Jeff McClendon

One dealer has the preorder Simplex listed at $254 US without headphones and $339 with headphones.

Jeff

The Cibola also has the H. O. T. circuitry. Somehow, Tesoro got the fixed ground balance settings just about right for the places I detected, many or which are very tough for most fixed ground balance detectors.

Jeff

That's a great question GB_Amateur. You are probably right. I don't think it's because folks here are still drinking 40+ year old beer. I have a lot of friends that are older than me or have less time to detect and they do their best to avoid beer and soda tabs as if they are something bad to dig. Unfortunately, there aren't any detectors that I know of that can accurately and consistently tell you whether you have a pull tab or gold jewelry under your coil. It takes a lot of practice to get a good feel for if and how any detector reacts differently to pull tabs and the occasional gold jewelry. If one tries to avoid them they lose that learning experience and finding gold becomes more by luck than anything else.  Or a person can do what one of my good friends does which is only detect areas that he would have picked for a place to make out with his girlfriend or wife!!! It works great for him as far as nice gold jewelry...... 

Jeff

Hi,

welcome to this friendly, awesome and very informative detecting site. I hope you are able to find most of what you need here.

 I'm Scottish to the core from the Logan/McClendon clan. Digging in the dirt comes naturally to me!!!!

Jeff

Hi,

I love Tesoro detectors, always have and always will. That being said Steve is right. There are better options especially if you will spend a lot of time in freshwater and saltwater environments. The link that Steve provided would be a good option. Also, a used Makro Kruzer or Multi Kruzer would work well too along with a used multi frequency Minelab Equinox 600 or even an old FBS Minelab Explorer if you want to get a real forearm, bicep and tricep workout. You should be able to find one of these for less the $500 US.

If you are dead set on a Tesoro (I definitely can understand that!!!) I have owned both the Vaquero and the Cibola and used them in saltwater, freshwater and high mineralization dirt. For some reason????  even using the same coil, the Vaquero was more difficult to tame in extreme conditions than the Cibola. I know some people modded their Vaqueros with 10 turn ground balance pots to help fine tuning them for difficult conditions. Mine just seemed to be more susceptible to EMI and ground noise whereas the Cibolas I used worked just as well with a lot less chattiness and noise in the same environments . The Cibola might have been a little less deep but not much. If I was just inconsolable and had to buy a used Tesoro it would be a Cibola. Just my opinions from experience.

Jeff

Looks like a fantastic detector. I am guessing that my Makro Gold Kruzer audio adapter cable for wired headphones and Nokta/Makro green wireless headphones will work with the Simplex.

I REALLY enjoyed the commercial!!!!!!!!!

Jeff

I hunt almost every day year round for 2 to 3 hours when the weather isn't below 25F or above 100F. It's good exercise, my dog gets to go too, and I get to detect!!!! I change up the pattern sometimes but 90% of the time I am hunting for coins and jewelry with my Equinox 600 with 11" coil  or my Fisher F19 with Detech Ultimate 13" coil. Usually my Nox is in Park 1 or Park 2 discriminating -9 to +4 and my F19 is in disc mode, iron volume 11, tone break at 55, discrimination 35.

Today, like most days I was concentrating on the pull tab, ring tab/beaver tail, zinc penny range looking for gold jewelry. That's roughly +6 to +23 on the Nox and 50 to 80 on the F19. If I am feeling pretty good I will dig anything in that range. I live in suburban Denver so no shovels, only screwdriver coin popping. It is really hot and dry here at the moment too, so I was only willing to dig shallow surface to 4" targets today so I wouldn't destroy the turf in the park I was going to.

I was planning to dig lots of pull tabs, ring tabs, beaver tails and zinc pennies. If I dug a nickel,  copper penny, dime or quarter in the mean time: Great! That definitely happened. I skipped over a few pull tabs/ring tabs and dug 41. Dug 11 pennies. So roughly 50 possible gold targets in 1 hour and 30 minutes.

Amazingly enough before I recovered the 8 gram 14K gold ring ($240 melt value ?) the first thing in the hole was a beaver tail. It was actually on my screw driver - perfect bull's eye. I was  NOT thinking "#$%%^^ another tab! I did what I usually do and rechecked the hole with my handheld pinpointer. The original target ID on my F19 with the Ultimate coil (thank you phrunt for constantly recommending it!) was a really steady 70 to 72 at 2 inches, so I was a little surprised with the beaver tail ring tab. Usually the numbers jump a little more just because of all the varying surfaces on the target when the beaver tail is still attached to the pull ring. So, I wasn't surprised that there was a second target (I was thinking maybe a zinc penny) but I was really happy that my remembering and practicing three important things payed off with a great ring. 

I don't find gold rings every time I hunt. I do find rings (junk and bling) at least 3 times a week along with earrings, chains, pendants etc. Some are gold or silver, most are bling. I would say that the ratio I experience  between trash and jewelry is about 50 to 1. This hunt was right in line with that ratio.

DIG PULL TABS/BEAVER TAILS

DIG ZINC PENNIES

RECHECK THE HOLE FOR OTHER TARGETS

Jeff

Chuck, there was a used one on EB?? recently with shaft and hardware for a really good price. May still be there. With the XP USA price drop, used prices have also dropped considerably

Jeff

Do you have the Orx, Chuck?   The HF elliptical is really pretty small and will get in most places no problem. It is a great coil and you won't lose hardly any depth compared to the HF round coil.

If you are putting one on the Deus it works good too except for the ID normalization which doesn't work on the HF coils. The target ID numbers will mostly bunch up in the mid 80s to high 90s depending on what frequency you use and target depth. Turns it into a beep/dig detector. Might as well have it set on 3 tones or less like the Orx and ignore the remote control VDI numbers when detecting targets deeper than 4" or so.

Jeff

Hi Mitchel,

I do not know exactly what Bill did. I am going by what he said in the video, from talking with him about how to use the Nox 800 and from experience there.

Yes.

There are different hot/cold rocks at the Little San Domingo Wash. Sometimes an area can be just about cleared of them and you can go with no discrimination by hunting with the horseshoe button engaged. Other places there you have to pick through a lot of the half-dollar sized and smaller hot rocks which are all over the surface and down a few inches. Starting with stock Gold 1 and accepting everything except -9, -8 and -7 takes care of a lot of them along with the general ground mineralization noise that can be a bear at this site. Then you just have to deal with the ones that hit in the mid teens and wrap around at +39 and +40 any way you can. I just dig them and/or move them out of the way.

Jeff

Bill is a great prospector with a detector and super friendly. Boy, he loves the desert. I like to watch his videos for his prospecting tips and nature narratives too.

He was in Gold 1 with a little low end discrimination from what he said (probably -9, -8, and -7 for some of the hot rocks) with sensitivity on 18 and he was using tracking ground balance.  On shallow sedimentary and volcanic bedrock which is intermingled, tracking ground balance is a good idea. The 6" coil in Gold 1 and Gold 2 multi is a beast!!!!

Jeff

That is not a very good photo. I only see one area that makes me even remotely think it is galena. Galena breaks (cleaves) in a way that flat surfaces are the result. In the case of galena it is called perfect cubic cleavage so that you should see any broken areas on a piece of galena as flat surfaces unless the piece of galena has been eroded by water or sand. Your specimen appears to have many jagged, rough areas in the unfocused photo that do not appear to be flat surfaces resembling the faces of a cube except in one place. It should produce a lead gray streak on the rough side of a piece of white tile. So, I would not suspect galena. 

Jeff

Nokta Makro, you are awesome. I love my Makro Gold Kruzer. It finds gold easily if I get the coil over some gold. It will not detect mica or any other non-metallic substance that I know of especially what the gentleman above has in his plastic bag which sure looks like mica to me.

thanks

Jeff

Great information and finds!!!! I am still cleaning out the first 8" of most of my hunting sites so detecting 12 to 15" targets sounds like fun. After reading your post I rechecked the manual and it recommends a normal swing rate for left-right-left swings of 2 to 3 seconds. When I try that it seems a little fast to me. My normal rate is closer to 5 to 6 seconds in moderate to heavy trash. Thanks for the post!

Jeff

Great videos Rob and fantastic finds. I don't know how you do it without a handheld pinpointer.  Man it's hot. I've been relic hunting in 100 degree heat all week. I'd almost rather be where you are.

Hope to see you soon

Jeff McClendon

That happens to me sometimes, especially the first time I noise cancel or ground balance in the user modes I'm using.

That is usually the only time it happens. I don't worry about it.

Jeff

HF elliptical is 11.6 ounces

HF 9" round is 12.3 ounces

X35 9" is 13 ounces

X35 11" is 16.1 ounces

X35 13 x11" is 21 ounces

With the heavier Deus telescoping metal stem the heavier weight of the X35 11" is not very noticeable. With the lighter plastic stem assembly of the Orx the X35 11" felt really unbalanced and  nose heavy to me. The X35 9" would probably feel the same as the HF round.

Jeff

Hi,

did you find that with a detector or did it come out of a hole you were digging going after a different target.

Gold and silver are far too soft and malleable, especially gold, to be used for stabbing or piercing weapons. Also, gold cannot be worked or shaped like the specimen you are holding. It has an amazing ability to smooth itself out when dented or scratched. Knapping it would be totally impossible. There have been gold and silver plated ceremonial stabbing weapons.

I have found pyrite, marcasite, schist, quartzite and even sandstone that has been worked by our native Americans for weapons and tools. Some schist, quartzite and sandstone can be knapped like flint since they are similar in composition having lots of silica based quartz. 

Like others have said, better photos would be great.

Jeff

Just turn it on and press the all metal horseshoe button. If you still see the speedometer all blacked in and all segments accepted press the horseshoe button again.

When the horseshoe button is pressed to enter all metal targets accepted that carries over to all of the search modes until you press the horseshoe button again to go out of all metal targets accepted then you should be back to whatever discrimination pattern applies in the search mode you are in.

Jeff

Hi Chase,

I really appreciate the opportunity to actually backup my field experiences with good old testing and study. Whenever you contribute to a forum thread, I always know it is time for me to check your ideas (which are usually right) against mine and do the research to find out why we might differ. I always learn something valuable!!!!!

thanks,

Jeff

?yep phrunt,

that button shank would equal a .50 to .75 gram nugget. It would hit pretty hard in Park 1 default  at up to 4" in my mineralized dirt in any ground balance mode. It would blow my headphones off in Gold 1 or Gold 2 at the same depth.

Jeff

Hi Chase,

I am still learning the Nox and its' very different functioning features when compared to other detectors.

In my little review of the YouTube video above I questioned the use of the 11" coil and tracking ground balance instead of using the 6" coil and auto/manual ground balancing relating to recovery speed and target separation. If the maker of the video had used a 6" coil and tracking ground balance he might have had little or no problem recovering two of the pin head sized nuggets he struggled to locate. I am certain that he would have had no trouble doing so with the 6" coil using auto/manual ground balance. Just as an aside, he continually claimed he knew how to operate the Nox. I never saw him properly ground balance the Nox he was using. He changed from multi to single frequencies repeatedly even after switching the detector off and back on and he never ground balanced before going into tracking.

I do not agree with your statement: Unlike tracking, Iron Bias is a filter. Personally, I think in the case of tiny gold prospecting in a carpet of hot rocks and magnetite that tracking ground balance is also a kind of filter at least on the Nox 800 in Gold 1 and Gold 2 modes

Here is a bit of what Steve H. has said about ground balancing in the Gold modes:

Ground Balance. The default is ground tracking on. Tracking attempts to keep up with and smooth out the variations in the ground. In doing so it has a filtering effect and can possibly tune out the slight audio variations that come not just from the ground but from very small or very deep gold. Tracking off is therefore the most sensitive setting, with adjustments made via the Auto (pump) method or manually.

So, I am still pondering this ground balance question and I appreciate your input. I am going to keep testing both at home and in the field. Just because Minelab has tracking ON as the default setting does not mean that it is ideal for me or that I should use it when I don't need to especially when I am using Gold 1 or 2 in multi frequency setting. 

thanks,

Jeff

Really long over 1 hour video. Edited judiciously, it could have been just as informative in about 10 minutes length or less. Otherwise, it is a fairly good example of what those three detectors can do on small to medium sized gold in hot rocks and iron trash.

I don't agree with using tracking ground balance on the Nox unless it is absolutely necessary. If the mineralization had been so high that the GM 1000 and the ORX were almost unusable then I might have considered tracking ground balance for the Nox. Ground mineralization was not that bad. I think using the 11" coil plus tracking ground balance made the Nox slower in recovery speed and gave it less separation capability than using auto/manual ground balance and the 6" coil.

Jeff

Hi DeltaDigger 

I don't have an X35 coil yet. I only have the high frequency 9X5 elliptical coil. I do have moderate to high mineralized dirt to hunt in.

For coins and jewelry I have been running mine on a custom program based on coin deep: discrimination 0, reactivity 2.5, sensitivity 80 to 90 depending on ground noise, 28 kHz. I have had no problem getting "Dig Me " audio responses on 6"+ deep coins, especially nickels and quarters. .58 caliber lead should be no problem. I have dug several .22 cal.  and .38 cal. slugs and cartridges at 4"+. In either of the coin modes make sure to put discrimination on 0 if you can in order to make sure to get those low conductors even though their depth will definitely effect numerical target ID upwards.  In fact, they may not give a numerical target ID past about 4" except for 99. They will probably high tone also. I think default  discrimination is 7 which could disc out small lead and the small gold I'm after. Either default gold mode should scream on a .58 cal bullet at 4" with the HF 9X5 coil. I always ground balance!!!!!

good luck,

jeff

nhgoldprospector keep posting. If you have a Nox 800 it is great for prospecting small gold especially with the 6" coil.

Welcome to this very friendly forum!!!!!

Jeff