Any Nugget Hunters Out There Using The ATX?

[John-Edmonton]

It would be nice to get some reports from hunts/finds from this year, especially for those of us who are soon to get bombarded with snow......

 

[yrekadude]

I hunted nuggets last weekend in Redding CA and although I didn't find a nugget I found lots of little 22 bullets, square nails and other targets at good depths. The Iron ID worked great, I was able to swing the stock coil all day without the shoulder assist gear. I did notice that when I bumped the coil lightly on rocks or twigs while scanning the ground it made a target sound.. but when I raised the coil up in the air and tapped it hard with my knuckles it was quiet.

I enjoyed the hunt, my ATX lasted all day.. but it was hot and dry and I was exhausted at the end of the day...

Here is a picture of the nugget my friend found with his GPX5000.. (I would have also found it had my coil passed over it!)

[attachment 301238 20141011_123036.jpg]

 

[steve herschbach]

Last nuggets I found with the ATX was earlier this summer in Alaska. It was raining and I was hunting in brushy conditions with the 8" mono coil. Got on a very steep hillside, and picked up these three nuggets at 4.4 grams. Nice fat little things.

I was out again with the ATX in northern Nevada recently but the area is well known and has been pounded for many years. I did not find any gold but the ATX performed well as usual. Still wishing for a lighter version though. I will get out with the ATX more soon as time allows. Lately I have been evaluating lots of VLF detectors for hunting nail infested tailing piles and that has taken a lot of time.

 

[Lunk]

I've been using the ATX for nugget hunting for a year now. I have also been using a Minelab GPX 5000 for gold nuggets since its release in 2010. As Yrekadude pointed out and as Steve Herschbach well knows, the ATX requires extreme coil control to keep it quiet, especially at high gain levels...that's the down side. On the upside however, the ATX will handle certain ground types that the GPX 5000 has difficulty with. One example that I will share is magnetite, commonly known as iron-stone; as any electronic prospector who has spent time in the desert goldfields of the American southwest knows, these magnetite hot rocks can be very frustrating to detect in, especially if they are numerous. The ATX can be set up to completely ignore them and still find very small nuggets, whereas the GPX 5000 cannot balance out the iron-stones and still be balanced to the surrounding ground. So when ground conditions get too tough for the GPX 5000, I grab the ATX. Here are some of the gold nuggets I have found with the ATX in the goldfields of Idaho, Nevada and Arizona:

 

[bearkat4160]

Yea my go to nugget machine with now close competition with the new Minelab SDC 2300.
Just got me 2 nuggets with my ATX a week or so ago in N Cal near the Oregon border.
Go to YouTube and type in Bearkat4160 and find my YT channel and you will see the video of the nugget find.
It has pocket gold nugget in the title... It has ads in the video so I can't post it here, grrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Bearkat

 

[steve herschbach]

Hey Lunk,

Very nice! I especially like that round fat nugget above the dime. And good to see somebody else giving the ATX a fair go. The machine has great potential and I really hope we see an ATX Pro made just for the desert prospector someday.

"So when ground conditions get too tough for the GPX 5000, I grab the ATX."

The marketing folks at Garrett just died and went to heaven!

 

[Lunk]

Steve,

Garrett is on the right track with the ATX, and you're correct that the next logical improvement be a light weight land unit with traditional coils without the telescoping shafts; it would be most welcome. If they also eliminate the touch sensitivity, the ATX Pro will be a winner. As far as the marketing idea, I better patent that quote before Garrett gets a hold of it...LOL!