KevinOntheCape

Thanks, I have been sidelined due to shoulder surgery and this forum is helping my sanity.I can get out for limited hunts and start putting into practice the tips I receive here.looking forward to some beach hunting with the Alter 71, I also have permission to some old county properties to look forward to. Having found a beautiful silver ring as well as a nice good ring the week before Mothersday my wife encourages me, unlike some other hobbies !! I can also include my grandchildren at times.

Good stuff, I am studying all I can.As others have said, I feel connected to the Alter and it just works and makes sense to me.

Hey Y'all, new to the forum. I am impressed by willingness to share knowledge and guidance that is evident when browsing through the posts here. I am fairly new to the hobby, got started about 4 yrs. ago when I repaired my friends Fisher 1280x. He let me use it while he got on with a new MX sport. I acquired an AT Pro 3 yrs.ago an have had limited outings, I had no luck at the ocean beaches and have stuck to land use.Recently I repaired a Whites Classic iii SL and still need to get familiar with it.I retired last may and have been getting out a lot more finally hitting some Silver and Gold, but I struggle with the AT sounds (I am a longtime musician) the iron grunt drives me batty, so I bought an Alter 71 and love it.It has stepped up my game considerably. Being an info junkie and a minor techno geek this pursuit satisfies my curiosity and discovery longings in many way.

Thanks E Nino, I will look into those..I have a Bluetooth setup coming that I hope will do the job. Meanwhile I am reading all I can including pouring through the forum library, the Fisher 5th edition into is enlightening !! I am able to do short 1 1/2 hr. hunts every other day and am enjoying the Alter 71, it is quite a blast to keep uncovering how the settings affect the performance. One site has so much stuff in the ground that I can hear 4 or more signals in one swing, so I am fine tuning the tones so not to be overwhelming. Less can be more soundwise, as well as a measured swing speed. As I learn more I can revisit previously hunted areas.

I have been informed by Laura at Detectnicks that the wireless headphone module is not approved for U.S. Sale. Any headphone recommendations ? The At Pro headphones hurt my ears after an hour or so. My buddy says it due to my big Irish lugs!! I've been looking at Grey Ghost ,Jolly Rodgers and others but have no experience with them. The manual suggests running volume at max while controlling overall volume from the phones, I assume this maximizes audio amps sensitivity to small signals.

That makes sense Dan, I tried a discrimination setup as mentioned to see if my idea had any merit. Just a backyard experiment with coins and common trash and it did work but not sure how it would hold up in real world situation. Although coin shooting may be under using this machines capabilities, by keeping sensitivity down to 50 to 60 range I can be fairly certain of what I find. Copper and Zinc pennies are easy to seperate. I am getting familiar with settings within my current limited use.

Thanks for the replies. Dan, I have been using stock programs and they are top notch, very easy to get up and running. Then I tweaked it so that the ID'S closely mimic the AT Pro figuring I could learn how much more this machine is capable of as far as target separation and fine tuning of disc.I thought that if certain trash was close to a particular coin- Nickel at 53, pull tabs 54 to 60, discing 56 and 57 out might make trash sound scratchy because coins ring very clear.It seems to work but I wanted to save it as an option. It being easy to restore to normal I wanted to experiment. On a short outing yesterday I found a 5" deep Nickel just above a 6" barn spike, no struggle to ID. The difficult thing for me is now I hear so many more targets I have to slow down an really listen LOL. As I mentioned before, the recent surgery (5/21/2020) limits my time out and depth of digging, although I got my doctors ok as long as I am cautious. I am very happy with my detector choice and welcome guidance.

Hi Steve, thank you.I will check that out, I have been reading everything I can find including some of your articles explaining terms new to me such as how to use threshold and dual mode. Being limited due to surgery I am currently coin shooting, can't really dig beyond 6". I hope to spend time learning this machine for now with a goal towards more relic and beach hunting. I was pleased to find out the coil is submersible up to 1 meter.

Oh by the way, I set it up with 12.2khz frequency- no pinpointer interference and 6k normalized ID so that the VDI somewhat matched the AT to feel familiar.

Hello all, new member here. I recently got a Rutus Alter 71 after using an AT Pro for the past couple yrs. After much research I chose this over the Nox 800 because I can't run with the crowd and after hearing an interview with the developer I was hooked. I wanted a change because my buddy was really cleaning up with his MX Sport and for me as a musician the AT Pro tones annoyed me, particularly the iron grunt gets tiresome. I will say the AT has been good to but the Alter is another level and I really like it. The sweet sounds and tweakability makes me feel connected to the machine just as a really good guitar seems to become an extension of the music making not just a thing in my hands. The Alter arrived the day after having shoulder surgery which gave a couple of days with the manual and online videos before I gave in an assembled it.The next day I had it in the backyard to get familiar with the menus and such, man oh man it was comfortable to swing and well balanced.I have been out about 5 times with it looking goofy with one arm in a sling but got comfortable with it very quickly and have been hitting finds much quicker and more often.I have a learning curve ahead of me but I feel that this machine is a good platform to learn skills I have been reading about and makes those techniques accessible. I have questions for anyone familiar with this detector- 1- any headphone recommendations? I am putting together a bluetooth setup but may get wired ones also. 2-I setup a discrimination pattern but it appears to be a global setting,can this be setup as a user program to be recalled ? Any other tips and guidance will be welcome, I really feel good about this detector. Rutus Alter 71 metal detector