phrunt

It was just a gentle ride back to town

Too old for that now, If I stack, I may not get back up again so I took on something a little more placid with skiing and swinging around a beeping screeching stick instead 😛 I don't think the 10x5" suffers from the edge sensitivity issue the 12x7" does, I certainly haven't noticed it, I'll have to bang it back on and check at some point, if it doesn't then it's the clear winner for me as both seem about as sensitive as each other, and the 11" is at least as sensitive as all of them, just runs a bit rougher. I wonder if the 12x7" will be much deeper than the 10x5", you'd think it would be on some bigger bits, but then again the 11" would be the deepest of the 3 except on small stuff where the smallest coil always wins for that.

The Carrot has one of the loudest speakers available, This video I did should show its nice loud speaker compared to others If your Pro Pointer AT is quiet there is something wrong with it.

Yep, my cable wasn't perfect either but I guess far enough away from the coil to avoid it picking it up, where the cable is going near the coil laying it down it's smack in the coils dead zone for tiny targets 🙂 So maybe that's why it didn't see my cable. He generally runs in maximum manual sensitivity on every detector so I'm sure he would have been in that. He's a bit of a guru at finding tiny gold.

Looked to me like the Carrot was the best in that test, at approximately the 3:43 mark he lifts the Pro-Find away and it goes nuts in the air, this is the problem I have with my 35 so it looks like that problem possibly isn't resolved on the 40.

Well, I guess the V80 breaches the same patent, as likely do the XP, Rutus and Garrett detectors. If you read the patent, it's there to stop any competitors doing a multi frequency unit, innovative of Minelab as it's a 2005 patent. So, it sounds like Nokta will likely be guilty, along with the other competitors. It's a very anti-competitive patent from my very limited understanding of it. If Nokta didn't sell into America they would be fine too and not be in this situation, so Quest is wary of doing so, and rightly so. I wouldn't sell my detectors into America either for the same reason If I was making them, not worth the risk and hassle when the world is a big place to sell into without the US market. Nokta has done a brilliant job of making their own version of multi frequency without using Minelab's technology so they couldn't go after them for some recent patent of their multi frequency technology like Multi-IQ so they go after them for an old patent. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION FIG. 1 shows a switched voltage signal generated by switching electronics 2 is applied to a magnetic transmitter 1, shown here as a transmit coil. Signals from a magnetic receiver 3 are amplified by a preamplifier 4 and applied to applied to approximate sine wave weighted synchronous demodulators 5. The output of these demodulators is fed to further signal processors 6 which provide a useful output signal, such as an audio alert or visual display. Both the transmitter and synchronous demodulators are controlled by a controller 7 which includes a clock to control timing. An operator selects the frequency profile of the approximate sine-wave weighted synchronously demodulation by operating switches 8, which may also alter the switched voltage signal appropriately too. FIG. 2 shows a switched voltage signal of fundamental period T, whose waveform repeats, and this is relatively rich in frequencies 1/T, 4/T and 16/T. This waveform and the corresponding receive sine-wave demodulation may very easily be changed using digital signal processing technology, which may be controlled by an operator using for example push-buttons. It would be useful to set 1/T at say 2 kHz if an operator is seeking USA coins, which are relatively conductive, or say 1 kHz if Bronze-age or copper-age daggers which are even more conductive are being sought for example. However, 1/T would be better set to say 16 kHz if small gold nuggets are the targets which exhibit relatively short time constants. Although the invention has been herein shown and described in what is conceived to be the most practical and preferred embodiment, it is recognised that departures can be made within the scope of the invention, which is not to be limited to the details described herein but is to be accorded the full scope of the appended claims so as to embrace any and all equivalent devices and apparatus. Patent Summary 1. A metal detector used for detecting a metallic target in a soil including: a. transmit electronics having a plurality of switches to generate a switched voltage signal, the waveform of the switched voltage signal being one of predetermined repeating multi-period rectangular waveforms; b. a transmit coil connected to the transmit electronics to receive the switched voltage signal and to generate a transmitted magnetic field for transmission; c. a receive coil to receive a received magnetic field and to provide a received signal induced by the received magnetic field; and d. receive electronics connected to the receive coil to process the received signal, the processing including a synchronous demodulation of the received signal using one of predetermined substantially sine-wave weighted synchronous demodulation profiles associated with a corresponding predetermined repeating multi-period rectangular waveform; the profiles being selectable by an operator; and a result of the synchronous demodulation is further processed to provide an indicator output signal in real time, the indicator output signal including a signal indicative of the presence of a metallic target in the soil. 2. A metal detector according to claim 1, wherein: a Fourier transform of the switched voltage signal contains frequency components of relatively high magnitude at frequencies corresponding to periods within the predetermined repeating multi-period rectangular waveform and the period of the predetermined repeating multi-period rectangular waveform, as compared to other frequency components across a frequency spectrum of the Fourier transform. 3. A metal detector according to claim 2, wherein: the synchronous demodulation of the received signal is such that received signal is synchronously demodulated at frequencies corresponding to periods within the predetermined repeating multi-period rectangular waveform and the period of the predetermined repeating multi-period rectangular waveform. 4. A metal detector according to claim 1, the metal detector further comprising: a controller, the controller being accessible to the operator, to control the period of the predetermined repeating multiple-period rectangular Full Patent info here: US7579839B2 - Metal detector - Google Patents I really don't know who to side with on this stuff, Patents are there to protect their R&D and income stream from the invention, Minelab are very good at doing patents and it's the main reason I think they've had little competition. So, their patent is working, its stopping competition, competitors have to tread very carefully. As customers these patents are bad in a way as they stop competitors and competition is great for consumers. So, I can't take sides on this stuff. It's a shame, but rules are rules, laws are laws.

They're features Chuck, Geolocation and GPS mapping to help you navigate. And the phone registering on the towers its using as they login (handshake) to it. GPS in the detector is safe from "tracking". It only stores it locally then you're using the pins on Google maps so it's as safe as your Google account 🙂 Either way, it's a shame that the concept probably won't survive and they likely only fixed this version of it as they still sell the two detectors that use it as new products and they're advertised as having the feature, if it didn't work legally in Australia and NZ at least someone could get a refund on their detector over it, not working as advertised.

Yay! Minelab finally updated Xchange 2 so it still works with Google maps, some time ago Xchange being so old was no longer compatible with Google maps and they've finally fixed the problem somewhat properly using a patch that runs in the background. You can download the fix to your Xchange 2 (Windows) here https://www.minelab.com/__files/f/507670/XChange2-1.8.7-1.3.5-Hotfix.exe XChange2 - Hotfix for mapping and pin fixes. (Released July 2023) External interfaces used by XChange2 change over time which can affect the way that XChange2 needs to work. Installing the XChange2 Hotfix file after installing the XChange2 1.8.7-1.3.5 program will help XChange2 maintain it's compatibility with Google maps so that detectorists can continue to use the program as intended. Step 1 - Download and install XChange2 1.8.7-1.3.5 Step 2 - Download and run XChange2-1.8.7-1.3.5-Hotfix.exe (This will take a few minutes.) Step 3 - Restart your computer then run XChange2 as normal. (the Hotfix will run in the background.) --- Note for Minelab, maintain its compatibility. 🙂

I'm honestly tempted to buy one, I just can't believe what I consider the best metal detector company on the planet can't make a good pinpointer and I often joked the Pro-Find's were made by an apprentice or a high school kid on work experience at Minelab, the Pro-Find 35 wasn't even better than most of the Chinese clone pin pointers, they in fact worked better than my Pro-Find 35 even though I had it swapped out to another one to ensure it wasn't a dud. I've bought a couple of Chinese fakes of Carrots otherwise known as GP-Pointers to test them out as they were so cheap it wasn't much more than buying a Big Mac meal it was worth it just to see how they go, and honestly, they were more stable and just as sensitive as my 35 (happy to do a video to prove it) but now this new video states one of the features of the 40 is reliable stability, and if in reality this is true the pin pointer will be pretty good. To quote the marketing department.... Ultimate Stability, Trust all signals. If I do buy it and it turns out the opposite, I won't be gentle with my opinions 🙂

A little update, JW may have found the solution to his bump sensitivity, his coil cable was wrapped so the cable was under the shaft near to the coil, so it's possible the detector was picking up the coil cable, today he went back using it and wound the cable differently so the cable was up above the shaft and he didn't get the bump sensitivity. Fingers crossed the problem is solved. You can see by habit with VLF's and chance more than anything my coil cable was well away from my coil, so this may explain it. Anyway, today he did very well considering the spot is hard to get anything at all, he was only there a few hours and came away with this using his 6000 and 12x7" The .06 bit at the bottom was the bit he found yesterday using the GM1000 that we tested on my NF coil to see the lack of edge sensitivity. I'll do a video demonstrating that soon as I think what I am saying maybe slightly misunderstood.

If you were to read the first couple of pages of this you'll see why Quest don't want to sell into America. Microsoft Word - 5FG5447.DOC (rpxcorp.com)

I think I'll soon record a video to demonstrate what I'm seeing just to clarify when it comes to edge sensitivity. The Police Siren sound gave me a bit of a fright when it first started 🙂

What a pain, it's great to hear you're really liking the machine though and it sounds pretty impressive to get such positive feedback from you. Interesting way to mount it to the handle though.

See the google drive link above

I'll find out, I believe these were 2 of the cons used.

Yup, the bigger the target gets the better the edge sensitivity gets, as the target is seen at a greater distance from the windings when it gets bigger. It's just very small gold the coil is dead on the edges. I did find my detector ran stable all day, my threshold was mostly good except when too close to the power lines it got a bit wild of course, unfortunately both of my videos were right near the powerlines so my threshold sounds a bit wild in them as I'm in maximum sensitivity too. I found it a very stable coil. I hope the Sadie size windings are slightly different to give edge sensitivity as that's a key attribute to a small coil for me and people with small coils like it are generally chasing the smaller gold. I'm happy with my purchase, although I only bought it as I was sick of waiting on the Sadie 🙂

I can see people digging a tunnel and smuggling these across the border. No sign of them yet at our Quest dealer.

Yea, first time gold detecting in a while, Skiing takes over my winter and I've been building a little cabin to store my detecting stuff in, it's almost finished now though just painting and flooring left and that has taken me ages as I'm just no builder so every step took 5 times longer than it would a builder i guess 🙂 I didn't ask if he's going to send it back, I guess now he knows mine isn't bump sensitive in the same spot and same settings he may consider it. It's a really good coil, but so is the Coiltek, someone with the Coiltek doesn't overly need to rush out and buy the 12x7" I think, and someone with the 12x7" doesn't need to rush out and buy the Coiltek unless they want the smaller size and are tired of waiting on NF to release their small coil. I found I was leaving my 10x5" on almost all the time too, then swinging the 6000 feels no different to a VLF 🙂 I should add I ran the speaker all day, no issues at all, love the EMI fix.

I've had this coil for a couple of months now but hadn't got around to using it until today. JW asked if I wanted to go for a detect this afternoon, I was having a day off skiing as the weather wasn't going to be all that great so it worked out well, perfect time to test out the coil. JW also has the coil, he's used it a bit recently at this spot but not overly had any success with it, in saying that it's going over ground that's been done by the GPZ and X-coils along with the 6000 and 11" and I've had my 6000 and Coiltek 10x5" there a few times too so it's a big ask to do well. We discussed his experience with the his 12x7" on the drive to the spot, he's found his is a bit bump sensitive and doesn't have edge sensitivity with small targets, I was a bit worried at this point I'd wasted my money buying one. This time he took his GM1000 and GPZ and 15"CC and I took my 6000 with the 12x7" NF. JW started off using the GM and popped up a tiny nugget pretty quickly, he brought it over to me and put it down on a rock and we ran my coil over it to see if it behaves any different to his, and nope, edge sensitivity is non-existent on small targets, mine is the same. The area of the coil outside of the red line marked with the X is completely dead on very small targets, the target needs to get beyond the windings to the inner area of the coil to respond. I maybe a bit generous with my red line as it seemed with the nose of the coil the gold was under the sticker before it would respond. This is a bit of a typical spiral coil thing, my 14x9" NF EVO was where I first experienced this with the centre of the coil being the most sensitive area, but I was a little surprised as I hadn't noticed the same on the stock 11" nor the Coiltek 10x5", I'll have to check that now but it means it's not an ideal coil for rocky areas for me with no edge sensitivity on small gold. Throughout the afternoon finding shot pellets I was able to verify this and indeed the edge lacks sensitivity. Tilting the coil on edge to locate tiny targets just can't work like it does with a bundle mono on the older GPX series. It's not the end of the world but something to be aware of, especially for those that hunt tiny targets. Now with the negative out of the way the coil behaved brilliantly, absolutely no bump sensitivity like JW is experiencing with his, I made sure of that by being quite aggressive with it on rocky areas and I ran in normal with maximum sensitivity all afternoon and it was fine except when really close to the power lines where I dropped down to about half sensitivity but didn't need to if I wanted to put up with a bit more instability. In both below videos I was in maximum sensitivity even though I was near powerlines. I think it did very well with hot rocks, I only encountered one hot rock all day, quite unusual for this area as it has a lot of them but it had me going, such a faint target from the surface, I dug down and the target was well below the depth I'd expect to find a pellet and still a faint signal so I was hoping it was a little nugget, but after messing around trying to find it for some time it turned out a small hot rock, the size of a reasonable sized coin. Damn! I thought it was going to be my first bit of Xceed gold. I don't use auto or auto +, I don't believe that auto+ can give higher sensitivity than maximum manual like has been said, if anyone would experience that it would be me in my very mild soils but I've never once found auto+ to be more sensitive than manual, the same was said about the GM 1000, I find it not correct, manual is always more sensitive. The NF appears to like pellets, responds nicely on them, near surface tiny targets give a great signal. The pellet to the right is a #9 bird shot, the pellet on the left was the smallest size I was finding, pretty small and a great response on them, I'm confident it will find smaller if there. Here was my first nugget of the afternoon, it was on a bit of a cliff ledge I climbed down onto hoping I was the first to ever detect it, turns out I probably was, pretty easy target, quite a small bit but had a good response The rest of the afternoon consisted of trying to find other ground I personally hadn't detected before while also trying to think of spots others are less likely to have been over before too, detecting the hard to get to spots basically, and lifting and flipping big rocks over to check under them, areas others had yet detected seeing it's such a hard-hit spot. Then, after some time and no success I ventured down onto a little cliff ledge that I found a couple of nuggets with my Coiltek 10x5" when I first got it, figured I may as well try that spot again as I don't think anyone else had detected it so I climbed down and starting going at it, I found 2 pellets down there which was a surprise as I surely would have dug them previously with the 10x5" and the 8" X-coil on the GPZ that have both been there, I doubt they were new but always possible I guess, they were just near surface targets. Then I hit a big boomer of a target, I couldn't remember ignoring any targets here but I must have and I do tend to get lazy with boomer signals especially if I'm tired from the heat in summer, today being winter I was full of beans and ready to dig it all, even my Equinox would have found this one with ease though so I'm pretty confident I was lazy the other times and ignored it, silly me. Quite a meaty bit. I decided I'd keep checking out this ledge after that, and nothing more, I even climbed down lower and risked being stabbed to death by the thorned plants to reach another bit lower down but unfortunately the only target turned out junk, I was able to benefit from the discrimination on my Sphinx 03 pinpointer to not have to keep battling the rocks and recovering this target, it told me it was ferrous so I passed. I used the Sphinx to help recover the previous two gold nuggets and a heap of pellets and its discrimination was accurate, always a green light on the gold and lead pellets and a red light on the junk. For those interested, the Sphinx worked perfectly with the GPX, I noticed no issues at all having it on my belt with its holster and liked it turned itself on when I removed it from the holster and off again when I put it back in, no need to press any buttons. At the start of the afternoon, I did notice I needed to do a noise cancel with it turned on and the GPX sounded like a Police Siren every time I turned the Sphinx on, once noise cancelled with it turned on it was all good. Now the weather was starting to turn and JW's head popped out over the top of the ledge I was on seeing how I've been going, he saw the weather coming in over the mountains and thought we should bail out, wise idea as we only just got back to my car when the rain really hit. Unfortunately, he only ended up with the tiny bit with his Gold Monster that he got right at the start. So, overall happy with the 12x7", ran really well, worked under and around the power lines OK, no issues with stability tilting it and using it on rock ledges, sensitivity seemed great on small targets except for the noticeable lack of edge sensitivity on small targets. No bump sensitivity unlike Jw's 12x7" and overall, a good coil by the looks of it. I still think I prefer my Coiltek 10x5", similar sensitivity but I didn't notice any edge sensitivity issues, both run nice and stable although it's quite possible the NF ran quieter over all, more time will tell there. As for the Sphinx 03, quite possibly my favourite pin pointer over-taking my Garrett Carrot AT, just need to make sure it doesn't interfere with the GPZ now. Here was my junk, not bad considering 2 bits of gold. On my drive home I drove past the ski field entrance I go to the most and the cars were all coming down covered in snow, good call not to go today in the end but great to get more snow for my next time up! Yay!

I guess it's another strong case for my wish to be able to hire detectors from dealers to try before you buy, if I could have hired all the detectors that I've owned I would have bought a third of them. Some just don't suit my detecting at all much like I guess the Axiom doesn't suit yours Peter, some people were raving about and I get them and just don't get along with them at all, others I bought just to see what they're like. I'd rather spend $50 to hire one for a day to decide if I want to own it than having to buy it to find out and by the sounds of it if you had hired an Axiom and tested it out much like you did your own Axiom you likely wouldn't have bought it knowing it's not really suitable for your ground. If manufacturers were confident in their product, they should have no concerns about providing dealers with a discounted detector or even a sample unit that they can use to hire out or loan to potential buyers encourage sales of their product.

No, a guy I know did 🙂 There are multiple numbers as he had more than one sovereign and they detected slightly different for different years.

That sucks Peter, I really think there is some inconsistency in builds going on with the Axiom, I've seen a few cases now where people get under performing ones, some have had them replaced and suddenly it works as expected. It seems no brand is immune to some quality problems on these complex high-end machines, it's just hard to know if it's just how it is or if it's got a problem without having another one to compare it too. I know this problem all too well, I went through it with my 6000.

Half Sovereign – 33, 35 Full Sovereign – 50, 53-54 Air test numbers.

It’s intended purpose is recent drop shallow targets and covering ground quickly, it’s not supposed to be deep and that in a way would make it counter productive, it’s a great coil.

Minelab just sent out a marketing email saying this: Designed for the complete detectorist, the PRO-FIND 40 pinpointer features increased depth, adjustable 5-level sensitivity, Rapid Re-tune, ferrous tone ID, high visibility and handy lost-alarm. With the PRO-FIND 40 discover coins, rings and gold precisely — on land and under water — with unparalleled depth and speed. So they're saying the Pro-Find 40 is the deepest pinpointer on the market? Speed is an interesting term to use, are they referring to recovery speed so you can swing it around quickly in the hole or are they talking ease of recovery with the discrimination feature making it fast to recover targets? Either way, a bold statement with the unparalleled depth. By the sounds of it they think it makes all other pin pointers obsolete 🙂