Mike Hillis

Might join something like that when I retire. Right now time is so sort that its all about me when I get out with a detector. I tell people that if they really care about their jewelry item have it engraved with some sort of identification that will help it get back to them if they lose it. If not, and they lose it, a pirate like me will find it. Arrrg! I have found lost items for friends when they ask. Mike

Hadn't taken any pictures in a while for show and tell. But now that I have some, its show and tell time. Nothing spectacular but its still pretty eye candy. A couple of few weeks back I was out with my V3 and got some silver and gold. The 14K DAD ring is the smallest diameter ring I have ever found. In the same patch I also found this really neat silver CZ charm. This past week I took the Compadre/Cleansweep combo out to another patch and found the One Ring! Nothing happened when I put it on so I think its just gold plated stainless. Anyway....some pics to keep the spirits up. HH Mike

Regards Dual Core.......Did you know that the Fisher Goldbug Pro/F19/G2/G2+ has two (2) processors? There is so much going on in the background that we as users never see. HH Mike

Marketing speak requires a different dictionary. Rather than tell you outright which of the five frequencies are being combined/processed for a certain target group for a certain program, they just say the program is 'weighted' toward that target group. Fairly easy to deduce which ones are in play for each program just by looking at the target group of the program. I'm not saying its a bad detector or that its not a true multi-frequency detector. What I would like see in true simultaneous multi-frequency detectors is the ability to select frequencies to correlate target responses with. The Whites V3 correlate feature is big step forward in multi-frequency discrimination processing. I hope someone will build upon that someday and take it to the next step or build more functionality around it. HH Mike

CZ two at time. DFX two at a time. Minelab BBS & FBS three channel at a time, V3 three at a time. Equinox two at a time. What the Equinox brings to the table that is different from past multifreq is the ability to select which two freqs are matched together via the program selections. HH Mike

Gold and Silver and Jewels. You are a Pirate! HH Mike

Forgot I also acquired a new Gold Bug DP this year. Got it for sale. HH MIke

Metal Detectors purchased in 2018.....hmmmm I think this is the list: I bought a G2+ . No longer have it. I bought an Minelab Etrac and still have it. I bought a Nokta Impact for a buy and try. No longer have it. I bought a Rutus Alter 71 for a buy and try. No longer have it. I bought a AT Pro and still have it. There you go. HH Mike

Thanks! Mike

There was a new Garrett Catalog included in the box. Garrett makes a nice Catalog. HH Mike

The detector arrived Friday so I got to use it Sunday. Using the ATPro is like riding a bicycle. Once you have done it once its no problem to do it again. Very nice. Nothing special to report for my maiden hunt other than a little over $7 in clad. ($4.75 in quarters, $1.70 in dimes, /.50 cents in nickels, and about 20+ pennies. I like Pro mode for most stuff, but I like STD mode for digging aluminum. Aluminum range targets really stand out in STD mode, and I dig a LOT of aluminum. I'll probably use STD mode in my patches and Pro mode everywhere else. I'm very pleased with it. HH Mike

I think it was just the low price that got me excited about the 705. Then reality set in and I remembered they are basically a money pit and that I didn't like them the first 4 times I went around with them and it would be pretty dumb to go around a 5th time and expect a different outcome. Speaking for the AT Pro, I like the AT Pro when I've owned them in the past and I have a need for one. So much better decision with a better outcome. By the way, the ATPro is pretty cheep right now too. HH Mike

Decided to get me another AT Pro. Last hunt back I was out in a light drizzling misty rain with my metal detector wrapped in a walmart bag and decided I needed a wet weather detector. Did a review and I know its not the new darling around town but I remembered how well the Garrett coil performed for me in the past and decided to get another one. Looking forward to chatting about it later. HH Mike

thats a lot of hoop la! Congrats on the silver and gold! HH Mike

Learn to dry pan and take one with you everywhere. Pull the detector out when you find color. HH Mike

Buy it now for $1350 Its been up for a while with no takers. Mike

That is a RF choke. HH Mike

yummmm.... Cheetos.....

Cipher, What did you find out? I have had both V3i models and V3 models. I currently only run the non-updated V3 just because of the ground cancelling. I can ground cancel the V3 in two or three pumps, where the V3i might take 12 or more pumps to ground balance. Of course I'd like to have the other features of the V3i.....but I hate standing around pumping the coil. HH Mike

Was looking at detector prices lately and noticed the Xterra 705 has really dropped in price for new. Kind of makes me want to go around with it again. Also noticed MarsMD offers multiple frequency coils for it now too, which is a big plus. What to do? what to do? HH Mike

Just note that the F75 only has two(2) gain settings, Low and High. The Low Gain settings are 0 to 29. The High Gain settings are 30 to 99. The numbers are actually threshold settings. You pick your Gain setting (low or high) then adjust the threshold setting for that Gain selection. I run at 0 gain quite often in order to have the smallest coil footprint the F75 can give me and still get excellent depth. I don't remember if any of this transitions over to the T2 or not. Its been a long time since I've owned a T2. HH Mike

My original T2 and F75 were the same as yours. Then, what, 10 years went by and out comes DST, which made the F75 a dream machine. Also I find that sometimes the coils need to stabilize a little while, temperature wise. I get different stability from the start of the hunt as compared to about 15 minutes in. So let the coil temp adjust, then go back and freq shift. HH Mike

ok. I must of missed it in there somewhere. HH Mike

Steve, basically a good article. However a couple of misses .... a) ferrous in contact with non-ferrous tends to draw down the identification and can bring it down into the ferrous range of 1-15. The disc level of six works because the ferrous/non-ferrous combined TID is greater than the nail TID by itself. Tom explains that well in his posts. Its basically a post about iron masking and its affects. b) the newer F75 DST models also include a tone mode called 1N. This is a VCO tone mode that incorporated preset 'nail only' iron rejection. HH Mike

So the XGB is basically the ATMAX's ground balance window feature automated into the 24K's ground tracking feature. That is cool as that is a good feature on the Garrett. Can you set it into the iron target range? Anotherwords can the ground balance window be set to where iron is included? Kind of like when you run your ground balance point all the way to 0 and move the iron into the ground balance hole that develops there. Or is the XGB setting window fixed to the ground only section of the phase response? it would be cool if you could throw a little iron bias into the mix. HH Mike