AT PRO Frustration

[Coinseeker 78]

I have been hunting with my buddy who uses a Minelab Pro SE with a 8 inch DD coil. He out hunts me every time. I am using the 5X8 coil and reading every signal he does swinging my detector over his target before digging. So it is not the depth that is a problem. The other day he dug a V nickle at about 5 inches. Not ten feet from him I dug a Jefferson nickle at 5 inches. Yesterday we hunted all day without much luck then as I was leaving he dug a shield nickle at about 4 or 5 inches and the next coin was a c coin at 5 inches. What makes me mad is I swept the same area just prior to him finding coins. I know my AT PRO should pick up the coins but I am reading the signals wrong. I have found a lot of silver with the AT Pro but not like he does. Any suggestions on how to do better with my pro?
I swing my coil at various speeds and do the wiggle when I find a target. I even tested several sweep speeds with a Quarter,nickle,dime and penny and found they all sounded off with strong signals at any speed.I love this machine but know I should do better than I am. Thanks in advance.I use Pro zero setting mostly.

 

[Diggin-it]

If you can read every signal his machine does before he dug it then its your swinging technique or you simply are missing the targets. The 5X8DD coil is a very small coil IMO, its hard to cover much ground thoroughly. Throw the stock coil on and try that out for awhile.

 

[John-Edmonton]

He knows his machine inside out, so he knows what it is telling him every time you get a signal. You will get to that level too.

When you get to the level where you can tell the machine what is under the coil, not the other way around.....you have mastered it!

 

[khouse]

Make sure you have superb coil technique. Coil flat and low with the ground. No more than 50% overlap. Less if you can.

 

[Oak]

n/t

 

[matthias]

Good question and great answers. I am a new owner of the AT Pro and this thread has helped me. I have only been detecting 3 years and good advice is always welcome- especially for a new machine. You simply never can know it all. HH. Matt

 

[sparkster]

Don't feel bad, I have had my pro for over a year and I have similar results as you. I have found several silver rings but only one gold.

I have tested my unit using gold, silver pull tabs, coins of all denomination and various sweep speeds. The pro is dead on with TID.

It has to be that we are just not running the coil over the right targets, or our coil technique is poor.

To be honest though I have found over $800.00 in coins within the last year, so cannot complain to much.

Sparkster------------- HH and GL

 

[EdwardH]

He knows his machine inside out, so he knows what it is telling him every time you get a signal. You will get to that level too.

When you get to the level where you can tell the machine what is under the coil, not the other way around.....you have mastered it!

 

[mike5853]

With some detectors / coils, the sense field / diameter can vary, some tighter tan others. I would make sure, as mentioned above you maintain a good speed and coil overlap by no less then 50%. Also, what I would do is the next time he hits a target, before he digs it, walk over and swing your coil over the target and see what and how your detector reads it. The truth is, and I'm guilty, if your coil is not over the target. . .

 

[synthnut]

It's easy to miss an overlap when swinging a smaller coil .....It's easy for a bigger coil too , but less likely ........My buddy video'd me swinging my coil one day .....He was laughing because I had a pronounced UPSWING at the end of each swing of the coil ......Spend more time swinging slower , and keeping your coil low to the sand especially at the end of your swings ...... Use a larger coil for larger area's ...... If you are going from wet sand to dry sand you also have to remember to RE ground balance the AT PRO .....Hiis ML machine does this automatically ......There is a BIG difference in GB numbers from wet to dry sand ....... You will probably GB in the upper numbers of the machine in dry saind and down in the teens in wet sand if you can GB at all .......Jim

 

[BigCatDaddy]

It's a simple thing really. Just pin your elbow to your side and you should keep that coil flat. You won't be able to swing that wide swath anymore but if your coil is flipping up at the end of your swings like a pendulum, you ain't hittin' but about a 1 foot wide piece of ground. I've watched so many people with the old "pendulum swing" and then ask how I'm coming along behind them and picking up loot. It's easy, I just move over a foot and dig the loot. I've seen some that the coil goes 2 feet up in the air!!