Chase Goldman

See if you can get with some local detectorists (not necessarily prospectors) so you can work on your detecting skills with local sites and get used to your machines before you hit the claims. You will be more comfortable and proficient that way, and who knows, maybe you will find you enjoy coin shooting, hunting for jewelry, or ghost town relic detecting too. The key is getting to some productive sites if possible so you can be exposed to different targets and their recovery and can get used to how your machine responds to them. Though it is not cheap, equipment is the least valuable variable in the detecting equation. Just as expensive golf clubs do not make the golfer, expensive detectors do not really make the targets pop out of the ground any easier. I speak from experience. I thought the key to better detecting success was better and more equipment. I learned that it was not until I stopped playing musical detectors and focused on learning one type to the best of my ability (including getting some in-person instruction from experienced detectorists) was the key to getting proficient. That is when things started to click and I started really enjoying detecting. The concept of hearing beeps or reading meters is deceptively simple, but the nuances are significant and it took me awhile to understand that the best classroom was not books or video but getting in the field and accumulating hundreds of hours of experience including digging a hell of lot of nails, pull tabs, bottle caps, tractor parts, aluminum cans and tin foil. But when that gold ring glimmers in your scoop, or that civil war cartridge box plate or uniform button appears in the mud, or that silver quarter pops out as shiny in the sun as it was in 1852, then all the hours of tedium and digging trash become worth it. I’m admittedly not a natural gold prospector, but the principles are the same, regardless. Best of luck out there on your prospecting adventures.

Gotcha. Ok gotcha, that's a good start. Somehow I had the mistaken impression you just got your Equinox in May based on a previous post, so sorry for the confusion. In any event, get used to your VHF detector, especially Equinox by just detecting your yard or local parks or ball fields. You need to get some swing hours in so you are not lost out there in the field, trying to learn your equipment. That way you can be used to the controls, displays, and audio BEFORE you trek all the way to the gold fields. Besides claim sites and maps, are you getting any one-on-one assistsnce and instruction from any of your club members in advance of your September excursion?

Wow. I don't want to dampen your enthusiasm for your newfound passion, but, frankly, I would slow down on the coil acquisition and focus on learning your new detectors with a minimal of variables at this point (i.e. different coils). It seems you are just starting out with PI prospecting detecting (if not detecting in general) but it is not clear to me your background as a prospecting detectorist is with your VHF 800 and Gold Monster detectors so ignore the following if it is stuff you already know and I will just put it out there for anyone else new to the hobby in general. Remember Steve's words of wisdom earlier in this thread: "People go chasing off after coils way to soon in a lot of cases when simply mastering what they have would be more productive." My advice to you is to just get out there and start learning your new detectors with the stock coils. There is a lot to learn just on setting up soil timings and learning nuances of the audio language of the GPX...and the GPZ is a completely different beast. They are both very different than the VHF detectors you may be used to. Mixing it up with all these coils, you'll be spending more time loosening and adjusting coil bolts and cords than getting quality detect time training your brain on a consistent baseline coil audio response to various targets. From that you can start to gradually learn how additional coil types sound and purchase coils on the basis of what they can actually bring to the table in terms of filling the target/capability gaps of your existing coil(s). All these coils will make the GPX sound and behave slightly differently even with the same exact detector settings. Avoid the temptation to be enamored of all the bright shiny hardware accessories and user claims of this and that until you get a handle on your detector, your sites, and the targets that reside there [you may already have]. Not sure if this applies to you, but for those new to the hobby, detecting takes a lot of patience, target acquisition and recovery is not all that easy (at least not as easy as the skillfully edited You Tube videos would lead you to believe) and before you invest TOO heavily, it is wise to make sure it is something you are going to enjoy for years to come. I have seen many folks get frustrated and quit the hobby because they spent too much time wrestling with an overwhelming mass of hardware that they could not master. Keep the detector piece as simple as possible when starting out. Though it seems resources are not an issue for you, just know that standalone coils, especially specialty coils tend to not hold their resale value as well as detectors. So be cautious in investing in coils you may not even need as your return on investment may be pretty low. Regardless, have fun with your new equipment, but focus on learning those new detectors at this point and the best way to do that is minimize the variables that can reset your learning curve like too many coils. There will be plenty of time in the future to acquire new hardware, it ain't going anywhere, will probably only get better, and frankly 90% of success in detecting is getting yourself onto a good site where the targets reside, knowing how to attack that site, and gaining field experience. After that, the equipment's effect on success is really about splitting hairs and the perceived performance deltas come from our obsessive-compulsive personality disorders that make us think that the equipment really makes that big a difference. I mean, who doesn't like to buy more tools just because they're cool and not because we need them. GL HH.

That may be true of concentric coils, but that's not how a DD coil works (which is what the Equinox uses). On a DD coil, the active detect region is beneath the center spine area where the two "D" coils intersect. Although you may have some edge sensitivity effects that can affect overall sensitivity and coil overload in thick target situations with larger DD coils, the target recovery time is determined by the detector solely, and the center spine strip thickness (the overlap region) and sweep speed determine how long the target remains in the thin overlap region which is basically the same thickness for all three Equinox coils. Although you could have a situation where more than one target ends up under the active region center strip, recovery speed does nothing for you in that situation because both targets are simultaneously under the active region, you are just less likely to have that happen with a smaller dismeter, shorter length coil. Equinox DD coil diameter or length/width for the large Elliptical coil) primarily affects depth and sweep coverage and ability to sweep the coil side-to-side in tight confines and has nothing to do with recovery speed based target separation. See this thread for more information on DD vs. Concentric coils.

You are correct in your interpretation regarding how the 800 works vs. the 600 on recovery speed. However, coil size really has no bearing on what recovery speeds are allowed or can be used. All available recovery speeds can be used for all the Equinox accessory coils and all three work well regardless of your recovery speed setting.

Totally agree, Jeff regarding audio and iron performance. Very capable detectors. And the AT Pro was a groundbreaking detector in its day. Glad Garrett improved the visual interface somewhat on the Max. Garrett bumped up the gain (which frankly has caused it to be more chatty than deeper, necessitating a gain reduction back to Pro levels so what was actually gained?) and claims of 50% depth increase (especially without specifics) should be taken with a grain of salt considering that there was no compelling technological breakthrough going on other than the gain increase. The frequency shift from 15 to 13.6 khz was insignificant from a performance standpoint. Garrett should have instead focused on improving the overall audio, audio ID and iron audio capabilities, perhaps providing multiple selectable operating frequencies (not just frequency shifting) and perhaps improving or providing adjustable recovery which hinders its ability in thick iron and trash and at mineralized sites. Hope Garrett wakes up and starts working on what it needs to do to be competitive with the Nokta/Macros, Minelabs, and XPs of the world with its next generation. A warmed over AT series detector for the next iteration is just not going to cut it. Their ability to be competitive, and more importantly innovative, again, would only be a good thing for the hobby.

This site has a pretty powerful yet easy to use advanced search feature which is needed because of the troves of valuable info stashed here and there. Hope this link helps answer your question. But what it boils down to is that the 5000 has a couple of additional timings for salt and mineralized soils and a couple of extra custom presets. Other than that, performance-wise they are about the same.

The pristine nails have typically Chuck - in that case those pristine nails have typically been annealed by fire (not intentionally though). They look great because the annealing inhibits the corrosion process, but are too soft to actually be used and will bend easily under a hammer. When recovering the corroded nails at archeological sites we call the severely corroded nails "cheetos". The type of nail (hand forged, machine cut (starting in the late 1700's to late 1800's), or the modern wire nail) and the type of head on the nail provides clues as to when the nail was made, what it was used for and can help you date or determine what a former structure was used for at an archeological site. When I do volunteer survey work at local historic sites, the archeologists get really excited about ferrous recoveries that detectorists typically throw in the scrap pile. I have learned a lot about what seemingingly mundane or junk targets are telling me about a site when I am detecting it for relics. It is all about doing the detective work up front and during the hunt, piecing together the back story of the site from old maps, to historical records, to the trees, water soures, and terrain to envision where the dwelling or long-term camp was likely to be located. Once you start heading in that direction, hitting the nails and/or seeing pieces of plates or pottery on the ground, you know you have arrived. That is why I always like to hear the iron when I am relic hunting and don't mind recovering the nails. Some additional info: https://www.uvm.edu/~histpres/203/nails.html https://www.harpgallery.com/library/nails.htm

Rarely, especially in quiet conditions, since several channels could be quiet, it sort of becomes dealer's choice. Similarly, under very noisy conditions, it may select diifferent channels on each run that have similar noise levels that it considers the quietest, even though they may not be very quiet.

The lack of corrosion on those nails indicates they were likely annealed by a structural fire or the wood was intentionally burned in a bonfire. Though the arid climate and soil could have also limited corrosion, too.

It is not a filter, it is selecting the quietest multi IQ operating channel at the time. Since there are so many variables, no guarantees it will work next time as power line load/time of day and even humidity all play a part in how well the noise propagates. But, hey, it’s worth a shot, especially if you don’t mind also being locked into whatever mode (e.g., Park 1) is associated with that channel setting as each mode has its own unique set of operating channels the noise cancel algorithm scans (which is why each mode needs to be individually noise cancelled). So if you switch modes, you are effectively switching operating channels. The 800 allows you to manually select the quietest channel in addition to auto noise cancel, which would more easily allow you to set up the same channel repeatedly if auto doesn’t do the trick. Unfortunately, you can’t do that on the 600.

It also fixes the dreaded user profile reset bug. So, yeah, 1.7.5 seems to be the way to go. It has been slmost a year since the last update. But I can't really think of anything compelling that can be addressed by a simple software fix. Would really like to see the functions of the user profile button and frequency select buttons swapped, but at this point I would probably hate it because I am so used to the existing configuration.

Steve, you would typically have to use a field mixer to do this before feeding it into the camera audio input or mike jack, unless you had a video camera with on board audio mixing and two audio inputs or a microphone with a built-in line level mixer. Otherwise you could separately record the live voice over narration audio (with another camera or digital recorder) and lay it on top of the video and detector audio in post production using a video editing program (since the canera is not trained on you while you are doing live narration, getting the audio to line up exactly is not critical). I have done a lot of event videography (weddings, graduations, recitals, etc.) with decent mid-range videography equipment. But I am such a perfectionist when it comes to that stuff, I would be fiddling with all that video gear that I wouldn't be able to focus on detecting, so I have made very few live detecting videos. For Equinox, I would probably rig up an external speaker connected to the headphone jack and allow the camera mic to just pick up my voice and the speaker audio of the detector whike I listened to the tones through my BT headphones. Alternatively, I could feed the detector audio into a BT APTX LL receiver with a clip on speaker/mic plugged into the receiver and the speaker/mic clipped to my shirt or jacket that way I can hear the detector audio and the camera mic could also pick it up along with my voice commentary. HTH

Yes those are typically just passive impedance matching circuits. But sometimes they are also more sophisticated active "smart" circuits with programmable chips that may tell the detector how to reconfigure to accommodate the specific coil characteristics. Detector manufacturers don't typically like to give much public insight or tech details into these special smart coil designs.

Besides latency, the other issue with using a wireless receiver as the source for your recorded audio is how do YOU hear the detector itself while recording, since the control head on-board speaker is cut out whenever you are using wireless audio. So here are some strange Equinox wireless audio fun facts that may provide some folks with alternative ideas to route "auxiliary" sources of "no latency" detector audio out to video or audio recording devices (or detecting "partners") instead of having to inconveniently capture lower fidelity audio from the control head loudspeaker so both you and the camera or your "partner" can hear the audio simultaneously. Many folks don't know this, but if you are using the BT headphones or the WM08 receiver, the control head speaker audio is cut out, but the headphone jack audio is still active. In this manner you can actually use the BT headphones to be able to hear tones yourself and you can route hardwired audio from the headphone jack via a mini-patch cable into a camera mounted on your detector shaft, detector housing, or mounted on your hat, backpack, or clothing. Another way this "feature" can be "used" is to enable a partner to hear the audio via the BT headphones while you swing and simultaneously listen to the audio using a pair of hardwired phones which can be useful in helping someone else walk along and learn how to use the Equinox. Another strange thing is that if you are using the supplied BT headphones, which also have a "hard wired" headphone jack on one earcup, is that you can actually use the headphones as a BT receiver and you can plug a separate set of hard-wired stereo headphones or earbuds into the headphone jack of the BT headphones and get audio that way. In this way you can "rest" the BT headphones around your neck/shoulders while using a set of wired earbuds. Not too practical, but it can be done if you want to use more comfortable wired earbuds in hot weather- though the bulky full-sized BT headphones are still resting on your shoulders/neck (I can't recall as I type this whether the BT headphone speakers are cut out if you do this, but I do think that is the case). Also, although only one set of BT headphones or a single BT receiver can be used in conjunction with the Equinox's BT transmitter output at any time, however, up to four separate WM08 Wi-Stream modules can be simultaneously paired with the Equinox at any time for small, four-person "group" Equinox instruction opportunities. Though, good luck getting your hands on four WM08 receivers at any one time unless you can borrow them from four Equinox 800 owners, because they are cost-prohibitive to be obtained as stand alone wireless accessories. All strange but true wireless Equinox audio factoids.

Not necessarily, impedance is not just resistance (which is determined by copper wire diameter and length) but also the diameter of the coil introduces inductive reactance which also "impedes" electrical current so these are balanced to enable the coil to match the output circuitry of the detector. VLF detectors are simply inductive balance machines where the two loops (a transmit loop and a receive loop) in the coil be they coaxial (typically concentric but can also be coaxial elliptical loops) or double-D overlapping Tx and Receive loops are perfectly balanced to produce a null signal until a metallic target is introduced into the balanced field area causing a phase imbalance that is then detected. As Steve and others have suggested, there is perhaps some difference in the power put into the larger diameter transmit coils to produce a larger/deeper detection field but the field strength/density is lower primarily because of the larger area of the coil, not the power put into it.

Referenced in my response below. Bingo. Yes, Multi IQ makes it more forgiving to less than ideal GB (as I stated above) than other VLF machines (including FBS machines). So as long as you can run Multi and unless you hear it chirping with ground feedback noise, having a large GB delta in the numbers should not be too concerning. I suspect that the Equinox tracking GB algorithm is trying to trigger off sensed changes in magnetite levels. If magnetite mineralization is minimal and not the primary mineralization driver in your soil to GB phase number changes, then Equinox tracking could be ineffective. If detecting heavy alkalai salt soils, beach mode with tracking might be something you could experiment with. But bottom line, you can still be effective with Equinox without tracking because Multi IQ is so forgiving to less than ideal ground balancing. HH

Did you try sweeping side to side as suggested in the manual. Tracking likes to continuously see the ground and it is looking for changes in ground mineralization as you sweep. If it does not see a change in mineralization (even if the ground phase is off), then the auto tracking algorithm will not engage. A vertical pump may not do it. It is also designed to react slowly so that it doesn’t overreact to ground condition changes. The best thing to do is do an auto or manual GB to get it close then engage auto tracking. If you notice it getting out of whack even in auto tracking then re-GB. When in auto tracking you should only have to do this occasionally if at all compared to leaving it fixed. When it is all said and done, though, don’t obsess over the GB numbers. For Equinox, the difference in performance between say 30 and 70 or even 0 and 70 is incremental (compared to other detectors) when in Multi because Multi IQ does such a great job compensating for a less than ideal GB anyway. Unless you are hearing a lot of ground noise when in All Metal, I wouldn’t fret about about the GB setting. HTH

Eventually, when you come across and understand what iron bias does, you'll see a similar thing. 4 settings for the 600 vs 10 for the 800, but the max setting of 4 on the 600 equals 6 on the 800. Other differences you will notice include limitations on non-ferrous tone settings, limitations on single frequency selections, lack of the user profile button, lack of backlight adjustment, lack of included wireless audio accessories (but the 600 is wireless ready), etc. These are all nice, but not necessarily essential "missing" features on the 600. The 600 is a very capable detector in its own right, so you shouldn't be discouraged once you start realizing what you can and cannot do vs.the 800. Definitely peruse the Essential Info thread and for a more comprehensive look at 600 vs. 800 features see this forum link in the essentials thread and Steve's Minelab Treasure Talk artcle on the subject, here. Welcome and happy hunting with your 600.

Yes.

Interesting take. Note that IB disappears and cannot be adjusted when in single frequency mode so it can't be directly multiplied the number of settable frequencies so that chages the total number of combinations by an order of magnitude. In fact, I have previously argued that when you go to single frequency in any of the Park or Field modes you are essentially setting the detector up in a single mode as without Multi IQ you basically take away the "personality" of those modes. Another "special case exception" - Note that with gold mode, threshold is true threshold (unlike the other modes) and it's setting is key to performance for weak signals. Similarly, 50 tones obviates non-ferrous tone bin breakpoint settings. Finally, black sand/mineralization overload transmit power reduction in the Beach modes can affect performance. But point taken on the shear number of settings combinations.

Sounds like a great way to preserve the coin for mounting and passing on to his grand kids as planned.

Thanks, Fred. Appreciated.

This^. I was going to respond similarly, but you beat me to it. The target orientation variabity and lack of direct contact with the soil are problematic, but still better than an air test IMO. Can't wait to see your results.

Putting the discrimination all the way up can actually cause strong non-ferrous targets to blank like iron, so that is not advisable. I keep the ironnreject at 7 or less and, yes, the DD coil is what you want in order to be able to use iron reject discrimination. My advice to you is to set up tge detector with timing set at normal, abs all other settings at defsult. GB set to manual, find a quiet channel with auto scan, GB, and bury some typical relic targets: minie balls, round balls, j-hooks, buttons, high conductivity coins, etc. AND square nails (bent, straight, corroded, and just nail heads) and get used to the audio. HTH.