Running The Equinox 800 In All Metal Single Tone At The Beach?

[Bill (S. CA)]

1 hour ago, midalake said:

How are the Horseshoe Mode "on" testers doing??? 

I'll probably get ripped for this but I elected not to go to the beach today and instead ran a Compass 77B Yukon at a very trashy old park.  Just for pure fun.  Yes I dug a mountain of old ring tabs. But I also dug several nickels and a 1964 silver dime.  And I had a blast.  Sometimes for me I like to step away from all of the tech just to clear my head.  Using an old detector does the trick for me.  All you do with the little beast is turn it on and adjust the tuning.

If any of you do try this, you will be astonished how many old, shallow low conductive trash targets are still in the ground.  Targets that on occasion could be something good, just like the three nickels I dug proved.

The beach is a couple of weeks away for me right now.  Tides are lousy and I'm back to working weekends.  But as soon as I can I will be out there giving midalake's tips a try!

[F350Platinum]

I went to my local "clean" beach (I have literally wiped it out of anything good) a couple of days ago to compare IDs and test out the concept presented here.

Again this is a white sand beach with a small amount of patchy black sand that does register in the ones and twos of sensitivity is cranked. It's not everywhere but sure sounds off.

I put the Equinox 600 in Beach 2, sensitivity 23, and was ready to switch to Beach 1 also should I find anything. There are some very deep targets here, but I have dug everything up to 10" for the most part.

I'm a little puzzled with the contention that no tone or ID comes up with the horseshoe off, as the default discrimination for Beach 1 and 2 is everything 9 and lower, so yeah, you wouldn't "see" or hear a thing. I always run in all metal mode so I hear and see everything. Tried that too.

I did finally get  -5 in all directions and happily dug until I got down to about a foot deep. The Equinox hit on this small iron nail strongly:

The top of the hole is 4" above the pointer making this hole 12" deep. This was with the 10x5. It's hard to get a photo of depth for sure. The nail is the small brownish gray object on the bottom left edge of the hole.

I'll agree that black sand does somewhat cut sensitivity, but I've found especially with the 10x5 that it doesn't stop the Equinox from more strongly "locking on" to a better signal amongst the crap. Admittedly there was no black sand over this nail, but all metal sure does go deep! I'm still chasing a 30/31 here that even a 2 foot hole doesn't get to. ? It's probably a deep silver beer can. ?

I also switched to Beach 1 and got exactly the same result. Even from all directions, ferrous is ferrous from my view.

Your mileage may vary, but this is what it is. ?

[Badger-NH]

The test target needs to be non-ferrous.

I think if you had accepted -5 in disc mode, it would have picked up the nail just as well in disc mode as it did in all metal.

 

 

[au pirata]

I would like to revive this topic, it's very interesting  I always run horseshoe on ,but have never investigated the targets that gave a vdi of minius.

That's not to say I haven't dug gold that started as a minus number.when detecting in highly mineralised sand a target can have 90% ferrous 10% non ferrous sound..

I would like to know what advantages you feel 1 tone is over 50,I will be trying 1 tone,for the next week of hunting.

It's possible 1 tone will give a cleaner sound to a deep non ferrous target.did it take a while to adjust to 1 tone..thanks 

 

 

 

[midalake]

11 hours ago, au pirata said:

I would like to know what advantages you feel 1 tone is over 50,I will be trying 1 tone, for the next week of hunting.

On the Equinox 800 platform: 

I use one tone for several reasons. I do not like my detector chirping at me in different tones, makes it harder to tell the difference between false chirps and fringe targets. Also, this allows me to hear subtleties such as target size and depth better. 

I identify the ferrous/nonferrous targets two ways. First of course is by TID.
The second way I identify Nonferrous is by the sound in horseshoe mode.  If a target will not ID correctly or is fringe and very deep. I then procced to sweep slowly 360 degrees around the target. If the target double rings OR breaks down in signal strength as the coil passes over it, then the fringe target is 100% iron. You cannot make a fringe nonferrous target double ring on an Equinox. 

[StarVatrex]

I don't know of a single beach that is uniform throughout. It will have more mineralized patches, others infested with iron and some with more or less black sand... Why use a single configuration? I don't understand.

I start in a basic configuration and I am modifying it to my liking.

On the beach I usually use All Metal and I spent a couple of years in 2 tones and without using the threshold much.

Nowadays, there are times when I have the horseshoe in Off and when I hear the humbral cut plus a low and broken tone; works the same for me. If it is also deep, better...

Any detector upon reaching its depth limit will give you ferrous tones. And it's not always a nail.

Currently I use All Metal and Beach 1 or 2 if I get in the water. In dry Sand Park 2 and once Gold 1.

I left the two tones behind and run in 5 or dP on the X-Terra Pro.

Depends.

Not all are "round signs", there are also broken rings, earrings, small chains...

You have to go out more and think less, the Equinox loves Gold.

That ring sounded like ass...

[Airtemisa]

On 8/24/2023 at 3:25 AM, midalake said:

On the Equinox 800 platform: 

I use one tone for several reasons. I do not like my detector chirping at me in different tones, makes it harder to tell the difference between false chirps and fringe targets. Also, this allows me to hear subtleties such as target size and depth better. 

I identify the ferrous/nonferrous targets two ways. First of course is by TID.
The second way I identify Nonferrous is by the sound in horseshoe mode.  If a target will not ID correctly or is fringe and very deep. I then procced to sweep slowly 360 degrees around the target. If the target double rings OR breaks down in signal strength as the coil passes over it, then the fringe target is 100% iron. You cannot make a fringe nonferrous target double ring on an Equinox. 

Does this apply to Equinox 900? I on an 800 and a 900 is on his way to me...

[midalake]

3 hours ago, Airtemisa said:

Does this apply to Equinox 900? I on an 800 and a 900 is on his way to me...

I have no idea. Not even sure it works out of the Equinox 800 Beach 2 mode. 

[Cal_Cobra]

On 8/15/2022 at 4:01 AM, Badger-NH said:

The idea sounds plausible. I can't wait to try some tests. I wonder if it increases depth on land as well.

 

That seems to be the general consensus, but IIRC Nasa Tom stated that there's not a true AM mode on the Equinox, and that the horseshoe button just toggles the discrimination pattern.