auminesweeper

Yeah I always take it easy when I use mine, I saw a guy on YT get cut up pretty bad with one, They are a great tool to have but there is no safety feature on them so it is a case of user beware for sure. John.

Getting out to some of our more remote locations is our Idea of living the dream but and for some of us such journeys can be weekly or monthly or even a yearly excursion but what ever it is no matter how much planning we do fate can always step in and throw us a curve ball, I bought another Truck/SUV In February I have been preparing it to reduce the chances of being caught by what ever mother nature can throw at us, What started out as something where I needed a 4x4 to get off the beaten track is turn in to a money pit, Not that I am complaining because I have always loved Pickups and 4x4's but setting up a vehicle has sort of taken over a lot of my spare time, I don't mind that because I get to play with lots of high end Gadgets, Having been a bit OTT I have looked in to many Gadgets from Exhaust Jacks which can be a great life saver along with recovering ya truck from a bog hole with minimum effort, Also The Genuine American made Hi-Lift Jacks, having always used them I won't cut corners and buy any thing else in fact my first one (The HL-485) still looks like new, But a couple of months I happened to get on you tube and I saw their video showing the "NEW" 60" Extreme Hi-Lift Jack with a new colour scheme (paint job) and some very useful features such as removable foot plate and a new Clamping attachment that has extra features and is rated to the maximum rating of the jack (7000lbs) so out came the wallet again and my new toy arrived the next day, This thing is real hard core and a must have Item, It can be used for clamping Winching and of coarse lifting etc, These are the best jacks bar none, http://www.hi-lift.com/hi-lift-jacks/x-treme.html The jack is the sort of thing that you only wanna break out in an emergency, and be very careful when operating the thing, theres enough videos on YT of people busting up their heads and loosing teeth, Anyway you get the picture, Although the jack can be used as a winch I decided that a good winch was in order so out came the plastic and "Yep" you guessed it and the next day it arrived, So I ordered one of Champion/Warrior 9500lbs short drum winches as in the same model the UK armed forces use (SAS) vehicles, Joy of joy this thing came with every thing including the normal remote and a spare cordless remote, Seeing that I was kind of hoping it had built in TV channels but sadly "No" but I will survive without watching NCIS or Nashville for a week or two, All this thinking and spending made me hungry and it wasn't long before my thoughts turned to "Food" In February last year lowlifes broke in to my lockup and stole about $100K's worth of Tools and stuff but the thing that **** me off the most was the stole my 70 quart "Snap-On" Cooler and my electric cooler that I bought here all the way from Oz the lousy £&%@ers, So while I am on my excursions I thought about buying another cooler but the thought of all that Ice and soggy food did not bode well with me so I started looking up for Aussie Fridge Freezer, Brands that I knew and Trust well I did the research thing and I ended up buying the ARB 47L/50Qt version, I figured that It has enough room for enough food to last me on my own for about 21 days, I check this thing when it got here and I plugged it in and it cooled down pretty quick and I half filled it with frozen food and it came on for about 6 minutes and it never switched back on for over 2 and a half hours, once it settled down that became roughly every two hours and even then its run times got shorter and shorter which was fine with me because when this thing is mounted in the Truck it will use next to no power, ARB rate it at 0.87 Amps per hour, well I was seeing run times as little as 0.5 Amps per hour variable. I also bought the protective jacket for it to keep it safe and help with insulation because these things are not cheap and if looked after they will last forever. This Fridge freezer cost me a small fortune but I got it for a real good price at around $900.00 So life is Good and the fridge lives in my home because they is no way am I loosing this one. See this Link, http://store.arbusa.com/Fridges-C11.aspx One thing that I have always done when I have bought a truck is replace the tyres, On this one they will be replaced soon, I got 2 that are driving me Nutz within a week the rear two loose Air and the drivers side one looses the lot, Back around 2003 I bought the American Made TruckAir 275 and they are a brilliant little compressor that are supposed to handle the big stuff and it does but they do hammer ya battery, Anyway I had seen these new Double pump versions that are on the market and they are impressive to say the leased, Now baring in mind these things are only about the size of a loaf of bread, This thing can put out a 150litres of Air per minute OR over 5 cfm (cubic feet per minute) what that mans in the real world is that it can blow 4x4 tyres real fast, My truck battery was 3 parts flat and it blew up my tyre in 3 and a half minutes which is incredible and considering with the truck running it will do it from Zero to 40lbs in under 2 minutes, I strongly advise you gentlemen to buy one of these things, I know the brand names with be different depending where you live in this world but if you read this review you can find the good ones that are sold near you in this link, http://www.unsealed4x4.com.au/issue017/#185 This is just some of the kit I have bought for my Truck and I have bought a whole lot more and have more to get still, It's not cheap but it will all make for a better safer time while I am off swinging a coil or two and my next task is to mount my solar panels on the roof to charge the Duel batteries that I have ordered because I need to charge them detector batteries up, I have bought a 115 Amp /1000 cca for the Trucks starting Battery I have 2 X 135 Amp /1100cca batteries to come then it is off to the Auto Electricians to get the wiring fitted so they will also charge via the Alternator, And all because I like detecting. John.

That's fine Mate what ever works for you. J.

Sounds good Jim, I do like the older whites machines, they seem to really do well and the depth is not to shabby either, My old 5900 Di Pro is Brutal when it comes to depth, what a PI does with a 12" coil the 5900 will do with a 9.5 Coil with room to spare and as heavy as it is It is very well balanced, If you ever get time when you get them cleaned up what ever, Could you post some pictures of them,? thanks mate. John.

I not going to mention anything to do with age or that you were the shipwright when Noah set Sail. There is a lot to be said for the GM series and them longscan coils, Always first class service from Whites, I wish I lived closer to them, I would like to go there one day. John

Yeah your MX Sport is doing well for standard setting, It's good to hear how lively those settings have become since the updates. Great Video Tom well done. John.

One of the things were people go wrong with PI's is people want depth and power, I believe that in most cases people can get away with using a VLF, To a lot of folks the PI has become more of a crutch than a Tool, without ever measuring the ground conditions they just grab the PI and then wonder why they either mis'ID targets or wonder why the depth is less than spectacular, when in fact a Good VLF might do even better in more mild conditions and also help ID'ing junk too, I try to use a VLF first and only use a PI as a last resort or in ground that is littered with hot rocks and basalt, stick the 12" coil on the MXT and it will match the TDI's until the GND numbers get in the high 70's early 80's or switch to an equal sized DD and work that until things get too much, I tried one of my PI's in normal ground once and my VLF went deeper and I was using one of the better PI's at the time, I worked my tail off and I went over the same ground and my VLF ID'ed good targets and it went deeper, In soil similar to that in that video I would not use a PI machine because it does not look like highly mineralized ground to me, I know looks can be deceiving but that's the chance you take, There is a great post here under the name of Guide to Nugget detectors, and it explains the theory of using the VLF's first,

Great report/video and good to see Tom had become a Jedi Master with the MX Sport. Thanks for posting it. J.

My Bad, Sorry.

I think the TDI would never be what they are without Reg, he is an extremely clever Person and I wish I knew 1/1000th of what he knows. Not the most powerful machine in the world but they are a good work horse and perfect as a rough country machine. J.

Don't go knocking my kangaroo hides, I got a new shipment just this week,, Far Out "n" Groovy Seriously though I did try to explain this to Reg and Carl about 2 years ago and I contacted Whites in Scotland too, And it was put down to the "Roo Hides" back then too, I showed it to RickUK back in November 2015, and it had him scratching his head too, Nothing made sense with it and the people in the know were telling me I was not seeing what I saw, My tests did not match anything that was being posted elsewhere and left me wondering why they were putting down the machine, That overload/reset trick was the thing that first alerted me to the GB on and off thing because I air tested a Quarter at around 15/16 inches and then it stopped whooing on it so I bought the coin up to the coil and tried again and it reset it's self out 15+ inches again giving me another thing to figure out added to the list, So I then tried it with the GB off and it did not work and the distance was now down to 12/13 inches and nothing I did would improve the signalling distance, So I grabbed the Pro and it did the opposite, being what we all know to be the "Norm/True" with the TDI series machines, With my emotions put back in the box, I began to realize the benefits of the SL over the Pro from a Prospecting point of view, In hot and unpredictable ground we need to use the GB and the SL puts the power out with the GB on, In the same situation with the Pro with the GB "On" you are actually loosing depth compared to with it Off, The SL has always been seen as the Red Headed Stepchild, but in the situation above I think it has become the long lost Son. Anyway, I hope I did not Hi-Jack the thread, Apology's if I did. John. PS, Good work Jim In Idaho.

I still can't get one of them battery packs and I run 8 2700s NiMh AA's, My one is dated 2012. John.

Well I Apologize if my post my post appears misleading but I phoned whites in Scotland and they know very little about the machine and found my self clutching at straws So I just gave up with it and assumed that is how it is meant to behave, and it is not worth paying two lots of shipping to and from the US to get it resolved, John.

Yes that was my understanding too, but for some reason my SL is back to front, , It does/has caused me some head scratching so much so I showed it to RickUK when he came round one day, and the result of comparing the 2 TDI's I have stopped using the SL, It has the power but it goes against all of what we know about TDI's in general I still have it but I can't sell it knowing what is does and I have stopped using it for over a year now. John

Yes this on and off GB can mess things up quite a lot, Doing side by side tests with the TDI Pro and the TDI SL really had me wondering what the devil I had done when buying the SL, Having done the GB off thing with the Pro and being impressed with the Air test results and then doing the same with the SL gave me an "Oh dear" moment, In that video where the guy on the beach test many machines you will see the Pro with the GB off actually smooth out the ground which is great if you have no bad coil control habits, and what the pro is doing is sort of self adjusting to a happy medium as long as your sweep is controlled, But with the SL if you turn the GB off the SL will loose depth and there is none of that smoothing effect that the Pro has running the same settings, But on the SL if you turn the GB on it actually increases the depth and does that smoothing thing that the pro does with the GB off, With the SL if you wave a target under the coil "IE" it will give a faint signal on a quarter at about 16" but if you wave it 3 or 4 times the signal will get fainter and now it will only signal at around 12 to 13 and a half inches, ( Don't worry ) Now with the SL that drop gave me concern but when you are sweeping the coil over the ground not Air Testing The SL is actually focusing on the ground so when it see's the Coin the coin signal stays and the SL smooth's out the ground, Back to the Air test,,,, So you have swept your coin in front of the coin and got a signal at 16" and on the second sweep it is not so sharp, 3rd and 4th sweep your back down to 13" +/- Now hold the coin about 16-18 inches in front of the coil Now bring the coin straight up to the middle of the coil so it makes a loud tone and rapidly pull it back away again, "Now" sweep the coin in front of the Coil again and it will signal again at 16", because when you put the coin right up to the coil is overloads it and makes it reset to a different type of signal and it will do this all the time that the Coil can not see the ground even though it has manual GB, When you Overload the SL with the GB On and do the same with the Pro with the GB off when I measure the distances there is less than 1/4 to 1/2 difference between the too, The SL is murder to Air Test and because people do not know about the overload trick and smoothing effect they tend to think that the pro is a lot deeper, So I hope this helps but remember the SL must see the ground with the GB On to maintain maximum depth and in an Air test it will smooth out about 3 or 4 inches because it is focussing on the Coin and has nothing to deduct the coins signal from. hope this helps, John.

I like my favourite machine as it is, The weight does not bother me because I have always done physical work. John.

That's a lot for us to take in so it's no wonder newbies keep asking the same question over and over, the choice of which IB machine to buy now boils down to which one suits the application along with the desired features. One thing that impressed me with the GM-1000 was in Chris R's 2nd video with the way he changed to Disc mode and not only did the GM go quiet over that soil and Iron but most of all the way the hot rock vanished, Using VLF / LF machines I think we would put up with some junk but hot rocks will drive you nuts, But not with the GM-1000, I like it.. John.

I just watched all 3 videos in this series and they are excellent for young and old, So a big Well Done to Chris R for taking the time and making the effort, They are the sort of video's that refresh some of the finer point that get lost over the years as well as give the new prospector the info they need to get started. Out of all the modern machines the GM-1000 is the one that impresses me the most and I can't wait to get my hands on one, Thanks again Chris. John.

Good lord your gonna get a whoopin when the Wife comes home, Lol I can't believe how well that goes together, John.

On my Whites, following the black sand relates to the GND meter and it only works when in the tracking mode, you can see the ground phase change under normal sweep speed but if you actually want to follow the black sand it is better to bob the coil up and down and go where the ground phase is the highest, where as on the GMT you have the ground phase on the left meter and the Amount of minerals/black sand on the meter on the right, But if you lock the Tacking on either machine the ground phase does not change and on the GMT only the Amount meter will change. John.

That's a great report JP, and you pointed out the glass is half full with this machine with it have so many possibilities and it does so much when you take in to account the price point, and to find Gold in an area that has been well used is saying a lot, Nothing is ever going to match certain well known machines, But the QED seems to offer the best bang for the buck along with giving less well versed people a chance to get in the thick of it. It seems like the QED is the perfect machine for someone who is just getting in to the hobby or on a limited budget, This hobby needs more machines like this to cater for the young and old as well, thanks again, John.

So would the SAT on the V3i fill in the gaps in the tracking speed like it does on other Whites models ? I prefer to use the Default relic mode but if the ground phase numbers are above the mid 70's I hit the push pad once or on earlier models push the trigger forward because they have a faster SAT speed which does help with ground noise. John

Having the off set on the V3i is more of a hybrid version of manual GB, It will be interesting to know just how much adjustment the off set can offer for those who prefer to manually over ride the GB setting. Where I posted in an earlier post that you can off set the GB via not lowering the coil completely to the ground I think that has a reverse effect in that it actually sets the GB to a slightly more negative setting because by doing that it sets the GB to a lower GB number, So really there is no way to set a machine with a ground Grab to a more positive setting because once the coil reaches the ground those + numbers will not get any higher, So the level the machine see's is as high as you can go. Or have I got that wrong ? As in + numbers being higher or more positive and - numbers being lower meaning more negative , because the only manual numbers I can intentionally set my machine to is "83" by locking the Tracking before I turn the machine on or by turning the machine on and setting it to "Lock" before the coil reaches the ground then I get a setting of "50" John.

That is a very cool set up because although it is not updating the machine you can actually follow the ground conditions where machines like the MXT only display the current setting in the GND window unless a person is actually using the tracking feature, Does the V3i or the DFX have a Live ground phase window when the GB is locked ? John.

Sorry Steve I was under the impression that the F75 did not self adjust, I thought that they only monitored the Ground and then set them selves to their last reading when the Ground grab was pressed, Thanks for that, again I apologize for any miss information. John.