Machine Suggestion :)

[Daniel Tn]

I know you guys are pretty serious about your beach hunting and thus why I'm asking this here. I think most of you are saltwater people but feel free to chime in anyway. As stated once before, I'm only hunting freshwater but the beaches are heavily mineralized with natural iron oxide. The only sand we have is what is imported in on the dry areas; anywhere the water is, is mud/rock/clay. They do draw the water down in the winter time on most of our lakes but that gets hunted pretty hard when they do it; nobody ever ventures into the water though.

I'm hunting with the Garrett AT Pro right now and it seems to be working alright in the water BUT I'm afraid of the leak problem. Every time I dunk it I wonder if its getting water in it or how long its gonna last. I'm already enjoying the water hunting so much I'm thinking of upgrading to a better unit. Thus is what I'm asking suggestions for. What machine would you guys recommend for freshwater? I'm not planning on making any yearly trips to the salt beaches but I might go in the future and would probably bring the machine with me too. Right now I'm looking hard at an Excalibur II. Any pros/cons? Would it handle the freshwater and salt pretty good? I like Minelab machines; have had good success with them in the past but never a water machine.

What about the Infinium? I tried an Infinium for relic hunting but we only tried the stock DD coil which didn't get good depth here in the iron dirt. I hear that the mono coils really make it shine...would the same be true for the beaches?

 

[therover]

Daniel,

I know you dont' skimp on the units you use, so I would say the Excal II is probably your best bet. I use an Infinium with the 10x14 mono ( sold the stock DD....did not like it at all) on the saltwater beaches here in NJ and it works great. You do have to tune it for the conditions as it is not like the other PI water units due to it being a gold hunting machine so it does not have the internals set to eliminate the salt water condutivity as much as the other PI beach units. Hence it is a bit 'chatty' sometimes but once you set it up for the conditions, it runs super smooth. I actually run my Infinium hot and have it a tad noisy, because you can still distinquish metal targets from falsing due to repeatable hi/lo or lo/hi tones. Most falsing and ghost targets do not repeat and have very faint single tones....once you use the unit for awhile, you get to understand what it's doing.

Since it does have the ability to swap out coils, the smaller 8 inch mono may work very well in the fresh water. As you know, the fresh water will have a lot more small iron junk in it as opposed to the salt water, but with the Infinium, you do have the hi/lo and lo/hi tone ID...problem is iron will sound off with either tone. But the tone ID can be used to an advantage if gold jewlery hunting, as most all gold in fresh water will hit as a hi/lo tone ID, whereas clad and silver will hit as a lo/hi.

I would not count out the Infinium with the mono coils, and it will go deeper and be much more sensitive to gold than the Excal. Thing with the Excal is, you have much better discrimination.

The other unit I would look into for both fresh and salt is the CZ21. I would also say the Tiger Shark for fresh water, but it seems you have tough conditions there and not sure if the Tiger would be able to handle it...but it is the most sensitive unit on gold than the Excal or CZ21. In reading about the Tiger, it is not in the same ballpark as the Excal and CZ when it comes to salt water hunting.

JC

 

[hershey1]

I too live in TN. and hunt the TVA lakes and swimming areas. I use and like the Excallibur II from Minelab. If you get close to the hydro-electric dams and have EMI problems you can adjust the Excall and keep hunting. Not had that problem a lot but it does occur. Had a Garrett MKII and it worked fine but dug a lot of junk. Make yourself a floating box to dump that clay in . I used an old Coke box put some plastic mesh in the bottom and tywrapped a swimming noodle around it and just pull it along behind me while hunting. You can retrieve the target without worrying about losing it and when you are finished just dump your trash. Don't forget TVA requires a metal Detecting permit. They are free and they do check. Good luck with your choice and HH.

 

[JOE in MD]

I have a CZ 20 and hunt salt water not real good on small gold though. I really like my 20. never owned an excal. Tiger shark is great in Fresh water, got to turn the sens way down in salt water, but it will pick up very small gold.Don't be affraid to get that AT PRO wet, Daniel. I just had mine under salt water for 3 hours this morning. No problems. Had more problems with my Pentax water camera then the detector. LOL
JOE in MD

 

[Daniel Tn]

What part of the state are you in? I would hate to tread on somebody elses territory. I will be hunting the Watts Bar & Chickamauga beaches. I've only seen land hunters locally and thought I'd be diff and hit the water.

 

[Kieth-Tx]

I have not owned the Excal but I have 4 buddies that do. Three of the four have had problems and have had to send them back for repair. They kept the detectors quite a long time and cost them big $$$. I bought my CZ20 used for 500 bucks 10 yrs ago...really is built like a tank...no problems so far. I also purchased a Stingray II new...and as mentioned...kicks any detectors butt in fresh...but in salt water....falses quite a bit.

 

[grumpyolman]

I had a not so good experience with the Excal like some of the others. Sold it right after the 2nd trip to the repair folks. Nothing against Minelab. I have a E-Trac with all the bells and whistles. I do all freshwater also. Got a Tigershark and love it. However I also got a Fisher CZ-21 and a Whites Dual Field. Both the Whites and the Fisher will work in either salt or fresh. The Tigershark needs to be in someone else's stable.
Haven't seen folks mention but the Tigershark is a unit you can change coils with. If you are only going to do freshwater you can get into a Tigershark for around $400. The CZ-21 will cost a whole lot more. But if you like to work with the best TOL equipment and discretionary money is not an issue, you won't be sorry to go with the Fisher. Read lots of stuff here and my impression is the CZ-21 and the Excal are really close in performance. jim

 

[Daniel Tn]

Isn't the CZ platform around 15 yrs old though? I want the best I can afford but that seems high priced for that old of technology lol. I need to look at some of these in person and play.

 

[Joe G]

My first "real" machine was the CZ-20 (Fisher with the lifetime warranty). I had a number of issues with it and it died again last year; a few weeks before Memorial Day. Long story short, they replaced it with a CZ-21 and gave me a 10.5" coil (to replace the original, hockey puck 8") for $125. They will continue to honor the original lifetime warranty. Turn-around time was about 6 weeks. (I've heard of Minelab repairs taking months).

I really do like the CZ-21 a lot. It is built like a tank but weight is not an issue when belt or chest mounted. Depth in autotune is, I think, pretty impressive and I've found it to be very sensitive to small objects. I don't particularly like the headphones, nor the fact that there's no limiter on the volume, but I've worked around that. All in all, I'm very pleased. Now that I'm somewhat "retired", I've had the time to hunt like I've always wanted to and I've had some pretty good results with the CZ-21.

I also have an Exp II and I think that I'm going to make a winter project out of waterproofing it.

 

[itsaawgood]

The AT Pro does very well. Yes it has the possibility to leak BUT all water machines seem to have issues that arrise once in a while that require a trip to the service dept. I had one leak, sent it in and once returned it has been submerged countless hours with no leaks. I myself plan on purchasing an Excal II next year....but am more then happy to hunt this year with an AT Pro. I have worked behind 2 guys in the water both swinging Excals...I found a ring that both of them missed. I would just finish this season with the AT Pro....running in PRO mode with zero disc. and going by ONLY sound. This way you will train yourself to detect by sound and not a display...as the Excal don't have one. Stay away from a PI such as the Infinium for Fresh water hunting...iron stays in the ground waaaaay to long and the machine will drive you nutz!!!

 

[grumpyolman]

If I'm not mistaken, what I read on this section of the forum about the CZ vs the Excalibur is they are really close in performance. If that's the case and the Excal is one of the best machines ever, no matter the age of the technology of the CZs its designed correctly and was pretty close to spot on from the beginning and has only required minor changes. You would be spending money for some of the best technology to do what you want to do, not necessarily the latest or 'old' technology.
The CZs have the battery compartment that is waterpro and it's a totally different waterproof compartment than is the electronics. The water cannot get into the electronics compartment from the battery compartment. I have flooded the battery compartment as I didn't put the "O" ring on correctly and thankfully all I had to do was take the stuff out of there and let it dry. Then...back to work. You want the best water machine that's not a PI, the choices are CZ-21 or Excalibur. That's my not so humble opinion. Probably angered a few but I gotta call like I experience it. Have fun and success with whatever you choose. jim