mh9162013

28 minutes ago, phrunt said:

I don't think we give the engineers enough credit though as we armchair engineers think they can just buy a faster processor for $20 and make a whole new better detector by just switching the part order.

Oh, I can completely relate to that sentiment. I used to work in a field where most people were ignorant to how it worked and would often scoff at certain results that they didn't understand. I imagine that applies here to me and my understanding of metal detecting design. I'm all ears to learning more about what I'm missing and the challenges engineers face.

3 hours ago, ☠ Cipher said:

Much of the base tech is maxed out. It’s all about innovative features and peripheral enhancements now.

I've heard this before, and I am inclined to concur with this sentiment. But I have a question that you and maybe some others here can answer.

Wouldn't another way to make a significant advancement in metal detecting technology, without creating a new type of technology (a la MIQ, FBS, BBS, etc.) is simply speed up the processors in metal detectors?

I've read countless times how FBS and BBS are slow. Or how even older "flagship" detectors aren't as fast as an Equinox or Deus. But why?

Do Minelab's FBS/BBS detectors or Garrett's AT line of detector require such high end CPUs that simply speeding up the processing ability is cost or design prohibitive?

Imagine an E-Trac, Safari or Explorer II with a max recovery speed of say...an Equinox on a 4 recovery speed setting. With NOTHING ELSE CHANGED, wouldn't this be a massive improvement that could result in a jump in the popularity of those older machines? This same question applies to a Garrett AT Pro/Gold/Max or other similarly situated or capable machines.

I'm no metal detecting engineer, but you'd need a CPU upgrade, plus a few other chips, I imagine. Power usage would go up too, but this could be offset with newer battery tech (like a built-in lithium battery *gasp*). Then you'd need to rewrite its programming too. But all of this is doable for a reasonable cost...or maybe not?

Is what I'm describing not happening becuse of business or engineering considerations? Maybe I'm misunderstanding how metal detectors work, which wouldn't surprise me. So I'm open to being instructed on what I'm missing. But it's my current understanding that a major limitation of older machines isn't just their limited discriminating ability (compared to SMF tech), but also their target separation ability.

For example, let's say a Fishr F75 with a stock coil can "see" an iron nail and silver dime as distinct surface targets as long as they're 2 inches apart. But due to the physical limitations of the stock coil, the closest the nail and dime can be and still be seen as 2 separate targets is 1.25 inches. Then why hasn't Fisher boosted the processing power of the F75 so that it can see the nail and dime when they're say...1.33 inches a part? Going from 2 inches to 1.33 inches in target separation/recovery speed improvement would be a dramatic boost to the F75's performance, would it not? It would easily make the F75 competitive again in locations it had to yield to machines like the Equinox.

I guess what I'm saying is, metal detecting companies don't have to develop MIQ's replacement to create another great detector. There are ways to dramatically improve current VLF technology (without adding bells and whistles) to still make them competitive machines today...right?

TL;DR: If you have a sailboat and want more speed, you don't need to develop steam power. But maybe designing a clipper ship would be a viable option.

On 10/16/2021 at 12:40 PM, phrunt said:

As a business would you rather swap out the occasional coil that hardcore users are breaking and the occasional weekend warrior breaks by very bad luck or would you rather adjust the design and have a massive PR disaster with many requests for new replacement better coils even without them being broken and with people even breaking their ears on purpose to get the new model? That also means admitting there is a problem that needs fixed? 🙂

But this issue (in my eyes) isn't how Minelab should handle the coil ear problem. The issue is why it became a problem in the first place.

8 hours ago, midalake said:

This is the biggest design failure I have ever seen in detectors. 

For an extra 50 cents of plastic.

I don't think it's as much of a design failure as it is a failure of Minelab's management.

Engineers are probably asked to push the envelope when it comes to reducing weight of coils. However, once it became known the original design was insufficient, why didn't a redesign take place? That was probably management's call, not the engineers'.

Personally, I think that the engineers knew all along the original design wasn't ideal, but management told them to shut their mouths and do as told. Maybe Minelab/Codan has a few executives that used to work at Boeing? But even if I'm wrong and Minelab's design team screwed things up, it was still management's call when it came to how to deal with this coil ear issue.

1 hour ago, RobNC said:

Call me pessimistic but has anyone thought maybe they are on the edge of saying goodbye to the "hobby detector" segment?

The T2 I had was a good machine but reached its limit and didn't do well around difficult soils. Struggled with iron a bit too. What really did me in was a site where it could not even be used because of chatter.The T2 was a coin getting rascal in decent soil conditions, and it did well with a smaller coil. That much I will give it. But as the conditions got harder it nose-dived.

But seriously, after all these years why can't they do something different than the re-mark and re-package game. Maybe they just don't care anymore. Why dink around with little low-end and lower priced units when they can sell a few of the more expensive models.. I don't expect to see anything interesting out of them anytime soon.

I hope you're wrong, but it wouldn't surprise me if you're right.

On 10/10/2021 at 1:40 PM, phrunt said:

Nokta did with the Simplex what First Texas could have done with the T2 or F75... completely modernize it, waterproof it and sell a bunch of them. 

But FT did this, to some extent when they released the F44. No, it's not as capable as a T2 or F75 (and its variants), but for the average metal detector consumer (not us), it's a roughly comparable version to the basic Simplex or AT Pro. 

I do think a waterproofed (or weatherproofed) T2/F75 with wireless and a few tweaks could have sold better than the F44. But would they have sold enough to warrant the R&D costs? I'm guessing FT's powers-that-be concluded the answer was no.

9 minutes ago, F350Platinum said:

Haven't seen them preaching any difference, so I don't think it's a sponsor thing.

My thought is that it may not be that Minelab's sponsoring them, but rather, Garrett's no longer sponsoring them.

But then again, they've often claimed to not be sponored by Garrett, and perhaps they weren't...at least directly. But going to Garrett events as VIPs, accessing new machines before most people, being in Garrett literature, etc. are forms of "sponsorship" whether the Hoover Boys are willing to admit that or not.

Imagine if Kurt's face shows up on the box for the Equinox!

On 10/7/2021 at 7:20 PM, F350Platinum said:

Noticed they all use the Equinox now.

Huh, I wonder why that is?

Cool Smokey token, by the way!

1 hour ago, phrunt said:

Would it really kill them to let us have access to coils?

Apparently, yes. I don't know how or why, but Minelab has some reason for handling coils the way they do...right?

I mostly coinshoot with my AT Max, so I'm definitely interested!

But I wonder if the AT Coil will work for the AT Max?

Garrett says all (or most?) of their AT coils are interchangeable among all 3 of their AT detectors. But as for third party coils, they can't say for sure either way. NEL says their AT Pro coils won't work for the AT Max. But according to metaldetector.com, their AT series coils seem to be largely interchangeable among the Max, Pro and Gold.

6 minutes ago, Erik Oostra said:

I'm with Chase on this one, I'd also buy another whole detector, even if it was just to have another spare coil.. I've got a 600 as a backup to my 800.. 

But the price for a new pod is so cheap, it costs less money overall to just buy the new pod, then buy a new coil.

38 minutes ago, nickeldNdimed said:

Hopefully not out of business. I like my F Pulse under warranty

Me too!

If they're going out of business, I need to stock up on Tek Points or F-Pulses...

7 hours ago, Mike_Hillis said:

the F5 is still being made basically as a private label for MetalDetector.com. 

Do you know that for a fact? I heard (rumor) that metaldetector.com simply bought out Fisher's last remaining stock of the F5, and that's what they're currently selling. However, the F5 isn't being made anymore.

I could be wrong and you could be right. Just curious as to the basis for your statement.

2 hours ago, steveg said:

I am having a hard time believing that Minelab's policy is that your unit would not be replaced, if you have another water intrusion failure.  A warranty is a warranty, and if your replacement machine remains under the original unit's 3-year warranty, I cannot imagine a scenario where Minelab would refuse to replace it in the event of a shallow-water water intrusion failure.  Perhaps I'm wrong, but I would be quite surprised...

Steve

Ivan's story doesn't surprise me one bit. This isn't to say Minelab is shady when it comes to warranties. Rather, it's my "default" belief that when it comes to warranties, they're often difficult to take advantage of (in general).

So when a company drags its feet concerning a contractual obligation, I assume that's the norm. Again, not saying Minelab does this. Just saying Ivan's story sounds believable, especially considering Minelab's spotty customer service record (at least compared to Garrett).

Assuming Ivan's story is true, my guess is that the second time his unit failed, Minelab assumed customer misuse. And if Ivan were to take advantage of the warranty again, any denial is probably Minelab's "I dare you to sue me. Go ahead, hire an attorney or file some pro se Complaint in court where you have to spend a few hundred bucks in court fees and lose a work day just to recover a few thousand dollars, at most."

Again, not saying Minelab would do this, but so many other companies do this, whether it's a computer company, insurance company or car manufacturer. I know for a FACT that at least some insurance companies do this. They recklessly adjust an insurance claim and only pay out 60 cents on the dollar and dare the policyholder to file a breach of contract or bad faith insurance lawsuit.

Every few dimes or quarters I dig will have a pinkish-redish "coating" on them, similar (if not identical) to the coins Jeff showed. I figured it had to do with fertilizer, weed killer or a "stage" in the coin "aging" process.

Impressive F350! I guess you better call Saul who can help you clean all that money! 😄

15 hours ago, Bishop said:

im really surprised by the poll numbers.
the amount of hunters that don't wear headphones.

12 percent use the built in speaker?
your missing a lot of targets. i would say 20 percent or more.
the small stuff, more importantly the bigger, deeper stuff.
the kind of target/sounds that just make the threshold rise, like, maybe there's something there, i give it a bit of a scrape
and its a target that i would not hear without headphones on.
not to mention the rear facing speaker, on a mellow target when trying to recover it.
the only detector i don't use headphones with is the gm 1000, no threshold.

 

At least for me, avoiding headphone use is about situational awareness. I do most of my detecting in yards, parks and I'm often next to roads. Yes, I can hear targets/sounds better with headphones, but it's not worth the cost of having almost no idea what's going on around me.

When I'm focused on a hunt, I'm oblivious to almost everything around me, at least visually...whether I'm in the middle of a swing, digging or using my pinpointer. Basically, the only thing that will catch my visual attention is law enforcement or a park's grounds crew. Therefore, I rely on my ears to warn me of anything else I should be on the lookout for.

If I ever do use headphones, I only use them with one ear.

The above applies when I used my Vanquish 540 and will apply if my Equinox 800 arrives as planned *crosses fingers*

6 hours ago, ScoTTT2 said:

in your yard, try digging every signal, including iron, and see what happens .. try and make it so the detector is quite when it goes over your lawn .. it doesn't need to be the whole lawn, just pick an area that is easy to define, so you can hit the same place over and over .. I think you'd be surprised on what is down there masked by something you normally wouldn't dig

I may do that! When I've got the itch to hunt (or test batteries), but don't feel like going to a park or knocking on doors, that's definitely something I can do.

ScoTTT2,

What machine do you use?

As for the old house, I have no idea when it was sided, but it wasn't recent, that's for sure. The owner told me his front yard was tilled, graded and leveled, so I wonder what effect that had on the silver coins that may have been there. Assuming it was never hunted before, it was probably a bad thing, as far as metal detecting is concerned. But if it's been hunted before, I suppose it's a good thing.

But it's reassuring to hear about how once you get the shallow targets (trash and desirable items), that the lower items begin to show up. Looking back, that explains my front yard. I've found so much clad and after the most recent hunt, I'm always telling myself, "yup, got all the coins!" Yet when I hunt my front yard again the next time, I almost always find a few more pennies. They're not recent drops, so I know this is an instance of me learning my ground better and digging up prior targets which could have masked or otherwise distracted me from the recently found pennies.

25 minutes ago, ScoTTT2 said:

in my short time as a detectorist, TIDs are good for the shallow coin shooter (8 inches or less, depending on soil) and even then only 70% accurate at most, not much else

That's my experience, too. The majority of my hunting has been shallow coinshooting in parks. We're talking coin targets 3 inches or less below the surface...and my AT Max and Vanquish are pretty accurate (each within a few VDI points).

But when it comes to digging targets 4 inches deep or more, I have much less experience; most of my experience is in my yard. The good news is that my soil at my home is fairly comparable to the soil in the parks I hunt at.

The only notable experience (that I can remember in great detail) I've had digging a coin target that was deep (8-10 inches) was with 2 clad quarters. The AT Max's VDIs were all over the place, but would occassionally hit some numbers that indicated there was at least a penny in the ground. I also got a high tone in at least one direction. In a park or permission, I'd normally let this signal go, as it's a deep dig and I assume there are other good targets that are easier to dig up, ie shallower. But this was my heavily pounded front yard, so I had the "what the heck" attitude.

I have no problem taking this approach with a permission, but only if: a) I'm confident there's no pipe or wire I could hit and b) I'm confident I've already found all the good targets that are much shallower. I'm guestimating here, but I imagine I can dig 2 or 3 shallow coin targets (3 inches or less) in the time it takes to dig 1 deep coin targer (6 inches or more). 

So what am I saying? What I'm saying is that I will "triage" my digs based on my prediction as to the density of "high value" targets. As a case in point, a week or go so I was digging around a public pool at a local park. This park would normally give me plenty of pennies and dimes, with the occassional quarter. But around the pool, I was getting quarter after quarter after quarter. In the end, I found 18 quarters in a span of about 1.5 hours. This is an incredible quarter:other coin ratio that I had never seen before. So there came a point that I was actively passing up penny targets so that I had more time to find and dig quarters.

But of course, I've spent over a dozen hours hunting that park, so I was familiar with its soil and types of targets it has. I had no such familiarity with the old house. So i wanted to make sure I did at least one pass over the front yard, back yard and sidewalk areas looking for the "easy" targets before spending time on the iffy (relatively speaking) signals. I guess this just goes to show how it takes more than 2 hours to learn a site...

12 minutes ago, Monte said:

Realistic or conceivable?  Yes, but less likely.    But using a lower Disc. setting helps a detector process targets better when you have a lot of very close-by Iron trash that causes good-target masking.  The more Discrimination or rejection you use, the more negative behavior you'll have from the unwonted junk and that can often make it more difficult for a detector's circuitry to recover and process a good or higher-conductive target.

That makes a lot of sense; thank you for the explanation.

As for relying more on sounds and less on VDI, are you referring to the decision to give a target a second look or the decision to dig? When it comes to a potential target, I always rely on sound first. Only when I get the high tone (or mid time, if I'm willing to dig for nickels or gold), do I look at my VDI. However, even with a high tone, if it's in the 70s (or really jumpy and all over the place) and I don't feel like digging a penny, I'll let it go.

So are you suggesting that if my goal is to get silver coins I should dig all high tones, no matter what the VDI is doing?

Thanks again!

1 hour ago, GB_Amateur said:

The one thing that jumped out at me is that you had (only) 2 hours to detect that site.  But it sounds like you can go back, so that's good.  It takes me more than 2 hours just to figure out where I want to hunt and what settings (and coils) I want to use.

The owner was friendly enough, so I think I can go back. But while hunting, I took the approach that I can't assume a second hunt. But I'll definitely try to hunt there again.

So 2 hours really isn't that much time, eh? Sounds like there's an echo in here 😄 Up until this thread, I honestly thought expert or experienced detectorists could dial in their machine to their soil and intended targets within 30 minutes or so (assuming they had the right equipment).

1 hour ago, EL NINO77 said:

If you are in doubt about what kind of target one is used to check the signal before digging .. pinpoint detector AT Max and try to raise the coil above the target .. to evaluate the size of the target..in combination VDI what target gives you ... what could you help avoid some big goals

I do that when I think I could be digging a large object. I'll also use my pinpointer on the surface to gauge the target's size. I've detecting enough with my F-Pulse to know what it sounds like when the target's just below the surface, but is larger than a coin. The catch is that many of these targets are within 2 inches of the surface. Sometimes it's just faster to quickly dig the target as opposed spend extra time to confirm its size before moving on.

As for your approach to hunting a site in phases, it makes a lot of sense. I just hunt all permissions with the assumption that I can never go back and that I need to focus on efficiency given my usually short hunting times.

34 minutes ago, kac said:

Any kind of discrimination you risk losing good targets. I suppose if there was a perfect machine that could filter out aluminum and keep the gold everyone would use it

I know that using discrimination is a trade off, but I figured it was largely due to target masking. For example, if you discriminated out iron nails, but a silver coin is next to an iron nail, you risk hearing nothing when you pass over these two targets (assuming your detector doesn't have the recovery speed and separation ability to tell these 2 targets apart).

I also understand that depth can be an issue here too. If a silver coin is an 85 on the surface and an 82 two inches below the surface, it might be a jumpy 60-70  eight inches down (depending on soil conditions, of course). So if I've set my AT Max to only hear targets 80 and above, I'll never know I've swept my coil over this target.

But what other scenarios might "over discrimination" be a bad thing in the sense that you don't hear/see desired targets?

2 hours ago, Monte said:

Most of the time, however, it takes a while to really get a handle on the sate environment, and then put in the time to thoroughly cover the area with the right detector, best coil, and working it slowly and methodically.  Only 2 Hours?  Not nearly enough time to do a good job of covering any 120 year old sire.

That's really good to hear, as it implies I'm not an idiot and that what I perceive as a challenge is due to the fact that it's actually hard to do.

As for boosting discrimination, I understand that it'll likely lead to missing out on good targets. But if I were to dig anything that rang up as a 70 or higher on my AT Max at that old house, I'd literally be digging a target every 45 seconds.

With respect to the larger targets, those were far larger than a coin, and only rang up as an 80 or so. I imagine a large cache of silver coins would ring up as a 90 or higher with an AT Max?

Yes, I was using the stock 8.5x11 coil yesterday with my AT Max. The more I hear people talk about that coil compared to the 5x8, the more I wonder why Garrett made that the stock coil! I want that coil for the reduced weight, if for no other reason. Then tack on the fact that it's better in trash, and it looks like the only reason not to get it is if I find an Equinox 600 for cheap.

I sometimes use Iron Audio, but not often. And I never actively hunt with it on. I only use it as a "tie breaker" when I have a target I'm debating whether to dig or not.

If I go back to that old house (with or without the 5x8 coil) with the primary goal of finding silver coins, what's the advantage of only setting my discrimination to 35? Is there a realistic chance that my AT Max could detect a silver coin and have the VDI ring it up in the 40s?

Thanks again for your advice here; it's much appreciated. 😀