Pyledriver
Active member
I'm rapidly approaching the one year mark with my 705!! I started detecting a few years ago with a Silver uMax (OK Monty! MICROMax) and loved it. But of course I wanted more! That silver didn't have a ground balance adjustment and I knew I needed that if I ever wanted to go prospecting. That led to a Garrett Scorpion, which say what you will, is still a good detector in it's own right and a light, fun detector! Still, the ground balance was hard for me to use, I hated the batteries and quite frankly, took to heart what some had said about a lack of depth-even though I had not seen any indication that it would only detect 'X' deep on any coins I found. I got interested in hunting old farmhouses at that time and although old coins are always nice, I really wanted to find a cache! Still, the top of the priority list was a prospecting machine and I started reading about the Xterra 70. It wasn't long before I knew that was the detector I wanted! I scrounged some money together, struck a deal with Richard for a partial trade, and ended up with a brand-spankin-new 705!!
So almost a year later, I've found a couple silver coins (not looking in the best places or I'd have more), a nice amount of gold jewelry, a bunch of silver rings, another bunch of 'nitro' rings and jewelry, tiny earrings, a cool old cap and ball pistol bullet, tools, a watch and enough clad to pay for gas money to work for weeks on end, and some really cool relics. What I can say most about this detector is that it's target ID, tones, ground balance options, noise cancelling, frequency options and so on have kept me quite busy for these last months!! I'm currently on the trail of some caches, and I know that whenever I've done my part to get my coil over productive ground, the Xterra has done it's part to keep me digging!
The only thing I'd change is to make this detector WATERPROOF! For me, it would be perfect at that point. With money being tight, I've considered selling the X to fund a water machine and a cheaper land machine, BUT I CAN'T BRING MYSELF TO DO IT! Last night I was cleaning the dirt, mud, and possible poison ivy oil off of it (no worries about the 705, all the poison ivy got on ME) and noticing the scuffs here and there and light scratches on the rod and coils. Then I took the rain cover off and admired how good a job that little cover does of keeping the head unit looking brand new. I thought about where this detector has been and it occurred to me that this detector is still more capable of finding good stuff than I am of running it at it's full potential!
So for that water detector... I'm giving the Xterra a new job, go find me the funds! I partially paid for a vacation with my finds from this detector last summer. This summer I'll be digging up another Minelab that likes to SWIM!
So almost a year later, I've found a couple silver coins (not looking in the best places or I'd have more), a nice amount of gold jewelry, a bunch of silver rings, another bunch of 'nitro' rings and jewelry, tiny earrings, a cool old cap and ball pistol bullet, tools, a watch and enough clad to pay for gas money to work for weeks on end, and some really cool relics. What I can say most about this detector is that it's target ID, tones, ground balance options, noise cancelling, frequency options and so on have kept me quite busy for these last months!! I'm currently on the trail of some caches, and I know that whenever I've done my part to get my coil over productive ground, the Xterra has done it's part to keep me digging!
The only thing I'd change is to make this detector WATERPROOF! For me, it would be perfect at that point. With money being tight, I've considered selling the X to fund a water machine and a cheaper land machine, BUT I CAN'T BRING MYSELF TO DO IT! Last night I was cleaning the dirt, mud, and possible poison ivy oil off of it (no worries about the 705, all the poison ivy got on ME) and noticing the scuffs here and there and light scratches on the rod and coils. Then I took the rain cover off and admired how good a job that little cover does of keeping the head unit looking brand new. I thought about where this detector has been and it occurred to me that this detector is still more capable of finding good stuff than I am of running it at it's full potential!
So for that water detector... I'm giving the Xterra a new job, go find me the funds! I partially paid for a vacation with my finds from this detector last summer. This summer I'll be digging up another Minelab that likes to SWIM!