What are the advantages to hunting in "Threshold" as opposed to "Silent Search"?

[matthias]

What do most of you use? Thanks in advance. HH. Matt

 

[Rick(ND)]

If you want max depth I feel the threshold will make the difference as you can hear those slight tone changes that you will not hear in silent search. I also like to hear it nulling so I can tell if I am swinging the coil to fast for the conditions plus on a null I am able to hear if there is a good target close to iron.
Now I never liked Silent search before, but on the GT I have seen where it has its advantages now that I have used it a bit. In those area where targets are far and few it seems like the last target it sees is iron so you have that low growl of iron most of the time, so silent search helps so you don't have to listen to it. Once I get a area where targets are more frequent or deeper and want to hear that threshold to pick up the deeper one and those closer to iron I will always switch back to threshold. If you know your GT well you will see some of those weak and deeper signals you will not hear in silent search.

 

[Critterhunter]

What he said goes for me too. I like silent search when I'm scouting the woods where I might not hear a target for an hour. Once I locate a target I'll switch back to threshold for better depth and work the area. Silent Search saves battery power so I'll throw over to that if I feel I'm pushing my run time with the battery and want to keep hunting as long as possible. It also saves your sanity when you won't hear the threshold change for a long time until you hit something. For that reason I have used it on the beach some when targets are few and I'm just sick of hearing an unchanging threshold. My only complaint about using Silent Search when doing these long "scouting missions" is that I'm worried I won't hear the machine's threshold respond to iron. I want to know when iron is around as that points to human activity in the woods. If you listen even in silent search you will hear the iron false and break through here and there. Once that happens I'll flip over to threshold. On the other hand, I guess I could hunt in All Metal Silent Search when scouting vast areas. That way I'd hear all iron and not just what changes the threshold or causes the machine to false or null. I'll have to remember to try that next time.

Another good use for silent search is when the ground is really bad with minerals, hot rocks, or small bits of iron. Using silent search will smooth out the machine some and cause less falsing. Also works well for when you can't keep the coil at an even level such as when hunting a field with crop stubble or such. Some times a machine will false as the coil moves up and down in relation to the ground so it's good for that. Even if you don't want to use Silent Search it can be though of as a buffer or extra ground filter in a sense. When a spot seems impossible to hunt due to RF noise, minerals, hot rocks, iron, and so on think of using Silent Search. If it's still noisy try Iron Mask OFF as well. If it is still bad crank up the discrimination dial to quiet it down. It's rare to run into a spot like this that the Sovereign won't handle smoothly because hunting bad ground is when these machines really excell compared to the competition. Still, somewhere out there you'll find a place that is hard to hunt even for a Sovereign. I've found one or two so far, but my other machines had 7 or 8 sites that gave them problems.

 

[deanosaur1972]

What do most of you use? Thanks in advance. HH. Matt

A newbie to the GT but I have already seen (heard actually, you know what I mean) the benefits of threshold change when near to a target but not over it. Another point I will make about the threshold hum is that I know that the machine is turned 'on' - (I am sure you may laugh at that) most of my hunts on beaches are at night and I have always had a habit of switching off the machine when I break for a cup of tea (yes I am from England), countless times with other machines, I have searched afterwards for 10 minutes with the machine not actually on.... I can safely say I will never tire of hearing that noise!!

Another good use for silent search is when the ground is really bad with minerals, hot rocks, or small bits of iron. Using silent search will smooth out the machine some and cause less falsing. Also works well for when you can't keep the coil at an even level such as when hunting a field with crop stubble or such. Some times a machine will false as the coil moves up and down in relation to the ground so it's good for that. Even if you don't want to use Silent Search it can be though of as a buffer or extra ground filter in a sense. When a spot seems impossible to hunt due to RF noise, minerals, hot rocks, iron, and so on think of using Silent Search. If it's still noisy try Iron Mask OFF as well. If it is still bad crank up the discrimination dial to quiet it down. It's rare to run into a spot like this that the Sovereign won't handle smoothly because hunting bad ground is when these machines really excell compared to the competition. Still, somewhere out there you'll find a place that is hard to hunt even for a Sovereign. I've found one or two so far, but my other machines had 7 or 8 sites that gave them problems.

Thanks critter - I note those comments with interest, I do have a nightmare section to do in a few months.

 

[Dick from NC]

I just purchased a Excalibur 800 (used) and have had it at North Myrtle Beach and Myrtle Beach, SC. I had a Explorer for years and it finally died. I bought a T2 for relic hunting, but it doesn't work that well at the beach, so that why I got the Excalibur. I've had it out for about a week and I'm still getting use to it. Because of the wind at the beach I have had to turn up the threshold to hear it good. The threshold changes pitch a lot and when I go back over the same area I don't hears any targets. Sometimes it might change pitch from low to higher then higher then higher on the same sweep, and since I'm not that accustomed to the machine I don't know it this is normal. The last day I hunted at Myrtle Beach I set the machine on pinpoint and hunted with the Excalibur in the pinpoint mode. On some of the targets that I got a pinpoint on I switched back to discriminate and heard nothing. I dug more targets that day by hunting in pinpoint mode instead of discriminate, because it I had of been in discriminate mode I would have missed a lot of targets. Now I dug a lot of trash but some times what you think might be trash turns out to be something very nice.

 

[Finderskeeper]

I just purchased a Excalibur 800 (used) and have had it at North Myrtle Beach and Myrtle Beach, SC. I had a Explorer for years and it finally died. I bought a T2 for relic hunting, but it doesn't work that well at the beach, so that why I got the Excalibur. I've had it out for about a week and I'm still getting use to it. Because of the wind at the beach I have had to turn up the threshold to hear it good.

Put some electrical tape over the drain holes at the bottom of the headphones. That will help cut down on wind noise.

Threshold changes will indicate a target is present and often to what that target it. So a slight buzz is the way to go. If it changes, then I know something is there. If there is no sound, there is no digging and no payday.