Go Terrain Test And Cool Relic

[F350Platinum]

If you read my posts you'll know I badly dislocated my left shoulder last Sunday. Then XP released the Go Terrain app, so I had to try it out. I held off until today, and just took a minimum of gear with me, I dug my targets with @kac's excellent Devil's Tongue digger.

The ground in the field in front of my house is littered with corn trash, at least they turbo tilled it.

This is from the app, I set a detection zone, and started tracking. It was late in the afternoon so I only covered about a third of my zone, but I tried everything. Yep, right out in front of my house. ?

First off I'll say the app is cool, and I sure don't mind paying 10 bucks a year for it. Instructions are pretty easy to follow, and it does what it says it will do.

It records your finds after a selectable number of swings,  I picked 8 in 10 seconds like the excellent instruction video.

I was easily able to pair the coil, just search for it and swing the coil over a find until it registers. Everything worked very well.

It recorded my path ok, GPS accuracy isn't all that good due to lots of military aircraft testing in my area, so it kinda fluctuated, creating the squiggly path. At first I didn't have path enabled, and if you forget it enabling it later will turn it on. I even tried going away from a target without digging it and went back, found it fairly easily and dug it. I also went out of the zone many times and it vibrated the phone as expected. ?

I paused and restarted the app many times in order to dig my targets, you have to remember to start it again, and if you don't pause it, it will keep registering the target especially if it has varying IDs, which lots of targets will. I had to pinpoint and use the MI-6 a lot as all I had was a small digger.

Iron targets are recorded as black dots unless there is some falsing, a few times I re-registered targets because I knew the reading was false, if you have big iron on the edge of the 13" coil that is what happens until you are over it. "Null" targets - those that come up with -- on the display - will not be recorded. With my program this means anything below 1.

These are my finds, mostly stuff I would throw out. The lamp wick raiser was about 8" deep, tough to get with a hand digger in this dry soil, but the ID was accurate.

Ok, now my thoughts about this app:

I have a Samsung Z-Flip 4 that I can fold and keep in my pocket with a battery that keeps it going all day. However, that is a problem. Unless the phone is on and the app is running in the foreground, it will not record targets. ? It will track but that's it. Folding the Z-Flip shuts the screen off.

The screen doesn't "follow" or move when you have it zoomed in, so you have to keep hitting the location icon to see your present position. This could be fixed by making your "sprite" move the screen. ?

The detectorist in the video made it look very cool using the app, in reality not so much. You'd have to have your phone running live in a pouch and whip it out when you want to see anything, or you'd have to have a chest harmonica rig to see it all the time ? I'm not one of the Blues Brothers, so this ain't gonna do it for me. ? To get the vibrations when you leave your detection zone you'd have to hold it, putting it in your pocket or a pouch renders that feature moot.

The app is very cool, but not well conceived for us dirt pirates, maybe it's cool in Europe to walk around all day with a cell in your hand, but not with a detector in one hand and shovel over your other shoulder. I still haven't found a shovel clip that stays together for even one day. When you close out your hunt it takes a long time to upload it to the server, at least with my measly 3 bars of 4G.

I might use it now and again for fun, but really OnX Hunt still does it for me. It runs and tracks all the time.

At least I got my thank you for coming prize after I put the phone away, this really interesting Civil War relic that I cannot identify ?

I looked for it on the Internet and did find a similar relic found in Culpeper VA, about 60 miles away: 

I don't think the seller knew what it was either. ? If any of y'all know please help. ?

[Dan(NM)]

Thanks for sharing your experience with Go Terrain. I went out today and completely space out that I had down loaded the app until I was ready to leave. Sounds like more trouble than it's worth, I have no problem identifying where I've been ?

[F350Platinum]

8 minutes ago, Dan(NM) said:

Thanks for sharing your experience with Go Terrain. I went out today and completely space out that I had down loaded the app until I was ready to leave. Sounds like more trouble than it's worth, I have no problem identifying where I've been ?

Awesome pic Dan! ? I can see why you use a pick, and yeah, only rain or wind would erase your footprints and digs there ? walking on corn trash is another story.

Next time I'll set up grid stakes and really give it a go, but OnX Hunt allows you to track yourself, record pics and info, and even edit your track later when you forget to turn it off. It also works well with a flip phone, I saw Chase using one and hadda have it because it fits in the average cargo pocket with a big battery attached. ? Hope ya got some great stuff! ?

[F350Platinum]

Found it! It's the device that goes through the side of a banjo for the bolt that holds the rim down over the skin. 

It's called a "Banjo Shoe".

[kac]

The app sounds good but since phone needs to stay on and uses blue tooth you probably should bring a charging pack for the phone. Your phone should have geo data already when you take a picture and that should show on a map. iphone has them in the photo album that way.

You sure the squiggles was not you wandering all over? I tend to hunt in what I think is straight lines only to keep seeing the holes I already dug lol

[F350Platinum]

5 hours ago, kac said:

The app sounds good but since phone needs to stay on and uses blue tooth you probably should bring a charging pack for the phone. Your phone should have geo data already when you take a picture and that should show on a map. iphone has them in the photo album that way.

You sure the squiggles was not you wandering all over? I tend to hunt in what I think is straight lines only to keep seeing the holes I already dug lol

Ha, yeah I'm that old. ? I do have a battery pack but the Z-Flip is so long when open it doesn't fit in my pocket with the battery attached. Fine folded, but that shuts off whatever comms it has with the coil to grab IDs.

I turn off location data on my pics, something I learned long ago reading articles on how people will use that data to go where you were. Doesn't matter here where I have cameras, but other locations might be a problem ? 

The digger worked out great for me today except maybe the really deep targets. ? I can only dig with one hand right now.

[ColonelDan]

Great review Bob.  Thank you.  I too thought it would be impossible for me to carry my detector in my left, the scoop in my right and my phone in my "third hand". ?

I see the value for me being registering my finds with time, date, lat/long, depth, TID  and photo.  Having said that I'm still more than a novice with this new tool right now.  More later.....

[iron_buzz]

I tried the app out yesterday and it was going crazy sending me constant notifications and dropping target pins all over the place.  I was running on Auto mode, but I think next time I will have to set it to Push (hold down on the middle button to register a target).

[CPT_GhostLight]

Thanks for your review, F350! I kind of figured it would be similar to Tect O Trak but with auto finds and TID logging. I may still try it out just to see what's what, but I rarely use Tect O Trak anymore either. However I do like the idea of using the Push mode to manually record a target TID and location on the fly with the remote on a large relic site. ?