X-tera 705 Decision

[Rainyday101]

Hi, for some reason I am determined to get a minelab and can't make my mind up between the Safari and 705. I have a few questions for someone who has used both or can make a comparison from hunting with somebody who has one while you used the other. Which is deeper in your soil? Does the safari have a slower swing speed and is that a disadvantage? If I go with the 705 and use the 3KHZ coil am I saying goodbye to gold rings, but hello to silver coins? Do you think one has an advantage over the other? Dollar for Dollar these both seem to be great machines from what I have read. I will be doing conshooting and some areas will be trashy. Thanks in advance for any advice!!

 

[7centsworth]

Welcome to the forum. Morelic has both maybe he can chime in on this one. I really like my xterra and have found all kinds of things with it. I do know the safari is quite a bit heavier.

 

[EOS]

Well the Xterra 705 is a fantastic detector.The Safari is an FBS detector and what comes with that is you have to swing slower.Xterra is faster and as deep as the safari/Explorer/Etrac.
The Safari dont have a backlit display if you wanna do some night hunt.I dont have the Safari myself,I purchased the Etrac this autumn and that is a very well built md with lot of functions.Absolutely brilliant in park/beach
due to the splendid discrimination which give you a lot of target information compared to the Xterra 705 with its simpler discrimination.

Not many use the Safari in Europe,they spend some extra to go up for the Explorer or Etrac.
Xterra is my no.1 field machine.Fast,light,and pretty well balanced depending on coil.
When I hunt in parks or pasture with a lot of junk I go for the Etrac.

With this said I will not complain on the Xterra in park/beach it work fine there as well,but I dig a lot less trash with Etrac on this ground.

I dont know the price difference in US between the Xterra-Safari-Etrac.but if you have the xtra money to step up to the Etrac I sure would recommend it.But dont forget both the Safari and Etrac is a lot heavier.
Or go for the Xterra for its allround performance.

Hope this helped you a little bit for your decisions.

Mike

 

[morelic55]

Both have their place. I have the X-Terra 70 and have had the 705. Remember to get my results, for my type of hunting, you have to use the 10.5DD coil. I am strictly a relic hunter and find coins in the process of hunting relics. The X-terra excels as a relic hunter, great depth and tones.

Now, The Safari....I have one and it, along with it's big brothers(Explorers & Etrac) are slower machines by nature. I have found using them as a relic hunting machine is a nightmare in the heavy iron laden places that I love to hunt, however I have used both the X-Terra and the Safari in some old yards to hunt for coins. The Safari wins as far as a place where there is NOT alot of junk iron. I think the Safari and the Explorers/Etrac are better for old silver in older parks and yards right out of the box. The Safari is a tad heavier. I also think that the Safari is a little better as to un-masking of coins close to trash. The X-Terra suffers in the un-masking of co-located iron trash, so I use it in places where nails are not as thick and other machines for the really trashy iron places. Both are deep running machines. In the pic is a .69 cal minnie ball at almost 12"
Since I have limited use for my Safari, I'm thinking of selling it sometime soon.

Randy, I'm sure you can give some insight on his questions also............Mark

 

[EOS]

Wow ,thats a deep bullet!
Did you find it with the XT70?

Nice picture as well.

Mike

 

[morelic55]

It was found with the 705, althou the 70 is just as deep, I've found them with it also..............Mark

Wow ,thats a deep bullet!
Did you find it with the XT70?

Nice picture as well.

Mike

 

[Old Longhair]

It's just as Mark says, they each have their place, which is why I have an SE and a 705.
With the SE I've encountered sites that were essencially unhuntable due to small iron. The 705 at the same sites had no trouble.
Yet, there are some sites where I feel that the SE has an advantage. So until I amass the funds for a CTX, I travel with two machines and a host of coils. And even after a 3030 is in the stable and the SE is history, I'll still have the 705 or whatever advanced V-Flex is out there.

The way that I look at them, is not one of competing technologies, but of complimentary ones. They are both very different from each other, and from anything else out there. As an example I offer the CTX....Minelab's new flagship. It employs aspects of both FBS and V-Flex, and has basicly blended an E-trac with a 705, then made it waterproof & wireless with a GPS, and added a few other capabilities that were now possible with digital/analog integration.
V-Flex like FBS2 is in it's infantile stage of development. The possibilities are boundless when digital science gets creative. And with Minelab continuing to invest in the Xterra and new FBS2 lines, I'd suggest that you hold onto your b_tt! We're going to have some wild new stuff comming at us in the future, and Minelab is driving it.

 

[Rainyday101]

Wow, I thought you guys were going to make this easy for me! I am not sure any machine in the $900 dollar or less range is really good in a trashy area. Let me ask this- Is the Xtera as deep as the Safari?

 

[EOS]

I would like to say yes! My Etrac is not deeper then the Xterra 705.
If you get the Safari I bet you wanna stepup real soon to the big brothers.
If I have to choose beteeen them two I would go for the XT.

Also I had my most valuable finds the XT 705 and that machine always gonna stay
with me.
Merry Xmas

/Mike

 

[morelic55]

I don't know about stepping up from a Safari to the SE,ET or CTX for that matter. To me it is the simple operation of the Safari with the depth of it's big brothers. I had a EXII and Etrac and it drove me crazy with all of the settings so I just ran in factory pre-sets on them, which to me are just as good as the Safari. I figure, why pay more for extras that I did'nt use. On the other hand if you can use the settings, used SE & ET's are in the $750 range now, but don't forget, they quit making the SE, so I figure in a couple of years it will be on the Minelab obsolete list..........Mark

 

[Rainyday101]

When I look at air test on the Xtera they are really impressive. Some may say air test mean nothing, but I tend to disagree a little on that. My thing is the the detector transmits to a target in the air, gets a return, and gives a target confirmation. In this case air is the medium the rf is sent and received to and from. The ground is not as good as a medium for transmitting and receiving and therefore will have greater losses than the air. (in most cases) So in my opinion max depth achievable by a detector is always air test distance or less. There may be some rare exceptions with soil type and moisture, but I have found this to be true for single frequency VLF machines 99% of the time. So I have seen real disappointment in detectors on depth in this price range. For example the Whites MXT Pro. This is a detector that people really love, but its air test on a dime is 6-7 inches. Another example is the Fisher CZ3D. Thomas Dankowski determines the CZ3D performance to based off an air test on a dime. A pre First Texas CZ3D will air test a dime at 11-12+ inches. A current First Texas CZ3D will air test from 6-8". Send it in to Dankowski, get it tuned and he will get 10-12 inches out of it. You shouldn't have to pay somebody to tune it to get the performance out of it. Single freq. VLF technology is about as far as it can go with the exception of fancy displays and menus. The simple fact is that the FCC limits the transmit power. The easiest way to get more depth is more transmit power, but it is limited by the FCC. So after transmit power we are left with the detector receiver to get maximum useable gain and good filtering from the received signal. This seems to be where some manufactures do better than others. I see some pretty shoddy air test on You Tube also. For one, many of the people are testing in the house with all kinds of EMI present, they are testing on wood tables that have metal framework below the detector coil, they are testing on concrete that has reinforcement wire or rebar in it, or they laying the previously tested items in front of the coil. It's hard to take these results to serious.

Can somebody tell what they get for air test with a dime on both the safari and extera.

I appreciate the comments from those that have replied. I have already read lots of your post and comments and greatly respect your opinions. I guess I come to the question of is the extra $200+ of the safari justified over the price of the Xtera. Also what do you guys think of the 3khz coil on the xtera for silver?

 

[Old Longhair]

I'll comment on a couple of things, then get out of the way.

First, there is a basic flaw in your thinking, because the Xterra isn't a common VLF single frequency machine. V-Flex is it's own technology which has more digital aspects than any other machine on the market.

Second, other than the factory 9" LF CC, the Coiltek coils are the only 3kHz coils, and they've only been out for about 6 weeks. So about the only info that you'll find on them is posted at the top of this forum page, and there is info on both the 15" All-Terrain and the 6" "Digger".

 

[Rainyday101]

Old Longhair,

You live in lower Mich. and looking at the USGS map it appears you have mild soil with little mineralization much like I have here. What are you getting for good depths on coin finds? Also what's your opinion on saving $200+ and getting the xtera over the safari?

You are probably right on my thinking as it may not apply to V-Flex technology as you have stated. For a standard single frequency VLF I beleive from what I have seen that it is true. BUT, I have been wrong before!

 

[EOS]

I have been using my XT 705 for two years now.I think I know it pretty well and is surprised what a detector in that price range can offer.
However my finds rate increased since I got the Etrac.That is for park,beach and pasture with a lot of trash.Etrac is a real silver sucker and have experienced times out on the field comparing them two that on some targets Xterra can not
find the object whilst the Etrac had no problem.Those target have been small silver coin on edge in very trashy ground.In that place I think a FBS will outperform the V-FLEX.

Etrac is not that complicated to learn and customize your own discrimination pattern is great.Of course it has a lot of settings that in the beginning can look frightening but
I think once you have be going through all the functions it will suit most people.One thing Ive noticed its not so sensitive to falsing as Xterra.

Having them both is splendid,the perfect couple.Whatever you decide for you will find good stuff,they are all very good detectors.

Mike

 

[scoopjohnb]

There isn't a lot of stuff the 705 will miss.
And once you get a hang of it, different coils turn it into different detectors.

Some detectors are optimistic, in that they false high conductors a lot, when resweeping the TID, tones go down and you decide not to dig.
I've found with conservative settings, running the detector stable it is a very honest detector.

A hint of a non discriminated TID remains a non discriminated TID, you dig and out comes a keeper.
Great stuff and why would you otherwise want a discriminator.

The TID's aren't as elaborate as the E-trac or should I say as confusing as the TID on an E-trac.
Sorry don't use the Safari.
Same targets will generate slightly varrying TID's on both 705 or E-trac. Don't let that scare you.
A couple of digs later you know what you're after.

The tech being used in both machines isn't better or worse, just different and each have their day.
I've hunted parks and beaches with both.

The FBS tech is slower but runs very stable in mineralisation and salt beaches, deep on solid soil.
The V-FLEX is faster, loves iron trash and fluffy soil.

You really can't go wrong with either and both is twice as nice!!

 

[Old Longhair]

OK, I'll do my best to answer.
The USGS maps might be of some use to some people in a general sense, but it really isn't accurate enough to be very applicable to my area. On the ten acres that I own I can find Red/Brown Clay, Blue/Gray Clay, "normal" Topsoil, Black Muck, Peat, Gravel, and Sand. I've seen GB numbers (w/Tracking turned on) that range from high single digits (very mineralized) to over 50 (extremely mild). Wild variations are a plague here, making the Tracking feature a Godsend.

As for depth.....there's no simple answer. Coil size, configuration, and frequency, as well as substrate makeup, and both conductive & magnetic mineralization all play rolls in depth capability/limitation. I can tell you that the deepest coins I've dug, where I knew that they were coins before extracting them, were @ 13"+. And next season when I get out with the 3kHz 15" more, I hope to exceed that.

Would I spend $200 more on a Safari? No, I don't believe that I would. I think that I'd rather initially buy a Gold Pack machine, and then spend the extra $200 on another coil in a different frequency.

 

[Rainyday101]

It looks like I may have to taste the Koolaid! I know I will have to sweep slower if I choose Safari, no big deal, I won't be leaving anything behind. Just gotta decide if the Safari is worth the extra $ or if I should just get the Xtera 705 and have money for a pinpoint probe, and the upgrade in a few years. Keep the great opinions coming!