Noticed LS hunter scatter some questions about the Sand Shark across a few posts and they have gone largely without response, so I collected them here and will add my thoughts.
Yes it is a PI and is does not discriminate out trash. The LS you have has a feature the gives you an idea, but it's not perfect either.
The Sand Shark balances very well, I can swing it all day with little fatigue. It is effective and deep in wet sand and in the water. In my opinion, the stock headphones are the best stock headphones I've used with a detector that can go underwater. I find them comfortable, they significantly reduce outside noise and present an easy to listen to response. The threshold on the Sand Shark is not the smoothest but is not hard to get used to what is normal and what is a threshold disrupted by a deep target. The Sand Shark is easy to set up and stable in use. It does pick up some interference from some other detectors and from some wireless hot spots, but then so do some other detectors. Just move a little away from the interfering source. It may not be tuned specifically for sensitivity to gold like a couple of other PI detectors are, but it does well.
In beaches with a lot of iron, I will use a detector that discriminates and not use a PI. When there is not so much iron, a PI detector gets used. I have not used a Tiger Shark, but from what I've read, it is not one of the deeper units in wet salt water sand or in salt water. Based on that second hand information, I'd lean towards the Sand Shark for salt water beaches unless there is a lot of iron at the beach you are hunting. Generally, on most beaches I've been to, even those with trashy dry sand areas, the wet sand and in the water are still suitable for using a PI detector.
How to tell what you are digging ... if in doubt dig it up and see what you have. No detector is going to discriminate or ID perfectly. With the Sand Shark there are some clues. Hair pins, small nails and iron screws give a classic double blip along one axis and a single blip when swept 90 degrees to the direction that gives you the double blip. That is a good give away but not perfect. Sometimes a disc (like a coin or a ring) that is on edge gives a similar sound signature but not normally as pronounced. It is a low percentage of good targets to bad when you get the double blip; you choose whether or not you dig it. Iron also gives a little prolonged or stretched and slightly hollower sound to the threshold rise / tone. Not as much like a small sharp response that a nice round coin or ring gives. For me it is easier to hear the draw out and hollowness in normal mode than in VCO mode. I hunt the Sand Shark mostly in VCO mode since, for me, the rise in pitch with the rise in threshold volume catch my attention a little better. It is a dig nearly all of the targets detector. You can eliminate large targets like the larger tent anchor pins by sizing them, but then you just may miss a large heavy chain with pendant that is laying out beneath the surface (I'm still hoping for one of those, at some beaches I see a lot of them walking around draped on people, but have yet to recover one from the sand). There are some sound indicators that can help figure out iron or not iron, but there is no guarantee a target is ID'd correctly until you dig it up and actually look at it.
So those are my opinions on the Sand Shark. It did not go on my last beach trip because I was going where I knew there was a lot of iron. It will probably go on the next trip.
Cheers,
tvr
LS hunter said:
Yes it is a PI and is does not discriminate out trash. The LS you have has a feature the gives you an idea, but it's not perfect either.
The Sand Shark balances very well, I can swing it all day with little fatigue. It is effective and deep in wet sand and in the water. In my opinion, the stock headphones are the best stock headphones I've used with a detector that can go underwater. I find them comfortable, they significantly reduce outside noise and present an easy to listen to response. The threshold on the Sand Shark is not the smoothest but is not hard to get used to what is normal and what is a threshold disrupted by a deep target. The Sand Shark is easy to set up and stable in use. It does pick up some interference from some other detectors and from some wireless hot spots, but then so do some other detectors. Just move a little away from the interfering source. It may not be tuned specifically for sensitivity to gold like a couple of other PI detectors are, but it does well.
In beaches with a lot of iron, I will use a detector that discriminates and not use a PI. When there is not so much iron, a PI detector gets used. I have not used a Tiger Shark, but from what I've read, it is not one of the deeper units in wet salt water sand or in salt water. Based on that second hand information, I'd lean towards the Sand Shark for salt water beaches unless there is a lot of iron at the beach you are hunting. Generally, on most beaches I've been to, even those with trashy dry sand areas, the wet sand and in the water are still suitable for using a PI detector.
How to tell what you are digging ... if in doubt dig it up and see what you have. No detector is going to discriminate or ID perfectly. With the Sand Shark there are some clues. Hair pins, small nails and iron screws give a classic double blip along one axis and a single blip when swept 90 degrees to the direction that gives you the double blip. That is a good give away but not perfect. Sometimes a disc (like a coin or a ring) that is on edge gives a similar sound signature but not normally as pronounced. It is a low percentage of good targets to bad when you get the double blip; you choose whether or not you dig it. Iron also gives a little prolonged or stretched and slightly hollower sound to the threshold rise / tone. Not as much like a small sharp response that a nice round coin or ring gives. For me it is easier to hear the draw out and hollowness in normal mode than in VCO mode. I hunt the Sand Shark mostly in VCO mode since, for me, the rise in pitch with the rise in threshold volume catch my attention a little better. It is a dig nearly all of the targets detector. You can eliminate large targets like the larger tent anchor pins by sizing them, but then you just may miss a large heavy chain with pendant that is laying out beneath the surface (I'm still hoping for one of those, at some beaches I see a lot of them walking around draped on people, but have yet to recover one from the sand). There are some sound indicators that can help figure out iron or not iron, but there is no guarantee a target is ID'd correctly until you dig it up and actually look at it.
So those are my opinions on the Sand Shark. It did not go on my last beach trip because I was going where I knew there was a lot of iron. It will probably go on the next trip.
Cheers,
tvr