GoldBug Pro Mod a Success

[Sven]

Picked up this GB Pro with a 5" coil dirt cheap, really cool high frequency machine. From bench and back yard testing using a 5" coil and NEL Sharpshooter, have to say impressive.
Very nice performance on buried gold jewelry, not to shabby on silver once the internal pot was tweaked a bit for the Sharpshooter coil.

There was only one aspect of this detector that kept bugging me.
If you want to go from all metal mode to disc mode, its done with one external control threshold pot that incorporates an on/off switch. If your in disc mode and you want to go into all metal, you turn the knob on, then you have to adjust the knob to get the threshold down to zero, that's way over near 1 o'clock. Then if you want to go back into all metal mode, reverse what you just did. Now I like to sometimes, many times, cross check a target by switching from one mode to another, the GB Pro in this regard is a royal pain.

What did I do to solve that issue??

Snipped the on/off switch leads from the threshold pot. Then solder two wires to the leads that went to the circuit board. The other two wires were soldered to a On/Off toggle switch, which was mounted just under the control box. The toggle trigger was set so when you pulled the toggle towards you it went into disc mode.

Works great, a wonderful easy mod. Now you can turn on the detector, adjust the threshold and set ground balance in all metal mode and go hunt. Any time you want to switch to disc mode, pull the trigger. All this without disturbing your all metal threshold control. Then switch back to all metal mode...play the switcheroo game between modes.

If you have a GB Pro under warranty or paid a lot of money for, don't have the ability to solder or work around electronics, don't do the mod.

 

[conehead]

Hello Sven......That looks like an interesting mod, I have an Omega that I do most of my relic hunting with, I wonder if this mod would also work on it?
I like to use all metal to cover more ground quickly but depending on target, sometimes I switch to disc. and have to turn the knob to disc & then back to all metal.
A trigger sure would be nice

 

[Sven]

Hello Sven......That looks like an interesting mod, I have an Omega that I do most of my relic hunting with, I wonder if this mod would also work on it?
I like to use all metal to cover more ground quickly but depending on target, sometimes I switch to disc. and have to turn the knob to disc & then back to all metal.
A trigger sure would be nice

Looking at the Omega, looks like you can do that, at your own risk.
Last time I had an Omega, I rarely hunted in disc mode, too much masking of Canadian clad coins was going on. So I hunted in all metal mode 3 or 4 tones
Omega guts pictured, left side pot, you can see the two stand up leads coming off it. Those are the two you snip to separate them from the pot. Then solder your switch wires to the leads.
Seal the snipped pot leads. If at a future time you want to revert back, just a matter of resolder the leads.

 

[digsgti]

Very cool. Wish I had a clue about this stuff. Would be fun to mod detectors.

 

[conehead]

Hello Sven......Yea that picture makes it look pretty easy to get to, and the detector housings look to be the same between the Gold Bug & Omega.
I replaced the trigger switch on one of my old Fisher 1266 detectors a couple years ago and I have worked around some electronics devices before.
I'll have to find me a small two position toggle switch then I'll see about opening up my Omega for this mod. Thanks for the info & the picture.
conehead

 

[horikindaguy]

looks like the Omega 8500 has this feature, but I believe 'disc mode' is dominat, ie momentary press of the menu button will go to all-metal. I don't have one (yet?) but I believe that's how it works....

 

[Sven]

looks like the Omega 8500 has this feature, but I believe 'disc mode' is dominat, ie momentary press of the menu button will go to all-metal. I don't have one (yet?) but I believe that's how it works....

That would be a good reason to sell the 8000 and move up to the 8500, would make life easy.

 

[horikindaguy]

looks like the Omega 8500 has this feature, but I believe 'disc mode' is dominat, ie momentary press of the menu button will go to all-metal. I don't have one (yet?) but I believe that's how it works....

That would be a good reason to sell the 8000 and move up to the 8500, would make life easy.

8500 has some other nice features (iron-audio via separate segment adj and VCO) but if it, like your experience with the 8000, is poor on cdn clad then I would have to pass...
could you speak a bit more to how it handles (or not) our various clad....would appreciate it....

 

[Sven]

but if it, like your experience with the 8000, is poor on cdn clad then I would have to pass...
could you speak a bit more to how it handles (or not) our various clad....would appreciate it....

Canadian clad the 8000 was way too bouncy on the numbers. Had to hunt in 4 tone and try to pick out the clad. If there was any iron in the ground the clad was masked, you would never find it in disc mode.
If any EMI was present, depth would be diminished as you had to turn the Gain, sens down. Don't remember if I could run the detector higher than 50-60% for the most part. Mind you I had the early version. I sold mine a few months after owning it. What solidified my decision was hunting a schoolyard for a week straight, covered every inch, found a lot, was a job and a half. I was convinced there wasn't anything left in there. I went back in there with a different detector and it was like virgin territory so to speak. And over the course of the next year and a half, kept going back in with other detectors and the place kept giving up more coins and goodies. That school yard was directly across the street from a townhouse we moved into. It was a quick 15 second walk to go hunting. Pretty convenient. The Omega might be a great machine in the US but not for me up here in Canada. Had the Delta as well at the same time, which actually was nicer to use, ended up selling it as well. I bought these two detectors due to all the hype that surrounded them at the time.

 

[horikindaguy]

but if it, like your experience with the 8000, is poor on cdn clad then I would have to pass...
could you speak a bit more to how it handles (or not) our various clad....would appreciate it....

Canadian clad the 8000 was way too bouncy on the numbers. Had to hunt in 4 tone and try to pick out the clad. If there was any iron in the ground the clad was masked, you would never find it in disc mode.
If any EMI was present, depth would be diminished as you had to turn the Gain, sens down. Don't remember if I could run the detector higher than 50-60% for the most part. Mind you I had the early version. I sold mine a few months after owning it. What solidified my decision was hunting a schoolyard for a week straight, covered every inch, found a lot, was a job and a half. I was convinced there wasn't anything left in there. I went back in there with a different detector and it was like virgin territory so to speak. And over the course of the next year and a half, kept going back in with other detectors and the place kept giving up more coins and goodies. That school yard was directly across the street from a townhouse we moved into. It was a quick 15 second walk to go hunting. Pretty convenient. The Omega might be a great machine in the US but not for me up here in Canada. Had the Delta as well at the same time, which actually was nicer to use, ended up selling it as well. I bought these two detectors due to all the hype that surrounded them at the time.

thanks Sven, we really are in a unique situation up here in Canada due to the different metallurgy of our coinage. I've always been amazed at how well the US designed detectors can ID their own coinage...
also, your's is the first report I've read about the 8000 being used up here....really a dearth of information, Canada specific reviews....
since the 8500 will be (I assume) the basic (version 6) 8000 with feature enhancements looks like I'll have to pass on it.....oh well, my next 2 possible detectors will be a a version of the Racer (or Nokta version?) with iron audio (like Kellyco leaked) or a new Deus with, hopefully, a 6x10 coil and dual-freq....I'm really surprised FT hasn't produced a new digital CZ detector, just might work well up here.....cheers....

I'm looking forward to a (canada-specific) report on your GBP. Too bad the all-metal mode doesn't have a VID...and a difficult to see 'speedometer' has to be looked at.....oh well....good luck with it....

 

[Sven]

To clear it up any confusion of how the mod was done. Here's a picture.
Just snip the two leads coming from the Threshold/Disc pot on the black line. The pot switch is now disconnected from the circuit board.
Bend the stand up leads away from the pots leads. Solder wires from a toggle switch to the stand up leads. Your done.

 

[Fletch88]

Very interesting mod! I've been looking for a cheap G2 or GBP myself.

 

[Fletch88]

Sven, so when you pull the toggle to go to disc mode, can you adjust disc then while trigger is pulled (closed?) Or are you then running zero disc through the disc circuit?

 

[Sven]

Sven, so when you pull the toggle to go to disc mode, can you adjust disc then while trigger is pulled (closed?) Or are you then running zero disc through the disc circuit?

The control pot on the GBP is a dual purpose pot. It main function is the pot to control threshold with full rotation. The first 1/8 of a turn has no bearing on the threshold control, that small rotation is
just a on/off switch, its second function. Two independent functions.

All you are doing is removing the on/off function from the pot and moving it to a on/off toggle switch. Now when you switch the toggle in one direction its in disc mode, switch in the opposite its in all metal mode.

There is no change to any other functions. The other benefit is you don't have to adjust your threshold to zero to turn switch from all metal to disc. Just leave your threshold set where you had it for ground balancing.