steveg

LOL -- I understand!

Meanwhile, UPS seems to have decided -- despite my package being on the truck and "out for delivery" today -- not to deliver it.  Sometimes, it gets late in the day, and our UPS driver just decides they are "done for the day," and today was one of those days.  And now tracking shows "delivery attempted" (a complete fabrication), with delivery now re-secheduled for the next business day.

So, we'll see if the driver decides to show up on Monday.

Steve

Daniel,

That's a pretty impressive hunt, given how you described the site and what you'd experienced on the last few trips there...

WOW.

Steve

Thanks, GB_Amateur!

Steve

8 hours ago, MFF18B said:

Received mine yesterday and it snowed all day.  First Minelab product, so this should be interesting

First Minelab product?  You'll have fun learning!

Steve

Dan, 

Sending you a PM...

Steve

2 hours ago, Dan(NM) said:

Yes they are Steve.

THANKS, Dan!

2 hours ago, xpmoguy said:

Yes, at least something is compatible..😎

LOL, thanks!   😂

Steve

Holy cow!  THAT'S the way to break in a new machine!  

NICE JOB!

Steve

Does anyone know if the charging cord used with the MC the same one as used with the EQX 600/800?  Are they interchangeable?

Steve

7 hours ago, TampaBayBrad said:

I love reading your pontificating along with Dankowski's. A big help in understanding how the machine works.

I got mine on Wednesday and went for a short hunt on the wet sand beach for an hour and a half yesterday. Came up with a nice man's tungsten or stainless ring that I swear was at least 12" deep. Also a tiny sea shell toe ring and a charm and a pink stone in a plated setting that was half the size of a pencil eraser at 6". This beach is pounded by others regularly.

Thanks for your input and glad you're getting yours. 😀

Brad -- thanks for the kind words!  It's good to know that a thing or two that I've written may have been helpful in some way.

As for your "maiden voyage," sounds like a pretty good hunt, for being new to the machine.  Impressive!
 

5 hours ago, Dan(NM) said:

Lol...Keep the pontificating coming Steve. Congrats on the soon to be ownership. I'm looking forward to reading your review.  

Thanks Dan!  I'm sure I'll have some thoughts, once I have some time to take it for a spin, a few times.  I want to run it carefully through my test garden, but I think that's going to have to wait, as I want to get it out "in the field" first, and see how it behaves/sounds, relative to my Equinox.  I'm HOPING the transition is fairly seamless...

Steve

Congrats!  You are DEFINITELY "all set!"

Steve

Well, what do you know.  I got a surprise message from my dealer tonight, that he'll be shipping my Manticore tomorrow...

Now, at least, when I'm running my mouth too much on this forum, at least I'll actually be a Manticore OWNER, instead of someone pontificating about a machine I don't even own!  😉

Steve

Dave,

Yes, your understanding is expanding!

If one uses target trace for NO OTHER REASON than to determine, at a given site on a given day, where to set their Ferrous Limits to accomplish that day's detecting goals, then target trace is an extremely invaluable resource JUST FOR THAT PURPOSE (entirely separate from the whole "what shape is the plot" that everyone seems to want to focus on).

To illustrate...

Consider this entirely made-up scenario...you are asked to find a lost men's gold ring, in the front yard of the owner's house (which you expect to read as a "mid-tone" target).  So, you start detecting.  However, you soon realize that it's not going to be as easy as you'd hoped, as you are digging TONS of "mid-toning" roofing nails.  You note that these particular targets are showing up at a specific location on the screen -- about halfway over (and thus why they are presenting a "mid tone"), and about halfway "up," i.e. halfway between the zero line, and the top of the screen (at the roughly "7" line, i.e. the horizontal line that passes through the "7" on the y-axis (FE = 7), or said mathematically, the line defined as y=7).

So, while these nails are plotting about halfway between the "0" line and the top of the screen, you note that your Ferrous Limits are set JUST BARELY ABOVE the location where the nails are plotting (i.e. they are plotting just below the "grayed out" portion of the screen -- which thus explains why they are "mid-toning").  So, you then go into your menu, find your Ferrous Limits adjustment screen, and adjust it so that you move the "grayed out" portion of your screen down, just a little, SO THAT the nails then fall WITHIN the grayed-out portion of the screen.  NOW -- those pesky roofing nails will NO LONGER REPORT A MID TONE, but instead will now give an iron grunt.  And NOW, you can hunt more EASILY, while looking for that ring, listening for mid tones (and not being distracted by what WERE mid-toning roofing nails).

While this is a simple example, such "strategic" use of Ferrous Limits, AND the fact that you can SEE what an adjustment of your ferrous limits does -- via the screen -- relative to the targets at your particular site, is of great benefit.  It allows YOU to adjust, on the fly, site-specifically, to determine which targets you are wanting/intending to present audibly as iron, and which ones you are wanting to present audibly as non-ferrous, based on what types of junk targets happen to prevail at that particular site.  YOU having that control over how the target is audibly identified, is a very interesting feature, from my view...

Steve

Geordiedan,

I hear you, on the cynical thought process, LOL!

Yep, I have indeed mentioned this to NASA-Tom, and am hoping that MAYBE that could help this come to fruition.  But, I think more people requesting it/talking about it would carry some weight also...

Steve

I should note, though, that there IS a way to more directly figure out a "FE" number, for what that's worth.

On the Manticore, the upper limits run from 0 to 14, and the lower limits run from 0 to 9.  SO -- think about it in terms of an x,y coordinate system.  This means that starting at the origin (0,0), and going UP the "y-axis," FE numbers go up to "14," while going DOWN the y-axis from the origin, FE numbers go down to "9."  So, mathematically, if we consider 0 to 14 values going UP the y-axis as POSITIVE y values, and the 0 to 9 values going DOWN the y-axis as NEGATIVE y values (i.e. 0 to -9), then technically, we could know, or at least estimate based on target plot position, what the FE number is.  If the target plots exactly halfway across the screen, in the "x" direction, the CO value is "50".  In other words, your "x" value, is 50.  Then, if the target also plots 1/2 way UP the screen (from the "zero line"), in the "y" direction, the FE value is "7".  So, the ID would be 50 CO (your "x" value) and 7 FE (your "y" value), so your ID (as an x,y pair) would be 50-7 (CO-FE), OR, in the more traditional FBS style, where the "y" value (FE) is listed first, it would be 07 50 FE-CO (y,x).

Meanwhile, targets plotting BELOW the "zero line" could be considered as having negative FE numbers.  SO, for example, a target plotting halfway ACROSS the screen, and all the way at the bottom, would thus have an FE-CO ID of -09 50. 

(...for whatever this is worth, LOL)

Steve

GB_Amateur, interesting thought, but I don't think there's a way to do this, for a number of reasons that would be too hard to explain in a concise way.  Briefly, though, one issue is that yes, the "scale" is different, but moreso than just that, is that it's not a one-to-one relationship, in PART due to the fact that the underlying technology is different (FBS, vs. Multi-IQ), which means different targets will ID differently, just due to the nature/characteristics of the two different platforms.  Consider a nail/coin mixed target (i.e. the two objects in close proximity), for instance.  What the E-Trac may see as entirely a nail (with an ID of say 30-45), the Manticore on the other hand may see, very clearly, as two separate targets.  SO, there'd be no way to make a "one-to-one" transposition of the target's ID, or its "plot location on the screen," from the E-Trac screen, to the Manticore screen.  The underlying technology produces a different ID for the target...

Make sense?

BUT -- my suggestion is, instead of trying to figure out a way to "arrive at" the FE number through some "backdoor method," that we should simply press/request that Minelab offer (in a future software/version update) the OPTION on Manticore to display (if we choose to) BOTH ID numbers -- the FE, and the CO.  WHY leave the FE number in the background, where we can't see it, with NO OPTION to "turn it on," even if we want to?  I think EVERYTHING would be so much easier to understand, and to explain to others, if we could SEE BOTH the FE and CO VDIs, and thus see DIRECTLY how those two values relate to where a target is plotted on the 2D screen (and all the implications therein).  As you said, if nothing else, having the numbers would be a good "learning tool" that would help with the understanding of what is going on, for new Manticore users (especially those without FBS background).  For the life of me, I can't imagine why Minelab wouldn't have at least given us the OPTION to "toggle on" a FE-CO VDI readout, instead of forcing us into ONLY the CO VDI...

Steve

12 minutes ago, Geordiedan said:

Great reply, thanks @steveg 

That affirms what I thought to be the case, and while I guess Toddy in that video may have his reasons for wanting literally everything to sound conductive, I think I'll run with something more like NASA Tom's suggested settings this weekend.

On the plus side, this was one of the key reasons I was interested in the Manticore.  With the 'Nox, setting Iron Bias to various degrees all I knew was that "some stuff" was being notched up as being more likely to be iron with each setting.  I ran f2 for a while but never really gelled with it (I've never dug a bottle cap in my life) so ended up back with regular Fe set at either 0 or 1 depending on the area.

With the Ferrous Limits and a suitable amount of trial and error (or, in time, cribbing the settings of the professionals once these have been out for a while in your native country 😄 ) then it should hopefully be possible to come up with some amazingly specific settings to isolate your preferred targets from the surrounding trash.

(Edit to add - I'll also be following the main Manticore thread over on Tom's board to see what he has to say on your tones query 🙂 ) 

Thanks again to all for your thoughts, it all helps me with my learning curve 👍

Dan

Dan, 

PERFECT!!  I am so glad that my post helped a bit, and yes, your understanding as I glean it from the quoted post, is precise/correct.  You "get it," in a very "complete" way.  SUPER!

Steve

3 minutes ago, GB_Amateur said:

Good to know, and it answers a question that bugged me forever (well, for almost 5 years owning the Equinox) -- when Equinox Iron Bias was set to zero (FE originally and F2 eventually), was there still iron biasing occurring?  Given what Tom D. has said about the correlation between the FE/F2 Equinox settings and Ferrous Limits settings, and throwing in what you've just said above, the answer appears to be a big fat YES!

OK, regarding what you call 'reporting' and I call 'sounding off', I'm looking for more clarification.  For simplicity sake (and for some of us, the way we always hunt), let's assume there is no notching in place -- none, zero, nada.  (Notching shows up as complete vertical bars/rectangles going from the bottom to the top of the 2-d screen on the Manticore.)  You point out that with no regions grayed out by Ferrous Limits, everything that sounds off will give a sound corresponding to the (conductive) tone settings.  If we add Ferrous Limits (from the top or from the bottom, or both) and a target lands completely in a gray zone, it will give an iron tone (grunt) only?  If it falls completely in the clear part (not grayed out) it will give a tone determined by the conductive tone settings.  And if the target falls partly in the gray and partly in the clear, it will give some combination of iron grunts and conductive tones (just like the Equinox often does)?

As a side note, I'm rereading (at bedtime, about 2 pages per day) the following treatise.  For those wanting a clarification "from the horse's mouth" (Bruce Candy) on this FE vs. CO stuff, you might want to follow my lead:

 

GB_Amateur --

EVERYTHING you said in the middle paragraph of your post (regarding limits, and tones, etc.) is exactly correct.  You understand it correctly, and you explained it quite well.

That paper from Bruce Candy is EXCELLENT.  A very good read.

Finally, to talk for a minute about what you said in your first paragraph...

Essentially, I know what you are trying to ask, and so I will tentatively say "yes."  I say TENTATIVELY, because essentially your "point" is correct, i.e. your logic/reasoning are consistent and reflect that you understand quite well conceptually.  BUT -- I am not sure if understanding the way the Manticore works can be "applied back onto the Equinox" directly.  In other words, I am not sure if the Equinox explicitly "calculates" a FE and a CO value "in the background," like the Manticore does.  BUT -- I am thinking that it does NOT.  IF IT DOES -- then, yes, what you said would be precisely correct.  It would equivalent to saying that even with FE (or F2) set to zero, there was STILL some "iron bias applied," or -- in Manticore terms -- still some "Ferrous Limits" with "grayed out screen" in place, in the background.   Because, of course, running FE or F2 at zero STILL allows some targets to report as iron.  We can adjust for "iffy" or "mixed" targets on the Equinox to make it MORE LIKELY that we hear conductive tones mixed in with the iron tones (minimizing iron bias), or LESS LIKELY that we hear any conductive tones (i.e. mostly iron grunts) on the same target, by maximizing iron bias.  BUT -- even set at ZERO, a nail can still report as a ferrous tone and ID.  So, YES -- it is "as if" there is still some "iron bias" (or, in Manticore terms, "ferrous limits") in place, even though we've set FE/F2 to zero.

We are delving a bit here to the fringes of my understandings of detector operation, BUT with that said, -- I will say that I THINK the Equinox leans just a little bit toward OTHER machines (though with plenty of DNA that it shares in common with the Manticore), with respect to the way it ID's iron, from the perspective that -- again -- I don't THINK the Equinox explicitly calculates both a ferrous and a conductive ID for each target, in the background.  I may be wrong on this, but to me, I think about the way non-Multi-IQ/non-FBS machines will calculate JUST a single ID, and somewhere along the ID scale, the algorithm assigns a "break point" such that below that point, the machine calls the target "iron," and above that point, the machine calls the target "non-ferrous."  And the way I think of "iron bias," (but which I know is not TECHNICALLY correct, it's just how I picture it in my mind), is that what you are doing by adjusting iron bias on the EQX, is adjusting slightly that "break point" the machine uses to call a target iron, vs. non-ferrous. 

This, again, is not technically correct, as I am essentially certain that what is in fact happening inside the guts of the EQX is that the multi-frequency approach is being used to get different "reads" of the target, in other words, sort of a somewhat "less explicit" FE and CO reading of the target as compared to what occurs in the Manticore or FBS where EXPLICIT FE and CO are calculated.  And it is in this "less explicit" evaluation of FE and CO on the EQX that is where "iron bias" enters the picture.  So, said a different way, I think EQX "kind of" reads FE and CO characteristics of each target, and we can "bias" the EQX's readings of these properties via the iron bias adjustment, BUT, that Manticore accomplishes a "more refined" or "more precise" examination of FE and CO properties of targets, assigning EXPLICIT values to both FE and CO.  And that "more refined" examination of FE and CO then allows such things as the 2D screen, and the more "precise" adjustments that occur with "Ferrous Limits," as compared to iron bias.

I hope this makes SOME degree of sense, what I'm trying to say, and is at least SOMEWHAT understandable.  

BUT -- I'll note that it is possible that what you assumed is actually quite correct, i.e. that EQX IS more "explicitly" calculating FE and CO in the background, and thus that iron bias is very much the same as "Ferrous Limits" on the Manticore, with the difference simply being that we just can't FULLY adjust iron bias to the degree that we can force ALL targets to ID as "purely non-ferrous" (as can be done on the Manticore).

Steve

 

On 1/11/2023 at 9:08 AM, Geordiedan said:

Enter the youtube video - This guy Toddy has advocated running with the upper ferrous limits at about 3, and the lower at zero, i.e. completely wide open screen.  Now that had never even crossed my mind as the purpose of ferrous limits is to make the tone of the target with ferrous characteristics sound like iron.  So running like this anything at all in the lower FE sector is going to chime up based on its conductivity on the x-axis only.  Am I missing something or are there additional benefits to doing this that I'm overlooking?  

 

Geordiedan, 

Yep, I'm here, LOL!

What you said above, in the part of your post that I quoted, is a correct understanding on your part.  As I strongly suspected, and then was able to confirm, is this -- if the Manticore were run with a "fully open" screen (no discrimination, and Ferrous Limits set to ZERO) this would have the same effect as running a Minelab Explorer/E-Trac/CTX 3030 with a "fully open" screen.  Which means, as you were corrrectly alluding to in your post, ALL targets, ferrous OR non-ferrous, would report audibly to the user as a "non-ferrous" target -- i.e. a "good target."  

For those who may be a bit confused by this, I'll explain, but I warn you that it will be long-winded, LOL!

The REASON that with a fully "open" screen, all targets will report a non-ferrous audio tone, is that IN THE BACKGROUND, the Manticore is essentially calculating a ferrous ID, and a conductive ID, for each target, analogous to what FBS machines do.  It's a bit more confusing, on the Manticore, because for some reason, Minelab does not allow us to SEE the FE-CO values directly (for a reason I will never understand).  BUT -- with that said, the FE and CO IDs ARE being "calculated" in the background, for each detected target.  Point being, each target DOES have a FERROUS ID, and a CONDUCTIVE ID, on the Manticore, and this is in my mind a key to understanding how the Manticore works.  The other key to understand is that the AUDIO reported to the user, for detected targets is based off of the CONDUCTIVE ID -- UNLESS the target in question is discriminated, OR falls within the portion of your screen "grayed out" by your Ferrous Limits setting.  (This is quite similar to FBS machine operation, when you have the machine set up with the sound profile of "conductive tones.")

So, to elaborate on the implications of what I've said above...because EACH target detected by the Manticore is broken into its ferrous component AND its conductive component, then with a fully open screen (no discrimination, and limits set to zero), what would be reported in the audio is the conductive component of the target -- i.e. a non-ferrous tone (implying the target is a "good target").  So -- to repeat...if running NO Ferrous Limits, and NO discrimination on the Manticore, ALL TARGETS will report as "non-ferrous."  This is important to understand...and wrap your head around, so as to fully grasp the logic, because understanding this logic fully will directly impact how you may wish to set the "Ferrous Limits" on your Manticore, in various scenarios.

Continuing along this line of reasoning, the ONLY way the Manticore knows NOT to report an iron target as a non-ferrous object (again, due to the audio being based off of the CONDUCTIVE portion of the target) is by adjusting ferrous limits.  When your ferrous limits are set appropriately, then an iron object -- which would otherwise report as a non-ferrous object if the screen were entirely "open," will NOW report as an "iron grunt" (assuming the ID of the iron target falls within the part of the screen that is "grayed out" by your ferrous limits setting).  

So, if this all makes sense, then the takeaway is that we have complete control, on the Manticore, as to where we place that "razor's edge" of a target reporting with either an IRON tone, or a NON-FERROUS TONE.  And therefore, "limits" settings may be more important than some folks realize.  Obviously the more we reduce Ferrous Limits (i.e. less screen grayed out), the more types of targets (iron OR non-ferrous) we will be "forcing" to report as a "good target" with a non-ferrous tone...but with the BENEFIT, potentially, of improved ability to unmask non-ferrous targets hiding in thick iron.  On the other hand, INCREASING Ferrous Limits (i.e. more screen "grayed out") means that more targets will report audibly as iron, allowing us to tend to dig less "junk," BUT, with the caveat that some potentially GOOD targets (i.e. mixed nail/coin scenarios, for one) may then fall within the grayed-out screen (i.e. within your "Ferrous Limits") and thus report with iron audio, causing you to pass over the target without investigating it further. 

BOTTOM LINE -- understanding that all targets detected by the Manticore will have an FE ID and a CO ID assigned, and that ALL targets detected will report a non-ferrous tone to our ears, UNTIL we set our Ferrous Limits "appropriately," is what must be grasped to properly utilize the Manticore to its fullest.  Until this is understood entirely, then it seems likely that the best way to approach things is to do what Chesroy said, above, which is to run factory default Ferrous Limits, until we understand the machine better, and then begin customizing (which will likely be site-dependent/trash dependent).

Hopefully, this makes sense, as it can be confusing until you wrap your head around it (and this is why it's easier for folks familiar with Minelab FBS machines to understand the Manticore perhaps a bit more quickly, i.e. a "head start" on figuring the machine out, as GB_Amateur noted above...)

FINALLY -- to bring this around to your original question, Geordiedan, what that particular user (Toddy) is doing in the video (though I haven't watched the video) is choosing to allow a vast majority of the objects detected -- including a good many of the iron targets -- report as a non-ferrous target.  This will, of course, cause him to hear (and potentially dig) alot more "good-sounding" targets that are actually iron (again, due to the minimal Ferrous Limits settings), but on the other hand, will help him reduce the number of times the machine improperly assigns an iron tone to a potentially good target...

Tradeoffs.

Steve

1 hour ago, Steve Herschbach said:

Looks like the Cabelas/Bass Pro people were given preferential treatment as the price Minelab had to pay to buy their way onto their sales floor. Same thing happened with Equinox. People put money down for pre-orders with dealers (never do that by the way) and then found they could simply order last second from Cabelas and get it faster. Which is why money down for preorders is a bad joke. Another blow for full service independent dealers, who will one day be just a memory. At the end of the day all people want is fast at lowest price, and can’t argue with that I guess.

Yes, it's hard to blame customers for seeking fast shipment, and low prices.  HOWEVER, the ultimate result is indeed going to be just what you said -- no more full-service, independent dealers, which to me is not a good thing for the hobby...
 

59 minutes ago, CCadrin said:

I was once told that the dealers and stores don't have the actual inventory and these early units are being shipped from the Minelab warehouses until the backorders are fulfilled.

 

Different dealers do it differently.  Some (some of the brick-and-mortar dealers) take delivery of the machines from their distributor, and then ship them out to their customers (and some will even check out each machine, prior to sending to their customer, to be sure all is well with it, etc.)  Others, and probably moreso for these "backorder" situations, will ask the distributor to drop-ship the units directly to their customers, as soon as the distributor receives units from the manufacturer.  

Steve

Dan,

Yes -- a bit of an "odd" size, BUT -- the wall thickness is then 1mm (based on your measurements, THANKS)!  This (the wall thickness) is pretty standard, though the tube size is a bit odd...

Steve

Interesting, strick.  Thanks.

Yes, I'd be curious to know the wall thickness...OR, if not a direct measurement of the wall, the O.D. measurement minus the I.D. measurement divided by 2 gives the wall thickness too, of course.

Steve

1 hour ago, Steve Herschbach said:

That’s because you dig those and not the other. An error in your sampling methodology.  False positives are not actually a problem, just an annoyance. Trust me, there are huge numbers of good targets left to dig between being called ferrous when they are not, and masking. People think they take a Deus 2 or whatever to the dense ferrous and have cleaned it out? Really? You are just scratching the surface.

Seriously, a detector should be giving you false positives and making you dig some ferrous when it said it was not. If you never dig any ferrous, you are leaving lots of good finds in the ground, for the reason I have stated. Which are the false negatives.

My idea of leaps is a higher bar. It was a leap when we went from no ground balance, to having ground balance. It was a leap when we went from having no discrimination, to having discrimination. It was a leap when we went from no tones, to having tones. It was a leap when we went from one knob variable disc, to notch disc capability. Even getting fast multi in Equinox I would say was a genuine advance.

EMI cancel working a little better? Not so much. But having lived and seen those other things actually happen, I suppose my perspective is different.

 

Steve,

Oh, yes -- I see your point now.  I TOTALLY concur that partially masked targets (and FULLY masked ones, for that matter), abound, such that if you are not digging ANY iron, you are missing good stuff.  I totally get that.  And I get that even with the best unmasking unit (Deus probably?), you will still not detect a huge number of non-ferrous if you are in a heavily iron-polluted site.  I'm with you there...

And yes, I can see your point on the "leaps" that you have seen in your "detecting career."  NO doubt, those things you talk about are indeed HUGE leaps.  Leaps that dramatically "change the game" so to speak.  I guess my only point was, we are at the point where it seems to me that the law of diminishing returns seems to now apply.  Let's say it took 2 years of solid, high-level engineering to move from no discrimination, to discrimination.  Huge leap, indeed.  But today, since there's not that much blood left to squeeze from this turnip, 2 years of EQUALLY solid, high-level engineering may be required for much smaller technological advancements.  Still noteworthy (generational?) advancements, it seems to me, from an engineering perspective, but since most of the "blood" is already squeezed, these current (and future) advancements seem to me to be much more unlikely to result in any MAJOR improvements that would be sufficient to "wow" the average detectorist (such as moving from no discrimination, to discrimination).  In other words, I agree with you in that it's unlikely we see anything TRULY game-changing, until/unless we move to a different "platform."  AND SO, we should all set our expectations accordingly, all marketing hype aside...  🙂

Steve

1 hour ago, Steve Herschbach said:

I bought it as a used cherry condition model a couple years ago, as a match for my Bigfoot coil. I went back and forth between which was better for the coil, DFX or V3i, and finally settled on the DFX. I’ve owned several DFX, and so I just looked in the database myself to see it was first produced in 2001 and discontinued in 2012, an 11 year run.

Which is all beside the point. I try to help people understand that metal detectors have remarkably little information to work with. And the reality is that due to the mix with the ground and other targets, good targets can read bad, and bad targets read good. The problem is not the detector, it’s the target and the physics involved. The alternator theory based devices we use can only see things the way they do, and no amount of engineering can change that, short of changing the physics involved by using a different technology. So if a bad target mimics a good target, you can show it to the end user, or you can hide it. But if you hide it, you hide some genuine good targets also. What’s not going to happen is something magical that makes only bad targets read bad, and all good targets read good.

I do think people want the detectors to perform magic they can’t perform. The magic comes in the context, in other words, the location you are hunting, and then in you, the operator, deciding what to dig or not to dig. You can only do that if you know you have a target. That is why I very rarely completely reject or notch out any targets, but rely on wide open full tone detecting. I hear each target, then I decide, based on my experience, how likely it is that the detector is lying to me or not. And they do lie, all the time. The biggest lie is the ferrous target. Vast numbers of non-ferrous targets get called ferrous. All detectors do it. People who notch out ferrous targets pass over them and never know they were even there. I hear them, and depending on the situation, I may very well dig them. People would be shocked at how many ferrous targets I have dug over the years that turned out non-ferrous.

My main point here is Manticore is new but it’s not. It’s still just the same old game, different package. Some tweaks and twiddles, but all this talk of multi generational leaps and game changing? Give me a break. If it was that, early users would be posting ONG OMG OMG and everyone would be in a rush to sell what we have to jump on this Huge, HUGE advance in metal detecting technology.

Or, people will get it, and it will just be a top performing detector competitive with several other options on the market. Some will like it, some will prefer the others. I’m betting that is how it shakes out, and that in itself denies all the talk of multi generational leaps and game changing technology. We have hit the wall folks, better get used to it, and not expect any new machine is going to change the reality in the ground. Which is that you’d better get out there and find some better locations, and put in those hours, if you really want your finds to increase.

Steve,

Interesting post.  You and I run our machines identically, and YET -- my experience is the OPPOSITE of yours.  In other words, for me the biggest lie is the CONDUCTIVE target.  For me, there are too many ferrous targets that get called (or at least hinted at being) non-ferrous targets.

Of course, most of this has to do with where the two of us focus much of our detecting -- you, on small gold that can CERTAINLY ID as iron, and me on silver coins -- such that "high-toning" iron (especially square nails) is my nemesis. 

BUT, your broader point applies in both cases -- our machines LIE to us; they try to do their best, but their "best" is limited, by the physics.  So, just as you said, allowing yourself to "hear everything," and then using your ears as the ultimate "discriminator" is definitely the right approach, from my view...

One last thing I'll say, is that one "generational leap" referred to with the Manticore is SPECIFICALLY the noise-cancelling aspect of the unit, and ESPECIALLY the "long press" feature.  Apparently, this is truly a unique, technological leap, and so to an engineer, this is a BIG deal.  BUT -- how much that "leap" translates into better detecting remains to be seen, but I'm pretty sure that it will amount only to an "incremental" change, not a "leap" in terms of finds.  I guess my point is, BECAUSE we have largely "hit the wall" as you put it, with VLF-IB technology, then any "breakthrough" that arises, after years of engineering work, would be seen differently by an engineer, vs. a detectorist.  I used the example in another post of the invention of fuel injection, which is a bit analogous in that it was a decades-old technology (internal combustion engine) that had largely been tweaked/improved/perfected to near its limit.  Then, fuel injection was developed, to replace carburetion.  To the engineers that designed fuel injection, I'm sure they saw it as a "generational leap" in technology.  And, if looking SPECIFICALLY at ONLY the aspect of the engine that involves how an air/gas mixture is created, and sent to the cylinder, then YES -- it WAS a "leap" in technology.  BUT -- to the average driver, was it?  A car with carburetion can very effectively take you to the grocery store, take you on a road trip, etc., and now, this new-fangled fuel-injected car can ALSO take you to the grocery store, or on a road trip, without being so much "different" or "improved" that the average driver would have been "wowed."  But, does that mean that the development, and inclusion, of fuel injection was NOT a "generational leap in technology?"  My point is, to an engineer, or motorhead, YES -- it was.  To your average car owner, not so much...

So, to me, it's more a case of our EXPECTATIONS, which you rightly point out must be TEMPERED significantly.  Because, even LARGE engineering advances in the technology surrounding VLF-IB will have only small/incremental effects in terms of any given detectorist's ability to locate and identify targets.  We simply have to set our expectations accordingly.  There ARE NO huge advances in VLF-IB technology left to make, in my opinion, that will be obvious/earth-shattering to an average detectorist.  Incremental improvements...that's all that I think can be achieved at this point, and even those improvements take dedicated, top-notch engineering wizardry to achieve...

Steve

On 1/9/2023 at 4:07 AM, strick said:

Maybe a little sensitive to emi like the Nox...some may find the lower shaft a bit flimsy. Larger vid to have to memorize...Otherwise I love the machine. It’s a cherry picker in a park. 

Strick

Strick,

Can you elaborate a bit on "lower shaft a bit flimsy?"  I'm surprised to hear this, given that it's a carbon-fiber shaft.  By "flimsy," do you mean it has "flex" to it?  The only way this would be the case, is if Minelab chose to spec a VERY "thin" wall for the tube.  Otherwise, with a more "standard" tube wall thickness for such an application (usually in the vicinity of 1mm wall thickness) there should not be any noticeable flex, at all.  That short of a tube, with 1mm wall thickness, would be a very stout/stiff tube.  IF there's "flex," making it feel "flimsy," then a very thin-walled tube must be the reason for that...

Steve