mcjtom

3rd Clarke's Law: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. I have the Vanquish 440 and while simple, it has enough controls for me to fiddle with and worry as a result if I could have set it a little better. I recently had a chance to use Vanquish 340 and it was refreshing: just a few choices of volume, sensitivity, and discrimination - and it detects and IDs well! An analogy to cameras can be made: ISO, aperture, shutter speed, and focusing distance is all that matters technically, but that doesn't stop the cameras to have too many buttons and menus that makes taking a picture, let alone a good one, more complicated that it needs to be.

Could somebody point me out to a source of soil type maps that could be useful in getting a feel for the soil mineralisation useful in metal detecting? I realise that the relevant conditions may be localised and there are plenty of geological maps available, but I'm not sure what to look for. p.s. Another question are soil conditions in forests. Is there anything special about them metal-detecting wise?

He mentions that his 'invisible enemy' ceramic piece contains some iron, but it wouldn't be detectable as a target. But what is it and how does it mask the target in the ground already mineralized with magnetite?

Did anybody shed some light on it, out of curiosity?

Why reducing the recovery speed may be helpful in wet sand?

I know it's been some years ago, but just want to report that all three links seem broken. I was able to find Carl's eye-opening article here: https://bodhi3.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/coils.pdf

An ignorant question: for small gold nuggets, is their value strictly the value of the gold they contain or do they carry some premium for being a natural nugget or having a rare shape/composition or perhaps something else?

How did the conditions differ?

There are several discussions on the Vanquish on this forum: https://www.detectorprospector.com/search/?&q=Vanquish 540&search_and_or=and&sortby=relevancy The 'glitch' is a bit of a misnomer and it affects all Vanquish detectors. It has to do with a low ferrous signal (ID -9 to maybe -4) in certain soils and certain situations which are not caused by targets. There is an easy work around if that happens by notching out one or two of the lowest discrimination notches, as shown in the VDO below. You won't be able to use the horseshoe button in this case as it uses no discrimination, but you can save the all except the lowest one or two notches discrimination in the Custom mode and use that as a horseshoe. The modes differ mostly by the recovery speed and the default notching. The horseshoe button merely turns all the notches on using the mode you're in - the recovery speed doesn't change. I think that the Vanquish are excellent and fun detectors that should work fine in all but the most difficult grounds. There are several Vanquish users on this forum that use and appreciate the Vanquish series who are way more experienced that I am and may be able to comment some more (or correct me).

About two years ago I bought a Chinese Mental Detector for some $40 thinking they are all the same. Kind members of this forum quickly set me straight and I got Vanquish 440. By no means I'm experienced or even succesful, but I have a technical background and the interest and the time to read about metal detecting, ask questions, experiment with settings, and be happy swinging. And I think by now I know enough to appreciate the complexities involved in metal detecting. Now the problem: I've been asked, obviously being an expert :⁠-⁠), by a friend as to what fun detector to buy for his wife so that she could look for things mostly around their summer house in a forest in Europe (and maybe later elsewhere, like on a beach). To my eye the ground there is mild, but I don't really know. She probably doesn't want to look for anything in particular, just explore what may be under ground. The detector should be sufficiently easy to use so that she doesn't get discouraged at first and not super expensive as he is not sure if his wife would like the new hobby. The question I got was if the Xterra Pro was the right choice. He also looked at the Simplex Ultra. My answer was that the Vanquish 340 or 440 may not look as modern, but she may have a better luck with it as it may be simpler to set and more stable to operate and read. Am I wrong? Is there something else that I should have said?

Where would one start looking for information on past or potential gold deposits but in countries other than the US, for example in Thailand or elsewhere in SE Asia?

Perhaps sub-plots showing weird stories on how the finds actually got there in the first place could add some excitement to the game and broaden the scope?

https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/11/03/going-for-gold?_gl=1*mup04e*_ga*YW1wLXktTWMtYzlhOUlZc1RQM3VXTWxSZmc.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/bronze-age-jewelry-uncovered-in-carrot-field-in-switzerland-180983109/

BBC News - Medieval 'love motto' gold ring found near Frinton https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-67090627