First Day with the Fisher Impulse AQ

[Mark kus]

Hi Bklein! Minelab CTX? Another VLF machine? No thanks! (Esp at that price!) I'm done with VLF machines. And I will never buy another Minelab. Way over hyped. And way over priced! Might be OK for the general hobby detectorist.
But not going to work on my beaches and gold fields.
Re your suggestion, I have already learned the Minelab Equinox 800.
Another overhyped Minelab product! I dont even buy thier "Multifrequency" scam.
"Multifrequency: We will decide what frequencies you are running and furthermore, we wont tell you what frequencies you are running."
Gee thanks, Minelab!
To each his own any minelab I've used especially on my beaches have found gold and hundreds of silver coins going back to a pine tree shilling!
watch NH beach hunter all he uses and his D2 and he finds lots of gold! so plenty of people have lots of great finds using them me included.
Using multi frequency detectors.
Mark

 

[bklein]

Multi frequency helps you find most targets in most areas and the salt filter helps you at the beach. But you may benefit from something more biased towards high frequency like 20 or 40 kHz. This will cut through black sand better as well as find more small gold and chains. Unfortunately Minelab doesn’t provide a hf biased multi with salt filter. The AQ may do ok or the Manticore in All Terrain and 20khz with lowered sensitivity. I don’t share your disdain for Minelab - I think their machines have the latest and best technology. I understand they are expensive, which is why I just wait for good deals on them. The only one I bought new was the EQ800 which I sold after 8 months and went back to my CTX and got a used AQ about that time. My Manticore was from a trade. I’m enjoying it but give up on reading ID’s and like CTX audio much better.
Detectors don’t optimize their behavior to find the most targets - that’s our job. In a few years though you’ll be able to get one with AI that tweaks itself to find all the targets in your test garden or hunt area.

 

[bklein]

Yesterday I hunted Laguna (low tide day). First pass with the Manticore. I played with modes and settings but never got to something I was happy with. Oh it detected the targets but a lot of small stuff that had loud signatures. I was using the 11” coil. I had used the 8” earlier and liked it a lot. I’d like to try the 9”. Upon return I switched to the AQ. Wow, what a relief to my brain - totally quiet until it hits a target. Regardless of detector I didn’t find anything good. Like OBN shows to focus on gold with the AQ you lose clad and who knows what else. I need to play with some gold targets and learn some new settings. I tried mute mode but did not have any gold targets to experiment with in the water.

 

[tvr]

I tried mute mode but did not have any gold targets to experiment with in the water.

I set up the disc and ATS with known targets on the sand for tone or mute mode. Otherwise it is largely an exercise in frustration with what is rejected and what isn't. That said, I run it almost always in all metal since it is expressive enough to tell a lot about a target without tone or mute mode. Even running tones, coins that present as low tone make such a round, smooth target signature that I can call a coin on the response and dig them as low tone. I'm getting better at walking away from bottle caps because they are a wider tone.