Who Says Minelabs Aren't Sensitive To Tiny Stuff?

[Critterhunter]

...about the size of a small pea. Not a big pea, but a small pea.

A more easy to convey size comparison would be about the size of the top of an eraser on a pencil. That's a close to describing it as I can get. I'll see if I still have a picture of it on my compact flash card.

 

[kai_gold]

You bring up a good point about screen resolution differences causing confusion. It would be difficult in my mineralized soil to get much more depth than a couple of inches on an eraser sized grommet, but in less mineralized locations it is much more believable. And imo that would be about as small an item as I would care to dig in the turf or in the water anyways.

 

[Neil]

I have dug several ear rings and ear ring backs that were a couple of scoops deep with my Excall while beach and water hunting. And it is nothing to dig small rivets and small buck&balls 10+ inches with my E-Trac while hunting CW relics with the Pro-coil. Usually with my E-Trac I set gain at 24 deep on and manual sensitivity 29 or 30 ground difficult and fast off relic mode with 1-38 edited out to stop iron wrap around. Now I will adjust according to the area I am hunting in but most of the time sensitivity is the only changes I make. This is in TN with the red clay and sand stone ground. So if people are not getting but 7 to 8 inches depth it sounds like the ground matrix may be the problem. HH

Im saying nobody is digging earring backs at 6 or 7" deep with a sov/excal. Its fallen deeper in the hole or something like that, but its just to small an object in both size and mass for the sov to do that.
I never said earrings, rivets, buck balls or any of that. An earring back is very thin/light and small whether its gold or silver, its a really hard target to hit at all with a sov and even in the best conditions nobody is digging em that deep, but its been posted on this forum before and I was referring to the depth numbers, how people throw those around easily, yet all the people I have even hunted with or saw hunting never measure or rarely do. So I think alot of these numbers being thrown around are just guesses and poor guesses at that.

 

[Neil]

Now if you wanna believe you can hit small silver O like Critter posted at 6" or 7" then Ive got a bridge to sell you because thats flat out crazy. Also a small piece of tin, iron, any garbage metal can block out the smaller targets signals like smaller gold and silver so where in the heck are you guys hunting? Even our beaches here have debris scattered through them, forget on land, part of the reason we do better on beaches is due to less interference from other metals and cleaner soils.

Neil, Was that directed at me? I said I have found small silver which is true. I never said it was the size of an O or 6" deep. Even my gold bug 2 doesn't pick up something that small at that depth in my soil. The smallest I have found with the etrac is a silver stud earring and an earring back which were each less than half an inch deep and were weak signals. A similar size earring in gold that I have is not detected at all. I never said anything about believing critter's size or depth claims. If you read my post it was about the limitation on detecting the small items. My main point was that for someone to claim that because the sovereign will pick up a smaller higher conductor does not mean that it is necessarily sensitive enough to pick up gold of a similar size and that closed loop items such as grommets provide a stronger signal than other similar sized items due to the shape and so these examples of higher conductors don't really reflect the sovereigns performance on small gold items like open hoop earrings or odd shaped bits of gold jewelry.

Kai gold sorry I put up the quote in the wrong post. Explnut is correct, Im referring to the first post in this thread by critter, in which he said " I've also dug a tiny sterling silver piece of a necklace about the size of this "O" on the screen at any easy 6 or 7","
An easy 6 or 7"?. Like I said, anyone who believes that I got a bridge I can sell you.....lol

 

[Neil]

That's true. I'm not claiming a Minelab is as sensitive to thin gold chains or small gold earings as something like a Tesoro for instance. That can be a drawback, however...I use to own a few Tesoros and got really sick of digging holes on solid sounding objects only to find a small piece of foil in the hole. It also makes them more noisey and eratic to hunt with when passing over objects like this. On the other hand, if you are hunting gold rings there is nothing as deep as a Sovereign or Excal. My GT hits much harder on gold rings in my tests than my Explorers ever did. Why is that? I'm not sure, but I think part of it is due to the long drawn out audio signal of a Sovereign. There is more "meat" there to hear and listen to.

if your not digging those small pieces of foil your certainly not digging those small pieces of jewelry your referring to in your first post. it would be great if we could seperate these targets up but it to date, cant be done.

 

[Neil]

Neil, that's how deep it was...stuck in the bottom of the plug. I don't care if you believe it or not, it's the truth. And I did say that I bet it must have had help from a built up halo around it. My digger is marked for depths. I don't guess how deep a target is when I want to know that. I simply look at my digger. And I didn't say it WAS the size of this "O". I said it was ABOUT the size of this "O", which is admittedly not the best way to convey size. Not everybody is using the same size computer screens to use as a gauge. So I'll put it this way...about the size of a small pea. Not a big pea, but a small pea. Come to think of it, I think I have a picture of it somewhere. I'll see if I can dig it up and post.

I've also dug small earning backings at these depths and tiny shoe lace grommets that deep too.

Is the Sovereign good on tiny gold or thin chains? Nope. Would never claim that. There are much better machines for doing that out there. But I am saying it's better on small targets then most people give it credit for. I also believe the 12x10 improves this ability somewhat based on how hard small stuff seems to hit with it compared to the stock coil (which was still good on small stuff too).

you might want to look at your first post in this thread. you did say what your saying here you didnt.

 

[kai_gold]

No problem Neil. I just wanted to clarify my opinion in case I was not very clear. HH

 

[Critterhunter]

Can't find the picture of it, but I did run across another small piece of sterling silver jewlery I found which was about the same depth (6 or 7"). It's bigger, but it's still pretty darn small. Smaller than a 3 cent piece. It's in the upper right hand corner of the picture. Compare it's size to the dime below it. If I remember right it also read 176 on the meter.

 

[kai_gold]

Some nice looking silver you got there critter.

 

[Neil]

a three cent piece is small indeed but your post was about a very tiny link of silver that you said you found at an easy 6 or 7". I dont know how this has wandered to an earring or three cent piece? I was referring to your orignal post in this thread, the original post of this thread that got the whole thing going.
let me know if you still cant locate it and I will copy/paste it for you critter.

 

[Critterhunter]

I know what I said, Neil...And I still stand by it. Just wish I could find the picture to relate the actual size better.

 

[Critterhunter]

Here's somebody finding some small stuff, and some at really good depths...

Cypearl
After four years, or is that five? I find the Sovereign GT surprises me more and more often. Nothing will beat it on the beach for coins. Small gold? I have found several gold rings, the smallest .95 of a gram and was broken at the solder joint, thus eliminating the shorted turn effect.. I have also picked up many tiny silver objects like sections of earrings etc, all with good repeatable signals.
What has astounded me most is the sensitivity to tiny copper objects. In one area where I search a boat has been burnt or just rotted away, leaving a legacy of copper nails screws etc. Amongst these are tiny copper roves. Roves are small copper discs placed under the heads of copper nails to increase their purchase in soft wood such as King William pine often used in boat building in Tasmania. I have detected roves 3/16" dia with a 1/16" hole at 10 to 12 inches. sitting under the sand on top of clay. They are devils to locate in the sieve when covered in mud, sand and clay.

That said, I'm sure the Sovereign GT is as good as you can get for the cash outlay. Also remember it is a pleasure pursuit, not a living. You probably won't get rich.

Peter down under

 

[Neil]

critter you can find and post all you want about these tiny items, your surely trying to convince yourself because your not convincing me one bit. I say these tiny targets are falling down in the hole while you dig or similiar to that. By what you just posted here, as a comparison, a silver quarter which is a high conductor and solid round disc much larger than what youve said you found, should be easily found somewheres about 15-20". Its ok, I will stick by what Ive found and not what others have posted. My experience is much more valuable and reliable to me.

 

[Nauti]

Critter i totally agree with you that the gt is capable of finding small objects at quite surprising depths.As i said earlier i have found hammered farthings which are tiny coins at depths of up to about 5" which is more than a lot of detectors will do.However,surely you don't believe claims of 10-12" on an object that is only 3/16" in diameter.......no detector available could detect an object that small at them depths.
Regards,another Neil.

 

[Critterhunter]

Not going to get into that, but I have noticed that the Sovereign seems to get more depth in the sand than on land for whatever reason. I've dug some pretty deep stuff in the sand that I don't think I would ever have got the same depth of on land.

 

[Critterhunter]

Not going to get into that, but I have noticed that the Sovereign seems to get more depth in the sand than on land for whatever reason. I've dug some pretty deep stuff in the sand that I don't think I would ever have got the same depth of on land.

...At some of the fresh water beaches I hunt. Not all. I've got one beach that has a lot of microscopic iron (the sand is sort of rust colored), and another that is highly mineralized...And at those two I get less depth than I do on land. But at other beaches I seem to get more depth than I do on land.

 

[Rob in (Ca)]

BBS does better on low conductors than the FBS machines, whats odd is that on my GT I can have the sensitivity down low, way low and still hits hard on the low conductors, for my hunts on the sports field looking for lost jewelry as I don't need depth for that type of hunting.

 

[Neil]

BBS does better on low conductors than the FBS machines, whats odd is that on my GT I can have the sensitivity down low, way low and still hits hard on the low conductors, for my hunts on the sports field looking for lost jewelry as I don't need depth for that type of hunting.

Would like to see someone put up some pics to show a piece of jewelry the Sov will hit that an explorer or etrac wont. Ive never seen it and dont find this to be true at all. If anything its the other way around, especially using the sov in disc.

 

[Rick(ND)]

When I was out there a few years ago on the beach when I used my Explorer EX II in the dry sand compared to the land hunting I do in ND a 10 inch quarter and penny would sound like it was 2 inches down.

 

[Rick(ND)]

You be surprise as how many claim to find real deep targets, but they are those that fall in the hole and why those that use a Sun Ray probe I believe more as they know how deep the target is when they use it. Also actual in the Field finds are more accurate as it is what we expedience our self and not what we read or do test with. I think Critter needs to find a job soon as he spends too much time on the Internet and doing test and not actually out getting experience with the Sovereign.

Rick