CTX 3030 On Gold Nuggets - Tips On Settings

[Gold Hound]

CTX 3030 on gold nuggets

Hi guys

I have had the CTX since it was released.

However I did not purchase it for the same reasons as most others bought it for, I bought it primarily to look for larger gold in areas that have a high trash density where non discriminating detectors like the GPX will drive you nuts digging junk.

It has the best discrimination and target separation of any detector I have used this far, particularly if the trash is iron.

That is why I use it for this job if the trash density is low I just swap back to a gold detector and would never waist my time using it in low trash areas for gold nuggets.

To give you an idea of what I am talking about with trash density’s and to establish an understanding I  will break them into 4 groups.

1-      Very low trash= up to 10 targets in a 5mx5m area.

         This area I would use a gold detector like the GPX in.

2-      Low trash 10 to 25 targets in a 5mx5m area.

         This area I would still use the gold detector in if it is worthwhile.

         But if the gold density is low I will start to use the discriminating detector.

3-      Med trash= 25 to 50 targets in a 5mx5m area.

          I am definitely reaching for the discriminating detector now unless there is           a high gold density.

4-      High trash 50+ targets in a 5mx5m area.

         Discriminating detector only! any other is a waist of time.

Ok now that I have established a base line of trash density’s we can get to the nitty gritty, I will go through the settings that have an effect on gold field performance one by one and explain how I use them, or play them against each other to squeeze the best performance out of the CTX that I can for my given situation.

Target trace; I turned it on and would never turn it off as it is very useful in helping to identify a target or multiple targets under the coil and I am yet to find a reason to turn it back off.                                  

Why this key feature was not on by default is anyone’s guess.

Target trace pinpoint; I turned this on and never turned it off ether, as it greatly assists in pinpointing particularly if there are multiple targets under the coil, by using this feature you can pinpoint only the desired target most times.

Threshold Pitch; I run it at 13 but everybody is different all you are after is a threshold pitch that is comfortable for you to listen to all day.

Threshold level; set up threshold so that it is soft but clearly audible, the manual covers this in detail.

Volume Gain; now this is a important one, I mostly just have it at max=30 but if you are getting spurious noises like those faint blipping noises that you can sometimes get in mineralized ground you can wind this back to cancel them out with less loss of depth than turning back the sensitivity, however it has its limitations in this regard. It is basically an audio amplifier that amplifies the target signal.

Sensitivity; Obviously you want to keep this as high as possible, but in the gold fields the ground usually contains various minerals and because the CTX is a multiple frequency detector ‘Auto’ sensitivity is more effective in these conditions, because the processor individually adjusts each of them to their optimum setting.

Where as in manual you can only adjust them all to the same setting which means that if one is effected by mineralization or emi and becomes noisy, you have to turn them all down to the level where the noise stops in that frequency and you are effectively choking the rest to quieten the detector.

So this is why Auto is the best option on the CTX in gold field areas. I can usually run Auto +3 but I turn it down if I am getting a lot of spurious ground noise and I can’t use any of my other tricks to get rid of the noise.

Response; My favored response is ‘Long’ but I also like ‘Normal’ as well. It depends on my anticipated target size and trash density as to which one I’ll use.

In a medium to high trash area I prefer Long particularly if the gold size is 3g+ like in tailings oversize piles.

I like normal for smaller gold and lower trash density.

Recovery Fast; I nearly always have this on as it aids in target separation.

And superior target separation is one of my main reasons for using the CTX

Recovery Deep; I have this on if the trash density is low or medium particularly when using the smaller coils.

Recovery deep improves the ID on deep targets and can improve the signal on deep targets marginally but it can cause spurious noise in some mineralized ground.

So if it’s on and you are getting spurious noise recovery deep could be the cause so try turning it off before dropping the volume gain or sensitivity.

Target Separation; The 2 best target separation modes for gold nuggets are ‘High Trash’ and ‘Ground Coin’, I use High Trash the most as most areas I target most with the CTX are med to high trash areas and High Trash is good at handling mineralization and still gives you very good target separation.

In a area with low trash density that is mineralized I use Ground Coin but it dose not perform well in high a trash density as you will get some blending of targets.

In a low to very low mineralization area ‘Ferrous Coin’ performs very good no matter the trash density, but is no good in mineralized areas as you will get blending of the ground and target, which makes the target ID go crazy and blending is a problem.

Gold Hunting Discrimination and Audio Patterns.

Below I have posted a few example modes that have a good base discrimination pattern and audio pattern to suit the situation that I use them in.

100’s of hours of work went into building each of them.

When building your own pattern I recommend that you do what I did which is scan as many nuggets as you can get your hands on of various sizes.

When I did this I scanned just over 1000 nuggets ranging from .2g to 32oz and I put the ones that show on the edge of my pattern aside and took them to a few locations and buried them in different mineralization to test and modify my mode’s, then I got my bucket of junk and scanned 1000’s of pieces of junk commonly found in the gold fields.

Then I modified my modes again to cancel out most of the junk whilst still keeping most of the nugget area open.

They are not perfect by any means but they have been pretty useful for me as a base but if I keep getting one type of junk in a specific area I will modify the discrimination to deal with it and save it as a new mode in my file.   

You might also notice that in all of my gold specific discrimination patterns that I have the top two lines rejected, this is because in mineralized ground the ground will give you a blipping signal always in these top two lines and rather than sacrificing performance by turning the sensitivity or audio settings down I dealt with this by blanking it out, buy doing it how I did I lost no depth due to having to back off the settings and no good target ever ID’s  only in these lines.

The audio patterns that are part of the mode also have a few tweaks that I have done for gold nugget specific reasons.

If you look at the Audio profile in the exchange software you will notice that I have set the low Ferrous tone line very low down at the 32 ferrous line, I did this because I found that when using the discrimination pattern if the tone was set higher up at say 17 for example I would get some audio blanking or mixing on some good targets in very trashy areas.

This is the main reason that most of my Gold nugget modes have ether a ‘2 Ferrous Tone’ or ‘Combined’ ‘Tone ID Profile’.

But when set low at 32 ferrous line the separation was very good in a cluttered area. It is not that noticeable on larger 3g+ nuggets but on the smaller ones even on the smaller coils (6in and coiltek elliptical) if I had the ferrous audio line higher it would not separate the nugget from the trash as efficiently.

That is why I mostly prefer the discrimination pattern over the open screen also. 

http://www.detectorprospector.com/forum/files/file/4-gold-hound-ctx-gold-modes/

Coils

My preferred coil for the CTX is the standard 11in coil because I mostly chase the bigger gold in the tailings oversize piles and old diggers camps. But in areas with predominantly smaller gold I put on the coiltek 11x5.

I also did away with the skid plate on the ML 11in coil as it wears out in a matter of hours in gold field situations and I silicon-ed a piece of 3mm lexan plastic in its place.

And after 2 years of heavy use it is still in good condition!   

[Gold Hound]

sorry guys I couldn't post the exchange2 modes file 

It says wrong file type???????

[Relichunter]

Hey Gold Hound,

 

Thanks so much for your information on the CTX. I do not own one but I just made up my mind to get one as I do hunt many trash areas. My sole detector for gold is the 4500 and its been good to me, but a CTX as a back up for trashy areas would be a smart move. Thanks again !

[Bada Bing]

Great post Gold Hound, thanks. Have you ever tried the 17 inch coil ?

BB

[Gold Hound]

 

Great post Gold Hound, thanks. Have you ever tried the 17 inch coil ?

BB

 

 

I have the 17 but I took it to Europe and left it with my treasure hunting kit because I hardly ever used it here in Australia.

And the 6in I gave to my friend and prospecting partner Tremain because he didn't have a small coil.

So I only have the 11 and the coiltek here in aus.

[Shelton]

Thank you nice post!

[Rege-PA]

Great info, thanks for sharing! I now see why you are successful in chasing the weight, you squeeze every advantage out of your machine that it is capable of producing by thoroughly learning and experimenting with the settings. Most of us never reach this level of expertise with our detectors, the majority of us are "Turn and Go" junkies who never really realise what we are missing.

 

Many of us are in the same situation with the GPX 5000 and now with the introduction of the ZED are thirsting for some miracle settings that will give us some more depth and sensitivity, pray tell you have some?

[Snakeriver]

Thanks for the great post, I for one would love to see your gold patterns. A link to them here would allow us to save them and then log into exchange 2 where they can be loaded and viewed. The CTX is a great detector and currently my only one. I live 20 minutes from vast amounts of tailings piles and recent posts here have the light bulb illuminating. Kudos for applying the strengths of the CTX and sharing your findings. Very encouraging!

[Steve Herschbach]

Really great and informative post - thank you Gold Hound!

The attachment function is for pictures only. I will take a look at activating the downloads area of the forum which allows other file types to be shared with forum members.

[Steve Herschbach]

On 3/24/2015 at 7:53 AM, Rege-PA said:

Great info, thanks for sharing! I now see why you are successful in chasing the weight, you squeeze every advantage out of your machine that it is capable of producing by thoroughly learning and experimenting with the settings. Most of us never reach this level of expertise with our detectors, the majority of us are "Turn and Go" junkies who never really realise what we are missing.

Many of us are in the same situation with the GPX 5000 and now with the introduction of the ZED are thirsting for some miracle settings that will give us some more depth and sensitivity, pray tell you have some?

There never will be miracle settings for the GPZ or most any other detector for that matter. You have to learn what the controls do, and the best way to do that is to use the machine. Each setting must be custom adjusted for each particular combination of ground type and gold. Anyone who uses a magic setting is a "Turn On and Go" junkie as you have described.

Even Gold Hounds suggestions are just that - suggestions that work best for his conditions.

Let's say you have a manual transmission car. What is the "magic setting" combination of gear setting and throttle setting that is best? Would that be third gear, half throttle, or fourth gear, one third throttle? It just depends on whether you are on a hill or not, whether you are passing someone or not. The gear shift and throttle exist with the sole intent of being adjusted as needed. So it is with the controls on your detector.

Some settings will never be more than educated guesses. On the GPZ I might use High Yield or General based on my best guess of the depth of the ground and the size of the gold I am after. Neither is right or wrong, it is just a judgement call based on experience and knowledge of the ground.

Some of us work solely in certain areas and so there really is a best setting for our situation. Somebody else somewhere else can settle on an entirely different "best setting". What works best for me in low mineral ground is not going to work best for somebody in extreme ground in Australia. Other people get around a lot, and so must be better prepared to adjust the machine for whatever conditions they encounter.

The vast majority of people I have encountered do not use their detectors enough to ever really learn what the controls do or how to properly adjust them. Reading has limitations. Read all you want about playing a guitar and you will get no closer to being able to play a guitar. Detectors are like that. You have to use them and use them constantly to stay good with them.