Sov/Excal depth Vs a PI machine?

[robby4570]

So, over on another forum there's the old debate of whether a Sand Shark is deeper seeking than a Whites Surf PI.... it's a tired old argument but one member keeps bringing it up. I have a Sovereign and it is a very deep seeking machine! My question is, do you give up some depth with the Excal being a BBS against ANY PI detector? I have never tried my Sovereign against my Whites Surf PI but both MD's have found me some really deep targets.

 

[Smudge]

Robby,

With the stock coils, I would say the Excalibur does not go as deep as the equivalent sized PI detector.

Some people have mounted larger, after market coils, on the Excals after the warranty has expired and claim to have equivalent depth as the PI.

However, I have only seen written claims. I have never personnally seen it happen.

More important than depth, however, it the ability the Excal gives you to not dig every single tiny iron flake in the sand.

That, to me, would compensate for any depth difference.

 

[Critterhunter]

I have heard some Excal guys claim their machine is deeper than PIs they've used, but I don't know what PIs they were talking about. Probably older or cheaper ones, or Excal guys using a larger coil.

But like he said, the ability to null out iron makes up for any depth gains of a PI in my opinion. A PI on fresh water lakes for instance is unusuable in many places due to the fact that the iron won't rot away as fast as it does in salt, and so you'd spend hours chasing iron junk when you could be digging deep non-ferrous stuff. At one beach last year I commited myself to hunting in all metal and PP on my GT for one hour, and needless to say I didn't move out of about a 10 foot square area chasing bobby pins and other iron junk. I'll never do that again unless targets are scarce, and I'm still not sure if it's deeper or not than discriminate. Thus far it appears not with more playing I've down in the last few weeks.

Put it this way...For a VLF machine in disc the Excal and GT are about as deep as it gets on both land and in sand/water, and they do an excellent job of ignoring iron. I won't name the machine, but I know of somebody who was recently using a non-Minelab water machine and it seemed to be coming up with a lot of iron from what I gathered even when he thought he had discrimination set right to ignore it.

 

[Bling]

iv dug many dimes @ 15" with my Sovereign's ,not quite as deep with my Excal's..iv used 4 diff PI's and if you use them right they do seem to be a little deeper but the trade off of having to dig every target with them is just not worth it.i dug 40+ bobby pins in one day at the beach....thats time i could have been digging good targets with my Minelabs! the only iron nail iv ever dug with my Sovereign had a Gold Ring in the same hole.it hit on the Gold but rejected the iron! Iron Mask is a wonderfull thing! i wouldnt trade my Minelabs for any other detector on the market,and iv had them all. from 1968 to 2012

 

[robby4570]

Thanks guys! I don't know what I expected to hear, but you all seem to have the same experiences to report. I agree that not digging every target with a PI (ESPECIALLY if it's DEEP JUNK) is worth giving up a couple inches in my book a well. I know, some guys will tell you that you need a machine that will do 18 to 24 inches to get the really old goodies... Frankly, I don't want to take my backhoe to the beach, I see enough of it during the week ;-) I currently don't have a scoop that will get me beyond about 12 inches in the water but hope to soon get a good water scoop.

Before I got my Sovereign, I just really had no desire to own an Excal. Now that I have a Sovereign, and have heard that the Excal is just a Sovereign in a waterproof housing basically - I heard right didn't I? - I want to get an Excal for my next MD.

 

[dewcon4414]

I have no doubt a PI is deeper..... even more so in heavier mineralized sand. There are times when the use of a PI is the right move out there. In the winter time here in Fl sometimes it get pretty quite out there and you just need that depth. Also .... if you are talking gold then you have to consider the K when talking depth between the two. Some PIs will also have better depth on smaller gold than an Xcal..... in fact the Xcal might not even hear it if its rubbed on the coil. Coil size.... some are larger on the PI. I believe the DF has a 12 inch coil.

Dew

 

[Critterhunter]

One way to look at it is this- Are you willing to trade maximum depth for discrimination, or are you willing to trade discrimination for maximum depth. If there are zero targets that a shallower depths at a beach then obviously you'd want max depth, but if there are lots of targets within range of your machine then obviously you'd want to sacrifice depth so you can have discrimination.

Put it this way...The Excal is already deeper than pretty much any other VLF machine out there for the most part, so you are already pushing deeper depths than the competition using another VLF machine, so why the need to race further ahead of them in still further depths? I wouldn't worry about the competition, but rather about the depth versus discrimination thing and decide from there.

And if you feel others are "catching up" to you depth wise on certain beaches, then one only need look at a larger coil, such as the 12x10, S-12, Excelerator 12.5", 14" Excelerator, 15x12, WOT, or 13" Ultimate to push a bit deeper. There is also the 16.5 and 18" Excelerators, but I'd bet perhaps they are well beyond the point of no return in size to still see gains in depths on coin/ring sized targets, but the coverage can't be denied for larger beaches that's for sure.

I found the 15x12 was deeper than my stock 10" coil in the sand but not on land. Had I primarily been a beach hunter only I probably would have kept that coil because coverage was for sure king with that coil to grid out areas faster. Not sure if it was deeper than my 12x10 in the sand though but have my doubts, because my 12x10 is deeper on land than my 15x12 was. I can tell you that even the 12x10 is a nice step up in coverage over the stock 10" coil for gridding out a beach, but I can also tell you that the 15x12 is lighter than the stock 10" Tornado if you remove the coil cover.

Another considering for depth is how stable the coil is and not necessarily what size it is, so that you can run sensitivity higher. I'm finding the 12x10, like the 15x12, runs so smooth over mineralized ground (usually) that I can often run sensitivity much higher and not have chatter or nulling as much as my stock coil, and resulting in better hits on targets at depth. The beach I hunted the other day though sure had my GT and 12x10 on it's knees in terms of how high I could run sensitivity. Had it 9/10s of the way down due to all the black sand streaks from storms and also the always present microscopic iron and mineralization at this beach. But despite that low sensitivity setting, the GT still was popping me some surprisingly deep targets.

 

[Rob in (Ca)]

The problem with a PI is they (hate EMI) noisy noisy scratchy must keep the gain way low, there was a YouTube video out with some Florida Dual field hunters, they run the gain full blast %100 and digging deep deep deep and finding all kinds of loot
.
I tried the %100 gain on my DF here in Southern California it was so noisy, i had to turn the gain below the pre set triangles to hear any deep targets

l agree with Dew a PI should be your 1st choice for Beach hunting, as they go deep and are immune to Black sand & salt . but not all Beach's are the same , real trashy Beach's would be better off with a BBS machine. So you need to do your homework

on the Beach you are going to hunt


Good luck

 

[dewcon4414]

You are right Rob.... location location location is always a big factor in choosing the right machine. PI or Xcal/VLF comes down to like Critter said..... you hunting style. If you want to spend more time digging and gridding an area and have the patience to pull missed targets then a PI is the way to go. Many prefer the VLF/Xcal just because they feel recovery time on less targets allow them to cover more of the beach hoping for larger targets and recent drops. Its a trade off. I dont think anyone would go wrong having both machines. Im not sure its the EMI down here we dont have as much as the lack of mineralization.

Dew