuse to get two detectors 🤣🤣 Here's my weapon of choice for an early New Years Day morning hunt....thanks to Eric Foster (RIP) Fully retro / vintage for 2024

Agree completely.....on my profile, I have four detectors. Two PI and two VLF machines that cover just about everything I can think of from Australian goldfields to 200 feet under the briny. I actually hit a section of beach today that until recently, was free of black sands.......sure wish I had my (very) old Sea Hunter XL500 instead of the Excalibur. Threads can drift off topic......I'm sure we are all guilty of that but I felt TBB had very good intentions and maybe that should be taken into consideration 🤨

So they are my Mother's scotch eggs after-all.........

They look like my Mother's home made "Scotch Eggs"........which I'm confident could be fired from a cannon and would do more damage 😁 Next time she makes a batch, I'll see where they ID on the Manticore.

I will always have a beach PI.......probably found me more beach gold than my VLF machines. Not having a pulse machine is like playing a round of golf and thinking you don't need a putter to get a good score ! Just imagine if Minelab brought out an underwater/beach pulse machine.........I'd be first in line. This line of detectors is not a niche market but for some reason the detector companies think so. Mind you, it doesn't help that White's and Tesoro are out of the game. Give me a time machine.....I'd grab a Barracuda, Aquastar, Sand Shark and a Surfmaster or two. My profile avatar is there for a reason.......it still smashes the bigger gold deep into the black sand muck. My poor old Excalibur falses at ground level at a sensitivity of 3 in this ground. I have never regretted selling any detector.....except my Sea Hunter MK2.

Get 'em while you can........if this trend continues then the only PI detectors will be strictly for the gold fields. Beach PI detectors might be on their last legs......that would be a sad day. I'd grab a new Sea Hunter and a couple of 8" coils for sure if Garrett decided to discontinue that line. *** Be careful when plugging in the headphones. The male pins on the headphone side are a little delicate and I managed to break one. I was probably a little careless but just something to watch out for. They are also quite loud on land and I used to wear a flap hat for the headphones to fit over. This reduced the volume quite nicely ***

Another major consideration is the JW Fisher Pulse 8 has a starting delay of 30uS to 40uS which is entirely the wrong tool for the job if you are beach or very shallow water hunting for jewellery.....the same applies to the Aquascan AQ1B. For deep salt water detecting they can't be beat if you're looking for larger items.....cannon balls come to mind !

The bigger coil might be okay if you're hunting the tidal flats.......my hunting was in the surf where pinpointing was somewhat difficult. Better coverage and slightly more depth with the bigger coil is something to consider.

You are welcome......I sold mine years ago (and regretted it). To make up for it......I bought a fully restored and updated Garrett XL500 Pulse from Eric Foster (RIP).......my machine of choice when I venture to the black sand beach areas. The Garrett Sea Hunter MK2 with that little 8" coil is impressive.....I never cared for the bigger coil. HH Tony

If black sands (remember not all black sands are bad unless attracted to a magnet) aren't a problem then the PI detector may offer no real advantage to a decent multi frequency VLF machine. Also remember that the Sand Shark ran a pulse delay of about 20uS to 22uS so the salt audio is nicely dealt with. Some people saw that setting as "no good" but I disagree. Anyhow, what's available new today.....I think it's the Garrett Sea Hunter MK2 which is well regarded. It has a minimal pulse delay of around 15uS and maxes out around 30uS to 40uS (rough guess based on what the "Elimination" control knocks out at the higher setting). When I had the Garrett, I used to advance the delay setting to around the 20uS which is very effective in fast salt water. So if you're after "new" as you mention above then the Garrett is it......if you have deep pockets then the Fisher AQ is still available but you really should think hard about that machine as it's expensive and it's quite a handful to operate.

Just tried that.....I got some weird eye roll from her 🤔

Absolutely loving mine.......but having said that, I'm hunting white sand beaches with no black sands and next to no iron trash targets and minimal EMI. I really focus on the audio firstly and if there are no "bikini" distractions, I sometimes look at the screen 🤣

Is this your second Manticore ??

I'm hoping Coiltek don't make anything for the Manticore.....I'm in over $3K Aussie so far with the detector, Thresher headphones and 15" coil. It's okay for Simon......he pays cash for all his stuff and has the outdoor cabin to hide everything in. I don't need anymore temptation 🤑

Well I can't help you with any of those detectors but a big thumbs up to your LC70.......I've got something "slightly" more modern..........a 2011 76 Land Cruiser. I was also the same age as you when I got my first metal detector in the early 80's..... I got distracted by beer and girls a few years later and detecting took a back seat for a while. I soon came to my senses and re-discovered metal detecting in my early 20's.....I decided to combine all three interests. I had a detector in one hand, a pretty girl on the other and quite often I would find a buried six pack of Heineken in the wet sand. Life was good and simple back then.......she even let me play Commodore 64 games without fuss. I'm still with that same girl.......Christmas morning here in Perth, Western Australia. Temperature is about 95F.....low tide soon.....nice offshore winds......I really want to go metal detecting instead of visiting the outlaws. I'll try and see how it goes...maybe she'll come with me, hand in hand.....as I try and find that elusive pack of beer instead of all the left over pull-tabs.

Not a chance for me.....my water conditions are too rough for the M15. I only used it in ankle deep water and it was a bit much. Mind you, this is the lower beach with the water rushing up. Calmer and/or deeper water might be okay. "Fast salt" does require tweaking the Sensitivity setting in the Surf Seawater program. As I mentioned before.....every "leading edge or rib" on the coil is something for the moving water to grab onto.

Nice going on all those targets.....what was the detector used?

And you just couldn't hold off until Christmas morning.........🤣

We all love a good air test right ? Well it's kind of useful when comparing coils on the same machine. My 7g 18K wedding band. Detector at 15 Sensitivity had a very smooth and unbroken threshold. Settings were: Beach Deep GB at 0 Sensitivity at 15 (outside at home) Prospecting Audio Ferrous Limits 4 and 0 Recovery at 2 All Metal M11 Coil.....slight break in Threshold at 18" M15 Coil....slight break in Threshold at 20" Depth advantage to the M15 is around the 10% mark. This is about what I expected. These are astonishing air tests and I understand don't necessarily translate into in ground conditions (definitely not black sands). My beach sand are mainly "Florida style". I will do a series of buried tests with the same ring at the beach when I get time....stay tuned.

I feel exactly the same way as you do. The transition to running the Manticore is easy for me as I have used PI detectors for beach hunting since about 2001. I'm going out on a limb here but I suspect the Manticore can match a high powered PI on mineral free beach sand. When I get time, I will do a beach test with my GP3500 (14" DD coil) against the Manticore with the M15. The 2D screen is awesome but as you say, the audio is critical......for the deep targets then my brain goes into PI mode.

Definitely no problems with the M15 coil. I have done some basic tests on my gold wedding band and it is an inch or two ahead of the M11. I got a sneaky suspicion that my GB on the M11 wasn't set correct when first using it....and the result was the Sensitivity couldn't be set optimally. I feel the M11 is the coil of choice for anytime the coil is under the water.

And I'd rather have 2 x 3000's than 1 x 6000..........😛

And paid cash too....smart move....this way wives don't see the credit card evidence 😄

My problem is I like chasing big gold.....big and heavy gold is down deep and I don't want to drown out these fringe targets with too much salt signal audio in the background.

Don't let Minelab see these prices....allowing for inflation, today's prices aren't too bad 🤑