GPZ 7000- Need Help On How To Hear Those Gold Whispers Missed By Others

[Gold Catcher]

I use the WM12/SP01 and the Gray Ghost headphones. The Bose QC noise cancelling earbuds are not good due to the shock sensitive cable, which gives alot of noise when it rubbs against anything. Key to me is hearing through treshold variations. Anything repeatable that disturbs the treshold tone I dig.  That's why I seldomly crank up to 20 since the treshold gets too erratic (in particular in HY/N), and I often cant hear those faint variations. The shallow screamers you can hear well through the treshold at max gain, if that is what you are after, but those juicy deep warbles will often get masked. That at least has been my experience, but there are different viewpoints on this.

GC  

 

[Aureous]

Its one thing to trial and adjust audio equipment and settings, but to ACTUALLY OBTAIN those deep, whisper signals that everyone else is missing with the GPZ, you need the Russistani X-Coil large CC coils. Anything bigger than the 15" is gonna help, big time. The 22" seems to be the best as the center receive loom is by far the largest. You'll have to adjust your swing overlap and settings (trial and error) but thats the best advice I know of.....

[Sheppo]

How do you go with lower tones? I found lowering the tone to about 40 on the detector helped a great deal.

Also using a set of quality noise cancelling earbuds was a huge help too. I usually run the volume on about 10 without a booster and between 6 & 7 with a booster to lift the threshold and any potential target noises.

[Valens Legacy]

16 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

As long as you can hear the threshold and tune your ear to it, how you get there does not matter. If you want to “Hear Those Gold Whispers Missed By Others” slow down, then slow down again. Get the coil center closer to the gold by covering every square inch carefully and methodically, moving any obstacles (rocks, brush) while doing so.

This also works  for almost any detector such as the 800, and I have been working this same technique in creek beds.

Steve I believe that you gave me the same advice because of the ringing in my ears is so bad, and I thank you for it. In the creek beds I am on the gold more now than when I first started using a detector.

[Gerry in Idaho]

Bill,  I'm not the brightest guy to answer your question on what Audio system works best to hear those deep faint signals with a GPZ-7000 as I don't like trying all the new boosters, signal enhancers, airtrees, ipods, earbuds, noseplugs and such.  But, I do seem to hear and find my share of "iffy nuggets" and at depths most don't believe.

1st off,  I'm not a gadget guy and most certainly not saying those items my Field Staff guys and others use, are of no good.  In fact I do see times when those Avtress and others have their purpose.  Who knows, maybe eventually I'll get some ear buds that want to stay in my ears and not jump out.

I feel Steve H, Rick (Lundy), Klunker, Prunt and a couple others are on point with my thinking.  It's the operator of the detector and what you are doing wrong and or not thinking correctly.  My pet peeve is "Coil Control" and "Stay Focuses on the task at hand"

I tell folks gold detecting is partially a mental thing and many laugh at me.  "mental"??? Really.  Most Certainly, I feel it is.

When I'm hunting old sites that's been productive for me the last 25 yrs, I know its history of what's come from the ground, from ridges, side hills, ravines, bedrock etc. I know where, how deep were most and what size was average.  I have those 1000+ nugget retrieves all stuffed in one of my last remaining brain cells and I seem to bring that out for my next hunt to that site.

My 1st 15 years of detecting I was all over the place.  Next 10 year I starting dialing things in and the last 20+ yrs, I'm one with my machine.  The detector becomes an extension of my arm.  I swing a little faster than most and don't recommend my speed to others, it's to fast for you.  Swing it slow and then slow down again. Coil Control is of MOST IMPORTANCE and make sure that thing is "on the ground".  On that old patch, visualize your coil as the bottom of an ice cream cone "V" and realize a foot down that pattern (depending on coil size) could only an inch wide. Paint every inch of that old nugget patch an inch at a time and from different directions. Listen to the ground, the detectors electronics (yes I can hear the electronics of a 7000 working) and try to make every little iffy signal become a target.  As been said by others, turn that iffy into a semi repeatable target by multiple sweeps of the coil from many angles.  Scuff an inch with your boot and do it again.  If there is any kind of repeat whatsoever, scuff some more and another inch or two and spend more time slowly swinging across the spot of the so called potential signal/target.  Do not walk away until you are 100% certain there is nothing there.  I've spent 5 minutes and 5" removed before I sometimes give in. On a rare occasion (usually on really windy days) I've even walked away and came back later to in fact finally hear it and dig down and sure enough it's gold. 

Stay focused and then some.  If you are trying to figure out the next site to go...you missed one.  If you are dreaming about a cold beer, you missed one, worried about what's for lunch, you missed another.  Most importantly, if you wonder how your buddy is doing or what he's finding, you missed the "iffy targets" because you allowed your mind to wander off the task of hearing that next deep iffy.

Threshold (my opinion).  It must be on at all times and as the day goes on, I usually turn it up a little.  I start my day fresh and the Threshold is a soft hum (just above the warble) that is mostly smooth. I like to run my Threshold at 38 setting and usually go up 1 or 2 as the day lengthens and the noises of ground and air start acting up.  Yes your detector is more quiet in the morning than most afternoon.  Yes the ground heats up in the later afternoon and cools off in the later evenings.  Best time to hunt is when ground is most quiet and that's early morning or late at night.

My choice of Headphones. I hate cheap headphones and prefer the brand Killer Bee and the like the Wasp model with dual volume control for each ear.  Made in USA and Lifetime warranty.  Yes he'll back them up if you do your part when 1st purchased and fill out the warranty.

These are 150 Ohm headphones and the guy "John" who builds them also used to make the very popular SunRay Gold. These headphones and the Black Widows are fantastic at blocking out ambient noise.  In fact I think the Black Widows are even better than the Wasp, but Wasp are more comfortable to me, I wear glasses quite a bit. 50 yrs my ears (yes I have bad hearing). 

I'm a creature of habit. For 20+ yrs I've been using the same 2 brands (Sunray and Killer Bee) of headphones built by the same guy.  My ears are used to their tones.  For 25 yrs my ears have been listening to Minelab PI's and I try to set the TONE so it's the same as or near the same I've been doing all those years.  On a GPZ-7000 I prefer 55 Tone PITCH Setting.

I prefer to plug my Kill Bees into the back of the detector, not the WM-12.  For some reason the WM adds extra noise and blanking blips that bug the living chit out of me.  I want to hear the detector and the ground..and taking out any other potential electronics is my desire.

No metal boots, no pick on the hip, no cell phone on the body, no pin pointer in your front pocket either.

Think Positive, smile, be happy... as gold enjoys seeing a smiling face when it's dug up.   Always stay away from Debbie Downers and negative people.

When detecting with the best headphones or whatever hearing device it is you prefer to use that blocks out the ambient noises around you, be sure to be thinking the next iffy is the one.

Reward yourself for your little stinking lead targets.  After all, those pieces of trash were missed by others and just as easily could have been gold.

There are many GPZ Setting people prefer and I'm happy if you have your favorites.  My own Field Staff have our favorites on the 7 and yes they are different.  But each of my guys are Top Notch gold finders with a GPZ-7000 and each of them have paid their detectors off multiple times over.  No magic #'s at all, just a lot of time in the field comparing.

Grow with your detector and never think you are the best and already have it (the detector) figured out.  Watch and listen to others around and especially those who are good with the same detector.  When I 1st started training with the GPZ-7000, the Settings I recommended and used are not what I use/recommend today.  I've learned more about the 7 by listening to great hunters around me and here on DP.  I've spent time comparing and testing and find new ways to get best performance from the 7.

My opinion and take it for what it's worth. One piece of advice I see many folks using on a GPZ-7000 that I feel their not optimizing.  Turn the filters OFF and if possible (depending on site and soil), run the detector open. OFF for the Ground Smoothing, OFF for the Audio Smoothing.  Those 2 Settings smooth out the detector (to much for my preference) and I feel I'm missing "potential iffy's".

Again,

- The iffy signals are missed by most folks because they don't have proper coil control and sweep. 

- Quit thinking the spot it already worked out, that's a negative.

- Most folks won't work an iffy to make a signal.  Ask Lunk what my 20 foot area looks like after a hard working with a 7000.  There's more boot scrapes, bent over bushes, dislodged rocks, and fluff/dust everywhere.  If it keeps giving, I keep swinging, boot scraping and smiling.

- Stay focused on the task.

Good luck

[Gold Catcher]

Great write up, Gerry. You should print this out and put it in every Z box that you are selling to a newcomer!

GC

[cobill]

14 hours ago, Gerry in Idaho said:

My choice of Headphones. I hate cheap headphones and prefer the brand Killer Bee and the like the Wasp model with dual volume control for each ear.  Made in USA and Lifetime warranty.  Yes he'll back them up if you do your part when 1st purchased and fill out the warranty.

These are 150 Ohm headphones and the guy "John" who builds them also used to make the very popular SunRay Gold. These headphones and the Black Widows are fantastic at blocking out ambient noise.  In fact I think the Black Widows are even better than the Wasp, but Wasp are more comfortable to me, I wear glasses quite a bit. 50 yrs my ears (yes I have bad hearing). 

I'm a creature of habit. For 20+ yrs I've been using the same 2 brands (Sunray and Killer Bee) of headphones built by the same guy. 

Gerry, I've heard from a reliable source that the SunRay headphones are going out of business now that Joe D. has passed and nobody wants to buy his business.  Glad that I have 2 pairs available, nothing comes close to what "John" makes!

Bill 

[Rob Allison]

Hey Bill and others,

  This has always been a debatable subject (hearing, signal enhancers and miss targets).   This last weekend, I gave the new Nugget Finder 17x13 Z Searchcoil another run over hammered patches.  My first trip out was actually much better, but we will talk about the second trip to some of the most hammered patches I know about.  Keep in mind, I have ran over these few patches with the GPZ and stock coils many times over, along with friends and some customers.  Prior to that, hammered to death from VLF's all the way to the GPX 5000 with various sized coils.  The ground has been passed over probably every direction, even spots dug up where people found several nuggets in a small area.  

That all being said, went back with the GPZ 7000, new NF coil, Sun Ray Pro Headphones, No booster/amp and running some pretty conservative settings (Sen 10, Auto Balance, General, Normal) and picked up 3 nuggets over the course of about 5 hours along with several dozen trash targets and bullets.  

I pretty much concentrated on the area where I know I personally found nuggets.  I was super surprised what was missed (many deep trash targets, boot tacks, wire, pieces of tin ...) and the 3 nuggets.  I really thought will all the targets missed at depth, I would get lucky to pick out a nice one.  

Nothing to write home about, but one piece was only a few grains, other was a nice 1 gram specimen and another 1 gram crystalline nugget.  A couple of grams only takes a small chunk out of a $1200 searchcoil, but I had a great time and realized you never can clean a patch completely out.  

My long time thought process has been conservative settings, very little background noise and concentrate on breaks in the threshold.  This can't in my opinion be done well with external speakers or detector speakers, but only with a good set of headphones hardwired to the detector.  

Wishing you all much success!

Rob

 

 

[beatup]

well done Rob , that is very much how i like to run my 7k .

[Gerry in Idaho]

On 2/20/2023 at 8:22 AM, Rob Allison said:

Hey Bill and others,

  This has always been a debatable subject (hearing, signal enhancers and miss targets).   This last weekend, I gave the new Nugget Finder 17x13 Z Searchcoil another run over hammered patches.  My first trip out was actually much better, but we will talk about the second trip to some of the most hammered patches I know about.  Keep in mind, I have ran over these few patches with the GPZ and stock coils many times over, along with friends and some customers.  Prior to that, hammered to death from VLF's all the way to the GPX 5000 with various sized coils.  The ground has been passed over probably every direction, even spots dug up where people found several nuggets in a small area.  

That all being said, went back with the GPZ 7000, new NF coil, Sun Ray Pro Headphones, No booster/amp and running some pretty conservative settings (Sen 10, Auto Balance, General, Normal) and picked up 3 nuggets over the course of about 5 hours along with several dozen trash targets and bullets.  

I pretty much concentrated on the area where I know I personally found nuggets.  I was super surprised what was missed (many deep trash targets, boot tacks, wire, pieces of tin ...) and the 3 nuggets.  I really thought will all the targets missed at depth, I would get lucky to pick out a nice one.  

Nothing to write home about, but one piece was only a few grains, other was a nice 1 gram specimen and another 1 gram crystalline nugget.  A couple of grams only takes a small chunk out of a $1200 searchcoil, but I had a great time and realized you never can clean a patch completely out.  

My long time thought process has been conservative settings, very little background noise and concentrate on breaks in the threshold.  This can't in my opinion be done well with external speakers or detector speakers, but only with a good set of headphones hardwired to the detector.  

Wishing you all much success!

Rob

 

 

Glad to see you making finds with the new NF coils and certainly sparking our attention, even mine.  You're one of the few long term nugget hunters and competitive friendly dealer who's comments can be backed up and I trust, for most instances.  I think part of what separates us is just the amount of hours we've been swinging detectors when compared to most others.   Thanks for sharing your experiences and glad to see you use the same quality headphones I recommend.