looking for suggestions for trashy site settings

[Neil]

Hello,

Im starting to work an inland site with my EXII I purchased this past summer. Ive beach hunted it many times and Im happy with it there but inland around alot of decaying iron Im having a difficult time of it.

I put a small 8" minelab coil on it to help sort things out as this area is really loaded up with large and small iron pieces. I havent deviated much from stock settings, Im running it in iron mask at -10, sens at 25, and I pushed the gain up to 7.

Ive dug barbers and indian heads and V nickels here and found one spanish reale but those finds have all come with a Sov, a CZ3D and an Advantage. There is still alot of area I havent covered so I sincerely believe theres alot more to be found.

So whats happening is Im digging alot of empty holes, meaning the Im getting high tones and the crosshair is scooting along the top of the screen from left to right, back and forth but all Im finding in the holes is small pieces of iron. Im baffled as Ive dug so many holes and no silver up from this with the EXII at this site. Ive found some silver with it in another spot but that spot has very little trash and they were textbook hits, upper right and nothing but a steady high tone........
What do you guys/gals suggest in these kind of spots or is the EXII not really a good one for these spots? I also bought a X5 for it but havent put it on yet. That might help some?

Thanks,
Neil

 

[Arturo de Zorro]

If your using Ferrous switch to conduct and if you using Conduct switch to ferrous, one or the other will get rid of some of the false high tones. You can also use the digital mode and don't dig the 00-31 signals that sound high, you are looking for those soft high tones that are mixed with a threshold hum. When hunting in a very trashy site, once you get a high hit, shorten your swing to about three inches or less to get a good lock on in digital. I alway lower my sensitive to 16 to ID iron better and I set my gain at 5 to tell deeper older targets and last turn off the Fast setting, I know they say in trash use the fast but they don't have the same dirt as you, everytime I use fast in my dirt I start digging deep bent nails. And if none of that helps, let me know when we can meet, Iron Maskman will travel.

 

[Jerry/Oregon]

Try turning down sensitivity, 25 is way to high in iron-infested areas, try 16 to 18 and see how that works. In may area at 16 and below i start to loss depth, but really cuts down on false signals.

Jerry

 

[Neil]

n/t

 

[Neil]

Thanks Arturo. I remembered that with the Sov about the threshold dropping out before a signal signaling iron, but of course I remembered it late in my hunt
Several people have said to lower my gain also. I pushed it up to 7 because that was what was recommended by Sunray on their X5 and I figured the 8" minelab coil I was using is real close in size so......
I have to learn the digital numbers, I did switch to that mode several times but since I dont really know the numbers it didnt help at all. I know I didnt dig anything that had a ferrous reading over 10.
I tested the ferrous sound at home and that might be something that could help, Ill try it.
Temps are rising again so Im staying out of the woods for awhile. I will have to try some of these tips at a park.

HH
Neil

 

[Arturo de Zorro]

Yes if you were using Conduct mode you need to switch to Ferrous and stay there, Ferrous is good for new users of the Explorer. The Ferrous mode will give all iron (except big iron)a low tone, BUT rusted crown caps will be high tone but they are easily recognize at the bottom right corner of the screen and can be blacked out in the edit screen and they will null after that, and if your in digital mode the conduct number will be a single digit number which can be blacked out. Digital number are easy to do, you want a high tone with a low ferrous # and a high conduct # (do not dig 00-31). AS for nickels the numbers are 10-06 or 09-06 or # close to that with a medium tone. Lower gain helps also if you have the X-1 probe. After you feel confortable with the unit you can try conduct mode, its what I use but it took me 4 years to be able to make the switch without digging iron and have been using it for the last 2 years Except when the ground is wet then its ferrous time till its dry again. There is a system for using conduct and I am glad Minelab gave us the option. The Iron Maskman