Minelab Video - GPZ 7000 Ground Type

[Steve Herschbach]

[klunker]

 Thanks Steve. This gives me some ideas to experiment with. It also goes well with my How To Speak Australian lessons.

[Steve Herschbach]

Obviously the Gold Modes are causing far more questions for people than the Ground Type setting. My only note here is to say I have been finding the Normal/High Yield combination quite possible at various locations in California and Nevada, typically where there are lighter colored soils. Some areas it is a total no-go but in the U.S. at least be sure and do not fall into the habit of always using the Difficult setting. Give Normal a try, and go back to Difficult if need be. The sensitivity to small items gives the SDC 2300 a serious run for the money, even with the larger coil, while delivering more depth on larger nuggets.

 

A nice summary explanation of how the ground modes may work by Goldhound at http://golddetecting.4umer.net/t21336-link-showing-a-minelab-vid-gpz-7000-gold-mode#207316

[DDancer]

Actually I do have a question/observation on ground type.

Hardly a qualified observation as I'm only practicing till I get into the area I'll be swinging this year but I've noted

EMI is much easier to handle here in the East in Difficult without much adjustment to sensitivity from default on targets in the .5 and below range up to a foot down.  In Normal I have to dum down sens a bit to get similar results.  High yield and General though General is giving me more chat.

Addendum: this is with smoothing off.  Increasing levels of smoothing seem to have to correspond with slight

increases in sens but that seems to have been noted elsewhere.

 

How is this working out in the wild for anyone in high EMI areas?

[jasong]

I think it's natural to have less discussion about the ground modes because each ground setting's effects are usually immediately apparent and very easy to test. The same can't be said for testing out detecting modes though.

 

DDancer, if your ground allows Normal and the noise is just coming from EMI then hit it with smoothing before you hit it with Difficult. There is too much reluctance online to use audio smoothing and I can't understand why. The amount of sensitivity you lose going from Normal to Difficult (assuming your ground is allowing Normal) is greater than the amount you lose going to High Smoothing, let alone Low Smoothing. Not to mention the amount of EMI cut out by Smoothing is far greater than the amount cut out by switching to Difficult.

 

I posted this in my settings post, but the general procedure for me is to start in Normal, the add Low Smoothing, then High Smoothing, and only then do I switch to Difficult if the ground is still noisy. I have ground modes on my user preset button so I can bump into Difficult temporarily when I'm in patchy hot/cold/hot/cold areas.

 

It seems like everyone is in a rut where we are stuck on no audio smoothing and Difficult, and I can't understand why. You can really get this machine performing crazy sensitive in a lot of places here in the US yet still extremely stable I think since we are lucky to have big areas with mild to medium ground. I could say the same about people being stuck on low sensitivity, I think its mostly because of a fear to use the smoothing and from my testing upping the sensitivity makes up more than what you lose with smoothing but the smoothing cuts the chatter way down so in the end the machine is more stable yet also more sensitive. But that's a subject for a post outside of the ground modes topic I guess.

[Lunk]

I heartily agree with Jasong, the same has been my experience as well.

[LuckyLundy]

Jason & Lunk,

Your more than both right! The GPZ is truly a gold detectorist machine. The more you use it, the more you'll understand it. Take some hours off your learning curve with Jason's above post. Lunk, Jason...see ya in the goldfield soon.

LuckyLundy

[Steve Herschbach]

"It seems like everyone is in a rut where we are stuck on no audio smoothing and Difficult, and I can't understand why."

 

That's funny, I do not see everybody as being stuck on anything. Different forums? Somebody making a suggestion for settings and an assumption that is all they ever try or use?

 

Seems like plenty of experimenting going on to me. The posts by Lunk and yourself prove it.

 

As far as smoothing goes, that came from JPs general aversion to smoothing and others following suit. As I mentioned at http://www.detectorprospector.com/forum/topic/800-five-rp-bits-with-some-new-settings/?p=7794 there is always going to be a battle between sensitivity and stability depending on peoples personal desires and tolerance levels. I cannot tolerate totally silent detecting and there is a point where there is too much audio feedback. Where those two things balance is very much an individual thing. Some people can listen to a barrage of what I think is noise and hear a symphony instead. Some people really do want the machine to run smooth as butter with nary a variation until a target is heard.

 

There are parallels between prospecting and hunting thick ferrous trash around old habitations. The best iron hunters prefer the detector to report everything and to listen for nuances in the signal. There is a real difference between blended and gated audio that few appreciate. Others want machines to shut the heck up on ferrous and just report non-ferrous. And some people want a prospecting detector to offer constant audio feedback on ground variations while also hearing the gold. Others want to hear just the gold.

 

The bottom line as I see it is you have to find a level that makes your own personal detecting experience reasonably pleasant. I find the GPZ 7000 to be so powerful that it is pretty forgiving of settings within reason and will simply find gold if I get over it.

[jasong]

I am often guilty of using overgeneralization in my casual speaking, I did not literally mean every single person running a Z, only that I see a trend, for that I apologize.

[Steve Herschbach]

And I often seem overly critical or argumentative and for that I apologize! No apologies needed jasong, your posts and contributions are greatly appreciated. I just thought it interesting our two different perceptions and as my wife is fond of saying - perception is reality.

 

You are spot on actually as if you look at the GPX 5000 you will see that people tended to settle into some mode somebody recommended and that was that. Fine Gold was a big offender in that regard. It is easy enough to do when you find something that seems to work. And if all a person does is hunt one particular area it can be the correct thing to do.

 

However, if a person moves around a lot it is imperative to learn what the settings do and adjust for different conditions. If one setting worked everywhere we would not need the controls, just a power switch. The settings on the detector are just like a manual shift car with a gas pedal. You need to learn when to be in second at half throttle, third at one third throttle, and in overdrive at full throttle. My GPZ settings are meaningless unless you know the exact context in which they are being used.

 

Yesterday I was in a fairly low mineral situation running in High Yield/Normal, Smoothing Off, and Gain 12. Unit was generally stable with a little ground feedback and as hot as a pistol on small stuff. I like the GPZ more and more the more I use it. My SDC is in danger of becoming an orphan.