dig4gold

Nice. Good for you & happy for you.

D4G

I'm just using my one off the 7000 complete with harness & using the swing arm as well.

D4G

It is a strange thing this believe or non believe of happenings from the other side. There are many things that happen that have no logical explanation except to put it down to the paranormal or visitor's from the other side. It is something I believe should not be scoffed at. If what you are telling us actually happened, & more than once or twice, & isn't made up for your "story", then you will have your own thoughts on the matter. "They" obviously mean you no harm but it would be un nerving. The mind is a powerful thing & it is how you process what you have "witnessed" as to how you react to it. Interesting, & like you say, you could write a book on that subject alone. Maybe you should.

D4G

Thanks for the great read Gerry. I always value what you have to say.

D4G 

On 11/10/2023 at 7:49 AM, Gerry in Idaho said:

Yes those roads did produce some amazing gold finds.

Steve B and another gentleman from ID that I know of, both found good gold there.  Funny as Idaho is my home, I've yet to wander that far North.

Best you do then... I am sure you would come back with a whopper stuck in your gob. 🙂

D4G

Ghosts from the past.....

D4G

18 hours ago, Dutchman4 said:

My wedding ring was a Nugget Ring.  I lost it in the surf near Ocean Beach pier.  Some cold water and it slid right off my hand.

Ooooh.... Bugger.

D4G

1 hour ago, Aureous said:

When I lived in Scotland, I once went on a train past the Kildonan train station and saw a big patch of diggings near there....looked 'juicy' lol. Went panning at Baille an Or a couple times, the gold was actually pretty good and plentiful. The upper hills benches have been ignored. 

Cats out of the bag now.

D4G

Now that is interesting.

D4G

On 10/19/2023 at 10:52 AM, phrunt said:

I've never been overly impressed with the swing arm design of the GPZ 7000, it does its job of course but the rubber part on it is always doomed for failure.  I've never really used my swing arm but JW who I often detect with always uses his, he's a real coil control person and I'm wilder and crazier however I've decided with gold getting very hard to get I need to up my game. 

I've seen JW break his swing arm I think 3 times it is now since I've known him and I can't be bothered with that and trying to deal with warranty and the costs associated with sending it in all the time.   I figured I'd have a go at making my own for my 6000 and use that as a starting point, the idea to do so came out of nowhere, I was going through stuff in my garage having a clean out and found some old alloy pipes that looked like they were off a tent and had just the bits I needed to give it a go, I wanted to do it all out of junk I was getting rid of.

So, I dismantled the pipes, drilled out the rivets holding the plastic bits I wanted on and salvaged what I needed.

 I also had some old ski poles I was throwing out which gave me an idea to use as a handle, they're made of super light fiberglass too so added no real weight to it.  I used old electrical conduit PVC pipe for the main shaft of it.  I might make a carbon fibre version next with a black ski pole handle 🙂

My bits and pieces.  The black connectors were off the tent poles, the PVC pipe and my ski pole that I've cut to size.  I wanted a bit of the fiberglass up inside the PVC for strength and for more grip when gluing.  Oddly the ski pole was quite a tight fit inside the PVC so it worked out perfectly, just some good epoxy and they're now stuck together for life.  I removed the strap out of the ski pole handle.

Just a little Velcro strap to hold it up next to the detector when not in use, doesn't really need it as it stays there by itself pretty well.

I used a nylon nut and bolt to hold it on, I might get a bigger tougher one if that one causes a problem.  I had to heat the PVC pipe to get it over the little black connector as it was too tight of a fit, once heated I was able to squeeze it in with some epoxy on it, very tight fit though.

and my ski pole handle, worked out nice, comfortable to hold too.

So, I'm open to ideas, has anyone made one? Made a better design? This was just a quick 15-minute job and I have lots of the parts left to make up more so I can adjust my design, I've a few more ski poles laying around that are old junkers too that I can rip handles off if I rebuild it differently.  I'm going to make one up for my GPX 5000 too once I'm completely happy with it'.

 

In your photo of the connection to the main shaft, am I reading correctly that the white pvc pipe has made in NZ on it? So we do make some stuff here. Well I'll be damned.

D4G

On 10/30/2023 at 10:00 AM, phrunt said:

They've made them slower to charge as it's better for the battery, fast charging can shorten the life of the battery.  They've done the same with the Manticore, very slow to charge.

This article is good explaining a few things about lithium's including why storage at full capacity is bad, it basically shortens the life of the battery gradually holding less and less of a charge.

How to store lithium based batteries – BatteryGuy.com Knowledge Base

 

Must be the same for electric vehicles too as they say the slow home charger is better for the battery life than the fast public charging stations. Also I read that only charging to 80% is also better for the battery.

D4G 

2 hours ago, Redz said:

Combine this with an EMI filter and change out the amplifier (which is very susceptible to emi) on the stock battery for a lithium battery with amplifier, and you can run much higher gain and much higher stabilizer = much more depth sensitivity

Woody even made an EMI filter that I ran on my GP3000. I swear it worked as I detected in a high EMI area very close to a small town & cell phone tower & also suffered from solar influence on clear sunny days. The reason I say I swear it worked is that it quietened down my detector instantly & I found more gold. Can't ask for more than that despite being told by some ML disciples that it was just snake oil. The truth for me was in my results. Enough said.  I also did the ground balancing push button mod on the handle of my 3000. Surprise surprise, the same thing happened from ML on the release of 3500 & all other gpx's after that.

D4G

21 hours ago, Aureous said:

The GP Extreme-> GP3500 were all just modifications to the same board and the GPX4000-> GPX5000 were also all (almost) just modifications to the same board.But since the demise of the 5000, their outlook has certainly changed. I think Steve said that a lightened and modded version of the 5000 , sold C. US$2,000 would be a massive seller....so ML don't have to stretch budgets to create a worthwhile detector.The GPX series has already made its $$ (the 4500 is the record holder for the biggest selling PI in history) and doesn't need to recoup any development costs. Add sub-boards for Voltage front end gain, frequency change selector and some upgraded timings (all just code of course) and updated, superior components and voila! Most of the post-development hard work has already been by Woody, Ismael and Mick.

I remember when the SD2000 first came out & there were people tripping over each other getting one. That detector started a gold rush with the big deep gold it was finding, being able to punch through the mineralisation. Even using the mineralisation to get the depth. I remember the shock horror from people when only a few months later ML released the 2100. That caused un uproar from those that had just purchased the 2000. ML responded by saying that in future upgrades can be added to earlier models. How right they were, but of course they didn't do it to an existing owners earlier model detector. You had to buy the new one. Bit like ML promising to make a 10" coil for the Zed. That never happened either. They lied & said it couldn't be done. Funny how X coils came out with not only a 10" but also an 8" from what I have seen.

D4G 

On 10/28/2023 at 12:20 AM, erfanpermanoon said:

What is the best device and method to find ancient objects in high depths? (above 2 meters) in Persia?

Can you guide me please?

. 

An excavator, but no guarantees. Just blind stabbing.

D4G 

1 hour ago, Swegin said:

Who are you asking?

 

I think he is asking the detectors to get/give back to him with their mods.

Funny how back in the day Woody was given a hard time about his mods, being mocked by the Minelab disciples who believed that Minelab were the gods & how could any body else improve their detectors. Well, as time has gone by we have come to see Minelabs business model. Why improve an existing detector with a mod or two when ML can release a whole new detector with those mods for a whole new high end price. Mining the miners.

D4G

1 hour ago, Allen in MT said:

I have had the big Minelab's, the Garrets, Whites and Fisher detectors and I keep coming back to the reliable Fisher Gold Bug 2 and I would guess it has found 90% of my gold total. The one pictured was with the GB2 in tailing piles in Idaho and is my biggest. It is 5.56oz

Nice. I have a soft spot for the GB2 as well & it still gets the occasional work out. I love its little bullet proof sniper coil.

D4G

On 10/19/2023 at 9:41 AM, Gerry in Idaho said:

MXT 300 helped me find quite a bit of nice size gold back in the day.  When compared to an EQ-800/EQ-900, I'll take the newer technology detector. Multi IQ, 100% waterproof, lighter weight and better at certain specimens/invisible gold...vs MXT.  But boy, was the MXT back in the day, a true gold grabber for those of us who learned how to use it.  Actually quite an easy detector and much so more than a GMT along with better depth on bigger gold than GMT.  Not true on small picker nuggets, the GMT shines through and also on invisible gold vs MXT.

Hi Gerry. Thank you for that. Funny enough, I have a GMT & a Goldmaster 4B. Collector items now I guess. I had forgotten I had those making my Whites collection of three detectors along with the MXT 300. Probably not common detectors in New Zealand. Even back in their day. Gold Search Australia were agents for Whites. I never got the TDI as I was then on the Minelab train with their PI's & have not looked back.

D4G

Interesting. I was surprised at the response the 19" (dog) coil got on the 7000. Shame he didn't try the 14"DD on the 6000. I guess the 17" got nothing so I suppose the 14" DD wouldn't have got anything either, so no surprises the 11" or 12x7 NF didn't either. Might have been nice to try a standard 5000 to give a comparison to the modded one. Or even some X coils on the Zed & 5000.

I noticed too when he was ground balancing over some ground noise he did it over the top of where the noise was, but he never ground balanced over the top of the target response but always to the side of it. Why would that be, fare of balancing it out?

D4G

Maybe it needs a trip to the doctor.

D4G

Are they slabs of schist? Possibly glacially transported from far away & not of local rock (erratics) along with the gold, & dumped when the ice retreated. 

D4G

For an NZ$9000 detector it should come with two batteries. 6 hours detecting off one battery isn't good enough when out in the field. Especially when in remote areas that takes time to get in to & you want to make the most of a long day detecting.

D4G

I would get a new coil if it were me. I don't see the point of spending the time & effort of doing the repair work on an old coil cable when the coil is most likely not performing at its best anyway. These days you need every advantage possible to get some gold in your poke & a new, later release coil is a good start.

D4G

9 hours ago, mn90403 said:

People that are new and relatively new don't know where to look.  haha

Termed beginners luck by some as beginners have no preconceived idea of where gold should be, or most likely should be. They will swing their coil in the most random places that those of us that "know better" where the most likely places gold should be, wouldn't think for a second to try those spots. Ha ha.

Good score & good on you. Gold is where you find it.

D4G

I would be more inclined to replace the coils completely. There are much better options in coils these days. Especially considering the age of the original ML coils & are most likely past their useful use by date with wear & tear & falsing etc. 

D4G

Hi Gerry. You have truly found some stunning pieces. It is a credit to you. I must have missed the ones stuck in your gob.😂

Would you still rate the MXT 300 for detecting bucket dredge tailings. Or would the Nox 800 be a better bet with the larger coil?

Cheers

D4G