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My Minelab Blows the Vision Away for Depth

S

steve herschbach

New member
Hi,

Well, I'm sorry to report that my Minelab GPX-4500 with a Nuggetfinder 16" round mono coil totally blows the Vision away for depth on a dime. I'm sure this is disappointing news for many of you who were interested in the Vision. Since depth is all that matters, you may as well pass on the Vision and start saving your pennies for a GPX-4500. I would recommend a larger coil than the stock coil also. Although the GPX-5000 may be out by the time you've saved up 450,000 pennies.

Steve Herschbach

Sorry - could not resist....
 
Steve

Were not all into gold nugget hunting, most of us are into coin shooting and relic hunting, we have gold in the UK Wales area i believe, and if i ever fancied giving it a go i certainly wouldn't buy a minelab machine hate them lol

I think most of us on here would like to know if the Minelab E-Trac Blows the Vision Away for Depth
 
Hi,

Actually, I was talking coins. The GPX-4500 will blow an E-Trac or a Vision away for depth on a dime or whatever coin you wish to try. Same thing with relics. I've never laid hands on a detector with more sheer horsepower than a GPX-4500. Any VLF type machine seems lackluster by comparision.

I personally helped my detecting buddy dig up a screw cap at a solid two feet that he detected with a GPX-4000 and the stock 11" round DD coil. He literally had to come back to the cabin for a shovel so I went back and helped him dig it.

Steve Herschbach
 
Steve

That is very impressive, to be honest i don't know anything about this machine, i guess its more of a gold machine, with no discrimination? I know the Vision is a good machine, and im not pulling anyone's chain asking questions.

I am just as excited as anyone about it and will be getting one when it arrives in the UK, i Know Whites makes the best metal detectors in the world as i have owned them and used them for over 30+ years
 
When things settle down a bit, I hpoe to get my Vision and my White's TDI out to some places with the possibility of deep silver. Reg Sniff had some very interesting experiences with his TDI in worked out parks. His ground was highly mineralized and thereofre the Pulse Induction type detector had it all over rthe VLF for depth. I suspect for deep silver the TDI will rule, but for shallow "microjewelry" it will be interesting to see how the pair compare with each other.

Isn't it interesting that White's has brought out two exciting detectors in less than a year. Of course the TDI is based on Eric Forser's Goldscan, but White's had the foresight to adopt it. The Vision, it is already established, is an All American design, based solidly on previous White's experience. Nice to see a small business in the U.S. willing to invest and take risks. My hat's off to thwm.

The other neat thing that they did is to hire Carl Moreland as their chief engineer. Carl doubtlessly has the proper technical credentials, but apart from that he is an enthusiast. He obviously loves the process of designing, testing and using metal detectors. I believe that many of the leading engineers in this field have had a purely technical connection to our hobby. Carl is one of us - and it shows!!!
 
Hi,

Yeah, that is the catch. The GPX-4500 is a ground balancing pulse induction detector. In ground with severe mineralization issues you can get depths two to three times better than what you'd expect from a top end VLF. The catch is that the discrimination is very limited and the units absolutely love tiny steel and iron trash. So the more steel or iron trash you have, the more problematic their use becomes. They also are a bit pricey. People balking at $1500 will have a heart attack when they check out a 4500!

However, if the item being hunted for was very high value, digging a lot of junk may be acceptable. So it is with nugget detecting. I dig hundreds of junk targets for every nugget found. Most people are not going to dig three hundred trash targets for a dime. But I will do it for a one ounce nugget.

I have experiment with the Minelab PI units, the Garrett Infinium, and the White's TDI for certain non-nugget applications. All three easily find coins a Minelab Explorer with a 15" WOT coil will miss. I'd not recommend them to the average person for coin detecting but they have their place. With use a person can achieve an ability to discern probable good targets with the PI units.

Let's say you are in the U.K. and you find a hoard. A bunch of gold coins in a small area. You hunt it to death with the best VLF units known to man. But you think there are a gold coin or two left. That is when I'd break out a ground balancing PI unit and give it one more go.

I honestly don't get excited by any VLF units when we are talking depth. I think the tech is maxed out. Someday somebody is going to produce a ground balancing PI with discrimination, and that is when the game will change dramatically from what we have now.

Steve Herschbach
 
Hi Rick,

I'm going back to coin detecting with the TDI when the snow goes away. I kind of drifted away from it last summer but want to give it another good go.

The TDI is my favorite tot lot unit by far. Amazing what the VLF guys leave behind.

Steve Herschbach
 
steve herschbach said:
I honestly don't get excited by any VLF units when we are talking depth. I think the tech is maxed out. Someday somebody is going to produce a ground balancing PI with discrimination, and that is when the game will change dramatically from what we have now.

Steve Herschbach
Click to expand...

I will agree 100% with Steve on this remark.
 
I have some spots where anything that is not iron is worth allot of money and it is in neutral soil, farm field. I want a detector which can give me more depth than my Explorer Etrac or SE's and can still at least identify iron, so that I don't have to dig a bazillion rusted cut nails. Would you use a GPX, 2200, or one of Eric's machines to go deeper than an Explorer in neutral ground and still be able to tell most iron from other targets? What detector would you use?
 
Hi,

I can get 100% iron rejection with the TDI but only by giving up the edge in depth. Still have to play with that.

I can use the GPX to max depth and by using the tones go after low conductors, but also will get small steel and iron. The iron discriminator can be engaged to reject at least some of that iron and steel, but also at the risk of rejecting some low conductors. Pretty problematic.

Or, by using the tones, I can go after high conductors and ignore the small steel and iron. Large iron will also be accepted but much of this can be effectively rejected with the iron discriminator. So there is a better chance of success chasing high conductors. The problem is the low conductors are more likely to be the high value target we are after - gold.

If I were there, I'd absolutely use my GPX-4500 for a couple days and see what happened. I have an extremely high tolerance for junk if it gets me a target I want. What the heck, I own the machine anyway. But I can't really recommend somebody purchase a PI just to find out as in all likelihood the amount of junk dug would be counter-productive compared to using a good machine like the SE for example. Maybe a brave soul would want to give Eric's machine or the TDI a spin just becasue they are less costly, or pick up a used SD2200.

I like trying oddball stuff. If everyone has come to a consensus that machine A is the best way to go, then I'm probably going to drag machine Z out at some point and give it a go. Point me at a place where there were some great finds that everyone, and I mean everyone, has given up on because the best hunters with the best VLF units have cleaned it out. Why not give it a go with a PI? Nothing else is going to work. You might just dig junk, but you may very well also make that big find everyone else was just passing over.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Steve Herschbach
 
But let me back up one notch here:

I am looking for coins in neutral soil that is no longer plowed (no till farming), so I am trying to dig Seated silver, shield nickels, Indian heads, brass buttons and leave as much as possible iron cut nails.

I will give you an example of what just a slight increase in depth gave me this past summer with my SE. ML put out the PRO 11 coil. There was about a 3 acre patch of field that previously I could not get a diggable signal from regardless of coil size tried. Even used the Wot with the swingy thing, however I could not push the sensitivity due to interference, so I kind of had to leave the machine in auto sensitivity or low manual sensitivity. When I received the Pro 11 coil, I found that I was able to run in manual sensitivity at max while the machine still remained stable and that section of field that I presumed targets were too deep started producing for me, which is why I love my Pro 11 coil.

From your reply above:........." Or, by using the tones, I can go after high conductors and ignore the small steel and iron. Large iron will also be accepted but much of this can be effectively rejected with the iron discriminator. So there is a better chance of success chasing high conductors. The problem is the low conductors are more likely to be the high value target we are after - gold."..... In my case the high value targets I am after at these sites are mostly silver as the Indians and nickels are so damn cruddy.

With that in mind, Do you think a GPX 4500 would maybe be a better bet that the TDI given (A) the neutral soil and (B) the silver (high conductive target) be the main goal?

And if yes, The GPX being a better bet for this specific purpose, would getting the 4000 or 4500 be a better bet?

Thanks allot Steve for your advice as I have a great deal of respect for your knowledgeable opinions.
 
Yea, and my C-4 blows your GPX-4500 clean away......................:rofl:
 
I see the GPX 4500 has a backlight, does the GPX 4000 and Whites TDI have a backlight? Most my hunting is at night because I work to darn much.
 
Hi,

The TDI has no screen at all to backlight. I do believe the GPX-4000 did not have the backlight but not swearing to that. But it is not like you look at the screen very often - only to make adjustments. There is no target info displayed. Strictly audio.

Steve Herschbach
 
Hi,

The GPX packs quite a bit more punch than the TDI if sheer depth is what we are talking.

The GPX-4000 and 4500 are basically the same machine. The only feature I am intrigued by one the 4500 is the ability to turn off the ground balance system, which should add considerable depth in neutral soils. But all tone discrimination ability is lost so it is a true dig it all mode.

Steve Herschbach
 
I have found someone willing to trade my Etrac for a TDI and I think I am going to take him up on it as I don't really like my Etrac and it isn't finding a whole lot my SE couldn't. I think however, I am going to buy the GPX 4500, sooner or later I would have to anyway to do any serious gold prospecting which I plan to do in the near future. I see alot of the meteorite hunters are leaning toward it also. Finding new sites is much harder than digging more at old sites for sure.:thumbup: Thanks again.
 
Set your Vision program mode to "Extra Deep Dimes Please"
Then throw away the GPX battery.
Retest - Your results may change.:punch:
 
I'm glad we're back on topic with these wonderful comparisons. Now lets compare apples with apples in terms of price.

My sense, based on observation of reported results, is that in most ground conditions, the e-trac will outperform the Vision
in terms of depth and trash seperation.

However, to be fair, the vision seems to outperform the e-trac in terms of LCD (color display), wireless headphones,
and the ability to assign custom tones to any VDI target.
 
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