Mike Hillis

I never ask, Steve. Hopefully they have read my posts on the subject and saw the benefits of what I think I need on a detector to be successful. HH Mike

It is my understanding it may still be under development. So I'd be looking for April. May be wrong though. Mike

I've got a signed copy of one of his books sitting around here somewhere. Don't remember which one it is right off hand. He's been helpful. He used to post over on Carl's old Metal Detecting Equipment forum site occasionally. HH Mike

Here is a link to a finished product of what you are attempting..... https://www.theverge.com/2016/7/19/12222104/landmine-detecting-drone-mine-kafon-drone I'd refer you to a google search of Land Mine detectors and mfg. See what the popular designs are. Then go to this group http://www.geotech1.com/forums/forum.php and see if anyone has the schematics available or something close that you can build to suit your vision. Best Regards, Mike

My didn't come with the extended manual either. I had to hunt it up. TRX is a nice probe. I run mine on level 3 and vibrate only. Plenty of juice on 3. I save the 4th level for special purpose. I like knowing there is still something there if I was to need it. The only thing wrong with it is the weak LED, but I only use the LED for a quick glance to tell me if its on or off. Good luck with it. HH Mike

I see all kinds of issues with this but at the same time its a good project. I'd point you to look at real land mine detectors that exist today. Notice the loop size and how close they need to be swept over the ground. That fundamental will not change with your project. You will need to mount that loop on your drone and keep the search loop at that distance above the ground at all times. Second you will have to mount the search loop far enough away from your drone that the drone itself doesn't interfere with the electronic fields of the search loop. That in turn will affect your flying stability. Anyway....quite the project. Good luck. HH Mike

Where o where could my Gold Kruzer be, Oh where o where could it beeeeee 61 killihertz hot, with a mic-ro pro-grammm oh where, o where, could it be.

Good find, Mark. What do you think about the Pro-Arc? Any better than the hobby brand? HH Mike

68 Pounds!!!!! What a day!!! Congrats HH Mike

That is a lot of tabs, Skate. A lot of large pull tabs. Why do you think that you need to be digging square tabs to find a gold ring? How many types of gold rings are likely to give the same ID as a large square pull tab? Who would wear a large pull tab type of ring? What activities would cause someone who wears a large pull tab type of ring to be lost? Are any of those activities taking place where you dug all those square pull tabs? Does that activity take place often enough that there is a good chance of a ring being lost, and, most importantly, lost and not recovered? I'm trying to be helpful. If you are going to go out and dig pull tabs at least understand why to dig them and where to dig them. I cannot over emphasis the importance of those books titles I posted if you really want to be successful at this. You hunt gold with your mind and recover it with a metal detector. HH Mike

I highly recommend this book by Clive Clynick. http://www.clivesgoldpage.com/ “DFX Gold Methods: Finding Gold Jewelry with the White’s DFX “E” Series TM Metal Detector” While he writes to the DFX, the information is valuable for the inland jewelry hunter no matter what machine you use. There is also this one, which is very good but I like the DFX one better... Gold and Silver: Understanding Beach, Shore and Inland Metal Detecting Sites” This is better than just telling you where to look as it puts you in the right mentality for gold hunting. HH Mike Shoot.....almost forget this one...... The Gold Jewelry Hunter’s Handbook: Finding Lost Gold at Beach, Park and Shoreline Metal Detecting Sites

NuggetBuddy, If I could only have one metal detector to 'do it all' I would pick the new F75 LTD with DST. Reason being that it CAN do it all, do it simply, and do it well. It is feature rich enough, powerful enough, and sensitive enough for all tasks you set for it to do. It has a very good selection of search loops and its a proven performer. It only has one user requirement. You have to learn the F75's sweep speed. Check it out. HH Mike

Thank you Steve!!!!! No mention of E.U.D???? 3700 mah of Lipo on the high frequency ought to last forever. HH Mike

Guess I have to wait until tomorrow. HH Mike

All the 7.8 and 7.6 kHz coils work but only to a set signal strength. They are basically on and off coils. Air tests to about 7 or 8 inches and then quick cut off. No modulation. I occasionally use the 11" Triangulated concentric coil on my F75LTD for a little concentric ground coverage. Seems ok for the top 4 to 5 inches of ground. I'd like to see one of these specifically for the F75 as I like that coil. The new 7.8 kHz 4" concentric coil air tests good on the F75. It will allow modulated audio to about 6-1/2 to 7". Haven't used it in the ground yet. I hear you Cipher on the V3. I pretty much just use the 9.5 and 12" concentric on my V3 for the finer discrimination ability. The DD's get better depth in my ground but I want the better discrimination I get from the concentric. HH Mike

Thanks Bado1. I had it out yesterday digging dimes. I do have one question. When detecting I get one set of FE-CO numbers, and when pinpointing I often got a different set of FE-CO numbers. The number with the major difference was the FE number. A dime would give me a 12-44. Pinpoint would often give me a 29-45. A big jump in the FE number. Should I care about the Pinpoint FE-CO numbers? Thanks Mike

You either have the right metal detector for micro jewelry detecting or you don't. I hunt gold jewelry on land. It is my desired target. I focus on it to the near exclusion of all else. I hunt for hot spots and when I find them I prep them for efficient recovery of new losses. It is what I like to do. And I find pretty small jewelry. Too small to even take good pictures of with my current camera. So I thought I was doing pretty good. Maybe using the term 'Micro' was splitting hairs. I had asked Tom Dankowski what to use for a Micro Jewelry test piece. He replied back that a 10k White Gold 4 or 6 prong stud earring capable of holding, what? a 1/4 or 1/2 caret stone would be a recommended test object. So I went searching for something and finally obtain something at the right price off of ebay; 3mm solid 10k white gold 4 prong stud earring. Silicone backing. So its just the earring stud itself with a topaz stone in it. Pretty tiny. Smaller than I thought it would be when I ordered it. Ok. The Gold Bug Pro is a proven prospecting unit, and my G2+ is nothing more than a Gold Bug Pro on a different rod set up. I've seen the pictures of the small gold pickers it can find. So surely it will hit this earring no problem, Rght? Well, I put the 5" DD on it, and start bench testing. All metal gets a hit on it out to about 1-1/2" if the prong end of the earring is facing it. Horizontal and Vertical orientation presentations are much less. In Disc, I can get a signal about an 1" away with the prong facing the coil and the other orientations are about 1/2" with mostly non-ferrous responses. That is at maxed out sensitivity. Wow. I thought it would be better than that. I have a V3 with a 22kHz single frequency option with a hot gold program on it that will hit it good, too. Right? Well I put the 4x6 DD on the V3, load up my hot little gold program and start my test. Hey, I'm getting something, thinking positive...better depth than the gold bug, oh...wait....its picking up my hand. So I transfer the earring stud to a ruler and try again. This time no response. Or at least no usable response. Did some tweaking to the program and still no thing. Wow. Got to try some programming changes and see if I can at least equal the G2. Not done yet......what about the Omega 8500. No. Not a chance of every finding one these little earrings with that. Put it up. Still not done yet....what about the F75LTD? Lets give it a try. I put the little football concentric on it, maxed it out and frequency shifted for stability and give it a try. WOW. In both JE and Boost mode it did better than the G2. The G2 audio wasn't that strong but the F75 audio was great in all orientations. And I was getting at least an 1" in the vertical and horizontal orientations and about a 1-1/3" with the prongs facing the coil. And it was giving mostly non-ferrous TID. This reminded me again of what a top notch detector the F75 is and will always be. Wow. Just Wow. I ended up sitting there thinking about how much time I have wasted at some sites thinking that if 'any' gold was there I would have gotten it. I got over it a day or so later as reality set in and reminded me that hunting really small jewelry has its own little focus and that I need not worry about unless I'm specifically hunting for it. But that if I'm going to hunt for it I need to equipment myself for it. And that is the back story to my pre-order of the Makro Gold Kruzer. HH Mike

Well....HA I stared at the Gold Kruzer Package too long. I went ahead and pre-ordered one. Someone is talking possible March shipping? What pushed me over the edge was the package deal being offered along with the higher 61 kHz. The higher frequency will hopefully require less gain to hit on the tiny stuff. Should also give a tighter ferrous / non-ferrous break point on that stuff. too. Hopeful anyway. I figure if it sucks at what I want it for I'll find out early enough I can get most of my money back on resale. I tried to jump for the Gold Racer but just couldn't make myself do it. Especially after I heard that even with the 56 kHz you still had to run the Gain up high to hit the tiny stuff. I am hoping the new Micro program allows me independent adjustments of the Gain and Threshold controls so that I can get low gain but high sensitivity settings. Another words, it will allow me to run it hot hot hot at very low gain settings. Fingers crossed. HH Mike

Thank you very much for the air testing, osbod007. That helps me a lot. I'll compare my Compadre/Cleansweep combo the same way and post for us to compare. 17.5 kHz vs 12 kHz. HH Mike

Thanks guys. Mike

I'm hoping Micro allows a low gain, high sensitivity(threshold) operation. Fingers crossed. HH Mike

So there I was....standing in the Equinox 800 line with my money in my hand.... .when out of the blue a nice clean ETrac came up for sale for $600. Quick to recognize a good deal when I see one, I quickly stepped out of the Equinox 800 line and bought the Etrac. I feel like a bandit as its a very nice unit and I'm very pleased with it. Looking forward to sharing a few Etrac posts this year as I get to the chance to use it. HH Mike

Thanks Steve. Just looking at the Gold Kruzer faceplate I get the impression that this is totally geared to low conductive hunting. Gen, Fast, Boost, and Micro program options gives the hint that everything gold is covered. Should be much better than the Gold Racer for my needs. HH Mike

I think the Gold Kruzer is going to be the one for me. Won't know for sure until I see the operating manual but at this point it is looking good. HH Mike

Nice silver! One ring could lead to another. Might be a gold one hiding out there...... HH MIke