with all of our advancements in electronics, pulse induction metal detectors are so far behind. VLF has come a very long way in the last 40yrs....but pulse seems to be stuck in the 70's ! Oh well I guess the French or Bulgarians will eventually solve this problem.......have you seen the detectors coming out or Europe! Their engeneers are motivated......and that's what it will take to produce an iron rejecting pulse. I'd have no problem at all paying $1500.00+ for such a .......supreme beach machine. My bet is that it will come from Australia or Europe.......our guys here are just not interested.
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It's really amazing that........
- Thread starter Ivan
- Start date
Dancer
Well-known member
Hmmm, Well you probably know more different ones then I do. Garrett has 3 that I know of that have somewhat of a iron tone tip off. (The Infinium has been discontinued but is still available around) I'm sure a lot of us would like to hear how some other Pi's are thought of. How some are better suited for different types of hunting, etc.
One thought I have is , any machine starting say at $800 and up, should be waterproof to at least to 10 feet. I dun no, are there non water proof Pi's out there.
One thought I have is , any machine starting say at $800 and up, should be waterproof to at least to 10 feet. I dun no, are there non water proof Pi's out there.
Ivan, there's too many "gotcha" premises in your post. Since when are all those advertisements you're seeing necessarily "better" ? I'll bet you $100, that if you took ANY of those whiz-bang machines to ANY of your USA sites (worked out parks, iron ridden ghost towns, beaches, etc....) that you'd do no better.
As for the lack of advances in pulse (versus the awesome things we saw in VLF from 1980-ish to the present), you're talking apples and oranges here. There's the laws of physics that can not be overcome.
Yes there is the fabled depth of pulse machines. But ANY of those machines that has EVER been able to incorporate any sort of iron ID, has all sorts of drawbacks. Namely: The moment you start to incorporate iron ID, you've lost depth. To the point that you're essentially back at the standard VLF / MF disc. depths. So that you have to ask yourself: Why switch ?
And no, it's not because "our guys here aren't interested" (as if to imply they're sleeping at the wheel, blah blah). TRUST ME: if the "better mousetrap" could be done, then our engineers would be ALL OVER IT yesterday. And if any of those European machines you seem to think are better mousetraps, then ask yourself: Why aren't Americans simply buying them, importing them, and "cleaning house" at our sites ?
As for the lack of advances in pulse (versus the awesome things we saw in VLF from 1980-ish to the present), you're talking apples and oranges here. There's the laws of physics that can not be overcome.
Yes there is the fabled depth of pulse machines. But ANY of those machines that has EVER been able to incorporate any sort of iron ID, has all sorts of drawbacks. Namely: The moment you start to incorporate iron ID, you've lost depth. To the point that you're essentially back at the standard VLF / MF disc. depths. So that you have to ask yourself: Why switch ?
And no, it's not because "our guys here aren't interested" (as if to imply they're sleeping at the wheel, blah blah). TRUST ME: if the "better mousetrap" could be done, then our engineers would be ALL OVER IT yesterday. And if any of those European machines you seem to think are better mousetraps, then ask yourself: Why aren't Americans simply buying them, importing them, and "cleaning house" at our sites ?
Wrong Tom........your'e reading things into my post. I'm simply saying it's not my problem.......it's the detector designers job to make a iron elminating pulse.........should have been done by now. I don't care about technological difficulties..... my job is to buy the product once it's for sale. They said at one time target id is a pipe dream...can't be done...see how that turned out. All I said was that I believe the Europeans will probably do it. Look at the Deus.....we have nothing to compare that model with on this side of the pond. Heck Whites can't get their flaship detector under 4lbs!!! And they are putting other peoples coils on thier units.......why because they can't keep up...that's why. I just feel that the overseas companies are more dynamic...that's all.... and inovation is more prevalent over there. The Macro Racer is another example. I started detecting in 1972......so I've seen a few things......kinda the same detecting span as Monte......but he is still much more of an expert than I will ever be.
Ivan said:
Ok. But the fact that it HASN'T been done tells you what ? That they should be working harder and doing their jobs better ? And you "don't care" about the technological difficulties? Maybe it's those technological difficulties IS the reason why it hasn't been done so far.
Let's run the topic through an analogy: "I want an automobile that can be shrunk down, when not in use, to fit in my back pocket " . Heck, I bet there's thousands of consumers who would pay millions each for that technology, etc... ? And if the engineers can't do that, then I say: "I don't care about technological difficulties. It should have been done by now"
Ivan said:
Sure. And so too did scientists at one time say that heavier than air flight was impossible. Right ? And scientists at one time said the earth was flat, right ? Hence it should therefore be possible to invent an automobile that will fold up and fit into my back pocket when not in use, right ? No, I'm sorry, the fact of past technological breakthroughs does not mean: "... Ergo, any future desired invention is necessarily always possible. "
Ivan said:
And are you agreeing, or disagreeing, that any of those over-seas machines will do any better at any of our sites here ? Eg.: ghost towns, beaches, turf, etc... ?
Not only has the debate been on-going about achieving fabled pulse depth WHILE having TID, full iron rejection, etc.... But there is also constant dreamy desires of shape-showing machines. But the problem is that the SMALLEST pixel size, in such machines, is about 1" across. Hence all the items we find (rings, coins, nails, tabs, foil, etc...) is all .... doh ... 1 pixel ! And so the debate rages on that scientist should, can, and will one day get the pixel size down to the point where we're looking at TV screen-like images, right ? Wrong. Because like the pulse debate, they hit a brick wall of the laws of physics. There is only so much information you can glean from the signals being bounced back.
And unlike the awesome light-years of advancements of technological breakthroughs that occurred from the mid 1970's to the mid 1990s (which you and I were both there as hobbyists to witness), have you noticed that the last 20 yrs. have NOT had such giant leaps of advances ? And it's not because "engineers are asleep at the wheel". All the advances of computers, cell phones, etc... is also not a comparison to this. Because in all those cases, it was a function of "faster and smaller" to existing technology. But for detectors, no matter HOW fast or HOW small, they still have to go through the medium of soil.
So unless something entirely different comes along (and not just "faster and smaller on existing methods of pulse, VLF, TR, BFO, etc....), I'm afraid we're at a stand-still. Trust me: I'm dreaming too, like you.
All designs are compromises. Therefore, among the things that are possible in principle, it's necessary to do triage and spend money developing only those products that are sufficiently different from what's already there to warrant the NRE; and not to spend money developing products that are bad compromises. And of course to develop those products that you actually have the resources to develop, not ones that may be great ideas but the job will have to be left up to someone else.
Pulse induction with VLF-type discrimination and target ID is not only possible, Fisher nearly launched such a product back in the late 1980's. Bad compromise: when the distributors were shown the demo unit they told the CEO "we never want to see this again." I myself thought it was a bad compromise, but it's what the CEO thought he wanted. We buried it and returned to developing the technology that became the CZ6. That one was a good compromise: intro'd in 1991 and with very minor revisions still in production today 25 years later as the CZ3D and CZ21.
There's newer stuff under development in engineering dept. but not necessarily what folks in beeperlandia are thinking.
Pulse induction with VLF-type discrimination and target ID is not only possible, Fisher nearly launched such a product back in the late 1980's. Bad compromise: when the distributors were shown the demo unit they told the CEO "we never want to see this again." I myself thought it was a bad compromise, but it's what the CEO thought he wanted. We buried it and returned to developing the technology that became the CZ6. That one was a good compromise: intro'd in 1991 and with very minor revisions still in production today 25 years later as the CZ3D and CZ21.
There's newer stuff under development in engineering dept. but not necessarily what folks in beeperlandia are thinking.
Nauti
Well-known member
Good post.All i can say is that i have used many different machines over here in England on both inland sites and on the beach.The inland sites include many ancient sites that have been heavily iron infested and difficult to search.The majority of my success has been with U.S machines.
I now search the beaches exclusively and i have kept two machines that have give me most success here too..........guess what,both are American detectors.
I now search the beaches exclusively and i have kept two machines that have give me most success here too..........guess what,both are American detectors.
Nice to have Dave J chiming in - one of the few who actually is both an expert and an insider who KNOWS what he is talking about. I suspect if metal detectors sold like cell phones the competition and vastly increased R& D budgets would significantly increase product evolution. Frankly I am amazed at the tech and products we have available, foreign and domestic.
A pulse induction with VLF type disc and target id..............................maybe it was introduced before it's time??? I think most all beach hunters would be in very interested in such a unit today. I mentioned this post to a few of my fellow beach hunters and they were amazed.......I guess those goofy guys in red clothes (remember the add) made a bad decision!! LOL
I know what the thing was, I designed it. The distributors were right to say "we don't want to ever see this again". What people reading the story now think the machine probably was like, is just an exercise of imagination.
The CZ was the right answer, as evidenced by the fact it is still being sold in both the "deep silver" and salt water scuba work markets.
The CZ was the right answer, as evidenced by the fact it is still being sold in both the "deep silver" and salt water scuba work markets.
Dave J. said:
Bingo. Can you elaborate on what in bold above ? Because certainly all of us (who are over 40 yrs. old) recall that in the past 25 yrs . (since the cz6 was introduced) that cell phones and PC computers have quintupled in capacity/functions. And shrunk by 5x as well. So why not metal detectors ? Heck: What FILLED A ROOM with computer technology and processing power in the 1980s, is now available on handheld smart phones, right ?
So why haven't detectors kept pace ? The average sentiment would be: "Because the market-of-sales of cell phones and computers is millions times greater than that of metal detectors. And that , supposedly, if "millions more consumers were buying metal detectors" then the engineers would have the $$$ and resources to quintuple abilty , depth, etc...
That seems to be Ivan's sentiments. But I'm thinking that it's not a case of "faster and smaller" (as in the case of PC's and cell phones). I'm thinking there's laws of physics involved. Right ?
And so : If a pulse could be made (either in 1991 or the present date) that could reject iron to the full depth of its fabled depth, then it would ALREADY HAVE BEEN DONE. There's already various pulse machines "with tricks" to discern iron vs conductive. And/or high concuctors versus low conductors. But the moment you start to try to use the "tricks", the depth becomes nothing more than you can attain on various discriminating VLF /MF machines .
The CZ platform is impossible to upgrade because it's a complex piece of analog hardware that's very difficult to manufacture. No matter what you do to it, you're not going to change its basic character. The only "upgrade" that's ever been done to it was partially digitizing the user interface (CZ70) and in the end that "upgrade" was scrapped. The CZ3D in production today is virtually identical to the CZ5 of the early 1990's.
The best oldie-but-goodie metal detector platforms pushed the limitations of the basic physics. The biggest such limitations are the thermal noise of the receiver coil and the associated preamplifier; and the Rule of 64 regarding signal strength and "depth". Newer platforms are still up against those limitations. It's not a dead end, things can be pushed a little farther than they have been, and more can be done working within those limitations. ........... Kinda like cars. I drive an '09 Scion XD and like it. But guess what? It does pretty much the same thing as my first car, a '49 Chevy coupe V6 -- despite all the billions that were poured into the advancement of the automobile over those 60 years. Just does it a lot nicer.
The comparison with things like computers and cellphones is misleading. They were never up against the limitations of physics (hence "Moore's Law") except for that one thing: the dictates of the Second Law of Thermodynamics with respect to S/N ratio. That's why in a TV fringe reception area your newfangled digital TV with its beautiful picture sputters and dies whereas your old analog TV used to get a usable signal from the same transmitter although it was noisy ("snowy"). The stuckness of horizontal communications distance is analogous to the stuckness of "air depth" in metal detectors.
The best oldie-but-goodie metal detector platforms pushed the limitations of the basic physics. The biggest such limitations are the thermal noise of the receiver coil and the associated preamplifier; and the Rule of 64 regarding signal strength and "depth". Newer platforms are still up against those limitations. It's not a dead end, things can be pushed a little farther than they have been, and more can be done working within those limitations. ........... Kinda like cars. I drive an '09 Scion XD and like it. But guess what? It does pretty much the same thing as my first car, a '49 Chevy coupe V6 -- despite all the billions that were poured into the advancement of the automobile over those 60 years. Just does it a lot nicer.
The comparison with things like computers and cellphones is misleading. They were never up against the limitations of physics (hence "Moore's Law") except for that one thing: the dictates of the Second Law of Thermodynamics with respect to S/N ratio. That's why in a TV fringe reception area your newfangled digital TV with its beautiful picture sputters and dies whereas your old analog TV used to get a usable signal from the same transmitter although it was noisy ("snowy"). The stuckness of horizontal communications distance is analogous to the stuckness of "air depth" in metal detectors.