Dain Blackburn

With the 25% off this month for a 6000 puts the Minelab close to the Axiom in price. What detector would you get especially if you have used both?

I was wondering how the Manicore compares for gold hunting vs the EQX 800 that I have.

I wonder why no body has implemented the" Follow The Black Sand" feature on the old White's GMT. I know 24K has a bar graph that with tell you the amount of minerals but the GMT put the information in numeric form. I was searching a site and found were they were processing there concentrates and used my GMT effectively to map a small area. I was pumping the coil and watching the numbers like 25, 30 and maybe a 40 then I would see a number like 60. I would drywash the high number areas that I mapped and found some good gold they lost on this commercial placer operation. They were sloppy is my best guess feeding a Knudsen bowl too fast or to much water. They spread out all the black sand tailings with lost gold with dirt mixed before they left. Iam keeping my GMT just for that feature.

Hi Steve, I haven't posted in a while. Lot of things been going on like moving my shop. I just jot my Axiom in the mail from Chris Gholson today and ready to head out and start prospecting again.

Thank you everyone for your input, it has help a lot making a decision. Then when I see Steve holding the Axiom with one finger, that's it iam going to sell.

After reading about the axiom I started thinking about selling my 4500. I like the features and the weight of the axiom. I wonder if it would handle hot rocks better than my 4500. I run into a lot of basalt hot rocks in the El Paso mountains by Randsburg Ca.

Jim was a friend of mine. The picture is from 2003 out in the Randsburg Ca. area. My son who is 21 now, Jim and I. He will be missed.

I learned a lot from Ben. Look at the picture with the screen on his drywasher. Most everyone uses the expanded metal that's on most production dry washers. Ben used a 1/4 screen to get better fine gold recovery. He would check his tailings with an old whites gold master when he was done.

I found the pictures of Ben Thompson. These were taken in the stringer district randsburg ca. around 2006. Definitely one of the last of the old school prospectors.

Ben Thompson last years were spent in Randsburg Ca. I would see him out in the stringer district with his drywasher. I have some pictures I'll post when I find them.

Just a thought while minelab is still working on software adding a follow the black sand feature like the whites GMT. I have used my GMT with that feature a lot to locate area's to dry wash. One area was a area that was a using a knudsen bowl for clean up for a large placer operation. I didn't know exactly where the machine location was but i know there would be a concentration of black sand where the machine was working. I pumped the coil up and down watching the numbers 30's,40's then 60+ Bingo. Knowing if you feed to fast or too much water your going to loose gold, I dry washed the the high number area and found good amount of gold for the dirt I ran. The numbers work a lot better for prospecting than a bar graph. If minelab is reading this that would be another selling point and useful tool.

After using a GPX 4500 for a few years I was reading and watching videos of the new Garrett ATX. I was most impressed by how quiet it was dealing with hot rocks. I ordered one from Arizona Outback and received it in a couple of days. I always get excellent service from them. Through the holidays practicing in the yard and a quick trip to a gold location I noticed something didn't feel right. Thoughts came to me like maybe i should have kept my 4500. The ATX handled the hot basalt cobbles and boulders a lot better than my 4500, but the coil was awkward getting around and in between them. After getting home reading some posts on here about using a garrett 5"x 10" infinium DD coil on the ATX, I ordered one. Next came how to mount it. I wanted to use the same rod so i had to come up with a way to have a quick release so i could use both coils. After some engineering problems, I have modified my ATX. So if i want to go back to the stock coil all i have to do is undo the coil quick disconnect then connect the other coil. The last thing that i did was sew a control box cover to protect it. The weight is another issue I'll work out before i head up to Randsburg area next weekend.