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9 hours of prospecting with the new Gold Bug 3

azsh07

azsh07

Member
Well gotta go pick a bunch of cactus out of my leg......but I will say it performed rather well.
One thing to note right off the bat...The F75 coils do not work correctly as was posted. Actually they will not GB in high mineral soil. They did in my yard as it is mild but up in gold country where it runs 88...no way....not even close. So...will call Fisher and find out what coils work.
I will post a bit more tomorrow...I am tired dusty...no filthy and my @ss hurts from ATVing 30 miles.
I will say it did work extremely well...no gold but that is the way it is here...it did keep up with a GBII that a guy was using...we compared targets to each other.
Basically nothing bad to report...very stable with sensitvity at max..with just a touch of light chatter at max.
More tomorrow.
Bummer on the coils:-(
scott
 
Yesterday was about 8-9 hours of prospecting with the new Gold Bug.

First two places I took it were to a couple of large prospect digs way...way out in the Bradshaw's. The first one I doubt anyone has been to in decades. It was a tough ATV ride of about 1.5 hours just to get within a 1/4 mile and then...it was a rough hike up.

I was basically sampling the tailings piles and sides of the prospects. Did not find any gold here and by the looks of it probably turned out to be low grade ore. The detector was able to be run at max sensitivity all the time. I ran in All metal mainly. The disc mode is not reliable on small nuggets in bad ground and this is the same with all VLF's nuggte machines I have tried....even the GBII. Once the nuggetts or targets are out of the ground you can swap to Disc and it works fine but....with the ground so bad they all loose reliability. So...no prospector uses anything other than all metal.
I did find the normal bits of small iron...typical.

We left here after an hour and decided to hit a stretch of bedrock that has produced quite a few pickers before...so off we went on the ATV's.
As we were getting close to our next destination I was riding behind my friend...he was a few hundred feet ahead. I spotted a prospect dig through the brush that we and alot of others had missed. It was maybe 20 feet straight in and the roock was very solid...a good one to sample the walls and see what we could find. SO I hopped on the ATV and caught up to my partner and we went back. This dig is actually on one of his claims and this claim has produced some nice nugs...and just up from this prospect is a big dig that has produced some serious poundage in the old days.

Well we did not have flashlights which is unusual...but since it was bright out and the shaft was bright enough to see any bugs,snakes and so on...I popped in...my firend stays outside.

I scanned the walls with the GB all the way in. At the very end of the dig right in the middle of therear wall I get a nice hit in all metalll.man this is solid...definately not ground minerals. My buddy tossed me in a pick and a plastic scoop.
He was so excited as he could hear my detector ring out ( no headphones on in shaft)....so he grabs his digital camera and video shot me digging.
Well took me 20 minutes to pick out the 3-4" of shist and rock to get the sample out. Picked it out of the wall and had it in my hand...then..I dropped it...damnit..now I had to locate it in front of me on the shaft floor..but it is asmall area...so soon it was found. I came crawling out of the dig...man this was sweet.....took the samples out and man there it was.....a .223 caliber slug someone had fired into the dig and had buried itself into a crack in the schist about 3-4" in. AHHHHH...you gotta be kidding me..I sat it bat poop for 20 minutes for this...ahh...c'mon.

My friend was cracking up...we both were sure it was a specimen...and had it been we would have tore up that shaft. It is all on video and will be posted on his gold forum. i will put up a link....you can here the GB going off...it is a good shot. But overall it was rock solid for hard rock sampling....just great in tailings.

Anyway, now the wind is out of my sails but we proceeded to the bedrock stretch we were heading to an hour earlier.

Now this is where there were some minor shortcomings. While the GoldBug ground balancled very well and was quite stable...it did not handle the Magnetite,hematite and basalt as well as a GBII. We met up with a fellow we had run into before in this same stretch the week before. he was pounding OUR strecth of bedrock with his GBII. He was a nice guy actually...and so i stuck around him as we both wanted to compare the new Gb to the older GBII target for target.

The new GB hit every small target his GBII did almost 100%. There was a small piece of birdshot (ended up being) he was detecting in a crack and I could hear it but it was slightly hotter on his machine..not much..just a bit.

The bigger difference was hot rock rejection/accept. The GBII is a bit better on being able to discern between a faint target and hot ground changes. Not a huge difference but noticeable. This was the only minor flaw I found.

Now if you have never hunted a dry creek bed in Az then..you have no idea the misery that it can hold. Hot bedrock, basalt, magnetite,hematite, iron trash...it sucks. So having a VLF that can give you a good audio difference between hotrocks and target is crucial. This was it's only minor weak spot. But then again..I hate creek beds with aything other than a PI...but there is alot of small picker in the cracks the PI misses so...need a VLF that can cope..here the GBII is a bit better.Overall though it worked awesome especially for it's pricepoint. In hardrock tailing and such where the mineral content runs fairly constant it was a joy to use.

On the coin and relic end...it has mucho potential for a dual purpose/crossover machine. It isn't going to replace your F70/75 but....it will give a 70 a run for the money. I cannot give solid feedback on it's relic ability as I just do not have that here especially at any depth. Later this year we are going to do some relic up in an undisclosed location but...that is a few weeks off. I will bring it there. In my test plot...it hits a 6" indian head solid with just the 5" coil and I can lift the coil 3" up and still hit it and that is at 70 sensitivity( out of 100).

Ths machine deserves someone back east giving it a shot for relics and reporting. If I were in the Carolinas and wanted a machine to hit those creeks for nuggs and then walk right over and do relics..there is no other unit like this one. I hope someone trys it out down there.

I would not see a problem buyting one from Cabela's and trying it out...so if you are feeling froggy...give it a shot. You can return it for any reason to Cabela's with a full refund. Even if it works fine but you don't like it...they say it is fine. this is their policy and I would take advantage of it...within reason.
When the video is up of my Lead mining I will post a link....it was fuuny actually. I give this unit 2 thumbs up overal...but only one thumbs up and one thumbs down for hot rock accept/rejact ablities.
scott
 
Trying to find out coil compatability. Seems the Ohmega 11DD will work but have not heard of any others.
Also someone asked me about how I knew or ehard that the Cabelas' machines were going to be different than dealer versions. That is only rumor and I had read it on the forums....I think over on Carls Metal detector forum a couple people that were dealers stated that. I do not have any real inside info on that...may be true..may not. I don' t see how there would be any difference and the logic in it...maybe just updates to it via software and such as it is released.
scott
 
Now first understand that I really had no idea he was recording this or I would have not swore when i realized we did not bring a flashlight...and I usually carry a high 50K candlepower (or whatever) mega rechargeable one.
you tube gold bug 3 mine video
 
...hope this is not a no no...this is the thread on the Arizona prospecting forum...you can see...we go to extremes to get to some spots. We hit a few spots that were pushing what i am comfortable doing on an ATV loaded with equipment.

http://www.arizonagoldprospectors.com/invision/index.php?/topic/167979-exploring-gold-bug-3-and-a-video/
 
azsh07 said:
Trying to find out coil compatability. Seems the Ohmega 11DD will work but have not heard of any others.
Also someone asked me about how I knew or ehard that the Cabelas' machines were going to be different than dealer versions. That is only rumor and I had read it on the forums....I think over on Carls Metal detector forum a couple people that were dealers stated that. I do not have any real inside info on that...may be true..may not. I don' t see how there would be any difference and the logic in it...maybe just updates to it via software and such as it is released.
scott
Click to expand...

Scott,

It is not a rumor that the dealer versions will be different. FT's engineers have made it clear that there will be differences and to not base the performance on "C" versions.

In the mean time return the one you have and hope the dealer version comes out before the heat gets too bad out there. :biggrin:

Tom
 
..that is true...and I have no reason to doubt you....then I hope Fisher makes it obvious which a Full Dealer version and which is a C version. Maybe the dealer version will be a Gold Bug LTD...or anniversary edition. If they tweak the hot rock reject abilities on it then it can be a serious contenda!!!
scott
 
based on past models from Fisher/FT the rev # should show up at turn on by pressing and holding say the menu button for instance.

Hopefully!

Tom
 
..you are correct. I am just refraining from saying anything myself. I get myself in trouble too many times in my younger days. i am trying to be the kinder gentler Scott...:)
Actually, if the dealer version is in anyway better than this one..it really will be a great mid priced unit.
scott
 
Hey guys this detector has alot of potential. Really has me impressed. But..........and there is a big but...the unit needs the software tweaked for hot rock accept/reject. It could give some serious competition to higher priced units in the prospecting VLF range but it needs to handle the hot rocks better.
I know they are a challenge and I am not one who knows how to tweak it and I am not criticizing at all. But compared to the GBII or other units it hits hard on hot rocks verses other units even with a perfect GB attained. I spent about an hour and a half just tweaking the GB and, sensivity and thresh in all metal to get the hot rock response to a point where I could get it manageable and it was a challenge.
However..It is wicked sensitive to small gold...on par with the GBII amazingly.
I spent all day with this unit and as you could see in the video I am not futzing around with it in a lab. This is what this machine will be expected to do and more. A hard rock mine or tailings are EASY for any detector....it is scratching bedrock that is the challenge.
Anyway...I hope for the best with the dealer versions. Great job ( blatant sucking up).
scott
 
Scott ??

Must be the heat out there in AZ. :poke:

You used to pick apart everything you used back east. :lol: Can I mention Coinstrike! :rofl:

Scott thanks for the Gold Bug report. I mean that.

Tom
 
You should post another video, that shows what the detector can do.. ANY way how did you get one? I m just asking because I want one to go hit the river up in Northern California. Is the coil waterproof meaning can it go under water. I just wan't to see the detector more not the moon. Just joking.. Very cool video.:rage:
 
Anyway I can't find the video on youtube. I read some of your post about it. Are they going to make it a good detector or a better detector? Im just new to detecting and actuley don't even have one I just started prospecting and wan't a metal detector becasue their is so much land around me that is hard to get to by car or even walking. I just want' to try it out and see the new gold bug work. I have seen the older one on youtube and that think rocks. This guy cupitedbud or something finds like 2-5 gram nuggets all over the place.. Cool stuff... Well thanks for your time.. Jess:super:
 
I am curious - did you buy your unit from BassPro? I called a few dealers, and they told me the new Gold Bug is not yet released, and that the only one Fisher has released is a unit to Bass Pro and it will be different than the Gold Bug when it is finally out? It also will not be called the Gold Bug 3, but just the Gold Bug. Interesting...
 
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