Monte, what will I be missing?.....

[slingshot]

I've tried to imitate the guys with the ED 180 by hunting in a/m mode. I find so much with the Royal. I know the disc. is a little high-about bottlecap-but I enjoying seeing those little pieces of foil and such being passed over. The only thing I've found in improvement is a fuller trash pouch. I just hunt tot lots, schools, and places that have a bit of trash that no one else wants to bother with.

 

[Monte]

If you're using a manually GB'ed Tesoro, and it is adjusted to be close to "spot on" (which isn't always easy, especially with a touchy Tesoro with coarse GB adjustments), then you will get similar performance in a threshold-based (conventional) All Metal mode in that you will get responses from ALL METALS, both ferrous and non-ferrous, just like the silent-search, motion-based Discriminate mode with the ED-180 Discrimination set at minimum (all metal accept).

However, there are a couple of differences, and the main one has to do with ground signal caused by ground variances. In the conventional All Metal mode with a "proper" tuned Threshold audio, you are going to hear the audio responses (increases in threshold) and nulling (decreases in Threshold) caused by sweeping the coil over ground mineralization that is more mineralized or less mineralized than the spot where you adjusted the Ground Balance. Depending upon the auto-tune (retune) speed of the model used, you can get overshoot as well. So, working a site with rather variable ground, or rocks or pea gravel or nasty mineralized sand can be a bit "busy' for your ears to monitor.

Searching in a true ED-180 discriminate setting, and with a good, functional Ground Balance, you're not going to be hearing all the "noise' that comes from sweeping over most ground or mineral challenges. Thus, all you're going to hear are the audio 'hits' from a metal target, be it iron or foil or aluminum or copper or silver or ???

I've tried to imitate the guys with the ED 180 by hunting in a/m mode. I find so much with the Royal. I know the disc. is a little high-about bottlecap-but I enjoying seeing those little pieces of foil and such being passed over. The only thing I've found in improvement is a fuller trash pouch. I just hunt tot lots, schools, and places that have a bit of trash that no one else wants to bother with.

So, what you're saying, if I understand it correctly, is that you like the higher rejection at the minimum setting of the Royal Sabre because it rejects the small bits of foil and similar low-conductors that are a bit above iron nail rejection, correct?

if that's the case, then by all means just enjoy the sport and hunt at minimum discrimination. Forget about the All metal mode. In "tot lots" and schools and places that have a lot of low-conductive modern trash, you can just ignore it like everyone else. but you will be missing small gold jewelry ... just like everyone else.

Also, if in some applications where you will be hunting in iron or older types of trash, target masking is going to be worse (more pronounced) with a model such as the Royal Sabre or Golden Sabre or Silver Sabre or Inca or Eldorado (original) or Toltec 100 and others that do not adjust down. That's why the models with ED-120 discrimination are better performers in dense trash, especially iron, because there is less masking since you are just barely knocking out the iron nails and the like.

I like to hunt many sites with full acceptance (ED-180) simply because I don't know if there is anything there or not, and if so, how target rich the site might be. Therefore, I hunt in All Metal accept (ED-180 Disc.) so that I can hear any and all targets. If they are not abundant I can toy with the rejection level if I want on an occasional target, but if a site has a lot of trash, I just set the rejection level to barely knock out the most annoying problem trash.

More than likely, hunting with the Royal Sabre at minimum discrimination is all you need to do for the sites you typically hunt.

Monte

 

[slingshot]

Thanks so much. After the 5th reading, it really sunk in. I never thought of using, say a Compadre, to scout the area to get an idea of the target matrix. I have been trying to emulate others but my hunt sites are rather mild mineralwise and the trash is a little much in some areas. I do have several schools that I have pretty much ridded of trash over several years and I can see where giving these areas a shot with the ED 180 may open up new finds. Using the Royal does give me a "break" from the tiring ordeal of trying to hunt an area the size of 3 football fields in a limited time frame. I think I finally see where the noise from the newer circuits comes from and why the true a/m circuits are superior. Excellent read.

 

[JHM]

I've been trying to grasp this concept for a while. And I think I understand what your saying. I've just got a question. I areas with heavy trash,how do you decide what to dig with the discriminate circuit wide open? Are you hunting by sound and the way the detector is responding? Or do you dig everything? The last choice is not an option for me. Too many targets plus I would get ran off for damaging the turf.

 

[slingshot]

JHM, the Royal has a unique two-tone feature in regular disc. (not notch) whereby the tabs "split" with a dual tone if the notch control is rotated properly while in this mode. This actually mimics the Golden umax abilities in some ways, although it's three tone, rather than multitone. In some areas that are hefty in trash, I go by the tones (tones rule!) unless one of the split tones sound rather loud or unusual and I'll check it. In my trash-cleaned areas from previous hunts, I pull out the Silver umax with the ED-`120 and go for min. disc. Since the Royal has approximately bottlecap rejection, or somewhat less than ED-120, I don't have to mess too much with the tiny foil,etc-although it STILL gives a faint, doubtful signal on some foil fragments. So a lot of my low tone signals are nickels, charms, and larger pieces of foil (yes, some rings, too). Of course, in the tab jungles, the Royal has a unique notch system, though not quite as narrow as the Golden as I understand. I have just recently been through a series of hunts trying to grasp the concept of ED-180 and it's relation to fine gold chains and tiny gold rings.. My results? Tons of trash. To top that off, after I became disqusted, I said the heck with it and one day while hunting I EYEBALLED a 14kt charm and chain!

 

[JHM]

Thanks for the reply. I've never hunted with a Royal but I can see where the features would come in handy. I have a cibola and I usually run the disc at the 5c mark. Jewelery hunting in playgrounds is totally different and requires a special type of person to do it right. Maybe that's why I never got the hang of it.

 

[Monte]

I've been trying to grasp this concept for a while. And I think I understand what your saying.

Good!

I've just got a question. In areas with heavy trash,how do you decide what to dig with the discriminate circuit wide open?

In areas of "heavy trash" I seldom run with he discriminate set for full acceptance. Most of the time I search with my discrimination set to just reject a common iron nail. very, very seldom do I use more than that level of rejection, but there are times when I prefer to accept it all. Most of the time those are at sites that have a low target count.

Are you hunting by sound and the way the detector is responding? Or do you dig everything?

A lot will depend on the detector in hand and the settings. With some models I do hunt with full acceptance and listen to the audio. However, it's usually only when the predominant trash is iron, and I am using a model with Tone ID that can help identify typical iron such as a White's M6 which provides a low audio Iron range tone. If there are a lot of trash targets, and I mainly refer to iron junk, then I am using some level of rejection.

There are times, however, when I use other techniques to deal with challenges, such as a tot lot took a friend to today. he is a little lacking in the "patience" department and this playground is set above ground. I mean elevated above the surrounding black asphalt. Below the packed woodchips is some sort of, ... heck I just don't know, but you WILL get beeping that sounds like machine gun fire! On a target ID model these 'hits' read in the Zinc cent to Copper Cent/Dime range. If you cranked the Discrimination you could go after quarters, but what's the purpose in that?

I was told about this place last fall by two fellows who walk past it to hunt the sports field. They said it was the buggiest site they ever encountered and that nobody could detecting in there. It was impossible.

So, after I spent about 45 minutes to an hour hunting it I had to go and headed to the car. One fellow was heading off to lunch and, with a chuckle i his voice he said "pretty worthless, isn't it?" I told him I had to agree, or at least kind of agree because I wouldn't find as much on my next trip. I dug in my pouch and showed him the coins and jewelry I pulled. In two days I took over 145 coins and three good jewelry pieces out of there, hunting about an hour each day.

How did I do it when visual TID was just about useless and the problem target material was everywhere? I went by sound.

I reduced my sensitivity to about 25%, set my discrimination to just ignore iron nails, and then I used a 4

 

[JB(MS)]

That's what a co-worker I sold a GTA 550 a few years ago called a fairly large, graveled playground at a local county school . He tried to hunt it but said the high tone coin signals were nonstop and gave up before he started. He asked me to go check it out so I put a 5.5 inch coil on one of my Barons and gave it a try. When I got there I saw why he had problems. What is now part of the school was a garment factory until a few years ago, and in 1960 I had a between school years job that involved unloading rolls of cloth at a dock maybe a hundred feet from where the playground is now. Back then the area where the playground is located was a gully that was used as city dump. Basically they leveled off the dump, put maybe 6 inches of dirt on top and 5 or 6 years ago built the graveled playgrounds on top of it. I gave it a try but he was right about the nonstop signals, even with the sensitivity set at minimum and the small coil the detector sounded like a machine gun. I found a few coins, including a Mercury dime where I parked away from the playground, but gave up in less than a half hour. The next day at work I told him about it being built on a dump and that I didn't think it was worth the effort required to hunt since there wouldn't be any old coins there anyway. That was in December of 2006. Fast forward to early last year. I stopped in a local pawn shop and noticed they had a BH Fast Tracker that had a $20 price tag on it.

I bought the FT, tried it at a couple of places here in town and while it had more depth than I expected, I noticed the sensitivity could be set low enough that it would barely get a dime an inch or so from the coil. The next Saturday afternoon I took it to the "playground from hades", set the sensitivity at the 3 o,clock position and while it was noisy I got a lot of coins with it. I dug some trash, mostly pieces of aluminum cans, but the ground under the gravel was hard enough so the coins that weren't still in the gravel or lying on the surface of the ground were only maybe an inch down. No pennies in the photo, but the nickels, clad and satisfaction of being able to pull coins out of the place made the trip worthwhile.

<img src="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i57/mctubb/Stuff/cladfinds.jpg">
[attachment 134715 nutin.gif]

 

[slingshot]

[attachment 134718 HPIM0066.JPG]Wow! Talk about some great answers to problem sites! I'm glad to have started this post. Probably explains some of the success I've had with the 4" coils. Yeah, JB-I have a cheapo Walmart version of the Tracker and just the fact that I could turn the sens. down that far or slow the sweep speed to almost nothing meant success.

 

[JHM]

Yes that is some good information. And the common thread I'm hearing is smaller coils, lower sensitivity and a slower sweep. Tone ID wouldn't hurt either. I can handle iron with ny Cibola fairly well but the can slaw drives me crazy.