X-Terra 70, how much depth

[nuggetykath-68]

Many thanks for your info Pinpointa I sure do appreciate those tips....do I buy the cover or did you make one up yourself?
Yesterday I put my order in & it will hopefully arrive before the weekend. Will go over to our park to try & get a hang of it
before heading off to the beach.This is a great forum, you are all so kind & helpful.

Cheers,
Kath

 

[pinpointa]

I think they are about $20 and you just modified it. Another thing you will need to get is the eleptical dd coil for the beach the round coil which is standard is ok for dry sand but if you are going over wet sand you will need the dd. Also the eleptical coil is much better for pinpointing on the back edge. I never take it off i hope you are getting your detector off jammie at the prospectors patch at guilford. I have dealt their for years. Regards Pinpointa.

 

[nuggetykath-68]

YES Pinpointa my elsest son & I do ALL our detecting needs from Jamie also, such a pleasant, helpful chap.
You say use the eleptical dd for wet sand but that means I must swap it for the standard concentric coil so I
can go into SHALLOW water doesn't it? I have ordered the eleptical dd also as a back-up while bush detecting.
Do you find the concentric coil too noisy at the beach? Guess you don't go into the water then or maybe you
hold the coil [dd] ABOVE the water being careful not to submerg it?....Think you about Pearce air-port & no
beaches around there!!!!....Cheers, Kath

 

[pinpointa]

If you are getting the eleptical dd coil i would leave it on all the time but beware dont semerge in under water as it is not completely waterproof.The 6 inch coils are completely waterproof. If you have the dd coil on you can cope with dry sand and wet sand by cutting back your sensitivity. Really if your are going into salt water you need an excallibur which is waterproof and if you dunk it in the water you dont have to worry about any damage to the electronics. When i first started in 1979 we had garrett deepseeker mounted on hats so we could walk out into the water and keep the electronics dry. A guy alan hassell and i were the first to use aquasport p.i detectors in the water which was made by protovale in the u.k. Its horses for courses until we get better technology in a different form where we walk along and see what is in the ground on the screen which will be down the track you have to work at what we have got now and really know what your detector is telling you and investergate. Regards Pinpointa.

 

[Hungry]

When it is said that for depth ,it is up there with the best of them , does that mean it will go as deep as the GPX4000.

 

[BarnacleBill]

For "pure depth", the only circumstance may be when the X70 is used on the small specie type gold that BT et al find. So if you are in a gold bearing area that has mostly specie type gold, it would be your choice over one of the big pulse machines.

I hope that the following is a fair executive summary of Steve Herschbach's philosophy for machine choice for prospecting.

A. For larger nuggets, in trash free areas with high mineralization the 4000 easily holds the day.

B. For smaller gold or in high iron trash i.e. around gold camp buildings etc then a VLF with prospecting ability becomes the weapon of choice.

But rather than just look at "pure depth" there is a consistent "philosophy" among many experienced users, and that is "effective" depth. Could a 4000 be used in trashy park setting for coins & relics? Yes, but it will be like driving in thick fog with your high beams on. Tom Dankowski I believe used a 3500 on a baseball field to study the effects of masking and dug every target, which were very numerous. But this was an experiment and not a strategy to be used for hunting trashy parks. Since you could spend the rest of your life in a single large park digging every beep with a 4000, it's "effective depth" is very poor for this application, as your productivity would be terrible.

Are there other VLF detectors that can be used in a similar fashion? Yes, but none of them, at any price point, can change personality's so quickly, easily , and effectively as the X70. I do disagree with those that think that the coil offerings only mildly change the X70's capabilities. A prime example is the 3KHz coil, some think it's iron distinguishing ability is better, others like it for greater depth in high mineralization areas, but frankly I don't see those uses being as valuable to me as one particular characteristic of that coil. And what I am referring to is the ability of the 3KHz coil to ignore small pieces of chewed up aluminum foil. It has terrible response to small aluminum bits, a very short and dull audio response.

Here is an example of a very simple and effective approach I use with the X70. I detect many freshwater beach areas that I divide into what I consider two zones of a picnic table area, and the beach zone. The picnic areas are usually high in foil/tab/screw caps which is where I use the 3KHz coil to coin shoot. If I begin hitting consistent ID numbers of trash items, they get notched out to make me more productive. Could I be notching out some gold items, yes, but I don't plan on retiring while circling a picnic table digging tabs. Now it's beach time, in five minutes time on goes the 18.75KHz elliptical or 6"DD which are extremely sensitive to aluminum & small gold(ie chains, necklaces). I cannot emphasize enough how much the personality of the X70 changes with this coil transition. For me it is night & day, like two different detectors. Now the only question is how hard do I want to work on small gold this particular day? For small chains & medallions l"ll use Coin & Treasure mode, but for the Holy Grail of tiny chains/earrings kick it in Prospecting mode and focus.

There has been some discussion of why the different frequency coils versus not just using a dual or multi-freq machine. The multi-freq machines are very good "general purpose" machines and they especially excel in saltwater detecting(I love mine). The X70 is an excellent "multi-purpose" where the multiple coil and frequency choices allow it to excel at specific tasks, as I've pointed out above.

A very easy analogy to frequency/coil design choices can be related to TV antennas. Below is a "general purpose" antenna meant to receive a broad number of channels at very different frequencies. The rods jutting out are cut to different lengths to make them resonant(think tuning fork). As such there are only a couple rods cut to each channel's frequency. The antenna will work well within a suburban area as a "general purpose" antenna for multi-channel reception.

[attachment 71667 ANt1.gif]

But for long range, single channel reception, the "general purpose" antenna cannot hold a candle to the antenna below. It is known as a Yagi antenna and it is cut and optimized for one frequency with the rods being cut to essentially the same length. The same applies to detector coils designed for a single frequency, they can be optimized for ultimate performance.


[attachment 71668 ant2.gif]

HH
BarnacleBill

 

[Steve in Idaho]

I own an X-70 and I have learned more from this forum by reading the articles that you and Digger have written. I have worked in electronics for 30 years and I understand what you are talking about and it should make sense to a novice also. Thanks for your great information.

 

[pinpointa]

You have done it again Barnacle Bill,
Very well explained and i agree hole heartly with your outlook between detectors. Regards Pinpointa.

 

[Hungry]

Excellent reply,thank you, one more question, What do you class as a { larger nugget }

 

[BarnacleBill]

Sorry, but that question I don't have the expertise to answer. And I don't know if there really is a definite answer, as in a coin size. I am not a prospector, but having read many of the gold forums in search of a detector good for small jewelry, gold comes in all different sizes, shapes, and density. To me much of the size references of small versus large seems to be related to geographic location. So let's say if 90% found in a particular area are are 5 grams or smaller, then a 10 gram-er is a whopper.

If I were shopping for a detector for prospecting, first thing I want to know is where I will be prospecting. From that I can learn about what kind of gold is found there, ground conditions, trash level, weather, geography, snakes, scorpions, and bears, oh my!

HH
BarnacleBill

 

[BarnacleBill]

Thanks PP, by the way, saw you mention Alan H, I've read some materials of his, what's he doing these days?

HH
BarnacleBill

 

[Hungry]

Thanks for the replies, I appreciate them. HH

 

[B.T]

None taken at all Nugget. Funny, when I moved up to QLD and left my VIC plates on for a few months I got blasted by everyone on the road, "damn Mexican (sorry to any Mexicans here but they call us from Vic when we go to QLD Mexicans, border jumpers as a joke)
get off the road idiot, learn how to drive properly goose". Then I got my QLD plates , drove exactly the same way and no-one ever hassled me again. Moved back to VIC and left my QLD plates on for 6 months to see what would happen the other way around.
You know what, not one person payed out on me for being a QLDer! No "go home idiot, get off the road banana bender(thats what we call QLDers, heh heh.

 

[nugget71]

What can I say, we are an aggressive bunch up here, I think its the heat that gets to us.....hehehehe. You know I worked with Traffic Control for a bit and I sore some pretty bad cases of how not to drive a vehicle. There was one occasion where I had to dive off the road or I would have been as flat as a pancake! I warned the others who were working on a bridge at the time and turns out it was a car full of young Japanese woman Need I say anymore? LOL.
Cheers!

 

[pinpointa]

Sorry i have been away detecting around a billabong for 4 days 360 klms from home. Had a real good result just at the right place at the right time. Regarding
Alan Hassel he is in the u.k and i dont know what happen to him with his web site University of underwater detecting and that was a very good site with an incredible
amount of information. Alan and i were the first to use under water detectors in AUSTRALIA as their was only 3 detectors brought into the country and they were
made by Eric Foster and they were called Aquasports p.i. I bought one and alan had the other i took it home on the friday night as Melbourne has got late shopping
friday nights, tried it out and the electronics went so i had to take it back the next morning and get the other one as it had to be sent back to the U.K. My good mate
here in Western Australia still uses it. Mel Fisher used them when they first come out.
Regards Pinpointa.