(this is laughter meant in a good way here...)
WOW! That's still a haul, even if no gold or silver turned up. Getting that many sinkers means you are getting down to the gold levels with older drops, as they will sink being heavy much like a sinker. And hold onto that lead, as it's paying pretty good money these days in scrap weight.
Glad you like that coil and wiping my forehead of sweat here...That's one "convert" down that I don't have to worry about knocking at my door and asking why I talked them into buying piece of junk.
And here's hoping for many more.
It does amazing things for these BBS units IMO. Some particular brands of detectors don't seem to get along well with the SEF coils, but seems like most BBS and FBS guys love them, that I've read anyway.
And just in case anybody wants to crack the joke...No, don't have any money interest behind these coils, of course. Just think they really push these BBS units that last little bit to the edge of the limits of VLF technology in depth, stability, and left/right separation (unmasking). I really believe that, and so want to see as many people experience what IMO this 12x10 has done for my GT. It'll wake up some "dead" land sites or beaches for people, or at least it has for me *in my soils/sands*.
More on your remarks about the SEF 12x10 at bottom of this post, but first a diversion into PP mode...
I assume then you were using pin point mode some to hunt since you ground balanced in All Metal? I was told from an Email reply when I asked somebody at Minelab that PP on the GT is not a form of all metal that doesn't feature a ground balance, like the manual states. But rather it uses the All Metal Tracking setting that you set it at, and then once set flip to either All Metal Fixed mode or to pin point mode.
The email also seemed to imply that once you flip back to disc (from Fixed or PP), you are now using (of course) the unique method of BBS in Disc mode that doesn't use or need a conventional ground balance at all, but more importantly that when you flip back to PP or Fixed from disc (via the disc switch flipped to All Metal), that the last setting you set the All Metal ground balance at via Track for Fixed and PP will still be active.
Which is good news for those of us using a remote PP switch, because that means we don't have to re-calibrate the ground balance for all metal every time we flip to Fixed or PP from disc to do more reverse discrimination hunting. I had always wondered about if All Metal Fixed lost it's ground balance setting when you flipped to disc and then back again, so that's good to know for both it and now PP since it seems it too uses the All Metal ground balance setting on the GT.
I never saw any instability issues (for the most part) with PP mode when hunting even before setting it's ground balance before, and it's depth always seemed fantastic. However, last time I was out in the field a week or so ago I did ground balance via track, then flipped to PP, and darn if the PP didn't seem just a hair bit more stable than the already rock solid stable it always seems to be at full blast sensitivity, like you can often run it even in the worst of grounds and EMI. Sidenote: Full volume does indeed give PP mode more depth on my GT, so do that too.
Now, whether setting the ground balance for PP was mere perception or fact, I can't say for sure, but it did seem a bit more stable to me than it did hunting that site a bit prior to setting the ground balance for PP that same day. I hunted most of the day in PP, which allowed me to scan the ground quicker, and then would flip over to disc on stuff and wiggle right over it to see if I could get a response. Most of the time I knew what was iron due to PP's unique 3 or 4 response traits on iron, and I'm told PP has roughly about 10 words or so on various other targets as well (still learning that).
What's cool with extremely deep stuff or even shallow stuff in bad ground at some sites, is that if you don't get centered right on top of those targets and wiggle right there in disc you may not have ever heard them in disc with a long general "hunting for my next target" sweep. So by using PP to find stuff and then centering over it in disc and doing the Sovereign short/fast wiggle, you can pull some IDs out of stuff you might not even get a threshold change with otherwise with a general hunting sweep in disc.
But, to carry PP's potential further, I plan to both on land and in the sand start looking for deeper hits in PP that I think is beyond the reach of disc *for that given site's minerals* and start digging the ones that don't give me obvious iron like traits in PP. That's when I'm even more excited about the potential of PP, in giving me PI-like depth as has been said by some in the beach forum in relation to top of the line PI units they've owned in comparison in both good and bad grounds.
If Auto Sensitivity was working for you then that's all that matters, so long as it's smoothing things out and targets are deep and plentiful with Auto. I have used it at some sites, both in the sand and on land, but rarely needed to go that route. Only when I've lowered sensitivity in manual way down to almost the lowest and still have the machine being fussy due to EMI or minerals will I flip over to Auto. Seems to cope with fast changing levels of EMI or ground maxtrix better sometimes, much like Auto ground tracking on a machine would in a sense, but rarely have I had the need to do that since BBS seems smooth as butter most of the time in my mineralized soils/sands.
One particular spot I've used it is on old foot paths containing lots of rocks and bolders that act like hot rocks. Auto Sensitivity seems to track the "too hot/too cold" fast changing ground conditions and smooth the GT right out on those, which can reveal stuff that otherwise might be blinded by nulls or instability in a fixed Manual setting.
Also plan to play with it more in iron infested sites, as I have a suspicion it might have it's advantages in shallow/strong iron patches of junk and sniff out some silver between it faster than being "blinded" with a static manual setting in some rare instances. Maybe, maybe not. Plan to test that and see.
Short Story On Auto Sensitivity- When I first got my 15x12 coil (since has been sold off), I took it to a site that I had pounded the snot out of with various machines and coils over the last 20 years or so. Not a huge spot, so I've worked it hard and with intense gridding. Anyway, wasn't long before I got a rock solid sweet high tone silver-like hit. Dug down and at about 7.5" or so out pops a standing liberty quarter that was standing on edge (this is not the standing lib I got a week or two ago that was on edge with my 12x10). I was using Auto sensitivity to tame down the iron glare, as I was new to the 15x12 and didn't want to fuss with sensitivity yet until I saw how it should act when stable around EMI or iron.
Now, was that silver quarter found because Auto was keeping all four wheels on the road, so to speak with EMI and iron "glare"? Or was it found because it had been on edge and prior machines/coils had missed it? Not sure either way on that. Maybe a combination of both, but I will say these SEFs seem to bang hard on on edge stuff even better than the excellent ability in that respect of the 10" Tornado.
Small Targets & The SEFs- I too have seemed to find these SEFs, even more so the 12x10, hit on tiny stuff at great depths pretty darn hard. Again, an impression with no basis in fact? Not sure, so I need to finish editing the youtube thing I'm doing where I contrast a number of coils on some fine gold items and see what the results are. I suspect though coil choice for fine gold makes no difference, but maybe it does for small non-gold items like shoe eyelets and so on. Need to play with that some more and see what's up with various coils...
Thinking A Target Was Much Shallower Like You Mentioned- Yep again, glad you seem to have found that to be true too. It has a pretty loud "bark" to it. The 13" Ultimate does too. You'll get used to re-scaling the loudness of stuff in your head as to how deep it should be. Easy as pie to re-adjust after a little field time.
Good hunt . Jim
Jim