If you scroll through this forum you will find a lot of info directly relating to your questions.
I recently gave advice to someone else who also bought a Vaquero, rather than rewriting it I will copy/paste it along with a little editing.
Enjoy the read.
Happy to offer any advise.
First thing, the Vaq is an awsome machine, one of the very best. I have found that it's target I.D. abilities by far exeed those of the metered units (although I have never used one, I just don't know how target I.D. could be any more acurate while still finding good targets). It's depth is on par with some of the deepest machines out there, even without supertuning. The Vaquero is a legend in the making, I do not ever feel out gunned detecting new places where others have been before or detecting with people that have more expensive machines than me, I hope you will take the time to learn this machine and gain the confidence in it that myself and many others have.
I use the threshold-based all-metal for 90% of my hunting, there are a couple reasons for this. It is deeper than the disc mode (even if supertuned), more sensitive to all metals and it lets me know everything that is going on in the ground. The AM mode is one of the most overlooked and underrated hunting techniques. The Vaquero has one of the best AM modes, it is stable and smooth with very fast target re-tune/processor. It is this feature that I believe makes it deeper than the Tejon in certain circumstances. If you find the AM threshold wavering or is not steady, moving the freq switch to a different spot should clear it up. The freq switch upsets the GBalance either + or - depending which way you move the toggle switch, so might want to recheck that after moving it.
I almost never supertune the Vaquero. I have found that supertuning is nothing more than hype. Not only does the battery drain nearly twice as fast with the threshold turned up, but when supertuned the machine will sound off on almost everything and start giving the occasional false signal. A true target even at depth will usually give a clean beep without supertuning. I switch back and forth between all-metal and disc a fair bit so I also keep the threshold down for that too.
My settings vary quite a bit. when relic hunting I dig everything, so I might not use the disc mode all day and just stay in all-metal. On the beach I will try to keep it in All-metal unless I feel lazy, I will use disc. AM will get you the deepies as well as the small gold that everyone else walks over. In the parks and school playgrounds I will use the disc mode for the most part. Unless it is a clean area. I have cleaned out most of the playgrounds where I live, so I use AM to search for targets and check in disc.
O.k. After turning the machine on I will ground balance it PERFECTLY neutral, this is important to have clean discrimination. My disc is almost always set between 5c and the mark counter-clockwise from it. With this setting it will not sound off on iron, foil and balls of foil, small gold will be lost but will still sound off on small-med womans gold rings and bigger. I have found that for myself this is generaly the perfect spot to set the disc, it is a happy med between not digging too much trash and still getting the goods. If there is not too much foil in the ground I will set it a little lower. I don't thumb the disc knob either, there are too many variables that come into play. I was thumbing the disc once and the target discriminated out exactly where many bottlecaps do, I left it and my brother came behind me with the Lobo ST. and dug a heavy mens 10k ring. I have since commited myself to dig anything that sounds off within the accepted range of discrimination.
For the AM threshold, I usually set it so I can barely hear it. Not only is it less anoying but some claim that when in disc mode clad on edge will sound off better too.
Now if I am looking for the deeep targets, I will turn it just a tiny bit louder so that I can hear the threshold buzz, but not so loud that it gets too anoying. Listen for any flucuations in the tone especially the tiny whisper ones, they might be nothing more than a change in the ground matrix/mineralization, but if you turn 90 degrees and still get a repeatable buzzing tone change it might be worth digging. The disc mode will not sound off on these targets, wether you are supertuned or not it makes no difference. These are the ones that have brought me many of my deepest and best finds. Mind you, I have also dug some of these 'whisper' signals that had no target at the bottom of the hole, as I continue to apply this technique I am getting better at it, and I do this only when I am relic hunting or at a fairly clean beach.
Also the Vaq has a loud target response in AM unlike some other machines, You won't need headphones in the bush.
I don't think I know it all and I learn more about this amazing machine all the time. I wish the best to you and hope the machine works out for you.
