Find's Treasure Forums
Welcome to Find's Treasure Forums, Guests!
You are viewing this forums as a guest which limits you to read only status.
Only registered members may post stories, questions, classifieds, reply to other posts, contact other members using built in messaging and use many other features found on these forums.
Why not register and join us today? It's free! (We don't share your email addresses with anyone.) We keep email addresses of our users to protect them and others from bad people posting things they shouldn't.
Click here to register!
Need Support Help?
Cannot log in?, click here to have new password emailed to you
Bury me with my Sovereign GT...
- Thread starter joecoin
- Start date
Art (NWOH)
New member
It don't hurt anything to get rid of the large trash..makes detecting easier. It does make for some large holes that are hard to refill and kills a lot of grass during dry season, but if it's your property then it's up to you.
HH
HH
Gulf Hunter
Active member
I originally purchased my Excal in Jan. of '06, with high hopes of devastating performance and gold dancing in my head! The 1st time out, I was wondering, what the heck was I thinking?????? This thing is SOOOO strange and all the up and down in the threshold and all. I HATED IT! Over time, I have grown to really love it! It is like being on vacation, as compared to using a PI, but not as deep as a PI, but the amount of time that I save, not recovering iron, allows me to cover much greater spans of water, as compared to any other unit. I think it will take some time and be sure to read cjc's SOV/Excal book, as it will help you with the learning curve on the unit. I think if you stick with it, that it will be great for you. GH
Joe, You know what, I think you are right. I am going to dig the next signal from hell just to see what it is. I guess as long as it's not a demon from hell it can't hurt me.
I am telling you the truth about finding no nails. I have seen them while digging other targets but never got a positive signal from one.(hope I didn't jinx myself by saying it) You know, it could just be that nails give off a tone that sounds bad to me, making me pass on digging them.
HH, Bill
I am telling you the truth about finding no nails. I have seen them while digging other targets but never got a positive signal from one.(hope I didn't jinx myself by saying it) You know, it could just be that nails give off a tone that sounds bad to me, making me pass on digging them.
HH, Bill
"If you are nulled out more than half the time with a very slow sweep, then turn your sensitivity DOWN.
If you are getting a lot of hits on nails in disc mode, then turn your sensitivity DOWN. You should very rarely get a hit on a nail in disc mode unless you are running too high."
Turn the sensitivity down to what?
"Nails can cause good targets to sound bad. Don't discriminate out ANYTHING but iron."
How do I do this? It's a GT. Iron mask on, disc and notch all the way counter clockwise?
I don't mind digging trash , Lord knows I've done plenty of it, I'd just like to find a good target once iin a while. Maybe they are all gone here. Maybe I should ask the president if I can detect the front lawn of the White House.
If you are getting a lot of hits on nails in disc mode, then turn your sensitivity DOWN. You should very rarely get a hit on a nail in disc mode unless you are running too high."
Turn the sensitivity down to what?
"Nails can cause good targets to sound bad. Don't discriminate out ANYTHING but iron."
How do I do this? It's a GT. Iron mask on, disc and notch all the way counter clockwise?
I don't mind digging trash , Lord knows I've done plenty of it, I'd just like to find a good target once iin a while. Maybe they are all gone here. Maybe I should ask the president if I can detect the front lawn of the White House.
Gulf Hunter
Active member
Hang in there, could just be the area you are in. I really am a rank novice on land hunting, but in the water, well.........got gills coming in! We do not have the volume of nails, in my area, that you have there, but there are enough to keep the nulls coming pretty regularly. I run the Threshold silent, as Clive suggests and it has improved my recovery 10 fold! I will even have some nails show in the scoop, but they are simply recovered in the midst of recovering a non-ferrous target. I dig everything that will signal, no matter how weak it is. May be too difficult to accomplish on land though, good luck! GH
Art (NWOH)
New member
Turn the sensitivity down until you have a threshold at least half the time. This will depend on the exact location. If you move and you have threshold less or more of the time then adjust the sensitivity again, but not to exceed the 10 o'clock position of the sensitivity dial. Reminder...sensitivity works backwards....9 o'clock is higher than 10 o'clock. I am tempted to tell you not to exceed 11 o'clock. If you need to run it low, then DO IT.
I never run my GT over 12 o'clock. It is optimum under good conditions in my dirt. I turn it down as necessary. I can get away with 11 o'clock, but things start sounding a little "off". 10 o'clock and higher the nails start pinging. I can swing the coil over HUNDREDS of nails without getting a hit on one. Maybe one in a thousand will sound off. There have often been several bits of nail in the same hole as a coin. When I get the coin, there is nothing left but a null from the remaining nails.
Keep disc and notch all the way down so you won't disc out non ferrous items. Some iron will sound off because of size and shape, but most of the smaller iron won't.....unless you have the sensitivity TOO high.
HH
I never run my GT over 12 o'clock. It is optimum under good conditions in my dirt. I turn it down as necessary. I can get away with 11 o'clock, but things start sounding a little "off". 10 o'clock and higher the nails start pinging. I can swing the coil over HUNDREDS of nails without getting a hit on one. Maybe one in a thousand will sound off. There have often been several bits of nail in the same hole as a coin. When I get the coin, there is nothing left but a null from the remaining nails.
Keep disc and notch all the way down so you won't disc out non ferrous items. Some iron will sound off because of size and shape, but most of the smaller iron won't.....unless you have the sensitivity TOO high.
HH
Gulf Hunter
Active member
Review section 40-41 and see if you can see anything there. Section 40 does speak of the Excal, but that's where it is in that book. I also have, "Advanced Methods for Finding Gold in the Water with the Minelab Excaliber" and this book goes into greater detail, than the Sov/Excal book. Try it, you may like it!
Neil
Well-known member
Ive got both of the books and really have only read a little of the Advanced water hunting book but the first one he mentions over and over to get the threshold right, just audible and steady. I remember one of his remarks was that he was asked how much time it takes to set the threshold and he says in a 6 hour hunt it should take no more than six hours.......meaning he is always checking and adjusting it. I think your cheating yourself out of the deepest signals by running a silent threshold.
I just started trying his all metal suggestions and its not to easy, for me at least. but I did find a few coins and pulltabs that just moved the threshold and when I checked the signals in disc to see if it would null, there was no null or threshold flutter or anything, like there was nothing there in disc so Im leaning towards thinking at this freshwater lake anyways that all metal is deeper and Ive never been a believer of that in the past. Not sure how that translates to ocean beaches but I will try that by this weekend.
HH
Neil
I just started trying his all metal suggestions and its not to easy, for me at least. but I did find a few coins and pulltabs that just moved the threshold and when I checked the signals in disc to see if it would null, there was no null or threshold flutter or anything, like there was nothing there in disc so Im leaning towards thinking at this freshwater lake anyways that all metal is deeper and Ive never been a believer of that in the past. Not sure how that translates to ocean beaches but I will try that by this weekend.
HH
Neil
A slight hum is very important if you want the deeper targets, if not than silent search may work out if you dont want to go so deep. The reason for the threshold is to hear if you are going over iron or nulling to let you know to slow down your sweep speed, if not you will go over many good targets and never know it. These can be those close to trash or even those that are so deep the threshold only changes to let you know it has seen something and if there is no threshold you get no signal either.
Now on this all metal it may work great in water, but I feel and have tested it several times in my area I can get some very weak signals in disc and can not get anything in all metal when I try to pinpoint the target, I tied it today in a park to see what would happen in lock or track and even tried in pinpoint and found the signals were not as pronounced as in disc. It would be nice to try it in water hunting as it may work better, but for land hunting disc will get me deeper finds.
Rick
Now on this all metal it may work great in water, but I feel and have tested it several times in my area I can get some very weak signals in disc and can not get anything in all metal when I try to pinpoint the target, I tied it today in a park to see what would happen in lock or track and even tried in pinpoint and found the signals were not as pronounced as in disc. It would be nice to try it in water hunting as it may work better, but for land hunting disc will get me deeper finds.
Rick
I have taken both of these to this site and both work good for me. Those zinc fruit jar cover sure do sound good and read like a IH penny or a new zinc penny does and when they are deep they seem to sound pretty good too. I find with them once i take out a plug and go in with the S1 probe you will notice it don't sound like no coin and seems a lot bigger sounding.
Now I took the GT to a park no one goes too anymore as everyone says they cant find anything anymore as it has been worked so hard. I want to try some of the trashy area just to see what would happen. I got one area where Can slaw was fooling me as these read like a new zinc penny would. Another area I know is bad for rusty bottle caps I got one that read like a deeper nickle plus some of the beaver tails from the older round pull tabs and did get one 1941 nickle. I got the signal and then would guess what it was and was right on all the alum cans and even the older tin cans and pieces of them the way the signal act. The beaver tails and the rusty bottle caps I felt was too iffy not to dig, but felt they were trash and not a coin and they never locked on to 1 or 2 numbers like a good coin would. I never got one rusty nail as they would give somewhat of a signal if you hit it just right but would null out more than anything else. One signal I thought was a coin next to iron as I could get the sweet tone of a weaker deep coin about 3 inches away from a good solid null, but after digging a deep plug and not getting a signal with the S-1 probe I dug up the null which was a rusty screw and the other signal was gone too, so this was one that the screw was giving a false signal about 2 or 3 inches away from the target. One more target was so iffy and so weak I dug it to find a small piece of alum foil I thought, but it was reading with a high tone at 179-180 only to find out it was possible silver foil used on gum wrappers years ago.
Only got new pennies and the one 1941 nickle this trip, but got no rusty nails that sounded good, one rusty bottle cap that was sounding pretty good that fooled me thinking it was a nickle. I got a piece of copper wire too that sounded good too.
Now I took the GT to a park no one goes too anymore as everyone says they cant find anything anymore as it has been worked so hard. I want to try some of the trashy area just to see what would happen. I got one area where Can slaw was fooling me as these read like a new zinc penny would. Another area I know is bad for rusty bottle caps I got one that read like a deeper nickle plus some of the beaver tails from the older round pull tabs and did get one 1941 nickle. I got the signal and then would guess what it was and was right on all the alum cans and even the older tin cans and pieces of them the way the signal act. The beaver tails and the rusty bottle caps I felt was too iffy not to dig, but felt they were trash and not a coin and they never locked on to 1 or 2 numbers like a good coin would. I never got one rusty nail as they would give somewhat of a signal if you hit it just right but would null out more than anything else. One signal I thought was a coin next to iron as I could get the sweet tone of a weaker deep coin about 3 inches away from a good solid null, but after digging a deep plug and not getting a signal with the S-1 probe I dug up the null which was a rusty screw and the other signal was gone too, so this was one that the screw was giving a false signal about 2 or 3 inches away from the target. One more target was so iffy and so weak I dug it to find a small piece of alum foil I thought, but it was reading with a high tone at 179-180 only to find out it was possible silver foil used on gum wrappers years ago.
Only got new pennies and the one 1941 nickle this trip, but got no rusty nails that sounded good, one rusty bottle cap that was sounding pretty good that fooled me thinking it was a nickle. I got a piece of copper wire too that sounded good too.
Art (NWOH)
New member
Sometimes ground conditions will make a GT hit on small iron and hot rocks too often with the iron mask on. Since you are not familiar with how iron trash responds, it might be better for you right now to turn the iron mask off. I feel that this is a big step downward from how my 2a works.
If there is a lot of electrical interference, you will get a lot more iron hits and nulling also. This can be interference that you do not hear as chatter....you would never know that it's there. There are indications that a lot of noise is present, but you would have to know what to look for. Very difficult to describe.
I have seen times that it is better to run low manual sensitivity rather than auto. Auto can be unstable for some reason...possibly from the right kind of noise.
Try iron mask off and run manual at a low enough setting to keep a slight threshold most of the time. Keep your sweep slow. Use the S-5 in the worst of the trash and save the T-10 for the cleaner areas.
HH
.
If there is a lot of electrical interference, you will get a lot more iron hits and nulling also. This can be interference that you do not hear as chatter....you would never know that it's there. There are indications that a lot of noise is present, but you would have to know what to look for. Very difficult to describe.
I have seen times that it is better to run low manual sensitivity rather than auto. Auto can be unstable for some reason...possibly from the right kind of noise.
Try iron mask off and run manual at a low enough setting to keep a slight threshold most of the time. Keep your sweep slow. Use the S-5 in the worst of the trash and save the T-10 for the cleaner areas.
HH
.
Gulf Hunter
Active member
n/t
adam in cal
New member
I feel the presence of an audible threshold is important as well. Without the threshold you can be nulling out every two feet and will never even realize it, thus possibly missing some goodies, secondly the threshold is important on very deep coins as some of these will merely be just a slight ''waver'' in the threshold indicating a very deep target, If the threshold disappears and comes back with the same sound as when it left its something I want to investigate further, if it disappears and comes back with a slight buzz its a sure bet you have passed over some iron object (Nails or broken bits of irony crud).....for me the threshold is just another tool to help me make decisions . I used to hate that constant buzz ,and often wondered why on earth anyone in there right mind could put up with that annoying buzzing crap in the ear hole all day. Now I cant hunt without it and its sweet music to my ears........I have said it before and I will say it again, too much info can often be a bad thing, too much advice can hinder ones own ability to learn . GO HAVE FUN , If you're having fun you will learn and little by little things will fall into place, The sovereign can be a very frustrating machine in the beginning but once you start to grasp its nuances you will see its tough to beat, and it can compete with ANY machine on the market ................[size=x-large]A[/size]
I have a GT and there are some iron infested sites that are a real hard hunt with the GT. If there is iron everywhere it will stay in null but will still signal on a good hit. Try all-metal and see if there isn't iron everywhere.
Plus, if the site has been hunted hard... well, you cannot find things that are not there.
The Sovereign really is not a hard machine to learn. It really shines at a site without modern aluminum trash or at a site without too much iron. In iron, which infest's most sites I hunt, I prefer my T2 or F75 but still... I cannot bring myself to sell my GT.
Julien
Plus, if the site has been hunted hard... well, you cannot find things that are not there.
The Sovereign really is not a hard machine to learn. It really shines at a site without modern aluminum trash or at a site without too much iron. In iron, which infest's most sites I hunt, I prefer my T2 or F75 but still... I cannot bring myself to sell my GT.
Julien