UT Dave

I've no idea when it will actually ship, of course.

But when it's done and in production, it will ship.  Whenever that is.  Sitting on completed inventory when there are dealer orders open and in need of being filled and other projects and products already queued up behind the Manticore would make zero business sense.  At any time of year.  Fill the orders and take the money is what you do.  Inventory on dealers shelves is the dealers problem.  But I doubt that will be a problem early on, pre-orders should suck up most of the initial shipments nearly immediately.

I'm hoping for Christmas.  But betting against it.

- Dave

11 hours ago, Gerry in Idaho said:

An hour meter.  You mean like running hours?  My truck shows how many running hours?  That is kind of interesting concept but then those of us who hunt many hours and then want to sell our old detector for the new model Manticore, we'd have to swing it backwards for many hours to get the hour meter to show "low miles" meaning we get more $$$.

We could have a contest to see who hits the 1st 1000 hours on their Manticore and what all did they dig?

Is kind of interesting thought though.  

Exactly what I meant.  A run time meter.  

Swinging backwards reminds me of a couple of pickup trucks I leased years ago.  I put big tires on them to get around better out in the desert and such.  Did not correct the speedos.  Did not have to pay for the several thousand miles over the lease agreement I put on them.  😂

- Dave

I actually wouldn't mind an hour meter.  I won't miss it either, though.

But a clock...  No.  Detecting time is like fishing time, or hunting time.  No clocks.

- Dave

Already on the list with you Gerry.  Hope you get a bunch of them in the first shipment!

I'm wanting the 8x5.5 coil too.  Hope they are available soon after the Manticore ships.

- Dave Affleck

I've mixed feelings on the Manticore release.  The fact I'm buying one, not withstanding.

The lack of real info from Minelab, combined with the embargo on early independent first hand reports.  Result is there just isn't a whole lot of meat and potatoes on this beast yet.   

Which, means to me, really, compared to the D2 and Legend "launches", this one has been actually very quiet (so far).  The "hype machine" isn't really generating much buzz, compared to the last two blitzes, I think?

I lament the lack of solid info from Minelab for something I've already ordered.

I rejoice the lack of youtube testers (those early "independent" first hand reports) krap-posting everywhere and turning boards into non-stop Jerry Springer purse fights.

I wish Minelab would be more forthcoming with hard documentation of features operation.  I'm relieved Minelab didn't send out early test units to people who shouldn't really be entrusted with such.

- DAA

I'm not all that interested in any videos, so far.

What I'd really like to see, soon, is a user manual.  I can get more out of that than almost any video ever made.

There's only a couple of "online guys" I pay much attention to when it comes to how machines perform, in my typical dirt and hunting situations.  Both have posted on this thread saying they aren't going to be early adopters.  But, I got in line for one myself, awhile ago.  As Cal said, take the Pepsi challenge for myself.

At the end of the day, that's all that matters - my take, on my own terms.  Not any videos or forum posts.  I'll have one of the first to hit the USA shore, and I'll see for myself.

As Mr. McClendon pointed out, I won't likely post much if anything about my thoughts when I do get it though.  Unless it's just super straightforward factual stuff - my opinions can stay my own.

- Dave

If the product is ready to ship, start recouping development costs ASAP.  The cost is sunk.  Time value is ticking.  Economy doesn't really alter that decision?

Budget for projects still in development?  Different deal altogether.  Devil would be in the details and outcome could go either way.

- Dave

So...  I don't actually know anything about this.

But, I have a pretty new Nox 800.  And I have definitely noticed that around town, EMI is worse this spring than it was just last fall.  Why?  Don't know.  Some have said perhaps it's the proliferation of 5G stuff going up everywhere.  Maybe.  I can't say.

I'm not just imagining that I have to turn down the sensitivity a few notches lower, than I did six months ago, in the same places though.  Just two days ago, I ran through every frequency, noise cancelling at each one, and couldn't go above 16 sensitivity without the constant audible chuckle of EMI.  As it turned out, at that site, 40kHz is the only single frequency that would even let me run that high.  

Anyway...  I really know nothing about this.  But just on the face of it, considering what a universal issue EMI is, how many people have been trying to deal with it, I'd be flat out amazed to learn that just getting a new battery could make a meaningful difference.

- Dave

21 minutes ago, F350Platinum said:

Nice finds UT Dave,

I've been detecting for nearly two years now in lots of old places but Barber coins still elude me. We have no parks here however. 😀 Great stuff, and congrats on the silver and gold! That 800 is killing it. 👍

I'll trade you my Barbers for that half a half 😆.

- Dave

3 hours ago, Lost Scout said:

Probably off a head stall. Cool finds.

 

I do believe that's it!  Thanks!

- Dave

9 hours ago, JCR said:

Are they the right size to be saloon bottle labels? "Mon Choix" sounds more appealing than "Watered Down".

A little on the small side for that, maybe?  But yeah, "Mon Choix" does sound better than "soap added for foam".  Thinking along those lines, cigar box label?

1 hour ago, strick said:

Nice barber...the silver piece possibly from decorative trim off a mirror frame etc? Did you dig the Mon Coix tag with the Xp Deus 2 🙂 nice assortment you got there. 

Strick 

Definitely could be something like a mirror frame.  My buddy thinks it came off a piece of horse tack.  Buckaroos were known to get fancy with their horses sometimes.  Me, I just don't know? 

I see what you did there with Mon Choix 😆.  

- Dave

36 minutes ago, abenson said:

Nice bunch of relics. Place looks familiar! Congratulations on the Barber.

I bet it does look familiar 😁.  Although, not to very many.

41 minutes ago, JCR said:

All very nice finds & a beautiful area to enjoy. It does look like good coyote country.

Thanks!  Used to be world class coyote country.  Prolonged drought and giant wildfires have decimated the habitat though.  It's a far, far cry from what it used to be.  I've called as many as 25+ in a day out there in the good old days.  Now, 5 in a day is doing real good.  Still, I got a few coyotes to talk to me from camp each evening.

- Dave

That, is just amazing!

- Dave

I use a Worksharp Ken Onion edition, with the optional grinding attachment.  A Harbor Freight 1" belt grinder works too, but the smaller Worksharp tool is easier to control the amount of material being removed and doesn't heat up the blade as fast as the regular belt grinder does.

I don't go for razor sharp on it though.  Just a bit thinner/sharper edge than as issued.

- Dave

Trees can be a good tell, for sure.

Saturday I was hunting a fairly new soccer park, too new for silver coins.  I remember when it was built, about 40 years ago.  We used it as a motocross track before that.

Nothing very deep on the soccer fields, under the sod/soil only about 5" deep was a base layer of gravel.  But along the east edge of the park, are some old trees.  It's a part of the park that looks particularly unappealing and doesn't see much traffic, so not necessarily an obvious place to hunt.  But, I know those trees were there long before the park was built, they were big mature trees 40 years ago. So, not getting anything but clad and tiring of Corona caps and aluminum trash digging low numbers hoping for jewelry on the soccer field, I wandered over there to the old trees.

Different colored dirt.  Re adjusted GB.  And no gravel layer underneath, getting much deeper targets.  Pulled a couple of old shotshell butts from 8".  Few other non-ferrous junk.  Then a '64 Rosie from 8" deep!  In a "new" park.  Had to be a drop from before the park was built.  Old trees led me to it.  Not the first time old trees have put me on something good.

- Dave

I've been managing software engineers for a couple of decades.

First thing any dev wants to do with any legacy codebase is re-write it.  Often, with good reason.  It sounds like the technical debt of the V3 code is just too much to overcome without a complete re-write.  Which, usually doesn't make financial sense just on the code side.  Toss in the hardware obsolescence, and yeah, I can't see any business saying "oh heck yeah, let's take that old stuff and re-do it all".

Just not how tech works.

- Dave

On 1/3/2022 at 2:58 PM, F350Platinum said:

Oh yeah, I find tons of lead "Buckys"  both old and new. 😀 Check out my trash when I post it, don't want to miss those Tombacs.

Do they make sintered stainless buckshot? The two balls were in the ground for a long time. I don't hunt, so I don't know the types of shot. I do have a 12ga, but it's for another reason 🙄 I do know military breaching rounds are steel in a binder.

I don't "think" anyone uses stainless buckshot, even less likely sintered.  But, I only think that, I don't know it for fact.  I use pure tungsten shot, which is shiny like stainless, but that doesn't look like tungsten.  There are varieties of alloyed heavier than lead pellets which are sintered, too, but that doesn't look like any of them I've ever seen either.

Nickel plated lead buckshot is common.  Ringing 10-11, that sounds possibly lead too.

If, that's buckshot, my wild theory on the facets, would be a duplex load of buck and much smaller shot pellets.  Buckshot showing deformation from being surround by smaller pellets in the payload.  That's a lot of maybes strung together though, I wouldn't necessarily place any bets on my own theory 😁.

- Dave

20 hours ago, Tom_in_CA said:

Re. the type shank on Brian's silver button (which is same as on my flat plain button).  According to this chart, they would be the type A shank.  Which , as you can see, is 1700s.  Nice !

Saving this for future, err, current - going for bag of buttons now - use.

Thanks!

- Dave

Very cool!  And paint me jealous - snow and frozen ground here.

If that is a gun part, and I've no real idea if it is or not, but if it is, I'd guess firing pin.  Based on the small protrusion at the end of the long skinny part.  The other, large end, would be unlike any firing pin I'm familiar with though.

- Dave

Those are some cool as heck finds!

- Dave

Very, very cool hunt, all around!

- Dave

15 hours ago, maxxkatt said:

 And if you get one or two settings wrong, you in effect detune your 800 and make it much less efficient. I had to learn that lesson the hard, hard way. Wasted a lot of my hunting time with a detuned detector.

 

What was the tip off that your machine was detuned?  Which settings were off?  How much off did it take, for the machine to be much less efficient?

I'm not sure I'd recognize a detuned machine.

I'm going to make more use of the profile button, for in the field, on the spot A/B testing - changing a single setting at a time.  See what patterns I can discern over time.  Yesterday, in a trashy park, I used it to instantly switch recovery speed between 4 and 6 with all other settings the same.  Noticeably different and I think I do prefer the faster speed in the denser trash.  Find of the day was a small .925 ring in dense trash around a picnic table.  Also pulled a couple of deep wheats.  But no silver coins.

I'll have to remember to hit the frequency button and try the 4hz on spots like that, just to see.  The only times I have ever left multi is to mitigate EMI.

- Dave

Thanks again for the help gentlemen!  I appreciate it.

- Dave