HF2 Micro Gold Fail...?

[OCBeepDigger]

So... I realize that it is still a beta version (currently 3.03) but this very small gold is where I was optimistic that the HF2 coil would shine with it's higher frequencies .... maybe not so much (yet!) ... obviously still some work to do here XP!

 

 

[Jeff McClendon]

The HF2 coil with Beta 3 software at least tried to hit those targets. The 9" coil with Beta 3 software was a total NO SHOW FAIL.

Had Andrew been able to run a lower reactivity setting, the HF2 coil would have had better audio responses. Having to run reactivity 3 just to get it to settle down a little, was crazy.

Manticore smoked it and so would an Equinox 800, 900 or Legend using their simultaneous multi frequency gold prospecting modes. 

Some will say just run the HF2 coil in Mono 90 kHz or higher. The whole point of using the latest do it all detectors that have a simultaneous multi frequency gold prospecting mode are ground mineralization handling advantages.

Beta 3 software needs some work in that department. XP should really get some people in the Western USA to do ground mineralization testing for them if they haven't already done that.

I was really hoping for a lot better performance. There was nothing UNIQUE about that comparison except how bad it was. I'm super disappointed.

[Chase Goldman]

2 hours ago, Jeff McClendon said:

Beta 3 software needs some work in that department. XP should really get some people in the Western USA to do ground mineralization testing for them if they haven't already done that.

^This

[Steve Herschbach]

Making a good small nugget detector is not about detecting small nuggets as much as it is about ground handling. The detector must eliminate ground and hot rocks well enough to be able to hear the gold. That is why so many air tests are useless. You can tune up a detector for fabulous air test results, but have it fail miserably in the real world prospecting areas.

The problem in a hot VLF is that those high frequencies look good on paper, but they light up the ground and hot rocks as much as the gold. So you have to dummy down the theoretical possibilities as seen in air tests to get the machine to behave in bad ground and hot rocks. The ability to enhance the gold while reducing ground and hot rocks is the genuine magic that takes place in the receiving/processing end of things. People who look only at transmit frequencies and waveforms are missing where the real heavy lifting takes place, as it is encoded/hidden from sight.

There is another detector that has peoples interest due to some fancy buzzwords around the manner in which it transmits. I will repeat, transmission is maybe 1/3 of the game, it's the processing that really matters. And that only gets revealed in real ground conditions. You can't test ground handling efficiency without ground. When I tune up, I am ground balancing to ground and hot rocks. I am setting sensitivity, reactivity, etc. all in response to the ground. How well the detector finds stuff is only apparent after all those things happen first.

The simple fact is that XP is relatively new to the SMF game facing people who have specialized in ground handling for decades. This is BETA software for a reason. It is not done. Nor will version 1.0 really be done. Maybe by 2.0 things will be getting where they need to be.

Long story short the coil is an improvement over the 9" and will no doubt get better. People need to be more patient I guess, though it seems like this coil was a long time coming anyway, just to be where it is at still at this point in time.

I'm not certain that these European guys building detectors for European hunters are as focused on tiny gold bits as much as many here seem to expect anyway. If it is for relic hunters then extracting small gold coins out of ferrous with the better separation characteristics inherent in a smaller coil may be the real goal here. So instead of testing on tiny gold nuggets, maybe the tests should be on $1 U.S. gold coins and small Celtic gold coins in the midst of dense ferrous trash. Going too super hot on teeny tiny non-ferrous may not be what a relic hunter wants. If this thing can extract desired non-ferrous items out of dense ferrous better than the 9" coil, that would seem to be something far more XP owners would care about than the handful of gold prospectors here.

[abenson]

Good info Steve and I think you're right about the focus being on small coins in ferrous trash. That being said they need to fix the condensed coin ID'S on the higher conductive coins for me to even want to us this coil at all. Practically everything above a zinc is coming in at 99.

[stupot]

Those thoughts are entirely correct Steve. In the uk, very very few hunters look for natural gold with detectors. The majority using the elliptical coil would be looking for centuries old tiny silver and gold coins and artefacts. Even that is specialized to be honest using such equipment.

I bought the original elliptical for the D1, as at one point was extracting many tiny silver cut coins from very active ground with plenty of small iron fragments.  I also used it on the coast in dry areas full of bigger iron and rough terrain of stones where the shape made a difference in seperation and manouvreability. However, the 9 round hf coil for that detector was used 90% of the time.

I have no doubt XP will work hard to resolve issues. Testing in US would to me be absolutely essential - no, imperative. Its what the coil was designed for in the first place.

[Steve Herschbach]

55 minutes ago, abenson said:

Good info Steve and I think you're right about the focus being on small coins in ferrous trash. That being said they need to fix the condensed coin ID'S on the higher conductive coins for me to even want to us this coil at all. Practically everything above a zinc is coming in at 99.

Yeah, another side effect of very high frequency, high conductors all getting crunched up into the high end. At 90 - 120 kHz it is going to be extremely difficult to "normalize" the results as there is so very little separation in the ID numbers to work with. On the flip side you get excellent target id separation on the low conductors. Should be useful in a nickels / jewelry / aluminum tabs type scenario in particular. My preference is for a selectable control to turn normalization on and off.

[Jeff McClendon]

I’ve written this before but for newer Deus 2 users who think it might be a good gold prospecting detector in the USA for really small gold, XP included a dedicated FMF gold prospecting mode on Deus 2. We didn’t ask for one, they just did it. By default, that says to me that FMF Goldfield was ready to go as a competitor against the other do it all SMFs that also have a gold prospecting mode.

Maybe that is not what it means to include a gold prospecting mode on a VLF SMF????

Maybe asking Deus 2 to run the XTreme Hunter software and having tiny gold nugget capabilities while not infringing on competitors patents is just asking too much.

[Chase Goldman]

2 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

My preference is for a selectable control to turn normalization on and off.

My preference also.  XP had that capability early on on the original Deus then abandoned it with the HF coils.  Deus 2 never had that feature except for some of the early betas. 

As a relic hunter, I would be happy to just take advantage of the HF2 small form factor and run it around 25 khz to 40 khz which should address the issues associated with pushing it to its extreme frequency settings.  I really was just interested in the form factor more than anything else.