ToneID - Conductive or Ferrous?

[detectorbase]

Hello

Things have thawed abit in my area.. so was able to go out last weekend. Found 11 coins (clad), but was getting a good hang of ID'ing and pinpointing with my new Minelab Explorer SE.

One thing that I'm still having trouble with (coming from XLT world) is understanding the tones for target ID. I have tone id set at conductive and went for all 'high' pitched signals. Unfortunately, dug a lot of pull tabs, where I thought would be dimes or pennies. Don't get me wrong, I like digging pulltabs, but I like digging them up when I'm expecting nickle/pulltab and not when I'm expecting penny/dime.

I'm also using smart find read out and not the digital. A friend of mine suggested to use digital with discrimination and smart find with iron mask.. and to switch to ferrous tone. Anyone have opinions on this?

So, if I understand this correctly, ferrous will sing high on low-ferrous (so everything to the right in smarfind), and conductive will sing high if it's in the top half of the smart find (including the ferrous side)??

My environment will initially be parks and old yards, so trash will present. I have 8" sunray coil and my depth for Indian Heads/Barbers are between 4.5" - 6"

Please let me know if you have any tips!

Thanks!
DB

 

[Dan-Pa.]

First and foremost set your variability where you wish from 1 to 10..
I have found 8 to work well for me and is the favorite setting of many, but yours may differ as it sets the amount of change of tone depending on the target..
Get yourself a silver dime and silver quarter and nickle and run them past your coil until they are imbedded in your brain. Remember once you set on a variability number stick with as constantly changing it will further confuse..
I was lucky to be mentored by an excellent conduct user and never use ferrous but thats your call but stick with one or the other. I feel the tone ID is the secret of an explorer and going across a field a silver dime will stop me in my tracks and only look at the meter when I get a tone I am looking for.
After a while once you get the 3 above tones downpat you can work on perhaps where rings come in and lower than silver coins such as wheaties, two cent pieces, Indian heads...Time in the field is where its at and it will come with practice..Constantly changing your parameters changes your tones, audio responses and the like so try to remain constant once you get settings that work for you..A good clubmember mentor is a plus if you can find one that is willing to work with you...Remember we all have different hearing, different headphones so your settings may differ. In any case Minelab gives us multiple changes we can make so use what works for you and personally get quickstart downpat before we move on...

 

[tomtowns]

It really depends on your preference. I started in conductive but soon switched to ferrous. I would suggest you try ferrous & probably switch from digital to smartfind screens as you come across targets you plan on digging...it will give you a better overall idea of the different readouts & tones for different targets. You might try laying some different targets out on some clean ground & experiment with Tones, Variability, limits...etc. & decide how you want the Exp. to respond to the different types of targets you're gonna come across. Right now I'm running Ferrous, th tone 8, variability 10, limits 10, Gain 7, sensitivity manual, response normal, all metal & digital. Deep on, fast off when not in trash & deep off & fast on when IN trash...You'll have to play with it a while to figure out what works best for you depending on ground & conditions. there is no right way or wrong way...hope this might help...HH...TT

 

[tomtowns]

n/t

 

[detectorbase]

Dan-Pa...

I have my variability set to 8 as well. I'll start playing with some silver. Right now I was working with wheat cents.. and find those tones come up with alot of trash (mainly aluminum).

Tomtowns...

You mentioned 'all metal'. So you set the Iron Mask to accept all to get 'all metal'? Just making sure I'm not missing simple setting. And on that.. do you get a symphony of tones with 'all metal' all the time? Also, why do you like ferrous? What are the advantages?

Lastly, I'm not sure what the benefit is from switching from SmartFind to Digital. Are they the same? One a numerical representation of the target cursor (digital), and the other a visual position of the X/Y graph (smartfind). I kind a wish (during this learning phase) that it would display possible target (ie: coin, etc) in digital.

Thanks everyone for this expert advice. This is just what I need to get up to speed.

DB

 

[tomtowns]

Yes all metal is Iron mask on set at 32, in the smartfind screen nothing is blanked out...I hate it when a detector nulls & I would rather hear it all...I can slow up accordingly, when in a lot of trash. I really don't think there is an advantage to running ferrous or conduct, but like Dan said it is probably wise to choose one & stick with it. I am no expert with my SE...I've only been part of the Explorer fan club for going on three months now...TT

 

[detectorbase]

[quote tomtowns]Yes all metal is Iron mask on set at 32, in the smartfind screen nothing is blanked out...I hate it when a detector nulls & I would rather hear it all...I can slow up accordingly, when in a lot of trash. I really don't think there is an advantage to running ferrous or conduct, but like Dan said it is probably wise to choose one & stick with it. I am no expert with my SE...I've only been part of the Explorer fan club for going on three months now...TT[/quote]

Hello tomtowns

I had some luck today (3 keepers including Merc).. posted this in the other thread:
http://www.findmall.com/read.php?19,480075

I tried to go with ferrous today, but I think my mind is already stuck on conductive, so I stayed with that. I did use iron mask, and dropped it down to 25. I agree, I feel like the chatter going to null was slowing down my response time. Dropping the iron mask really helped that. I also switched to 8" SunRay coil.

Thanks for your advice, this forum is great. I'd like to keep the finds coming in.

DB

 

[tomtowns]

Yep, once the tones take up residence they quickly start arrangeing the furniture

 

[swingman]

You might try to get used to switching between the Smartfind screen and the digital readout. The Conductivity readings for tabs is ~08-10. The Cond. rdgs. for pennies through halves, is ~27-30 - not even close. The sounds are still confusing for me, so I like the digital screen.

 

[tomtowns]

n/t

 

[detectorbase]

I came across one here:
http://groups.msn.com/MinelabExplorerXSusers/digitalchart1.msnw

Is this the same one you're mentioning?

DB

 

[jeff & Maria]

I also came from an XLT years back. Since you are a new user don't try to overwhelm yourself but, try ferrous and digital. Compare the tone to the numeric reading. This will get you in the mindset as to how the iron sounds and how it registers digitally. Work your way up towards 0 disc.Not easy, but do it a notch at a time or the sounds will drive you crazy. There are areas where you can't run "wide open" but hearing EVERYTHING that passes under the coil gives YOU the option to dig or not dig. The thing about MD'ing is nothing is 100%. We have all dug a target that we thought was going to be junk and pulled a broach or some other odd but neat item out. And vice-aversa also.Try not to think in terms of all targets as coins or junk, there is alot of other things in the ground that will read an odd signal, some of which replicate a piece of scrap. My best advise is if in doubt, dig! The photo of this late 1800's buckle read as something a beginner might pass up.

 

[swingman]

n/t

 

[tomtowns]

This is a pic of mine...I'm computer illiterate

 

[detectorbase]

How does everyone go about multi toned targets? For instance, I can get a high pitch, but I get some duller pitches over the same target. I notice that ferrous count will slip in there. I'm assuming that this could be a couple of things:

1. good target with bad target next to it or on top of it
2. junk that is concentrated (wadded foil or folded screw cap, etc) that might be falsing the good tone

Is there any advice on how to approach these(besides dig every target). Right now, I do a pinpoint on it. If it seems deep, I'll always dig it up. Is there some settings to get a better read on it? Sensitivity, etc? Also will dropping the iron mask completely help with this?

Thanks again everyone!
DB

 

[Chris(SoCenWI)]

Because every little nail and other chunk of iron will sound good. If you run conductive you need some discrimination on the left hand side of the screen.

I run ferrous open screen except for bottle caps disc'd out 99% of the time. However, sometimes in parks where there is alot of pull tabs and other junk that hits farther to the right I will switch to conductive and black out the entire bottom half of the screen.

Chris

 

[Chris(SoCenWI)]

DB,

You have gained enough experience to discover the hardest thing to master with the explorer. Many iron targets, especially old square nail and some round shaped items, can give both a low and high pitch signal.

The problem is that many good targets- depending on conditions- can also sound the same way. I still dig or at least probe with my periscope, many iron signals.

There are some techniques that can help you tell the difference, and have been discussed on these forums many many times; try searching the archives.

Bottom line is that you will need to dig many of these signals to learn the difference and even with years of experience you will still get fooled.

Chris

 

[swingman]

To 'tomtowns' - this looks like an earlier version of the one posted 'yesterday, 11:23'. One difference: yours is ordered low-to-high/ferrous, the newer one low-to-high/COND.

 

[swingman]

Old nails have always fooled me - with my old Sovereign and now with the SE. I will dig 'em all, as now and then I pull up some old silver...which makes me forget the nails.

 

[detectorbase]

Today, I went with some new settings. I tried AM, raised the sensitivity to 22 manual, and went with ferrous tones.

I think my sensitivity was too much for my area, and I could barely handle the AM. Dug a few deep nails today that were reading and sounding good.

DB