The Axiom Ground Balance Window, With Notes For Relic And Coin Hunters

[Steve Herschbach]

See this video starting at the 1:40 mark. Hold the ground balance down for a full ten seconds. That is done to make sure nobody engages the window mode by accident. Keep in mind that normally when you push the ground balance button, the machine resets each time to whatever new conditions you are programming in. If you go ten seconds and open up the GB window, the machine is now in an accumulative mode. This can be useful for more than just hot rocks. Like those hot patches in burn areas, or clay patches, whatever. It broadens the ground balance system to work on multiple items. It is wise to use it with care and only when needed, but can also work miracles if properly used.

The video shows a simple L type balance where you pump over the ground then wave over the hot rock. In reality I just play with the ground and the hot rock or hot patch until both mellow out. It may take waving or pumping or both. You can choose how aggressive you want to be by how you do it. Anytime you think you have dialed in too much, just reset the system by releasing the button, and then pressing again, to engage the regular simple ground balance. Very important to know! If you have a perfect window set into the machine, pressing the ground balance button again after that will clear the window, and start you over with regular ground balance. It's quick and easy, but every once in a while leads to an "oops" wish I had not pressed that, and you have to start over.

Once people learn the ground balance system it will prove to be a real weapon for areas where other detectors drive you out due to too many hot rocks and hot spots in the ground.

Now here is some really crazy stuff to experiment with. I only did this once, but now it is out there for people to explore and share. The ground balance window works on almost anything. I tried it by ground balancing on a nail, it knocked it out completely, and it still picked up coins!! Now, I have no idea where the limits are on this yet, and what gets eliminated when you do this, but the fact is you can use the ground balance window to tune out most anything, and still find other stuff. This may blow the relic market for the detector wide open. Or not. Just depends at what cost in lost targets comes with this method. But right off hand it looked to me like I could tune out some common ferrous targets and still have at least some response left on many coins, so you can bet I'll be playing more with this in the future.

You can use the tones on the Axiom to separate small/low conductive (hi-lo tone) from large/high conductive (lo-hi tone). You have the iron check grunt for shallow ferrous. And now you have a fully capable ability to block out single target response areas with the ground balance, just like with the TDI, but in a dual ground balance machine. This should help alleviate the severe "hole" that developed when you used the ground balance as a disc control on the TDI. With the TDI out of production, we now have an even more powerful alternative available with a similar capability via the Axiom.

Lots to look forward to and experiment with in this detector for sure.

 

[Calmark]

Great topic about possible use for a PI to search for coins and relics by learning tones.

I've meant to do this with my White's TDI at a rural late 1800's two-room schoolhouse  that burned in the 1970's.  The foundation was filled and the lot plowed. I've found a dozen older coins, including wheat cents, buffolo nickels, a Chinese coin and 1893 V nickel over the years. No silver and non ferrous signals are sparse. 

I went last spring with my brother's TDI as mine is sold, but alas I forgot to bring the battery!  Now that I have the Axiom and the ground is moist again, I did a brief test for close to an hour today.

I ran sens. 1, normal timing, 13x11DD and Sunray Pro headphones. It ran beautiful right near some powerlines.

I stayed 30-40 yards from the debris strewn-zone and even so, there were a lot of blaring signals all over. I know most is iron from past detecting. I didn't pay attention much to hi/low or low/hi tones, just what signals sounded smaller, tighter and better.  Ir was a bit overwhelming really. I passed a lot of signals, gave up digging on several when hitting roots or the pinpointer told me the item was large.  I just wandered around with no particular plan other than to see what happened. I suppose with practice I could come back and try some more for coins later.  I will let my nugget hunting experiences with the Axiom attune my ear better to tones.

Here's what I dug in 45 mins or so. 

[strick]

Im listening  as I may ditch the TDI pro for the Axiom at some point...as I'm interested in trying it for beach hunting at some point but too many detectors right now and need to thin out the herd first...

strick 

[jasong]

Interesting stuff. Probably don't have an Axiom in my future, but it's little quirks and techniques like that which can really make a detector useful to some people and make some machines really fun to use. If I didn't have a 6000 already I'd definitely be buying an Axiom to experiment around with stuff like this just for fun.

[Calmark]

16 hours ago, strick said:

Im listening  as I may ditch the TDI pro for the Axiom at some point...as I'm interested in trying it for beach hunting at some point but too many detectors right now and need to thin out the herd first...

strick 

I say wait before ditching the TDI.  The conductivity switch on it is pretty dang useful.  I am holding onto my brother's unit for now, even though I have the Axiom.  I think there is real potential to use the Axiom say at beaches.  Not the best on turf like where I did my experiment.

I hear you on the "too many detectors", haha.    I sold my Nox and SDC at the end of last summer.  Now I have a Legend and Axiom and the Manticore is coming....

[Calmark]

15 hours ago, jasong said:

Interesting stuff. Probably don't have an Axiom in my future, but it's little quirks and techniques like that which can really make a detector useful to some people and make some machines really fun to use. If I didn't have a 6000 already I'd definitely be buying an Axiom to experiment around with stuff like this just for fun.

I don't take coin-hunting too seriously with a PI.  At least on more modern field/park settings like where I went.  My spot has little tinfoil, so I felt I could at least have a chance to locate a deep coin my VLF have missed.   I do think there is potential at old battle or relic sites and especially on beaches.