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The way I see it is the 6000 is sensitive enough to small gold with the 11" coil, you really don't need more small gold sensitivity than the 11" coil gives. The GPZ was not sensitive enough with small gold which is why it greatly benefited from small coils turning it into an entirely different detector. With the 6000 being already great on the small gold with the 11" there are two reasons I wanted a smaller coil for it, obviously the key one being to get the coil into places an 11" coil is just too big and awkward and the other one is giving the 6000 some more depth on the smaller bits as that's where it's a bit lacking at the moment compared to the GPZ and small coil. If by putting a 10x5" or another brands smaller coil on it I can get some extra depth on those smaller bits I'll be happy. This would normally be the case the smaller the coil the more depth on small gold so I'm hoping that holds true also for the 6000. What I do know already is the 17" coil on the 6000 is nowhere near as deep on small gold as the 11" and this is from actual in field finds that JW and I did side by side comparison on, this bodes well for the 10x5" being deeper than the 11" on the really small bits.

Nah, the 26" will be a different casing.

I broke my shaft on my GPZ pretty quickly, one of those little clips you've reinforced with glue cracked and when it failed the other clip also cracked pretty quickly, this was using my little coils in long grass, I guess I was a bit too aggressive with it, I do use it to flatten down grass a lot. Minelab service were excellent and replaced the clips for me. X-coils also made a 26" mono coil for the GPX series when they were making GPX coils, it was only sold within their country where they often hunt for bigger deeper targets. I can imagine a coil that size you'd need your shaft extended to full length just to keep the thing from bashing into your legs when swinging and it'd require a good quality shaft 🙂 I would imagine your 26" CC will weigh less than the GPZ 19" Stock coil anyway.

I just put two and two together, they're your videos 🙂 Thanks for taking the time to do them, all videos with information are appreciated.

Towards the end of the video he finds some smaller bits that were reasonably impressive on size alone more so than his depths. On the other bits I'd get double of triple the depth he's finding them at even with his bigger dig holes just with the standard coil and without over digging my holes 🙂 Many times it's impossible to over dig holes here as we have quite shallow bedrock and that's where the gold sits so you know the actual depth when you hit the bedrock and then you're getting the gold off the bedrock, or alternatively the gold is in the bedrock and I'm breaking it out so I have a really good idea the depth I can find bits of gold, there is no doubt about depth in those situations. Yes, they're not intending to make 6000 coils for public sale at the moment, it's just not cost effective to ship them. Anyway veering off track for a Coiltek thread. I think judging by the few little nuggets at the end of the video the Coiltek 10x5" seems like a coil I'd like to have. The guy should really consider taking his watch and ring off when detecting though 🙂

This guy marketing the Coiltek coils inadvertently captured exactly what I've been saying with the GPX 6000. It screams on small targets close to the coil yet they can completely disappear in your dig out pile as the signal rapidly drops off with some depth. All the other prior digs in the video you just see the recovered target with him saying it was "insert inches here" deep but its obvious the way he digs the holes were likely much deeper than the nuggets actually were and in this case he decided to film a dig from the start rather than just showing a big hole and a little bit of gold, the reason for it is he dug a hole far deeper than the gold was and piled the soil on top of the nugget then he scans over his dig out pile and the nugget has disappeared so he flattens it out to find it. The nugget was actually near the surface which is why it was at the bottom of his dug out dirt. I linked the video to start at the right place to see what I mean. I am planning on getting the 10x5" Coiltek though and I think although it's hard to know the Coiltek coils seemed to run a little more stable on the detector based off that video and I'm sure in my milder soils the results will be more impressive to me than that video was. I'm actually really looking forward to getting one of these smaller coils for it, the 10x5" seems the pick of the bunch for me from Coiltek.

My links should let you install it if you know how to install APK files. https://www.lifewire.com/install-apk-on-android-4177185

Yup, 5000 would likely miss that in any timing and if you were in an area with a lot of that type of gold then yes, the 5000 isn't the best choice. VLF's love that type of gold though and the 6000 is meant to be better on it than the 5000. I think the GPZ is better on it too, I don't need to worry so much about gold like that as we don't seem to have it here. Just yesterday out of interest I tested my latest 12 nugget finds on my GPX 5000 with 10" X-coil, I used that coil as it's the most sensitive coil I own being the smallest fully spiral wound coil I have for the GPX 5000. The nuggets were all 0.067 of a gram (1.03 grain) and smaller, down as low as 0.036 of a gram (0.55 of a grain) which is the one that has to touch the coil on the 5000, I guess I should clarify what I mean by touching the coil too. It means I doubt I'd find it in the wild as the smallest thing like some small gravel on the ground or grass on the soil would prevent the coil getting close enough to get a good enough hit on it that would make me find it, it'd have to be on pretty flat bedrock to find it. The interesting thing was the GPX 5000 hit the smallest nugget fine with quite good depth on most the nuggets I thought, it was some of the mid size ones it didn't hit at all or needed them touching the coil. Out of the 12 nuggets (flakes I guess some would say) the GPX 5000 hit 8 of them. The smallest nugget of the lot the GPX 5000 hits when it touches the coil at 0.036 of a gram or 0.055 of a grain. Interestingly the 3 the GPX 5000 misses are some of the larger size of them all, the one on the left very is 0.069 or a gram and the one on the far right is 0.067 of a gram, both around the 1 grain mark. This would be a demonstration of that ground balance gap that makes the GPX 5000 miss some gold more so than other detectors like the GPX 6000 and GPZ 7000 that appear to have a smaller gap of missed targets. All of these nuggets were found with the GPZ 7000 except a couple which were GPX 6000 nuggets, either way both the GPX 6000 and GPZ hit them all, overall the GPZ hits them all deeper in air tests by using the 8" coil on it. It's hard to believe the GPX 5000 completely misses this one even touching the coil when it hits well on far smaller nuggets like the one pictured below it gets a few inches on I'd not used the older GPX models in ages now and I was in fact surprised how well the 5000 with 10" coil did on this really small gold. It's inspired me to take the time to compare it to the 6000 on some small gold in the near future and just see how much better the 6000 really is on this small stuff. I might do some video when the weather improves, we've just had our biggest snow storm in decades a few days ago. The 6000's target response is certainly louder/more agressive but the 5000 appeared to get some good depth on the really small ones too. My 5000 settings were sensitive extra, gain of 20, audio boost and the rest on default from memory, I should check that.

Well Avantree Support was very good, they contacted me back in the time frame they said they would, unfortunately they can't fix the crackling popping sounds when connected with aptX LL. Some people may not even notice them I'm just very fussy with audio, the crackling sounds drive me crazy. Here was their reply. Sara (Avantree Support) Jun 14, 2022, 22:42 PDT Hi Simon, Sorry to let you waiting a long time. We are so sorry that we still can't fix this now. We'd love to to make a part refund for you if you will keep the Torus. If that is OK for you, please provide us your order No. Or you could return it to amazon if you don't want to keep it. Apology again for such a case. Take Care! Sara Avantree Support ========================= Find Your Product's Video Guides, Troubleshooting Tips, FAQs or Simply Book a Call Not happy? Escalate to T2 Support I'll just keep the things and use them for something else, hopefully they come out with a firmware update in the future to improve the aptX LL support on them, I previously asked if it was just my ones doing it and they said no it is a known problem. Their tech support is very good and they're obviously honest not trying to hide the problem, I guess they knew replacing them for me wasn't going to resolve it. They have awesome sound quality when connected with other codecs, it's just aptX Low Latency that has the problem. So if anyone's thinking of buying them for their 6000 it's something to be aware of, as I said on a noisy threshold like the GPX 6000 some may not even notice it so much and it just blend in as part of the threshold. For me I'd rather use the headphones and I hate headphones. They may have been pulled for sale from Amazon Australia, it seems yesterday they went to out of stock and not sure if they're coming back again, they were sold on Amazon direct from Avantree. https://www.amazon.com.au/Avantree-Wearable-Wireless-Bluetooth-Retractable/dp/B07Y56W9XQ Avantree have agreed to giving me a reasonable partial refund if I will keep them so I've accepted their offer.

Thanks Gerry, yep, I've already discussed buying it with my dealer, we probably will get them first. I intend to get one of each of the brands to work out which I prefer using. Yup, I know exactly what you mean about smaller coils finding stuff up against rocks and things that bigger coils easily miss with their field of detection more concentrated nearer to the target. It might be too early for you to know but did you find it better in EMI than the 11"? I would hope so being smaller but It'd be good to hear that it is better.

Go on Gerry, give the detail, how'd they miss such a big shallow target? I can see the rock there, might have something to do with it? I love the size/shape of that coil, perfect for around here.

I'm surprised they don't give dealers a machine to try and demo? It's hard to sell something and speak honestly about it without ever using it.

You could always buy one and try one Gerry, you're the one hoping to sell it 🙂 At least then you'd know yourself if it's worth pushing onto customers and you'd be able to speak from personal experience when talking to customers about it. Your hesitations to do so likely match your customers hesitations to buy it too for the same reasons, it makes little sense to buy it. It might be selling well in the African market where it was likely designed for more than anything, if they've priced it right over there lower than the GM it'd sell well, the GM was a huge success in Africa and it's a very similar detector, Nokta know how to price product in markets to sell well. This comes from another dealers page which indicates it was designed for Africa more than anything. Lots of manufacturers seem to be going for the ease of use design philosophy for the African market lately with their models.

Where I would change Doc's scoop for my needs is in the photo below. I would trim off the edge at the black line and sharpen it, this makes brushing/pushing soil on bedrock into the scoop easier for the tiny gold hunting on bedrock I do as curved edges are just useless and flat is much better for having more contact with the ground, so little of the scoop is on the ground surface with rounded edges. Other than that small change I really like the design. Do that and I'd even pay the crazy US shipping.

My scoop has riffles, and as someone that often is on the hunt for absolutely tiny gold I find them beneficial in dry dirt. The biggest thing for me is the scoop having flat sharp edges so I can push tiny amounts of soil into it to get the littlest bits.

I wish USA shipping was cheaper, you make some really good products Doc but they are just insanely priced once shipping goes on top of them to get them to me. Your scoop looks great.

I had it on good authority not to buy one when I asked about buying it. The person was disappointed with it compared to other options on the market in our conditions here. I was told just buy one of the more versatile Nokta 61kHz detectors like the Gold Kruzer If I want to buy a Nokta gold prospecting detector, far better value for the money with better performance overall and far more features. They just wanted a competitor to the Gold Monster making their version of it, you'd be crazy to buy it when the pricing is so similar to the Kruzer. I'm completely with Steve, I want a designed from the ground up Multi Frequency prospecting machine, we all know that's the future of prospecting VLF's as evident by Multi-IQ.

Minelab are very smart, or manipulative... one of the two or a bit of both. The previous GPX 4500/5000 series wasn't so good on really small gold so you had to buy the SDC. At the time I am sure they could have made the timings that would slam on the small gold just as well as the SDC but then few people would buy both, or buy the SDC at all. Aftermarket coil manufacturers started to release coils like the little NF Sadie and the flat wound coils that rapidly started to catch it up to the SDC in small gold performance. Along comes the GPZ, the deepest they've made and clearly the most powerful yet they prevented it from being excellent at small gold by restricting small coils on it even though they said early on they were going to make a smaller one, they're not going to make that GPX mistake again where the GPX caught up to the SDC on small gold by aftermarket coils, perhaps they had the GPX 6000 plan way back then. Then comes the GPX 6000 which hits small gold similar to how the GPZ with small coil does and has many of the other attributes of the GPX 5000's performance except any of the setting as they decided people don't need settings, the machine is smarter than the people using it at selecting settings for them. That opens them up to making a GPX 7000 at some point with the performance of the GPX 6000 but with all the settings added back onto it along with the fully auto mode, and perhaps of course the discrimination on it again and once again it will sell very well as people get back what they miss from the 5000, so I'm sure the GPX 6000 won't be the last of the GPX series and the GPX 7000 will be significantly better by just doing that. The GPZ 8000 will come out with both big and small coils to retain it's top position in the line up. So yes, people are telling you the 6000 is making detecting fun again and finding lots of tiny bits of gold, that's what it was designed to do, find the small bits their previous models were designed to miss. We are just pawns with wallets 🙂 Out of interest you said you didn't like the GPX 5000 as it was missing gold?, what timings were you running in when this took place? There are some timings that are far better than others on porous specimen type gold so timings could have something to do with it too. Yes the GPX 5000 isn't the best detector on that type of gold, but it still does pretty well when setup correctly. See the bottom line of this chart. This chart doesn't have Fine Gold as it was made for the GPX 4500 however if you were in Fine Gold you'd be missing gold no matter what, it's a very aggressive setting cancelling out hot rocks and bad ground and with it some gold will be missed. If you didn't need to be in it you shouldn't be in it. I think it's a shame you offloaded your GPX before really getting to know it as it's not as bad as you think and now you don't even have a PI to use at all without a very large investment to buy another one. You can easily make the GPX look poor on various gold nuggets by selecting the wrong timing and this is where the 6000 has an advantage, all gold, all the time and that's what they mean you don't need to be in the right timing anymore for the gold in the area you just turn it on and go. I think if you were to buy a 6000 you'd need to intend to use it outside of that junky area, it's very sensitive to small surface junk so you'd be digging a lot of it that you just skim over with your Nox and its discrimination. In areas like Rye patch it seems the 6000 would serve you very well getting the smaller bits others have missed in the past (by design) 🙂 It's a very good detector and great at what it's designed to do and I'm sure you'd be happy with it if you were to broaden your detecting areas or have a lot of patience where you currently hunt.

You could make a range of stickers with different picture designs, even custom printed ones where people could submit photos and you turn it into a coil protection sticker. Would be quite a successful little side business I'd think.

With no chips in the coils they'd have an instant advantage if they did release a new lightweight land model. They have a good opportunity, it'd be a shame if they wasted it, just being able to sell it at a decent price would put a dent in Minelab's sales, especially in the US. What's making the 6000 popular in many places is its finding small gold the other detectors missed being less sensitive to small gold in their retail form. People who were finding very little are starting to come home with a rattle in their jar so naturally they're happy with their purchase because of this. If the ATX is capable of hitting this same small gold, especially with better coils then they really have potential for a decent selling detector. I'd buy their land model in a second if it came out and was capable of hitting 0.027 of a gram targets, and this is with their clunky stock coils, putting newer better designed coils on it would likely improve that small gold depth. The coil in that picture looks more like a concentric than a DD to me.

A vinyl sticker to put on the GPX 6000 coil to stop wearing a hole though the top of it with the scoop?

that's a great deal, I've paid more for an aftermarket Coil for my Gold Bug Pro. You did very well at $250 shipped. If this was their everyday price they'd sell a lot more of them that's for sure. It brings them into fierce competition with the Vanquish, Apex and Simplex where they belong.

I can vouch for his scales being good accurate ones 🙂 I have the same. Yes, I'm quite surprised by the ATX too, if this is the case I have renewed attention towards the ATX. If it had some decent coils it'd probably be a weapon. It's a shame Garrett didn't take all of Steve's hints and remake the ATX as their lightweight modern PI in a new land housing while fixing all of the known flaws with it at the same time, it sounds like it has potential to be a very popular detector after a redesign or the housing and coils designed around light weight and a land scenario.

Now there is a Bounty Hunter Time Ranger pro all other models are a bit of a scam especially the Gold Bug Pro. Let's use Kellyco pricing as an example.... To buy the Gold Bug Pro it is $549 USD, it comes with the 5" coil. To buy the Time Ranger Pro it is $399 USD with the 11" coil. Kellyco don't sell the Time Ranger Pro, I wonder why? Now lets keep in mind the Time Ranger Pro is an upgraded version of the Gold Bug Pro with more features and a back light and with the more expensive bigger coil that costs $149 USD at Metaldetector.com and the Gold Bug Pro comes with the smaller 5" coil that costs $119 USD at Kellyco. So the main differences between the Gold Bug Pro and the F19 uhm, G2 uhm, Time Ranger Pro are Pinpoint in both disc and all metal modes Main volume control Ferrous volume control Notch accept or reject Notch width control LCD back light - With variations between shaft and coil to try make the models appear different. So when you add the price of the 5" coil which then gives you both the 11" coil and the 5" coil to the price of the Bounty Hunter with more features it comes out at $518, still cheaper than the plain featureless Gold Bug Pro and with two coils instead of one when the Bug is priced at $549. Selling the Gold Bug Pro in today's market is almost criminal and I feel sorry for anyone that buys it thinking they're getting something "better" when it is just the name people are paying more for. The Gold Bug, Gold Bug Pro, F19 and G2 either need their prices seriously adjusted or they need discontinued now the Time Ranger Pro is out.

I'm puzzled by your dislike of the 5000 and I recall it's because you were worried it missed certain types of porous gold and while you will possibly find the 6000 easier to use as some people do and it will hit on some gold the 5000 misses I think you should really take up peoples offer to let you try before you buy, I wish I did. Your area sounds a nightmare with a 6000 and perhaps your Nox is the best tool for the job. If you're planning on going prospecting all over the place then a 6000 might be worthwhile, but your 5000 would have been too and you offloaded it. Yes the 5000 will miss some gold for various reasons, so will the Equinox obviously with depth limitations, and so will the 6000. No detector is perfect and your expectations are possibly too high. You've got an offer to try before you buy, take that offer.