cudamark

I found those lower sensitivity settings greatly reduced the depth capabilities. I tried it on several targets that I found in all metal and sensitivity maxed. I then lowered the sensitivity and found many signals disappeared when set at 5 or lower.

At the beach, I agree. I just can't bring myself to do it at an urban park......especially if I have to dig for it in the turf.

If you ever plan to use it on a salt water beach, don't get any of the Ace series. Single frequency detectors don't do well there.

Well, this morning's hunt was at a lot less junky beach. Pretty quiet actually. This beach gets hunted a lot, and today was no different. We had our club hunt there today. Just 6 members showed up at 3am, but, there were 2-3 other independents there too. The club hunt is just 2 hours long, but, I stayed after and hunted until the battery went dead.....2 hours and 55 minutes this time. No hunting with a low battery with the AQ, When you get the low battery warning, it's over. Without all the iron and other trash in the wet sand, I went ahead and hunted in all metal and dug everything again. I did switch over to Tone on every target to see how the sound would or wouldn't change depending on what I dug up. It worked in some cases where I would get a mixed high and low signal and those were all junk. Good signals though were still had with junk as well as good targets. So far, the good targets I've found (including today), I could have found with my other machines, except maybe the necklace. It was down about a foot. At that depth on a necklace most machines have difficulty. The AQ banged out a nice signal on it though, so, it would probably see that at even greater depths. Too bad the necklace is plated junk however! Same with the ring. It gave a nice smooth stable signal, but, it wasn't deep (one scoop) and would have been found with any good salt water machine. It's not marked, so, I don't know what it's made of yet. It has a gold tint to it, but, doesn't have the weight to be gold. Probably stainless. I'm glad to at least get some sort of jewelry at this point. The more I use it, the more I think you would be able to find coins and silver with it too. Those targets give the same low tone that foil, and iron will give, but, it's a much smoother and more even tone than the other junk targets I've run across. As you can see, I did find one quarter. It didn't have any high tone mixed in like the junk targets usually do. I expect silver rings might react the same way, but, I confess, I haven't test those yet since that wasn't what I was expecting to find with this machine. I don't know what others have experienced with the AQ, but, I find it the worst pin pointing detector I've ever used. Most targets seem huge, especially when the target is out of the hole and you're trying to find it in the pile. The edge of the coil seems more sensitive than the center, and the target will sound off even several inches off the edge. Normally, I center the target in my sweep and back off until the signal disappears. The target should then be right in front of the leading edge of the coil. Not consistently with this machine. Like other detectors, shallow targets are worse than deeper targets in that respect. I hope it's something I can just get used to, as that is kind of frustrating and time consuming to be chasing the target with the scoop. Here's today's take.

Tried a dry sand hunt today with the Impulse AQ. Being the 4th of July, the beaches were PACKED! Started with plan A, went to plan B, but, ultimately ended up with plan F. Ended up on a bay beach where in the past, I've found a little jewelry, a few older (40's up) coins, and LOTS of trash. This is definitely one of the trashiest beaches in my area. I'm not sure the name of this beach, or it it even has one, but, I call it "Nail and Nugget Beach" for the slew of nails and melted aluminum can "nuggets" that are all over the place. Probably not a great place to try out a new PI machine, but, one of the few places I could get to today and actually find parking. I tried hunting in all metal, but, that lasted maybe two minutes when the realization of the site hit my ears. In all metal, I wouldn't leave a 10 foot square area. Ok, tone then. Not much better, but, a little. Time for some testing. I brought with me some of the iron junk I had found on my first adventure with the AQ. On the surface, I could actually get the discrimination to work pretty good on rusty nails if I put the reject control to at least 8. It would sometimes work at 7, but, 8 seemed pretty consistent. That was with the ATS at the preset. I also tried the ATS at both ends of it's range, but, it didn't seem to make any difference, so, I kept it at 8 for the first hour or so. Well, it did I.D. some iron, but, not all for sure. It seemed the wetter the sand, the better the discriminator worked, but, it wasn't anywhere near 100% accurate. 50% at best, and that was just real rusty nails. No way could I find a setting that would keep me from digging bottle caps or hair pins. I ran ATS and Reject from one extreme to the other and everywhere in between and couldn't find anywhere it would give any hint of a low tone. Both those items rang loud and clear with a high tone regardless of depth.....and some were very deep. I then settled on putting the reject knob on 10 to maybe help with them and the iron. Hunting around the fire rings was impossible. Just too many targets ringing in your ears. I dug a lot of low tone and mixed tone targets just to get a feel for what the machine was telling me. Most of the time it was telling me there was a good target there, but, alas, most of the time, it lied. Lots of false positives, but, I didn't get any false negatives. If it said it was bad, (or at least had a low tone in there somewhere), nothing good came out of the sand. Good targets, if you can call them that, sounded good, with no iron low tone mixed in. These were the 4 nickels I found, along with the butter knife and other "normal" items in that range. This includes the foil, slaw, and pull tabs too, unfortunately. Too many times the iron sounded just as good though. I also ran the sensitivity up and down in my testing, and found it affected the depth quite a bit, but, not the discrimination, which I expected. So far, this machine IMO is a great beep and dig machine if you need depth. If you're looking for good discrimination, forget it. It's not nearly reliable enough in my book, at least, not yet. I'll give it many more outings at various beaches before I come to any firm conclusions. I plan on hitting another beach at a minus tide early tomorrow morning at a beach that's a whole lot cleaner, so, we'll see. This outing lasted 2 hours and 45 minutes before the battery died. At least that's headed in the right direction from the 2 1/2 hour episode the first time out. Here's the take for the day.

He isn't.......his real name is Marion Morrison. 😀

I just noticed that Joe's looks a bit different than mine. Mine seems to have more of a strain relief on it, and the coiled part seems to start sooner on his. From the connector to the first coil on mine is about 17". I don't think there is any strain the way I have it, in fact, I kind of like it this way. Less likely to get a sharp bend or strain it it if it can move a bit when needed.

If I had a Deus, I probably would too.

Yes, that was the first thing I noticed about the headphone cable....and the power cable for that matter. they really stick out like a sore thumb. What I did until I find a better method, is to run the cable back under the arm rest between it and and the battery pod. That way the stress (if it gets any) will be on the cable almost a foot from the connector. I may tape it similar to what you have done though, so, it at least points in the right direction!

I had one go bad a few months ago. White's gave me a new one, but, it's not exactly like the one I bought. I liked that lime green case on my original, but, the replacement was the standard black with the orange end cap. The first one had some sort of internal electrical problem. You'd turn it on and it would just keep beeping uncontrollably. If this one eventually does the same thing (or dies some other death), I'll just get a new one in a different brand.

Unless you bought several batteries (at $200 a pop) you're not going to be hunting all night with the AQ limited. I got just 2 1/2 hours on my first charge, and Fisher says it only good for 3 1/2 when broken in.

I just drove through Ventura yesterday! If I had had the time, and had the AQ with me,, I would have stopped in and played a while!

I don't think I will buy any extra parts for obsolete detectors. With my luck, the part that fails will be one you can't get, and I'd have to toss the whole works anyway.....new spare parts and all.

Ok, I hit the beach at low tide this morning with the AQ in an area where I've had great luck in the past with gold jewelry and old coins. When this place loses sand down to the rocks, it's amazing. It's sanded in right now, and has been for the last 3 years or so. I was hoping I could get some deep signals that would be in the "treasure" range amongst and under the cobble. Well, even though I had a few deep targets, nothing good or old showed up. I ran the machine mostly at the presets except for sensitivity, which I ran at max, and the delay which I ran at 7us since it was fairly stable at those settings. I tend to run all my machine hot, to the point where they usually "talk" to me a bit. Something I've gotten used to and doesn't bother me. This machine is going to take some getting used to though. It's been a while since I've hunted much with a PI machine, and this is definitely one. I was quite underwhelmed with it's "discrimination" abilities. I ran it in all metal and dug everything just to get a feel for it and see what things sounded like. I did change from all metal to tone and mute just to see what those changes did to the target sound. Well, in most cases, it didn't change at all. Iron still sounded good. After recovering a couple of bobby pins, I could test them on top of the ground and get that double hit I've seen posted, but, when that same bobby pin is 8 inches down, it doesn't do that . It sounds steady and solid. Same with bottle caps, it LOVES those things! On the rare occasion where the tone and mute would change, it was rare I got the "bad" target grunt. Most of the time, the targets sound would just disappear altogether. Not one to give up, I dug those too. So far, they've just been deep junk. I had brought a batch of test targets with me to the beach to scan and analyze. All seemed to react the way I thought they would, but, the junk I was finding didn't sound any different than the good targets. Now, this is just one 2 1/2 hour hunt (the battery went dead at that point), but, I would have expected to have found a lot more coins (I found 1 Hong Kong 10 cent piece, that's it) and in this area, a ring or two. I found 3 at that area a few days ago with my Equinox, and a friend that was there today found 2 more also with the Equinox. I find the AQ very well balanced with the stock coil. At 5' 10", I had the lower shaft extended as far as it would go and find that barely enough to feel comfortable. Taller people are probably not going to like that and will need a longer shaft or extension. The armrest strap is completely useless. It's at least 6 inches too short. I don't usually use one anyway, so, not a biggie to me. I plan on using a sling. Not because it's too heavy, but, because it's a pain to lay down. The headphone cable isn't long enough to just lower the detector down without removing the headphones or putting a big pull on the connector. Removing the headphones every time you set the detector down is just not something I'm willing to do. Usually, I just prop the detector against my hip, but, with those cables and connectors sticking out the back (and very vulnerable by the way) that just isn't happening. Maybe make a guard for that area? I knew this machine wouldn't have a display, but, did they really have to make the writing around the knobs that small a font? Almost need a magnifying glass to read the stupid things. I know, I'll get to used to them eventually, but, at 0 dark thirty and trying to use my headlamp, it was a real challenge. A backlight showing those readings would be cool, but, I realize it would add tons to the cost. I haven't experimented yet with adjusting the arm rest. Not sure it's possible. It doesn't hit my arm exactly where I would like it. To me the handle it nice, and it's angle is good too. I like the coil and wishbone shaft connection design. I've been advocating a similar design for years, where the tension and failure point was on the shaft and not the coil. Well done. I'll come up with more nits and kudos as the hunts continue. I started to video this maiden voyage, but, alas, the camera went dead shortly after i started. I'll try to put something together, but, I'm out of town for the next week, so, anyone hold their breath!

That's what we're hoping the Cygnus will do.

Thanks. I don't want to pressure Doc. He'll get it done when he gets it done. Gives me more time to play with the AQ! 😀

I just received mine today. Hope to take it on it's maiden voyage tomorrow morning.

Hello everyone, I've been a lurker here for quite a while now, but, since I got a new detector today, I thought I'd join a new forum and the discussions about it. I've been detecting now for 50 years as of this month. Been through many machines in that time. Started with a BFO, went through the TR's and various single frequency VLF's and then into the multifrequency Minelab machines. There were a few side trips with PI machines, but, they made me work too hard digging iron targets at my beaches, so, I got rid of them all after getting my first Excalibur. Now, just today, I got the Impulse AQ. I've been considering another PI machine for some time now to complement the Excal, and was about to pull the trigger on a TDI when I started to hear about the Impulse AQ (Manta back then). Kept in touch with Rick K and got on his list when it looked like it was going to happen. Just charged it up and hope to hit the beach at low tide tomorrow morning. Wish me luck! Thanks, Mark