Don in SoCal

Thanks for reaching out with the invite. I’ve already committed that weekend to Placer Pete’s outing over at Coogardie . The claims owners will be giving some classes on different prospecting techniques plus land geology. I need all the help and info I can get.

There is a TDI, a TDI Pro , and a TDI SL. In simple terms, the TDI Pro is the TDI with an added fine ground balance control mainly to address areas of extreme mineralization. The TDI SL is a scaled down (hardware to software) TDI. With an upgraded power supply it can nearly match the performance of the TDI. The TDI series will accept coils made for the Minelab SD and GP series detectors. But tolerances are tighter on the coils made for the Minelabs and the TDI produced coils will not work in reciprocal. A vast amount of coils are available. You as the end user has to decide what your target goal is and which coil will best achieve that goal. Karelian did a post on this forum regarding a number of coils he ran through a test, a good starting point. Coils tend to be more expensive so pick wisely.

Good Luck With That. Take a number and stand inline.

The Sovereign series is tone based and has a digital meter. Meter scaled for target ID 1-550 but many have been converted to 1-180 for ease of use in the field. That said, it's forte is knocking (nulling) out iron, better than the TDI. It has notch capabilities... but as you discriminate out... chance of missing good targets is inevitable. Weighing options.

Joe B and Strick both mentioned BBS machines. You may want to do a little research in that department. Old but a different technology that worked very well for iron infested beaches. Notice, not FBS. Excalibur line is still factory supported, WP, but a bit heavy for beach work. Many of us were hoping for Minelab to produce a lighter weight WP Sovereign but it never happened. The Sovereign has tones, a meter, good disc., but not WP and not supported. The Nox is hard to beat but...

The Whites Hi-Q coil is an elliptical dual field, not the same design as any of the Miner Johns offerings. The Hi-Q's are similar to the Round Whites Dual Field coils only elongated. Reg Sniff helped in the design perimeters for the production of the Miner John coils as well as many upgrades on the TDI platform. Reg worked with Luke Lindsay from down-under to make ongoing improvements to the TDI Pro platform and Luke is a big proponent of the Miner John coils. Independently Karelian did some good testing on a rather extensive number of coils. His test results favored the Nuggetfinder Advantage 8X6 Sadie coil over a wide variety of targets. Nenad Lonic (Phase Tech) has done comparative tests with coils on the TDI and of the offerings currently available for gold nuggets his leanings are to the Nuggetfinder EVO series coils, the 12 round, 12X8, and the 14X9. Your mileage may vary according to the targets you're seeking and the ground you are covering. Note the EVO series are flat wound and do not detect on edge to aid in pinpointing. For a first coil I'd recommend the NF Sadie.

Hey Bryan, Welcome to a great place to hang out and educate yourself on a myriad of topics on prospecting and metal detecting. If you're north of Talkeetna I'm sure you'll need a big pick to dig much this time of the year. On this site Steve has provided some great info for research and for locations. Enjoy and feel free to get involved.....Sauer21....?

My first machine was the Gold Demon II. I had a number of coils for it, the 4.5X7 DD coil was the most impressive. To my memory it was capable of about 3/4 the depth of the LST on #8 shot with the 6X9. I liked the manual ground balance and the retune switch for zeroing in on pinpointing. Good starter for a dig it all machine. Lack of coils really makes it a dinosaur. That Faswing rock hammer must be a Chinese clone for an Estwing (so sorry). The Hodan pick, you did great. The rest of the bundle made it a good CL buy. Good news about John, Thx. Should you ever get bored with your Pantera.....

Sorry I missed this post earlier. The SEF 12X10 is an outstanding coil for any of the Sovereigns. It and the Ultimate 13" are two of the best all around coils and superior on beach hunts. For some, unknown reason to me, the Ultimate is used more on the East Coast and the SEF12X10 is used more on the West Coast. Most Sovereign users would have 90%+ of all their needs covered with the stock Minelab Tornado 8" coil and one of these two. Going to a larger coil and you may wish to bring a friend to help with the digging.

Sven, Thanks for the write-up. These units and the Deep Tech Vista X detectors have always caught my interest. Good to hear an unbiased review and assessment of the V5.

Whoa GK, From what I've read the Gold Trax is a highly prized collectable which you have pictured here. If you would have the time or inclination to do a video of it please post and share it with us. Real 'eye candy' for the more 'mature' crowd'.

Thanks for sharing the video. I have followed Keith Southern over on Tom D.'s site and Keith has mentioned Mr. Paynes original designs and units were quite remarkable in their performance. This all took place before my entry into the hobby so your video was very enjoyable to see.

I concur with CK, the 800, maybe slightly better than 90% with the 6" , but you will also gain with it's great versatility in other areas. You didn't mention any details about your TDI, but stock even with the 8X6 Sadie you won't pick up much under a 1/2 gram. From sub grain and larger the NOX will do well to increase your recovery abilities.

Still hanging in there with the old Tesoro Lobo ST. Yes I know it's long in the tooth but the fact is as Steve has said single frequency VLF machines have not come that far in the last 20 years. The LST is very forgiving and just works good in Southern Cal. soil. I keep getting detector units that I believe should out perform it but so far it hasn't happened. With the high iron content of the ground the high frequency machines just don't go very deep. With all the coils of the Whites Goldmaster series detectors and all the detectors in that series I did not see a significant advantage over the LST (running 5 3/4 DD). Mind you, I'm not looking for fly poop, but a grain or more is a target. I'm currently on the fence for an NOX 800. A detector partner has one and so far it hasn't proven to be that more fruitful than the tools I'm currently using. Being in the field and having confidence in what you're swinging is what's most important.

"A second detector for friend to tag along". If they're "tagging along" your activity probably wont be in the gold nugget search mode. The outing will be for a 'fun adventure'. Get something inexpensive that produces like a Compadre, Silver U-max, or Ace 250. I still on occasion take out my Compadre just because it brings a big grin to my face. It's light, dummy proof and finds the goods with the least amount of frustration. And they probably don't want to dig much more than 6 inches.

phrunt, I agree with you on Minelabs short sightedness in the after-market coil strategy. I'm sure it was a marketing ploy originally to bolster their in-house sales of their own competing detectors (Nox vs Monster). But ultimately it may come back to bite them. When Whites took on Detech to supply their own in-house coils it was a big 'gold star' for both companies and the reciprocal effects served the MD community for the greater good. My hopes are that Garrett will follow suit in some way.

I guess my first leaning would be to the detector that has more optional coils available. Sven mentioned about Deeptech, the DTVG accessory coils came out so slow he left the machine before he was fully able to appreciate the machines capabilities. Minelab was very slow with the Nox accessory coils. I think if Garrett quickly either produces coils for the Apex or accommodates someone like Detech to produce aftermarket coils, they'll steal the show.

Wow Sven, Just down to 12 grains. That tells me what I wished to know. Thanks for your responses. I probably wont go there. And.....Oh yes Kac, In 'hot' ground the SAT is real slow to return on the Tejon. With the pinpoint switch pulled it is better but the DNA of the machine is just different. The Lobo ST is quite unique in that it has ground tracking yet is quick in recovering it's threshold. To ground balance it takes two pumps of the coil and then on the third pump its ground balanced. Sweeping, the tracking seems to aggregate over about a 2- 2 1/2' sweep span. On the swing in detecting this is enough time to hear a small target, pass over it several times or more to verify it, then hit pinpoint to hone in on it before losing it.

Thanks for your reply Sven. I emailed Dave over the Pond at Pentechnic's Detectors, the offshoot of Tesoro making the Lazer Trident machines, see if their company could accommodate me and this is their response; Hi Don, Thanks for your email. The audio mod needs a replacement processor and unfortunately I have no more left. They were programmed by Tesoro but as you will know they are no longer in business. Sorry I haven't been able to help. Regards Dave So, not being a techy at this point I'll just have to adapt. …..BTW..... How is the DTVG X performing for you, and have you had a go at finding small gold (1-3grain) nuggets with it? I had the Tejon thinking it might out perform the Lobo ST in depth but the SAT speed was way too slow in recovery on going over bad ground with hot rocks. The Vaq is within a hairbreadth of performance to the LST but touchy on the GB. Both have little problem seeing #8 birdshot in bad ground. Looking at the DTVG X. Thanks

I have found that my Vaquero is a good honest all around detector that fits much of my detecting style and needs. I would like to do the high tone audio mod. Contacted Keith Wills and he does not do this mod. Is there anyone currently doing this upgrade?

Flycatch, That's funny and a good observation. My Lobo ST (AM) does close to the same thing on a small target at it's extreme edge of detection. Left to right a soft signal, right to left almost a null or no signal, I scrape off a bit of top soil and give it another pass. I then investigate if the signal improves. Jeff is right about small bits of lead for practice targets.

Thank you for the very good write-up and details on this detector Mike. I also had one for a short time. The fellow that I bought it from had both the Outlaw and Bandido II uMax . His take was the performance of the two were nearly identical but the Bandido had a much sweeter tone and that made it slightly favorable to identifying targets. Unfortunately in my soil (SoCal) it didn't have much punch, sold it to a fella in the Great Lakes area and he reported back to me how pleased he was with it's performance. Again, thank you for taking the time to do the write-up and post.

You might want to post over at the Dankowski forum and see if Keith Southern chimes in and can help. He is by far the most knowledgeable and experienced with the Tejon.

What coil do you have installed? That big 10X12 is an antenna. Put on a smaller one like the 5 3/4" or even an 8" and see if it calms down. The bright side, at least you can maintain a threshold, here in SoCal the ground I so 'hot' I can't maintain a threshold with the 5 3/4 WS no matter how slow my sweep speed.

I guess I'm a little weak on imagination. I never conceived that our hobby could be so inspiring. Good job, well done.