Need Help From the Experts Please.

[Anonymous]

I am a new Explorer XS user, and only been out with my detector three or four times. I went to an old farm site today and did alot of detecting. I only found a 1954 wheat penny in the garden spot, and a couple of old tools. The places that I expected to hunt hard were very trashy, and the detector was going crazy up around the old house. But I was having an extremely hard time determing the identity of the target. The cross was jumping around a lot and the sound pitch was cnanging very quickly. My question is this. When I was out I would locate targets that were reading 28 - 30 in digital mode and when I dug them they were bigger tool items. Am I doing something wrong. Also, a couple of times the reading was a 28 showing fairly deep, and when I would dig down and re-check the hole, it was reading 31, and I would find a piece of rusted metal. Also, I got a lot of 24, 25, and 26 readings today that I did not dig. Should I have dug them in hopes that when I dug down the reading would change to a 28? If there is anyone out there that can give me some help with this I would appreciate it. I seem to be having problems at this time in identifying the targets, or maybe it's just not as easy as I thought it would be after reading some of the posts here. Thanks a lot for your help, and Happy Hunting!!

 

[Anonymous]

That seems to be the same problem I have. I have tried the factoey preset, plus several different sens settings . Also changed the gain, Iron mask etc. Seems to read different each time. I guess we need to get several hours (100 plus??) on it before the light clicks on.
GARY SMITH

 

[Anonymous]

I'm no expert yet, but a couple things I have found that causes this is multible targets under the coil can cause the tones and some iron objects will id in the coin range until the rust and halo is disturbed then it id's right,which is why yours jumped from 28 to 31.
I believe the smaller coil is the answer for areas like this that have alot of iron or other trash. Jim can give you a better answer,but don't give up on the explorer, some places are just so littered there is just to much under the coil at one time. HH Daniel

 

[Anonymous]

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[Anonymous]

Experienced the same thing at an old farm site; suggest you first start learning the good sounds which will prove invaluable in sites such as these. My learning curve skyrocketed when I decided to try the local park, which provided me with numerous shallow targets that taught me the difference between good & trash sounds. Once you find yourself hearing the good stuff prior to checking the smartfind screen (double verification), you'll know your on your way! By the way, digital can be your "triple check" prior digging if the first two are unclear.
Good luck & happy hunting!

 

[Anonymous]

If they were bigger tool items then you would have been able to raise the coil well above the ground and still detected them --maybe still at 2 feet high, a coin will be lost after raising the coil 6"s to a foot high while the really deep coins will be lost after raising the coil only by an inch or two.
If you were getting readings that jumped or bounced between a 28 ID and a 30 ID then I'm sure if you analyzed the signal more it would have also shown a 31 ID a couple times --a 31 is IRON/S.STEEL pretty much every time. High coins stay fairly constant, a 28 ID will rarely waver if it's a coin, a 30 ID will stay put too. Only your 'at extremes' items will waver or move around a bit. So look for 28's and 30's that are steady and get lost when you raise the coil.
The 24's, 25's, and 26's can be good diggable ID's.....indians, wheats, 2 cent pieces, and sterling are found in that range. A signal that bounces around between 22 and 27 and is showing up as deep is almost a guaranteed wheatie every time, but you will have to dig a few to get used to the bounce.
If you start digging a 28ID and then check after digging out the first good plug and it's still a steady 28 then it's going to be good, but if instead it's now a 31, then it's going to be iron.
General coins (Digital);
an ID of 6 is a hot one for nickel.
an ID of 4, 5, and 7 can be nickel but are not as hot ID's for nickels as 6 but when you do get one in these ID's it's usually a buffalo, V, or Shield.
an ID of 28 is hot for copper pennies; clad dimes and quarters; silver dimes and quarters; and large cents.
an ID of 30 is hot for clad halves; silver halves; and large cents.
a deep 'bouncing' ID of 22 thru 27 are wheat backs.
On a different note.....I think a hunter is better off if they can hunt by sound, I like Digital mode, it's very simple and inclusive but since I hunt mainly by sound it doesn't matter whether I'm using Digital or Smartfind I already know if I'm digging before ever looking at the screen, though both screen modes do give a very nice second opinion <IMG SRC="/forums/images/smile.gif" BORDER=0 ALT="">
GL/HH

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks to everyone for their assistance in answering this question. I am a lot clearer on this now. Special thanks to Mitch, your advice will help me immeasureably. I am sure that all that have the same question that I had will be helped by all your responses. Happy Hunting everyone.

 

[Anonymous]

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[Anonymous]

There are a few things you can try along with what others mentioned, First of all what was your sens setting? if set too high you may have been getting interference from the houses electric wires, try a lower setting or auto.. dont forget to do a noise cancel. Make sure your recovery set to fast.. go slow and listen for high tones that dont warble after locking in.. You can also try setting up a coin program in learn mode that only accepts high end coins and nickels, just to see if you can pull some out of the trash.. But as has been said, going to a place that has limited trash using the iron mask mode, and running in smart screen learn where different stuff falls, dig everything for a while and switch to digital making note of what numbers get you the best stuff and how each target responds.. afterr a while your ears get tuned into those good targets and you can go back into the high trash.. I did the same thing as you the first time I had mine out, went into high trash and got a little confused <IMG SRC="/forums/images/smile.gif" BORDER=0 ALT="">

 

[Anonymous]

what helped me through the learning curve was getting the sunray x-5 coil. i was able to get around in most trashy areas very well and helped big time in learning the different sounds. you might not cover alot of ground but youll sure be able to isolate alot of good targets.
good luck,
stan pa.sjmdc