Hey Cody, got another question for you . . .

[Tony N (Michigan)]

I've been having such great success lately with my Explorer that, to be honest, I'm afraid to change too much. But, I always strive to better myself and detecting is just another extension of that. Sure, I fail alot but, who doesn't?

Anyway my question:

In this one place I've been going to, I've been going super slow and listening, not for a beep from the detector but listening for a slight difference in the sound. In other words, if I wave my coil back and forth over a little area and hear a constant same slight rise and fall in sound I know somethings down there. Pluse looking at the depth gauge and the way the cursor bounces adds to the picture.

But the question is: I wonder if Audio 3 were chosen with fast and deep ON if this would increase the detectors ability to enhance that deepy?

I've tried audio 3 and it sounds otherworldy.

Maybe I should just try it and see. I guess I should ask: Have you tried audio 3?

 

[Cody]

Audio1, 2, and 3 is a form of filtering, in my opinion, and does enhance discrimination. I use Audio 1, 2, or 3 for this reason and do just as you in that I don't listen for beeps but the sound just as you suggest. I listen for the waver of the threshold combined with high and low tones. You already have a major part of what I am trying to explain in conjunction with the program and settings. I don't like null discrimination at all so use the audio1 most of the time. I can hear what is going on down there and when I hear it waver in conjunction with a high tone I know there is something there that needs to be examined. The soil matrix including minerals will cause a sound similar to co-located targets. I think other users miss a lot of goodies for these reasons.

I don't use fast with Audio1, 2, or 3 since they extend the sound and FAST is to shorten a null recovery. They seem to work against each other. I think I read a post by the tech from Minelab that also indicated they were not designed to work together but heck if it works then I will do it. I try anything I can think of with the detector to see what will happen. Audio1, 2, and 3 give a continuous sound as you know so the highs and lows are mixed which is what tells us a coin is there with the iron. I hear Auido1 very well so it takes a little more hearing for Audio 2 and 3. I don't recall the last time I used normal or Conductive sounds. The only problem I have with DEEP is it amplifies tiny bits of surface trash signals when not using trash rejection. You hear all those little pecking sounds that go away if DEEP is off. The function is real dumb and does not know if a faint sound is deep or surface. However, getting past that I can see DEEP ON and FAST OFF for the deeper targets.

 

[christian_99]

Cody, I have been following this forum for about four years now and truly, you have definately become an expert on this machine. With my trials and tribulations I have done well with the machine and sometimes it has even surprised me. I have the original explorer and numerous coils. My question for you is that I have a site that I have continually pounded for the past 7 years. It is a Civil War winter camp with hut sites everywhere, and it has been pounded by others for the past twenty years with machines ranging from the best to worst. The site is covered with iron and most of the surface "good" signals have been dug and removed. To have a good day in this camp is finding "one or two bullets, and a percussion cap". The majority of the huts have been dug out, however the camp looks as it did in the winter of 1861. The ground is somewhat mineralized but not too bad. What settings would you use for this type of situation to increase the finds of deep buttons, bullets, scattered next to the iron. I have also dug test pits- clearing surface area about one or two inches and digging signals from this area but the iron is very heavy and square nails abound. If you could respond with some suggestions I would appreciate it. I use ferrous, iron mask 16- gain at 7, variability 10, senstivity to 24 (due to some power lines near by and mineralization). Primarily, I use the sunray 8" coil due to the amount of falsing and difficult pin pointing with the 10" coil. Your thoughts, opinions, settings, would be greatly appreciated. Thx!

 

[Cody]

One of the best features of the Explorer is the ferrous sounds and indication. If you will go to IM-16, just to test this, and set the sounds for Ferrous and Audio1. You can put a miniball right next to a piece of iron and here is what we hear. Assume we sweep the coil from back and for nice and slow. When we hit the iron and then the miniball we hear a low increase in the threshold and then a higher tone. When we sweep from the other direction we hear a higher tone followed by a low tone. Using Audio1, 2, or 3 and a constant threshold we can pick any target out of iron. Ferrous sounds and audio1, 2, or 3 will pick those target right out of the iron.

 

[christian_99]

Cody,

I used various Ferrous settings as well as tried other coils both large and small. What would your gain, and other settings be for this area? Again, many of the good items are DEEP and scattered in with piles of iron nails and red brick. Red brick used in huts in this area have some metal alloys that cause them to sound good if gone over, similar to that of a hot rock. Would you use the 10" coil or the smaller coils? How would you tackle this?

 

[Cody]

That is a real interesting trade off between the stock and small coil. We know that a large coil has a greater volume of soil matrix being detected at a point in time. The greater soil matrix has to be processed so in general it is a little harder to run the detector as hot as we can with the smaller coil and have good stability. The smaller coil is better on soil with due to less soil matrix volume and increases the value of the Double D design. The rule of thumb is the larger the coil the larger the target has to be for detection but there is an overlap between the stock coil and small coil on coin sized targets.

I use the smaller coil for a number of reasons one of which it would respond better than the larger one where a lot of iron is in the soil. We are enhancing the advantages of the Double D design and can run the setting higher. I find relics with my relic program that are so deep I can stick my arm down to the elbow and as far as I can reach with my arm with the small coil. I frankly find the stock coil to be cumbersome and of little value other than covering more ground with a single sweep. I am not sure about the coils I see used other than Minelab's but it sounds like they do a great job.

This may be a situation where we might consider another machine. Iron is more responsive to a low frequency operating detector. The bottom frequency of the Explorer is 1.5khz so it really hits iron hard. If we raise the frequency to about 7 to 15 khz which is common or even up to around 20khz or so we see a lot better rejection of iron. Also, we may see a better response for these conditions with a single frequency detector. Minelab has the Advantage which may be best kept secret for a machine on the market. I think it operates at 6.5khz and may do better than the Explorer in those conditions.

A last thought and that is I can tell soil mineral from iron or targets if there is a constant threshold and using Audio1. I am not sure that will help you much as the soil mineral will skew discrimination as will co-located iron.

So with the Explorer I would use the smaller coil, Ferrous sounds, and Auido1, 2, or 3. So far I have been able to use this in all the soils I have worked for coins and relics. One other consideration is iron will be detected better than non-ferrous metals when the soil is damp or wet. The old time relic hunters I know would really go after the relics after a rain or when the soil was good and damp or wet. I think Eddy current flow on the surface of the iron is better in wet or damp soil. There was a general rule that damp soil increased detection better for iron than for coins and dry soil was better for coins than for iron although wet soil would increase detection depth on both.

Ok, I am going on about this but you have an interesting site and there is no good hard answer that I know of. I would give the smaller coil a try first of all.