jasong

Pretty sure that isn't an x ray man... To me the location and solder points on that board look simply like a way to terminate or connect the ends of the wires from each lobe, keep them immobilized, and send it on up into the shielded cable. I don't see an IC on there. No idea though, photo is small. I agree they could just disable the firmware security check. Charge $200 for that update instead of a patch cable that might induce noise, and then Minelab could make money off the X Coils at least a little bit instead of no licensing fee at all as it stands now. I mentioned that a few days back in the large pile of posts related to this subject that get rapidly buried. I was hoping it might elicit a response from JP inferring it might be on the drawing board before I cut my cable for good, but no such luck. If ML ends up doing that after I cut my cord I better be getting a free coil for the idea.

Interesting...have you X rayed an X Coil to see if there is an IC in it out of idle curiosity?

Phrunt, losses and error handling is much easier to deal with in digital communication. There is no circuitry in the Z coil (or is there??) so it must be analog only going in and out (other than the security chip comms). Analog is notoriously susceptible to noise, and there is no real way to correct it or resend, there are no checksums, nothing. You have filtering. But filtering generally reduces sensitivity and/or resolution. It reduces noise but it reduces signal too in a lot of cases. Any time you add a connector you add a potential source of noise both from inductive or capacitive sources or via mechanical motion unless it's somehow perfectly shielded and immobilized. That has nothing to do with detectors, just electronics in general. One way coils get touch sensitive when the windings, solder joints, or connections come lose as one example (hence why I only used potted coils on the GPX). Another way coils can be touch sensitive is if they are weak and the winding flexes slightly when bumped. I too am curious about the inner construction of the X Coils for these very questions, and if it comes apart easily I'm going to see what's inside.

You aren't the only one JP, look at my posting history and you'll see I've asked every tough question about the X Coils I could think of asking even if it ruffles feathers, for a month ongoing now. And I'm buying my own coils in order to answer the questions people are not interested in answering for me. I also mentioned the business model in a post a few days ago. And I've pointed out a number of times that the only real conclusion here with the silence from ML and other companies is what I think you are also hinting at yet contractually unable to say: ML themselves or another 3rd party ARE working on a range of legit licensed coils and this Russian company put their coils out quickly before proper testing in order to make money before the legit coils were released. Feel free to correct me here if I've read between the lines too deeply and come to a wrong conclusion. I think I'm probably on the right track though and I don't like that I'm probably going to cut my coil just to find this out for certain down the line when I wouldn't have had to do it if I waited, but c'est la vie. I'll be more than happy to test some of these concerns and put them on video. The saturable soil thing is going to be an issue though as most the ground I work is probably as mild as it is in NZ. But i do have a yellow ferrite to test on. But if there is anything in specific you think needs to be tested, tell me how you think it should be tested here and I have no problems putting it on video. If you think it's not getting enough exposure, this is a good chance to change that. I have some 4 millions views using Minelab products and if just include the keywords "GPZ 7000" in a video it will usually find it's way to the front page of Youtube search on the GPZ for a while, sometimes Google too. I'll post here too which also get a lot of exposure.

Brian, the way I understand it is the 14 will still be usable since it'll have a new connector (sans security chip), it'll just require me to shut the machine off and switch coils. That said, it would be nice to have a second machine with the coil already connected nearby. I'm going to see how much of a hassle it is to keep switching coils when I do some initial testing at home, I will get in contact with you if it would be expeditious to have a 2nd person, thank you for offering. And thanks for the compliment on my vids! I will definitely try to film some stuff with these X Coils and I finally got some decent camera gear, so it will all be high definition and more watchable, my old camera was pretty bad.

Thanks for the update, I was following that closely. I only have 1 GPZ coil so I'm gonna have to get it right the first time... If someone has a beatup or dead coil (but with a good chip) that is going to no use and they want to offload for cheap, let me know. Currently I'm working on two houses 1000 miles away from detecting areas for another few months. I'll do some comparison tests at home as I always do with new equipment, which I can share, but it's going to be some before I'm able to actually get into the field. I'll try to take a quick trip out somewhere after I finish the first house though, hopefully in 3 weeks or maybe 4. I'll only have a few days but I can run them over some well known patches that a lot of detecting veterans are familiar with here to get a baseline. I think I might take them to NV instead of AZ to see how they do on salt as I think from AUS reports that they will do ok in AZ already. Chances are good if anyone else here in the US has them on order they will get out to the field before I do though.

I've read the instructions and it's pretty basic soldering, I'm sure I can do it no problems. The prospect of making one for someone else and ending up with the "coil not connected" error and getting blamed for it or feeling bad about someone losing a trip or buying a new coil makes me really not want to do that though after seeing the latest thread. That aside, thinking about this all - I really don't see this as a sustainable business model for these coils. I really wonder how long they are going to stick around to replace coils/keep making new ones or honor warranties if another competitor comes out with licensed coils for the same price or cheaper which are plug and play?

Yeah salty soils will still have salt response when dry too or even with an unmeasurably small amount of moisture - there is a place in Arizona, completely dry, that makes my 4500 go absolutely crazy even with the coil raised above my head 10 feet in the air. It's the top of a salt dome or something. Freaked me out at first, like I seriously thought I had stumbled on a hidden government buried transmitter station or something hahaha, I put a pinch of the soil in my mouth and it tasted like drinking the ocean, almost pure salt. I've never really used a VLF in salty areas so I can't answer that question. But yeah PI's struggle with salt especially with larger coils (the 4500 and newer have a setting to deal with this a bit though), and the GPZ struggles far (far, far) more, so I'm guessing VLF's do too. Ionic electron conduction is not much different from regular electron conduction in a metal when it comes to induced mag fields from that current, so seperating the two responses is probably very difficult.

I recall JP mentioning this issue in the past but this is the first user I've seen post about it. I dont watch other forums, are other people having this problem too? How common is it?

Does the manufacturer send a replacement coil in this case, or is that still to be determined?

Wow, I hope you guys can get that sorted out...

Did the clay keep getting quieter as it dried out more? Ground that gets hotter when wet usually means salt. Water mobilizes ions, ions conduct electricity much like a metal conductor. It doesn't have to be sodium chloride (table salt), it can be anything ionic including things that might not seem like salts. Metals like to form salts so they are found in mining regions. Especially since mining regions also tend to have acidic or basic soils. These can leech into things like clays and concentrate longer since clays tend to erode less quick, or the clays themselves can be derived from alkaline soils which are already salty. Clays also capture heavy, hot particles like magnetites (and 1/3 oz nuggets), but those should be just as hot wet as dry.

It probably means they might not have surveyed it yet, at least with whatever version of the public survey you are using. Check the Master Title Plats to see if they might have surveys now, they are usually kept updated. You can get them and a lot of other stuff here: https://glorecords.blm.gov/default.aspx, and the county recorder will usually have a more detailed and more updated MTP too, but requires searching through physical books usually at the office and is quite laborious. Anyways, heading back out to work.

Yeah there is definitely potential. You do seem to be doing real well in a place a lot of people might not find anything at all. There is always Arizona next door if that fails. Or Colorado if you want a real exploration challenge! CO is probably the most underrated, underexplored terrain in the lower 48 when it comes to detecting. Check out the San Juans though if you want to see some truly awesome mining terrain and history and some of the most underappreciated mountains in the US, depending where you are at in NM it may be quicker to drive to them than other parts of NM. One of these days when I strike it rich, I'll retire in Telluride or Ouray, I love it down there but damn it's expensive.

There are definitely some areas out there underprospected still with lots of wide open space. Especially in a place like NM that isn't exactly a hotbed for prospecting discussion online like some of the more Western states. Places that get mentioned online get way too much attention and then get really hard to prospect. The reason I started learning all this stuff though is because I started out where it appeared every square inch of decent land was claimed since there were only a few known places to find gold near me and years worth of exploration outside those areas ended fruitless. So I went to great lengths to figure out exactly how to map this stuff accurately and find the tiny fragments between the existing claims that I might be able to get a foothold into. When I started panning and later dredging in 2003, there wasn't even a complete copy of General Mining Act of 1872 online anywhere, the best one online was some weird scanned version with lots of artifact errors that was missing the last 5 or 6 paragraphs, and had some other act accidentally scanned in, which people as a result thought was part of the Mining Act. I spent 2 years searching for a copy in a library and finally found one on a trip to Denver, which I hand transcribed and put on an old page of mine that no longer exists, later linked and used on Wikipedia (which itself had been using the incorrect copy until then), and subsequently other sites later copied that one and I'm pretty sure that is the text most use today. It blew my mind that people could be so specifically sure of what they thought was right, yet would link a completely incorrect and incomplete copy of the law they were quoting. I even had guns pointed in my face in a few cases. That's when I realized I couldn't trust what people said on forums and online in general in relation to the law and I had to do my own research. I would recommend the same. Don't even trust what I say.

It's complicated, but it's freedom to me, I get real claustrophobic in places with all private land. That is a sticky issue that someone else can tackle. I've made my case over the years in a number of places and I'm done with that now. The answer you'll get from most in the mining community not named "jasong" though is "no". Read the law and court precedents and come to your own conclusions though if you have a lot of time to waste. Easier is just to move on and find some place not claimed at all.

Also, lode claims are 20.66 acres in size if the person claims the full amount allowed. This isn't always the case since lode claims do not need to conform to the PLSS lines (they need only to be tied to one point on the PLSS), they can go any direction and people claim fractional claims to infill. So, with lode claims you can't always say there is X amount per 160 1/4 section. They may be crisscrossing all over the place. Similarly, placer claims need not stay in within any specific 1/4 section or 1/4 1/4, etc though they do need to conform to the fractional PLSS lines. I believe the BLM allows fractions down to 2.5 acres, which can't be corner to corner, must be side to side. There are exceptions in the cases of gulches and unsurveyed areas. But you can get one placer claim like a half mile long and going across many 1/4 1/4 sections.

This one gets a bit stickier. There are lots of skewed or otherwise non-standard sized sections, both larger and smaller. I've seen them up around 720 acres in Nevada, and I've also seen fractional sections (and entire fractional townships) where the sections are like 180 acres total. Usually unless it's someone who knows what they are doing, the person just claims as normal without realizing it. When done with aliquot parts in a larger section this means their claim technically is larger than 20 acres and thus requires 2 people to claim or 2 seperate claims. A lot of times the BLM doesn't catch this, sometimes they do. Sometimes you'll see verbiage on claim papers "this claim contains X acres, more or less" That leaves gray areas where people think they have more claimed than they do. And that leads to an entire 'nother complex discussion about wether that is kosher or not. In other cases people's claims overlie partial private lands or partial private or withdrawn mineral rights. They rarely realize this either. When I write claim papers up in these instances I include the verbiage "excluding any private or withdrawn minerals or surface" and I recalculate my total claim acreage. To answer the 160 acre thing - that can be done in 1 claim, it just requires 8 claimaints (and 8 claim fees). Or 8 seperate claims with one person.

If you don't have it already, here is a PLSS WMS overlay (actually REST but works like WMS) from the BLM. You can download the whole database as a .shp file from their website if you want to import in ArcGIS or something, just Google that one, it's a very large file. https://gis.blm.gov/arcgis/rest/services/Cadastral/BLM_Natl_PLSS_CadNSDI/MapServer/export? These things change or go down from time to time so links have to be relocated. This one is harder to read than the one they had working last year that allowed you to change font sizes. If you find a better one easier to read the T/R/S let me know, I can't get this one to let me increase the font.

Yes, you have to pull the papers from the county recorder or off the location monument in the field. Even then, half the time the people filing the claim seem to not know what they are doing and their location is often impossible to nail down. I can't count how many times I've found lode claims with no tie to the public survey or placer claims using a lode claim form but attempting to still use aliquot parts and making no sense at all. And a thousand variations in between making the claim impossible to locate more accurately. A lot of recorders now have the last 20 years or so of records online, but now some of them are starting to charge for it and require signing up, which in some cases can takes weeks for the ones the require you to mail a form in. You'll want to get a PLSS overlay onto Google Earth or into your GIS program so you can map aliquot parts or tie the claim to the survey and calculate metes and bounds. When you are mapping a ton of claims this makes it way quicker. You'll do all that work and realize a ton of prospectors just go out and play dumb and detect over valid claims until someone says something to them.

4 years ago it was sometimes hard to ask a question that might be construed by some as questioning ML products or business. Often required was a preface - "I love my Minelab, but..." in order to get a serious discussion. Today we now have photo montages of instructions on how to hardware hack and bypass their IP security to run a product which has apparantly bypassed their licensing department in a way not so different from some Chinese business practices. Except we do it for them. Things can sure change quick with the prospect of a little better performance. I'm curious, is the DOD design patented too as part of some of their broader GPZ patents? Or is it a gray area? Might that be why they have not gained licensing? If so, is this Russian company doing anything so different than the Chinese do with IP theft? I mean, I'm buying an X Coil too just like a lot of people because there is literally no other option, but as much as we don't hear from Minelab we've heard equally little about this actual Russian company. I mean, I'll do what I please with my GPZ since I paid for it, but still, so many unknowns... Should these things be discussed or are they irrelevant? Absurdity abounds. However, I'm reminded a little of the fight in court here in the US involving farmers against John Deere and the right to modify and repair equipment you purchase, plus have access to firmware and not be locked out of it. We may soon have legislation saying exactly what is and isn't right there, some states I believe already do.

ML wouldn't even need to sell a physical patch. They could just update the firmware to bypass the chip authentication if they really wanted to allow customers to use more coils. It'd be free and require no cable doctoring and would cost ML $0 in manufacturing costs. They could still charge $200 for that probably if they wanted to and make even more profit. But then we are right back to square one wondering why instead they wouldn't simply license a code to a 3rd party to build coils and allow that code in a firmware update rather than disabling their code altogether, the manufacturers would pay for the license instead of the customers. And the snake just eats it's tail again leading us around an endless circle of wondering why this or that isn't happening. The GPZ was designed for firmware updates and coil upgrades yet they appear to have no desire to let either of them happen and no desire to tell us why. Some larger piece of the puzzle is clearly missing that altered business road maps, and which we as general public are not privy to.

The part I really don't get is the radio silence. If so, I don't get the point of the security chip at all. What exactly is it protecting? Why require a chip when they have nothing economically to lose if someone else makes coils? That chip indicates to me they were wanting to create their own coil market and be exclusive sellers (or sell licenses to 3rd party manufacturers). The only other explanation I can fathom is it was intended to prevent knock off GPZ's from using a real ML coil, but they are punishing customers way more than counterfeiters there if so. I also don't get why JP, ML's most well known tester, is himself testing X Coils and was provided a chip bypass by ML themselves. Does ML have some sort of interest in X Coils like rebranding the coils as their own or buying them out, or...? If not and they make patches for people to use for their own benefit, why can't we buy one too? So many things don't make sense to me here. I wish they would just say something. A large amount of people are about to chop up machines, some still under warranty and close to new, and still just...nothing, not a peep letting anyone know wether to wait or not.

It would be good to know if the models being sold now incorporate this change or not, if Dave or the manufacturer could comment. If so, how much weight does it add? Speaking just for myself, I almost only detect fairly mild ground so if the weight is significant I'd prefer a lighter option even if it has trouble in hotter ground which I never find myself in or could use the stock coil if I do. I decided to order a 12 and 17 so I can test them for myself compared to the stock coil since few seem interested in doing so in a way that provides the sort of data I want to see personally. I am curious what I will receive, dont want a heavier one if i dont need it... I'm potentially cutting 2+ years out of my warranty (my 2nd gpz) so I want it to be worth it since I cant uncut the wire.

Each succeeding year you get another $1k, so 1994 with whatever the best used VLF gets for $350 back then, live off Ramen and pay for it with VLF finds until (unknowingly to you at that point since you have no future knowledge) the SD comes out in 1995, and hope you are smart enough to take that gamble ? I dunno though, what good vlf was out in 1980? Gold was like 1200/oz back then and there was a ton of surface gold sitting around to find in what seems to me to be some pretty obvious places even without any knowledge of the future. I'd go with 1978, NNV, best vlf I could afford, and a cheap used dozer. Very few BLM regs on dozing back then too. I like to think I'd figure out a way to sell to mining companies again like I have now, and could outperform the stock market in the end, maybe not.