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Hey Guys, I've been detecting for close to 40 years now, and I wanted to pass on my recommendation for a really deep-seeking and stable detector: the Tarsaci MDT 8000. It's great to have a machine that provides a good 2-3 inches of additional depth over my older detectors. I'm using the 11"x9" DD coil. Earlier this month I located 3 Civil War infantry coat buttons in one hole (ranging from 9"-12" in depth), two Civil War cuff buttons at 6" each, and an 1880 cartridge belt buckle at 15". Yesterday I took it back out and found half a dozen rimfire shell casings at 4"-8" in depth, and a Minie ball at 10". Not that I want any more of these, but it's also great at finding rivets, some at up to 5" deep. Most of these areas had sandy soil, which thankfully made the digging easy. It took some getting used to the way I use it in "MIX" mode, since you hear both good and bad targets alike. Fortunately the good targets have a nice ringing tone to them. The ground balance is easy to set and very effective; I have not used the salt balance yet. Once I do, that will open up even more areas of detecting. I'm very happy to see this forum--I hope to pick up some good advice on using my new machine. Good hunting!

Yes, Killer Bs made all the difference on the Tarsacci for me. Glad you’ve made a breakthrough on the AQ.

This set I am using, Tony Eisenhower made for me. Tony@idigbeaches.com. I am working on a non-waterproof set with JBL headphones that I hope to have done before I leave for the beach next week. It will be an interesting experiment to see what works best on the wet sand, because there is no way I am going into the water in January. I can honestly say that Tony's headphones are superior to the stock headphones that came with my AQ. It really surprised me how much a quality pair of headphones helps a metal detector perform. I see it in the Tarsacci and I am now seeing it in the AQ. Isn't it amazing that we spend $$$$ on a metal detector and stick with the free pair of headphones that came with the detector.

Seems like the Tarsacci is running out of steam in the face of all the new competition. Yeah, I know some of you guys love them. But what buzz they had seems to be about gone. Thoughts?

I ran the Vista X some this afternoon as I had planned a few posts above. It has been a few months since I have had it out on a real site. The first thing that surprised me is how unaffected it is by the EMI I have been contending with on this site with SMF detectors. I had forgotten this great trait of the X. The Concentric really does help tame the falsing from all the Iron. What it seems to allow is for the Disc to catch the signal better & quicker. You still get an initial high false, but the Disc kicks in quicker & better to cut the tone. The DDs will too but not as well or as quickly. The 8" Concentric separates very well but the Super Six & 8"XS are better. The Concentric makes up for this by blending the tone easier on a mixed or co located/masked target. This is where you get the intelligence/nuance of the audio. It works very well once you learn it but it can be fatiguing after a while in heavy Iron. That is where the newer SMF comes in. Both the Legend & Rutus Versa are so much calmer in the same heavy iron in SMF if set up right. To me it is somewhat of a trade off. When I'm down to a worked over site that only has iffy targets left, the Vista X can call out enough good in some of those signals to dig. Sometimes it is a deep wire thin small or bent nail but often it is a small non ferrous target, Often a nice one. The Versa can do the same to some extent but I haven't learned it fully yet. Instead of blending the target audio like the Vista X, it seems to reach on down into the ferrous range to pull out good targets. The Tarsacci does this in it's own way. You get that initial false high tone, then the signal processing catches up on subsequent passes. The Legend is more sure in the Iron, even with a very low Iron Filter/Stability setting, therefore it runs smooth & quiet but it won't pull up those iffy good targets as deeply. All 3 are great machines with enough difference in the "How they perform" to make each useful & interesting. Between them I dug some interesting targets this afternoon. Buttons, overall snaps, small brass & a nice small Al Token "Good For 10 Cents in Merchandise ?.V. Smith & Son New Baden Tex"

Rutus released new software for the Versa & I updated my unit Saturday 12/02. The Wi Fi update process was very easy & efficient. The new software is NC, version 2.44. The NC stands for New Concept, The detector's behavior & performance in Iron is on a different level than before. It is hard for me to gage the level of improvement yet. The Versa's iron handling & unmasking was very, very good before NC. It is now even better but I have not run it enough yet to know how or why. There is something very different going on. The update included quite a few new setting adjustments. Some are aimed at Iron/mineral performance, quite a few are audio related. The unit is now much more flexible & customizable for both the operator & ground/site conditions. It will take some time for me to get a good handle on this revised platform. Meanwhile, I have about 5 hours in my test gardens and 4+ hours hunt time on the NC 2.44. Both hunts where on my favorite red dirt mineral site with the history back to the 1840s. I have hunted this site for almost 4 years with every machine I have. In fact I purchased the Vista X & Tarsacci for this & similar sites. I have done very well in spite of the tough conditions. I posted above my first hunts here with the Versa & introductory software V1.74. The new NC is going to make the Versa what I had hoped for, if I can master it. The photos are the real keepers of 25 additional Non ferrous targets. Also some decent Iron relics to clean up. Only a few bigger/bent nails & flat iron pieces dug learning the new target response. All the iron was deep. Most of the Non ferrous was either small( or very small ) or had some good depth. Most sounded somewhat iffy. ALL had plenty of iron in the hole. Every one was from a hard hunted area. There is a lot more testing to do, and hunting. The button is cuff size, Boy Scout. Lipstick tube & Common Sense cuff sleeve holder(used by Card sharks to hideout a card) Patent date Dec 29. 1885. DD23 coil, Park mode, Multifrequency FL(low conductor}. mid range(5-6}Reaction speed, Disc 0, Iron Filter mostly 0.

Glad you explained the Tarsacci, yes Deus was and still is a great product and having used Deus 2 it is an upgrade. Experience I have and my experience has taught that one can take a 1983 Tesoro Saber and still find coins behind other machines and vice versa. Yes target id my have helped with processors but your eye are still the best discriminatory "Monte" and by that he definitely meant you don't truly 100% know what it is until it's recovered because every machine averages and sends the ID accordingly for you to decern

You are correct that induction balance detectors depth capabilities have basically plateaued but it has nothing to do with FCC restrictions or transmit power limitations because even the most powerful PI or Multifrequency detector comes nowhere close to exceeding any FCC power limitations. Depth, at this point, is solely limited by limits of the physical principles under which the induction balance detectors work and the abilities of the digital signal processors to tease out information from the weak induced magnetic signals from the targets. I have a Tarsacci and have used it in the hellish mineralized soil in the fields near Culpeper Virginia. It is indeed deep for a non-PI detector on relic targets and will give you a good idea if your target is ferrous or non-ferrous but that's about it. It's target ID processing is highly unstable in mineralized soil and its limited audio makes it basically unusable other than on a salt beach or if you just want to differentiate ferrous from non-ferrous. Forget about using it in an environment with multiple non-ferrous junk targets like can slaw or pulltabs. While not quite as deep as the Tarsacci in hot soil, the Deus 2 has a much more stable ID and far superior audio and I have had more success with it than the Tarsacci under similar conditions despite the Tarsacci's slight depth advantage. Of course, in Culpeper the Pulse Induction machine is the preferred choice for maximum depth under such soil conditions, but there are plenty of situations where the Deus 2 will outperform a PI (machine gun iron or thick modern trash) simply because the undesirable target field density overwhelms the machine. Anyway, thanks for chiming in. Spend some time perusing what has been posted on the site and you'll find that the experienced folks here, like Jeff McClendon, understand that the machine is not the end-all and be-all when it comes to detecting. Number one is location (if you are on a site with no desirable targets, even Harry Potter's magic wand can't help you). No matter what detector you have, the best thing you can do is learn it inside and out, understand its limitations as well as its strengths and then exploit the strengths and compensate for the limitations. A detector's depth capabilities used to be the centerpiece of a detector's worth. That is no longer the case today. As mentioned previously, induction balance detectors have basically reached the practical limit of their depth capability. Additional, technological advances in signal processing and coils will likely not provide further significant improvement. However, what has improved is signal processing speed and capability and refined and affordable simultaneous multiple frequency transmission schemes which has improved the ability to separate adjacent targets and to more accurately ID non-ferrous keepers amongst the ferrous and non-ferrous junk. Speed and versatility (ability to adjust capabilities on the fly and to be able to select either single or multifrequency as appropriate) of modern detectors give beginners and pros alike more tools in their detecting toolkit and, if utilized properly (see the second bullet above) the potential for better results than with legacy and new detectors lacking this versatility. Put another way, it's not a matter of whether multifrequency is better than single frequency - its being able to dial up either at the push of a button, as needed.

The Fisher F75 and Gold Bug Pro/F19 read 4 to full bar mineralization here in the Denver area and most places west of here until you cross the Continental Divide. Magnetite is really bad. Deus and Deus 2 mineralization meters are mostly full here but they seem to read a little higher than some. Greelely, east of Fort Collins, Loveland and Aurora, the ground conditions become milder pretty quick. Most any detector will do OK on the eastern plains of Colorado. The recently made SMFs with 11" coils will hit 10 to 12" deep US coins in the more iron mineralized dirt in my area. IDs are very good down to 10" and rock solid shallower than that. Fisher F70, F75 and F19 lose IDs at 4" depth. They call coin sized aluminum trash, pull tabs, US nickels and smaller lead like 22 lr slugs and shell casings as silver targets due to up averaging if they are deeper than 4". All non-ferrous targets have iron responses much past 8" if those detectors will even hit them. I have dug 14" deep 3 ringers and Sharps bullets on the eastern plains east of Limon Colorado using the Equinox that had correct target IDs. Deus 1, Garrett AT and Fisher F75 users were present when that happened and their detectors got either iron or nothing on those targets and the ground there was moderate to mild iron mineralization. Those work the best here as far as getting 4" depth with decent target ID. All the rest do a little to a lot worse as far as overall depth and up averaging/down averaging target IDs. No, it is not absolutely necessary to use pulse induction detectors for USA gold prospecting. The Equinox models, Deus 2, Legend and Manticore are excellent to outstanding gold prospecting detectors. Their simultaneous multi frequency technology can handle most ground conditions that make single frequency gold prospecting specific detectors overload and their SMF frequency mixture includes a high frequency around 40 kHz which makes hitting sub 0.1 gram targets no problem. Hitting sub 0.009 gram targets is very doable with these detectors. They also keep some great discrimination, notching and tone features available in their gold prospecting modes that pulse induction detectors cannot compete with on small gold detecting. I really have zero use for a Tarsacci or a Blisstool. I would consider a Rutus Atrex if they were available here for sale and for repair.

Colorado area I live in Ft.Collins working the pipeline and only had access to a brand new White's QXT Pro and stock coil. I was impressed with it for coin hunts in parks around Greeley, Loveland, Ft. Collins area didn't blow me away like it did back home in WV but it worked. The lady that had it never used it but a few times and I worked with her husband and Ruby succumbed to cancer and her Hoot sold it to me for $200 looks brand new everything. Any way I never ever mentioned Gold hunting and stated that. Those are impulse machines and GP 7000 machine highly specialized. But I think you would be a good candidate to get a hold of a Tarsacci and see if it doesn't better for you then you think. I would think someone in that club has one or write the guy and see if the inventor will loan you one, never hurts to ask. If you are coin hunting what is a deep coin with multi vs single frequency? I'm just curious wish I had more time to detect instead of work when I lived out there. I have read and watched impressive video of the Tarsacci going deeper then the current crop and did you ever get to try a Blisstool? I never did.

Agreed, but until government regulations are lifted for transmit power nothing had been a complete game changer. But I'm going to get the Deus 2, thanks XP for convincing all of us that we were one and done by just updating what we bought wrong, updates yes but always going to make sure as sales plummet time to design the software so it doesn't work with what we sold you. But I do like the looks of the new control box XP. I hear you on missing old detectors and that's why I have such a hard time letting some go just because of the memories of past hunts or the down right simplicity of the unit. Question have you used the Tarsacci MDT suppose to be a deep son of a gun in mineralized soil according to Keith and others.

Larry Hogston has posted some excellent basic training videos on the Tarsacci MDT 8000 on his You Tube channel "Saving Local History".

Yep, that is how I have set up my MXT, Vista X & Tarsacci. Works great.

In my haste, made a bunch of mistakes filming, I almost scrapped the video but instead decided to add subtitles to my errors. Due to the vast amount of settings, more bottle cap reject tests are needed w this D2…. Aaron

Do You Still use Tarsacci I hunt in extreme mineral and Deus 2 is the only detector to perform better am between tarsacci or Deus hf coil

This one is for the cache and relic hunters.... There is an old camping spot I know of that makes an ideal testing ground for detectors. It's ultra trashy, being a popular recreation and hunting area for many, many centuries. People's of all ages have left behind every imaginable item - arrowheads, ancient stone tools, old wagon parts, stoves, bottles, engine parts - a cornucopia of items lost or abandoned. Last summer I finally got around to testing the Tarsacci in this challenging area. It's an alluvial fan where two creeks join, only about three acres in size. Every spring the snow above the canyon melts, which brings down a new layer of silt and gravel, covering up the items left behind from the previous year. The metal trash layer is about 4 feet thick, dating from about 1870 to the present day. There is a paved road that goes right alongside of it, and many detectorists have had a try on it over the last half century or so. They usually give up on it on account of the bewildering amount of worthless items detected on every swing. In the photo are just the bullet casings from a 10 ft. sq. area. It's so bad all you can do is laugh about it. This place has been shot to hell from every angle...I only had time to spend a few hours here on this visit, so I decided just to lift the coil(11"x9") and see if I could find some larger items underneath the surface trash. To clear the bullet casings I had to lift the coil about 15", which eliminated most of the small objects. This way only the large items would be detected, and there were lots of those. First up was a solid signal with a TID of 16, ground was 685, 6.4khz. I lifted the coil up to 24" before the signal faded. Definitely a large item. It was a tin sign, about 6" x 10", laying flat, 10" down. So that's about 34" with an 11" coil. So depth was about 3X coil size. Not bad! Next up was another strong signal. TID of 18, ground 700, 6.4khz. Again, I lifted the coil further up about 18", until the signal was gone. Found a crushed aluminum food container 18" down. So that's 36". It was approx. 4" x 6" in size. Irregular shape too. It disintegrated while trying to pull it out. In the pic you can see it at the bottom edge of the hole. What was strange is it didn't pinpoint dead center. It took me over an hour to enlarge the hole wide enough to locate the target. But you know, that's really good depth. Like, GPX kind of good! In all, I located about a dozen aluminum cans, some wire, and a couple of larger iron items I couldn't identify. It was a lot of work, but worth it because I had no idea an IB type of detector could do this with a standard sized coil. Much kudos to Dimitar - his detector definitely has an edge when it comes to larger items buried at depth. My next project will be to bury a 10 oz. silver bar and see how the MDT 8000 compares to the GPX 5000, in really hot ground. I know just the place. Should be interesting....

Check Tom Dankowsky Forum you have a few pages about it. I have D2, Manticore, and Tarsacci, and all devices are suppressed by EMI almost in the same way. Only Nexus and DeepTech analog devices work without any issues.

I have 2 pair of Killer Bs, Wasp & Hornet. They are excellent. I believe they & the Sun Ray Golds are very similar. They have a stereo/mono mode switch so they are compatible with most all detectors. They have very little Bass tone so work best for me on the Vista X & Tarsacci. The AT Max, MXT, F5 & Anfibio need more Bass, so the lower ohm Garrett MS-2s work best for them. I do not have any Minelab machines. They have a website & you can contact the owner, John Smith for advice. Colonial Metal Detectors also sells them, ask for Richard. Either one can ship Overseas to you.

I still use mine, but only for water hunting. Manticore just cannot handle black sand like the Tarsacci. There are many places where the Tarsacci or a PI are the only options, so I keep it around.

showing my tarsacci foils settings, and how it can detect a 14 k ring under foils , Normally if you had disc on foils you can not hit another target under it but the Tarsacci can . and can be used to great effect in those foils laden sites

thanks fellow diggers, Today i was looking for Gold with the Tarsacci- i worked on some settings for it. and came up with a setting for finding Gold rings wich ignors small foils and yet hits hard on small gold rings, as deep as 8 inches deep , and gets normal size Gold at 8 and 9 inches deep . when i was working out the settings i found the pull tabs where coming in 2 inches deeper than the Gold Rings so i found the sweat spot that actually dropped the depth of the pull tabs and increased the depth of the gold rings so that they now are both comming in at the same depth, this is the setting on the Tarsacci i used for todays hunt , of course i found no Gold but just tabs and some larger can slaw but the small foils Gone , and in a school basseball field that is a big deal , now the tarsacci will not just be silent on the small foils , it will see right thrue then and hit a gold ring and i mean way below the foil Tarsacci Gold ring setting 5 gain, threshold -1 to -3 black sand on , salt balance 47, and using 18khz , and by the way, please share your setting for finding Gold rings.

The story I’m about to tell you may be the same thing with Tarsacci. This old cowboy had been in this bar drinking all day long and was higher than a kite . Two of his friends that’s if you want to call them that said let’s go turn Joe’s saddle around on his horse. Well they did and was waiting for a big laugh when Joe left. It was around midnight when Joe had his fill and out that barroom door he went. By then everyone in the bar knew what his friends had done and all was having a laugh about it. All of a sudden Joe came staggering back in the bar hollowing that someone had cut his horses head off and he’s still alive.Someone in the bar said Joe if someone cut your horses up off he can’t be alive. Joe said I know he’s still alive because I stuck my finger in his windpipe and he’s still breathing. Maybe this is what’s wrong with Tarsacci in someone could have turned Dimitars saddle around on Tarsacci and no I didn’t stick my finger in his windpipe to see if he’s still breathing. I’ll leave that to Dimitar, Chuck

Aaron I know you did like you said long time ago but I was still in hopes he would. I really don’t see Dimitar coming out with anything. I think that should cover it all with my above statement. Aaron when you were a dealer and you making the videos that you did that made Tarsacci. I’ve yet to see one video that Dimitar made on it . It’s like he could care less It’s just too many new detectors that’s coming out that show they want your business and I’m willing to give it to them. Detectors and cars have something in common in if a car looked the same from year to year it would get to the point they wouldn’t be selling. The same goes with a detector in you got to add a bell and whistle now and then to keep sales up . Chuck

As explained elsewhere my metal detecting is winding down from my glory days. I will never quit detecting, but it is a more casual close to home thing going forward. With that in mind I just don't need the dozen detectors I usually have had banging around the house for most of the last couple decades. I had already weeded things down pretty well but job one was to stop getting new detectors. The last new detector I added to my mix was the XP Deus 2 a couple years ago. After disposing of other models, like the Tarsacci for instance, I was left with the following: Minelab Equinox Garrett Axiom XP Deus 2 White's DFX For what I do I'm pretty satisfied with the Axiom as a general purpose PI so that's settled. The DFX sports a Bigfoot coil, and I own the machine as much to run the coil as the other way around, so it is not going anywhere. In fact it might become my most used VLF soon. So what to do with the Equinox 800 and Deus 2? The Manticore was really looking like a replacement for both. I can't really get enthused about the XP way of things. People rave about the light weight being a real factor for them, but I don't consider weight to be an issue for me with any detector weighing under three pounds. At the end of the day coils are a big deal for me, and I don't like proprietary limited coil options. Wireless coils leave me cold. People can argue with me all they want but they are wasting their time. I like wired coils, and I lean to detectors with third party coil options. So it is the coils that decided it for me. Minelab took too long with Manticore coils and now I just don't care any more. I'm also peeved XP has withheld the 5x10 coil from Deus 2 owners. My Equinox 800 I have a 6" round coil, the Coiltek 5x10, the stock 11" coil, and the Minelab 12x15 coil. XP has nothing similar to offer in way of coils. Nor does the Manticore. Plus I have custom rods for my Equinox perfect for both compact backpacking and for beach use. I even have an S rod that I have yet to use. The icing on the cake is a set of custom Tony Eisenhower underwater headphones I really like. Would I get rid of all that and keep the Deus 2? No. Would I trade all that for the Manticore as it exists right now? No. So I think I have after ages finally weeded it down to three detectors. The Deus 2 will find a new home. And I am left with... Garrett Axiom - my most used detector for gold prospecting and beach detecting Minelab Equinox 800 with full accessory set - do it all coin, relic, jewelry, gold nuggets, you name it White's DFX with Bigfoot - Park jewelry use almost exclusively Maybe, just maybe the Manticore will tempt me again in a year or so, once the software bugs and coil drought get straightened out. But after 50 years I feel like I have got off the new detector merry go round. There really is something to be said for using a machine you know inside and out, and fact is my Equinox talks to me. The Deus 2 still speaks French and frankly I just don't care to make the effort to learn French. Too old to learn new tricks? Maybe. The main thing for me is I won't waste any more time thinking about this machine or that machine and instead just focus purely on using what I have to best effect. Compared to what I started with 50 years ago I'm drenched in fabulous technology I once only dreamed of, so now matter how I look at it I'm thrilled with the detectors I have now. Minelab Equinox 800 with 6" coil and telescoping rod White's DFX with Bigfoot coil Garrett Axiom with 7x11 coil Equinox 800 with 12x15 coil and steveg counterweighted rod The perfect pair? Axiom 7x11 and Equinox telescoping 5x10

It’s been a while that I’ve been on the Aaron's Tarsacci forum on tarsaccisales.com and now I can’t access it. I’m wondering if we still have one there. Maybe someone out there has the answer, Chuck Link to forum (still broken as of 1/13/22)