New Safari owner- a few questions

[eliisawolf]

I've had my new Safari for a couple of days and must say that it is a completely different machine when comparing to my Omega. I've spent about 8 hours hunting and fiddling around using only the 4 preset modes to get used to the sounds/IDs etc. I have a few newbie questions that I thought some of the seasoned folks might help me with.

1) How do I know if the Safari is running unstable? Sounds silly, I know, but on my Omega this is easy to indentify as the numbers just jump around like crazy when the machine is idle until I lower the sensitivity or move to a different area. I have not seen anything like this with the Safari while hunting in the same spots as the Omega. Should I just assume that the machine is running stable? I have been using the "auto" mode for sensitivity and have run noise cancel each time.

2) With the above in mind, should I be using the auto sensitivity or is there a good method to determine what might be best sensitivity level for my typical hunting sites?

3) I have had my share of nail falsing over the last couple of days, some in the mid/high 30s a couple in the high teens. Any advice on a setup that might work best for old, rural properties with lots of rusted iron (square nails, oxen shoes, pieces of old farming equipment)?

4) Any super effective cross saves that might serve me well?

Any other tips for a new owner? Also, I do not yet have the Andy Sabisch book, but will be ordering.

Thanks much for your help.

 

[bunker314]

Welcome to the world of Safari. I think you are going to like this machine.
Question #1: With the Safari you can move back and forth pretty easily from manual to auto and back in sensitivity. In the beginning I kept it in auto most of the time. If I started hearing constant breaking up of the threshold (similar to your Omega I guess), I would drop into manual mode and move down till it stabilized. If you are not getting the breaking up symptoms you can assume it is stable. Continue to noise cancel.
#2 The higher the manual setting the deeper you will go. So keep checking it periodically. After I was a little more comfortable with the Safari I hunted primarily in manual mode.
#3 This was a weak point in my detecting with the Safari. Others with more experience may want to chime in here. I didn't have a lot of luck with switching to look at the target in Ferrous verses Cont. I think Prep may be the man to answer this one.
#4 I tended to cross save to get rid of the icons. After a while I never even noticed them. There is a theory that it may speed up recovery to eliminate the icons. I also ran pretty much wide open with the negative numbers discriminated out.
Do take some time to go over older posts. A lot of good info back there. Keep posting, someone will step up a answer your questions!
Look forward to seeing your finds. Please remember to add numbers, depths and type of location.
Best of luck!
Bunker

 

[j3cwill]

I too migrated from an Omega to the Safari. I do not miss my Omega, I must admit.

That was a great post by Bunker. Good advice in there.

The things that I noticed the most versus the Omega is the Safari is significantly quieter and more stable, especially in dry conditions. There were times where the Omega would just not quiet down in dry conditions. The Safari will punch through the soil and get the deep targets with accurate ID.

The biggest difference is the audio. There is just so much more information that the Safari is giving you compared to the beep and dig Omega.

Enjoy your new machine

 

[eliisawolf]

Thanks for the feedback folks- very helpful.

Bunker- when you mention the threshold "breaking up" is that when the detector is in motion or stationary. As I understand it, there will be some breakup if the detector passes over a discriminated target. For example, I have been notching out -10 per some of the comments on the board and noticed the threshold will mute when I pass over a -10 target.

J3cwill- Since you mentioned the audio benefit- may I ask which settings you prefer? Do you hunt with conductive or ferrous sounds and why? Coming from the Omega, it is a big adjustment.

Much appreciated.

 

[bunker314]

Hi Ellisawolf,
The sound will blank out when over a discriminated tgt. I guess I would describe it as more of a chatter. When it just won't settle down and give you a smooth threshold tone or a solid smooth tgt tone.
Hope that helps a little bit.
Good question, I was curious about that when I started as well.
Bunker

 

[j3cwill]

I hunt primarily in conductive. That is the most similar to the Omega. The only problem with conductive that I have found is that you cannot tell the difference between a copper penny, dime, or a quarter because they all hit within 2 or 3 numbers. You will be surprised on how hard it hits on deep coins. The first time I used it, I found a copper penny every bit of 7 inches down in auto sensitivity. My hunting partner could not even get a reading on it with his Teknetics Delta!

I have not hunted in ferrous yet, but I want to soon. As I understand it, ferrous will help in differentiating between copper pennies, dimes, and quarters.

As far as settings, just stick with the factory coin or coin and jewelry settings for your first few hunts. That will keep the machine quiet and stable until you learn what coins sound like.

After you are more familiar with the machine, start running sensitivity in the 16 to 20 range based on site conditions for a boost in depth.

 

[kschae4]

I often cross-save from coin to relic, or vice versa- relic to coin. Seems to help me tell the audio difference between clad and silver of the same coin denomination, as the silver will be slightly higher in tone . For me, the audio, tid and graphic id bar info aid in the decision. I always take worn coins of several denominations to a site and view their readings(stats) in different hunting modes as to help me id new signals that I may come across. As Dan-o wrote on a thread early last year -Icons provide no help for the decision to dig or not to.

 

[eliisawolf]

Thanks again for the feedback. Today I have begun to experiment with sensitivity levels (via air testing- its raining) and now can plainly see some instability when I put the sens above 18 (lots of jumping numbers, etc). When left on auto sensitivity, this does not happen. However, I was amazed at the depth difference (again air test) when using manual vs auto. At 16-17 sens I am picking up pennies at close to 12 inches in all metal with very limited chatter. When in auto sensitivity, the same penny is registering at 8-9 inches. I am even getting over 10 when running in the pre-set coin mode with sens at 17. Signals are solid and IDs pretty consistent 35-37. VERY impressed and bummed that it is raining here today in VT.

Hopefully I will get similar results in the ground. Is it safe to say that if I can run the machine pretty smoothly at 16-17 indoors I should be able to do so outside? Also, I did notice that I was generally getting a lower ID number in coin mode than in all metal. Is this common? Does it mean that I can expect less depth but better ID in the conductive modes?

Thanks.

 

[kschae4]

Most welcome..I'm a big fan of running in auto sens, as I rarely run in manual, but will now be inclined to try it. I don't hunt high emi areas near power lines or sub stations. Laziness kicks in, or time allocated to hunt, so I'll just move on to greener (more stable) pastures. I've read before that air testing distance results should not be used as the bar for field recovery depth. I know if I'm hunting in coin or coin/jewelry mode and a target is bouncing between several numbers, say mid thirties, I'll press all-metal mode to see if the read is consistent..or if it drops to different tenths group (-1 or lower, 1-9, etc,,,it's usually junk. But it's important to recover the target and learn it's id traits.... HH btw -raining here on the jersey shore,too.

 

[j3cwill]

Here in Indiana, I can almost always run at 16 or 17 sensitivity and be stable.

 

[Prep1957]

Safari is great machine,If I were a new safari owner I would work from top down.I would set my disc at 25 in relic program conductive and hold down button and save.I would hunt a place that was not so trash filled until I got use to what sounds good.The only time I use auto sensitivity is when I am scraping up new clad.Manual sensitivity is the only way to go for deeper coins depending on your soil.I have found no difference in depth or target separation between conductive and ferrous I hunt most the time in conductive I do not like all the noise in ferrous but both work good.Hunting in low trash will give you one extra inch but you need to be hunting in almost clean area with targets at least 2 coil widths apart the recovery is that slow.High trash 95 percent of the time you are losing almost no depth.Before you even think of hunting you need to ground cancel before you do that you need to find a clean spot which can be hard at times go to all metal/auto sensitivity and find a clean area then ground/noise cancel.Thought that area was clean?Now in the same spot go to manual sensitivity, all metal,starting from highest manual sensitivity check that clean spot again most cases you will have new targets(not falsing smaller metal targets) now try and find clean spot in highest manual sensitivity and ground/noise cancel again.If you do not like that you can also lower your manual sensitivity until the new targets disappear you now have a number, starting point,where the auto sensitivity was set or close to it like the etrac.Now you can raise that 2 or 3 sensitivity numbers but remember the safari scale is smaller than etrac so 2 bars/numbers up is like auto plus 5 on Etrac.Whatever way you choose you will be running very deep for coins.Now lets throw the book on the shelf what makes minelabs better than anything on the market at this point is the noise/ground cancel Andy describes it in his book in the best way possible but most people read it and do not get it.It reads the the ground and eliminates it by the FBS frequency selection.Now you are hunting an old site with lots of Iron small nails everywhere you cannot seem to disc them out your machine is nulling a lot you have to slow down to a crawl even in high trash you went to ferrous/all metal and your detector is not nulling as much but sounds like a chain saw instead of a detector.Well guess what, this is not the clean Illinois black soil I set the safari up for like the book said, it is now like iron soil. starting with a small rusty nail you dug put back in hole and put your 6X8 laying flat on the ground and noise cancel on top of nail safari will try to eliminate change frequency to get rid of this new iron soil/nail and pick the best set to operate in.You will cut down a lot on your nulling and iron problems,you will lose depth but after about the 10th Indian head at less than 6 inches in the trash I got use to it.

 

[bunker314]

NICE Prep...Can I get an AMEN!!!

Bunker

 

[eliisawolf]

Thanks Prep! I think I understand all of that

 

[kschae4]

You got it, AMEN and a witness!

 

[Mtnmn]

In my area (where there are no EMI issues) "17" seems to be the magic number where the Safari will continue to run stable and coins will still pretty much read like they should. At "18" coins start reading out of their normal range, while the Safari is still relatively stable. While at 19 and 20 the Safari is almost always unstable.

 

[Prep1957]

Sorry for delay I have gravel pits here in Illinois that are swimming holes/ camp grounds that I can see red iron stains coming out of rocks and to add insult to injury they dug the pits in late 1800 I have ciders spread on the ground the Pro Coil will not work at all at this location but 6x8 will.Safari is first detector that I could get to work at this location in over 30 years I cannot get more than 5 inches deep and cannot run sensitivity over 10 but pulled several hundred coins from this location, waiting for campers to leave so I can go back this fall.The oldest coin I have found there 1945 Merc but I know there is a lot more I am going over until something comes out better this will have to do.