1st Hunt On Dry Sand Venice And What A Difference A Coil Makes!

[mn90403]

Today I got out for my first beach hunt with the AlgoForce 1500.  I used a CoilTek Platypus Mono that I've had for many years.  I recently repaired it because the wires at the top were frayed and we put new heat shrink on it.  They are completely sealed so nothing can get inside the coil and if the leads break off the coil is toast.  After the hunt I took off the coil cover and noticed some sand trapped inside.  I need to put some silicon window seal inside the entire coil cover if I use it again.

With all of that out of the way, I found trash ... lots of it and just 4 coins and a pin!

 

All of the finds were a bit 'soft' compared to my other detectors.  This is my first use other than with the Sadie in NZ.  The target depths went up to 10 inches I'd say.  Most was more shallow as I was digging everything in a well raked and groomed sand area.  I tried a bit of wet sand but the conditions were not good for targets there.  The threshold was stable but there were no targets.

I was using Large Gold.  The Algo will only let you choose a setting that is labeled gold but it will find other metals within those settings.  I varied the sensitivity from 14-20.  Most of the bottle caps came in as a 3 on the ID scale.  The aluminum bits come in at 1.  My 4Runner comes it at 99!  haha  I've got more to learn than I know just now about the target IDs and settings.  (5/15 Edit:  I was not in Pinpoint Mode.  I could not get a target ID.  The numbers I stated are ground numbers!)

[F350Platinum]

Thanks for this post! 🏆

I'm sure it was a blast going to NZ, meeting some of the members there, bringing a new toy home, and now testing the AlgoForce on what looks to be very similar conditions to what I experienced lately, despite the opposing coasts.

Got my eyes on this one, but I'm a little thrown by 10" depth, so I eagerly await further posts on it.

[中国 张]

nice ! 加油！

[mn90403]

The coil I used today was the Commander/11/DD.  All I can say is WHAT A DIFFERENCE!  This coil Bangs on the targets.  The old, maybe damaged CoilTek coil made everything soft.  I felt like I had to 'baby' the combo.  You don't need to baby the DD.  Swing away at normal beach speed and catch a little piece of the target and zero in.

Once again I was in Large Gold, dry sand.  This time was near yesterday but some volley ball.  I dug deeper targets.  The pliers were over 12" and I don't know why no one had dug them before.  There was an extra good thing about this session.  I forgot my headphones.  I used the onboard audio (maxed at 9) but I could hear it.  I would be able to wet sand hunt without headphones but in the dry was good and if I was in a park it would give me the choice of phones or no phones.

This Commander coil came with my GPX 5000 from Chris Gholson in 2010.  I didn't know what I was doing when I got it (still don't much of the time) but I was told the DD was not a coil to use much.  I used it some looking for gold but I have to say that today it sounded better on targets than any time in memory.

I'm excited about using the Algo today.  Yesterday I had my doubts.

The screws you could hear the breaking signal with the edges.  The nickel sounded 'round' and the little wires were hard to get as they were dropping through my 1/4" basket.  That is a good problem as far as I'm concerned.  Perhaps another setting or sensitivity (I stayed on 20 for the hour I was out) would let me ignore the tiny stuff.

It is still a bit of a puzzel the ID number.  I can't ID iron vs other metal yet.  (5/15 Edit:  I was not in Pinpoint Mode.  I could not get a target ID.  The numbers I stated are ground numbers!)  This edit should be red but it doesn't show up.

I need to look up my 11" Mono and the 8" (which may have an issue based upon Lunk's opinion about 5 years ago) and try them out.  Maybe I'll look online or drop by a shop or two as I travel around the next couple of months in West with my Xcoils and Algo.

[Steve Herschbach]

Nice reporting Mitchel, now find a ring!

The target id is not ferrous versus non-ferrous. It’s a PI not a VLF. It’s more about small or low conductive targets read low numbers and large items or high conductors read high. Small ferrous reads low and in general the larger it gets the higher the number. So ferrous can occur anywhere on the scale depending on size. A big advance over existing PI options is that a coin will read with a repeat number as will other standard items. But don’t expect VLF rule ferrous vs non-ferrous discrimination.

Some DD coils can work / detect items on the AlgoForce although only one half of the coil is active and results with the target id may be out the window compared to the mono coil. It’s tuned for mono coils. But noting what numbers a particular coil produces on standard items will still be helpful. Interesting a DD worked so well for you since only half the coil was working. You might want to confirm that as the info is minimal about DD coil operation on the E1500.

As far as depth the E1500 falls above Infinium level performance and slightly below Axiom level performance as I explained previously here. Close to Axiom on small stuff falling farther behind a larger stuff, more in the same ballpark as ATX. It will beat a TDI that has ground balance engaged but if you turn off the ground balance on the TDI it will be another story.

[Lost Scout]

23 hours ago, mn90403 said:

The coil I used today was the Commander/11/DD.  All I can say is WHAT A DIFFERENCE!  This coil Bangs on the targets.  The old, maybe damaged CoilTek coil made everything soft.  I felt like I had to 'baby' the combo.  You don't need to baby the DD.  Swing away at normal beach speed and catch a little piece of the target and zero in.

Once again I was in Large Gold, dry sand.  This time was near yesterday but some volley ball.  I dug deeper targets.  The pliers were over 12" and I don't know why no one had dug them before.  There was an extra good thing about this session.  I forgot my headphones.  I used the onboard audio (maxed at 9) but I could hear it.  I would be able to wet sand hunt without headphones but in the dry was good and if I was in a park it would give me the choice of phones or no phones.

This Commander coil came with my GPX 5000 from Chris Gholson in 2010.  I didn't know what I was doing when I got it (still don't much of the time) but I was told the DD was not a coil to use much.  I used it some looking for gold but I have to say that today it sounded better on targets than any time in memory.

I'm excited about using the Algo today.  Yesterday I had my doubts.

The screws you could hear the breaking signal with the edges.  The nickel sounded 'round' and the little wires were hard to get as they were dropping through my 1/4" basket.  That is a good problem as far as I'm concerned.  Perhaps another setting or sensitivity (I stayed on 20 for the hour I was out) would let me ignore the tiny stuff.

It is still a bit of a puzzel the ID number.  I can't ID iron vs other metal yet.

I need to look up my 11" Mono and the 8" (which may have an issue based upon Lunk's opinion about 5 years ago) and try them out.  Maybe I'll look online or drop by a shop or two as I travel around the next couple of months in West with my Xcoils and Algo.

So cool. Keep us informed.

[mn90403]

This afternoon I finally put on the 11" Commander MONO.  It performed better than the other beach coils.  I searched in generally the same type of dry sand beach.  There are few coins.  I suspect it has been gone over many times with VLFs (I've done some of that myself) and what is left it trash.

There was one earring (magnetic) and one ring (also magnetic) with the assortment of other beach trash.  Conditions aren't right for wet sand hunting.  Waves and tides are small.

 

[mn90403]

On 5/9/2024 at 6:38 AM, Steve Herschbach said:

The target id is not ferrous versus non-ferrous. It’s a PI not a VLF. It’s more about small or low conductive targets read low numbers and large items or high conductors read high. Small ferrous reads low and in general the larger it gets the higher the number. So ferrous can occur anywhere on the scale depending on size. A big advance over existing PI options is that a coin will read with a repeat number as will other standard items. But don’t expect VLF rule ferrous vs non-ferrous discrimination.

I just realized that the 'number' I've been looking at when using the 1500 is not the real ID number.  I'll have to research a bit more to know what the swinging number represents.   In order to get the accurate ID number available on the 1500 you have to put it in pinpoint mode!  Now let's see what our clad numbers really are.

Sometimes we know what we are using and often times I don't.  

[Steve Herschbach]

23 minutes ago, mn90403 said:

I just realized that the 'number' I've been looking at when using the 1500 is not the real ID number.  I'll have to research a bit more to know what the swinging number represents.   In order to get the accurate ID number available on the 1500 you have to put it in pinpoint mode!  Now let's see what our clad numbers really are.

Sometimes we know what we are using and often times we don't.  

The number you see while swinging is the ground mineralization number. To get a target id you must stop and analyze each target using the pinpoint mode:

[phrunt]

This explains why you were saying all coins ID the same and the ID you had for them was not an ID a coin would come up 🙂 I was puzzled by that and thought it must be your faulty coil, turns out you weren't even looking at the Target ID's in the first place just the ground minerilization number.  I probably should have showed you how to do that when you were prospecting with it as we were in an area with a lot of pellets and it would have saved you a lot of time not digging as many.

Now when you go back to the beach you're going to have a ball using the real target ID's.

Flick it on in your lounge room, put it in pinpoint mode, lower the sensitivity until stable, probably about 15 or so and run some coins over it and get their ID's.  Unlike a VLF you don't swing them past over and over again to get an ID, just hold them still in front of the coil.  Pinpoint mode can go out of whack when left in that mode for a while, all you do is press the button again to retune it and keep going.