I am an experienced Sovereign user, would I be stupid to buy...

[jbow]

any underwater detector other then the Excalibur? I know it's not PI and that is a consideration since I only get to the shore maybe once a year. People around here are finding CW relics with PI machines that VLF detectors just wont hit, bad mineralization situations... so I am also thinking of a dual purpose machine. If I were buying a pulse machine just for land I would get a TDI without a second thought. I don't know if the Infinium LS is as good but maybe it is.

So should I think about getting an Excalibur for the beach and a TDI for land or should I think about two pulse machines, maybe a Pirate for water and a TDI for land.. or should I just get an LS and be done with it?

What about coil size and design and shaft length in the current. I don't want something that wears me out in 30 minutes.

Also, when shallow water hunting, say 5 or 6 ft deep wodo you use a snorkle or just hold your breath? What do you do? I wonder about a re-breather. Th

Sorry for the elemental questions but I have never water hunted before and I know nothing about it.


Thanks for the help and for any links to reading. I just remembered that I have Clive's book on the Excalibur, i'll take a look at it but I am still interested in your thoughts, your methods, and PI or VLF?

As for air.. this looks pretty neat for shallow water... http://www.spareair.com/product/carry.htm

Thanks,

Julien

 

[scubadetector]

FORGET a rebreather. They do nothing in shallow water. You also have to be SCUBA certified and rebreather certified to use it and the cost of one is outrageous. If you snorkel do that. YOU cannot use the spare air either UNLESS your SCUBA certified. NOBODY will ever fill it without a dive card. So you wade with a long handled scoop, you snorkel, you by a hooka , or you learn to dive. You can legaly by a hooka BUT you should at the least take some sort of training if any is available.


As for the machine, I have ABSOLUTLY no idea, I use 2 Fisher CZ-21's and a Fisher CZ-20. Good Luck.

 

[grumpyolman]

Re breathers start about 5K and go up from there. It's a specialty kind of diving and unless you don't value life, leave it. It allows great depths for longer periods of time and the decompression tables with that depth and potential bottom time would have you stopping at 125' for 2 hours.

The physics for hookah diving is absolutely no different than using SCUBA. Kind of stunned that scubadetector suggests that it is a 'safer' form of diving and that one does not need the full course. There is no difference in what happens to your body, in terms of retained gasses etc., if you are at 60' breathing from a SCUBA or a Surface Supplied Air unit...also known as the hookah. Typically, the SSA for sport divers is at shallower depths and the deeper you dive the more potential for something to go South where your training will take over and get you home safely. Since you are shallower, usually, with SSA generally you are not as exposed to some of the more serious things that a deep diver might encounter.

However, spontaneous pnuemorthorax, where you lungs are injured and you spit blood and are in serious shape, can happen in 3' of water. If you aren't trained to exhale as you surface, one may panic, and hold their breath and Blam! There goes a lung or two. The physics are the deeper you go the more the pressure pushes against your body and causes a squeeze wherever their is air. That's why your sinuses become extremely painful when you go to the bottom of the local pool. If you know how to equalize the pressure, there is no pain. Your lungs are air cavities. They have become smaller as you go deeper until you take air from your SCUBA and then the are the same size as when on the surface. As you surface where their is less pressure they expand. If they expand too far you pop the balloon. Thus the reason for being trained to do that automatically.

If you take a balloon and blow it up on the surface as full as it will go and jump into the water, the deeper you go the smaller the balloon will be. Now take that same balloon to the bottom of the pool and fill it from your SCUBA tank, like you do your lungs, as full as it will go and then start to surface. You have a totally fully expanded balloon heading towards the top and as one goes up the pressure is less and less. The balloon has no mouth so it can't let out the air. That's you holding your breath in a panic surfacing. The balloon can only stretch so far before it bursts.

I just looked at my cert card and it says I got it in 1970. I've had hundreds if not thousands of hours under the water doing both SCUBA and SSA. However, I am no spring chicken and my diving is now limited to 10-15 of water. Most of the time I am only belly button deep. It's just easier to recover loot when you can see what your are doing. Got lots of big rocks around here and you gotta move them to get to the target. Much harder to do with a scoop.

I sold a hookah recently on one of the forums. I wouldn't release it to the buyer until I had proof they were certified divers. Being certified is no flashy thing. It just means you have been trained sufficiently to begin to explore the underwater world. Didn't have to sell it like that. I probably missed some sales that way. It's just the right thing to do. Jim

 

[jbow]

n/t

 

[jbow]

I'll just snorkle. What do you think about the detector question.

J

 

[Taterhead]

I have a TDI and a V3 and they are both great. However, the V3 is getting a little dusty right now as I learn the TDI. The TDI is a great compromise between PI (IMO) and VLF functionality in a PI machine and I love using it on land. If I use the discrimination ability to its fullest the holes aren't too terribly deep, but I do find things that I missed with the V3. Because of the coil design it pinpoints very well, though not as well as my VLF, I'd say I am 80% as accurate with the TDI as I am with the V3 D2 coil, which is slightly harder to pinpoint than a standard concentric. It is very sensitive, works great in mineralization and works like a dream at the beach. If you get a used one with some warranty left you can probably sell it for what you paid for it even if you experiment for a month or so. I love the machine, myself, and the discrimination is just what it needs to not be a nightmare in ground...unless its super trashy and you don't want to dig nearly all positive or negative or both signals.

I can't tell you how much I enjoy mine but that might not be relavent for you because I don't relic hunt or know much about the excal.

Taterhead

 

[scubadetector]

some sort of class if it is offered. You still should have a BC and know how to use it!! You do not need dive tables or actually any training at that depth, Just the right gear. Anybody can buy a hooka, right or wrong. Call the manufatrures. As long as you have the money they have one for sale.

You have been diving exactly 10 years longer than I have Jim!! But I still play deep in the fastest and buisest fresh water waterway. Love the old bottles and all the fishing equipment I want to bring up!! Two pound sinkers fetch me a dollar a piece!


AS I stated just make sure at whatever you do your SAFE and you are completely at ease!! Good luck

 

[Micheal_R]

n/t

 

[kered]

Being used to the Sovereign i would stay stick with it, buy an excalibur, almost zero learning curve as you have the sounds already If you go the PI route don't forget the whites Dual field, its worth a thought, super light, only drawback is the coil tries to float a bit but can be remedied