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Dixie Mods For Sov GT

I'm mainly interested in hearing if it's increased the depth of the GT. My shot in the dark theory is that Minelab might have "borrowed" his idea and used that in the GT because most say the GT is a bit deeper than prior Sovereigns. For that reason I wonder if one would see improvement in a GT's depth or if it's just going to happen with older Sovereigns.
 
Hmmm, all sounds very mysterious.
 
Speculating does make for "good conversation".
 
David@dixiemetaldetectors
 
There shouldn't be anything hard about a simple question. Does it or does it not improve the depth of the GT? I'd rather hear the opinion of somebody who had it done to see if they saw any improvement.
 
I called dixie metal detectors and ask this very question if it Increased depth and I never got a straight answer from him just like a used car salesman's used to be they danced all around instead of answering with a yes or no, they tried to baffle you with B.S HH
 
The Original Sovereigns had the tone adjustment set very low & it just kind of grunted & acted lazy,, If you turn the tone adjustment all the way up it made it come alive, no more depth just a sweeter sounding machine to most ears.. The mod also included moving the jumper to silent search. The later model Sovereigns came factory set to a higher level.. The GT is no deeper than any of the others.. Ive had the best luck with the XS and XS-2.. I used a guitar tuning program called tune-it to set all my sovereigns to the same tone level that was good for me, just a smidge down from all the way up... wildherre
 
Critterhunter said:
There shouldn't be anything hard about a simple question. Does it or does it not improve the depth of the GT? I'd rather hear the opinion of somebody who had it done to see if they saw any improvement.
Click to expand...

I email David at Dixie several months back regarding the "Dixie Mods." I'm trying to see if I still have the email because I had the exact same questions that you all do. What do the mods do exactly?
I'm sure he's probably a bit secretive about exactly what he does because it is a business after all and as far as I know he is the only one who does this mod. So he either has something great going here or it's a total sham. I will however say that through word of mouth I've heard nothing but positive feedback on these mods.

I do remember in the email him stating that many users have noticed an extra 1-2in of depth. The mod is supposed to make the Sovereign a more sensitive machine from what I understand.
I'll see if I can dig up the email and paste it here.

~Joseph
 
These too were some of my favorite Sovereigns and did good with them. I do feel the GT is more sensitive and has beter Target ID on the deep targets over the other Sovereigns. Been using a XS2a trade in because my GT been back ordered since March and I just cant do as well as I do with the XS or XS2. My favorite Sovereign is the GT, but for learning on the XS I feel is the best.
 
I haven't used any other model than the GT so I can't say it is deeper based on experience, but I can say that I've read plenty of people state that the GT was a bit more sensitive/deeper than prior models. You might be the first I've heard say the GT isn't any deeper than older models. Then again, that could all come down to what coil they came with. The new version (Tornado) of the 10" coil that comes with the GT and I think the Elite might be the difference in depth compared to the old BBS 10 or 8" coils. But, I think there is more to it than that because I've read plenty of people say the GT seemed a bit hotter.

I'm not sticking up for the Dixie mod but the few threads I've seen on it were positive and said it did give them more depth, but again were short on details. I get the feeling it's more than just adjusting the audio but I don't know that for sure. Just the impression I've got from reading about it here and there. I'm interested in adjusting the audio tone pot on my GT as I prefer the "high tone" for copper/silver coins to be slightly higher like it was on my QXT Pro. Not that it isn't fine from the factory, just that I'm so used to a slightly higher pitch for coins. I'll probably not adjust it though because then I have to re-learn what nickles sound like and such. From what I hear it doesn't expand the audio scale, it just moves the entire scale of tones higher or lower? Just something I've been kicking around for a while with no real plans either way.
 
Ive had 15 -20 Sovereigns including a couple with the mod in question.. Believe what you want.. Most people just dont want to admit that they spent money foolishly... wildherre
 
So then you are saying it's for sure just him adjusting the audio pot? That for sure would not be worth the money then because it isn't going to change the depth. Every prior message I've ever read on this mod said it produced more depth. Not saying your wrong just that if that's true then I'm surprised nobody has said that up until now. I know I've read older Sovereign model owners claim it gave them better depth but I was curious if GT owners felt the same way. I'm not deciding either way on it until somebody can give the final answer. Just curious and asking questions here...
 
all you have to do is call and ask you will find out that he will not give you a yes or no he only says that people tell him that it increases the depth. just call he will be glad to talk to you. HH:detecting:
 
I just got around to reading this thread all the way through .....It aprears to me, and I could be wrong, that this mod not being explained, and there is really no REAL evidence that it does anything , it seems fishy to me ......Then reading more about the "tone" changes that people do to hear targets better, I can't help but think about another company that offers a "low tone" and a "High Tone" machine ......The "High" tone machines are claimed to have a better target tone seperation , and the actual character of the tone is better meaning you can better figure what target you are hitting by a "scatchy" tone , or a certain "chirp" that you can better hear when running a high tone machine .....Perhaps this is more a case of being able to better hear your targets , hense the feeling of better depth ..... Most people that have hearing problems , can't seem to hear low tones as well as when their hearing was good ....High tones are heard much better ...... This would make more sense in our world of detecting too !!.... I'm getting my first GT soon ....I will give it a quick listen, but if I can change the tones to higher tones, I am going to change them and start fresh running a "HIGH TONE" machine ......As wildhere was mentioning that he adjusted the tone using a music program that best suited his hearing ..... I would hope that this mod is more than an audio adjustment , but with the dancing around the issue, and no real solid answers , perhaps this is the deal ... Whether or not this is the case , perhaps changing the audio yourself to what best suits your ears , might help your finds ....Agian, I am only speculating after reading this thread thru .....Thanks..Jim
 
I adjusted my 2a tone control for the highest pitch to be something like a mosquito. There was something about the tone I chose that stuck in my mind.
Anything slightly lower easily sounds wrong to me. Once I got used to the zincs, it was easy to tell if I had a tone between zincs and high coins.
Later when I got the GT I set it up for matching tones.

HH
 
The tone must be set slightly higher so that silver sounds cleaner and higher, as a result better separation between copper and zinc. The high tones on a default sovereign can easily be lost when the GT is sounding off on multiple targets and/or while nulling. I bet that by setting the higher end tones to an even higher sound, high conductive target can be identified easier at depth. Thus the increased depth claims. I think I am interseted in this since I want my silver to sound sweeter on my GT. And I am asking if high conductive targets do in fact sound higher.
Thanks


HH
Take care
 
The way I understand it adjusting the tone doesn't raise the high tones alone. In other words, it raises the entire scale of tones. IE: If on a scale of 1 to 10 a silver tone is a 7 or 8 it will now be a 10. By the same example, though, something like foil at the bottom of the scale which was a 2 will now also be raised to a 4. Meaning, the spectrum of tones all move together higher or lower depending on what you do with the internal POT. That's at least what I remember reading a while back. It would be nice to just raise the high tones higher while everything else stays where it was, but I don't think that's possible.

Regardless, I do see what you mean about raising the high tone to be able to hear it better and perhaps any "problems" in the audio that may indicate it's not really a coin. As I said, I'm used to a somewhat higher high tone from my QXT Pro when I hit silver. The QXT can not separate silver from clads either but I could tell it was a silver coin by an ever so slightly higher/sweeter sound to say a silver dime versus a clad dime. The difference was ever so slight but I could tell. I could also tell quarters and copper pennies by the audio most of the time. Like on the GT, zinc pennies on a QXT had their own zone so they were easy enough to ID by just looking at the display. Copper pennies would jump back and fourth from the zinc zone to the coin zone so I could tell them by that and also the slightly lower audio compared to say a clad dime and such.

I've noticed on the GT that there is a slight difference in tone between say a clad dime and a silver dime. The silver sounds just a hair more sweet, smooth, and soft. As I've said before, there is a way to also see the difference on the ID. If you use a silver dime to calibrate the meter to where it will just bearly bump up to 181 here and there as you sweep then I find that clad dimes and copper pennies will never hit 181 but stay at 180. Clad quarters (and of course silver quarters) will however bump up to 181 here and there when calibrated like above. An easy way to tell if the machine is set just right for me on the Minelab meter is it will read 507 instead of the normal 506 when it's "at rest". The meter will often go and rest at this number if you pass over say iron or a hot rock and then it resets. It's a handy way to tune the meter if you don't feel like sticking a coin on the ground.

Anyway, now I'm more tempted to adjust the internal audio pot to raise the high audio a bit higher. I think that might allow me to hear differences in coins a little easier. Anybody have a picture to show which pot it is because from memory I think there are two or three on the circuit board on the GT. I'd also mark exactly where the pot is set stock so down the road you can return it to that position should you not care for how it sounds or to return it to stock when you re-sell the machine.

About the splitting hairs on numbers- That's one of the reasons I'm interested in building my own meter. If you have meter that shows a 4th number after the decimal then I wonder if there is enough difference between say a silver dime and a clad dime to show a slightly different number for that. In other words, if say a clad dime was 180.2 the perhaps a silver dime would be 180.8 or something. Has anybody who has that internal meter mod done noticed any difference like this?

If I ever get around to building a custom meter for the above reasons I plan to install two tuning pots on it. One will be a rough high resistance tuning pot to get the number at say 180, and then the smaller pot will be used to precisely tweak the 4th number to exactly where I want it. As it stands right now I could use that second pot on my stock Minelab meter because it can be picky about getting it just right so silver will bump up to 181 here and there. When you set it just right you won't see 181 with every sweep, it'll just bump up to that say every 4th or 5th sweep or so.
 
You are right that all the tones changes if adjusted. Now I had bought 2 used XS earlier that someone and maybe they were Dixie mods that the tones were set all the way to max and i found with my hearing the tones seem to sound too close to one another and was very hard to tell the difference in the coins like it was at factory setting. I even found doing some air test on a Dixie mod I seem to have lost some depth as i couldn't hear the faint one like I can with the factory setting, but that can be my hearing too as I do have a bad hearing problem, but yet with my Timberwolf headphones I can hear lot of deep signals others cant. Much of that is my running higher sensitivity and running slower looking for those slight tone changes.
I think for some with different hearing loss the higher tones may be good, but for most of us with the higher pitch loss the factory or lower will possibly do better for us.
I had a guy send me his as he thought something was wrong with it as he bought it used and wasn't doing good telling the tones, I found someone had maxed the tones out when i tried it, so I reset it to what mine sounded like that was factory setting and sent it back. He told me it worked so much better for him as he could tell the tones real good now. Now what i am saying it if you want to set the tones different mark the setting it is at now so if you don't like it it will be easy to set it back to where it was. Also if you decide to sell the Sovereign please set it back to factory setting so the next person don't have a problem with it.

Rick
 
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