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First trip out with the Makro Racer2 and a dealer shout out!
Posted by Cal_cobra
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First trip out with the Makro Racer2 and a dealer shout out! March 22, 2016 03:23AM |
I got the new Makro Racer2 and was itching to test it out at an iron infested ghost town'ish kind of site that it should excel at. My detecting buddy was gracious enough to take me to one of his 'worked out back pocket' sites to see if it could eek anything out from amidst of the sea of iron. This is an early California site, nothing to do with the Spanish or missions, but was a camping site of John C. Frémont and his men early on. The R2 has adjustable iron audio and tone break that can be set in either two or three tone audio mode. I have to say that adjustable iron audio is a tool that all detectors should be equipped with, it's a big asset hunting in the sea of nail type of environs that we encounter at these old sites. The first time I ran iron audio (at 2), it actually sounded like I was getting a ton of EMI, but I quickly discovered that it was simply the slew of iron I was detecting in.
It did pretty well for it's first trip. The cross is made of lead, and was in the midst of the iron, but the target that most amazed me was the No. 26 Phoenix cuff button. It was a squeaker that came out of thick iron that was about 6-7" deep, and it was on edge. I got a fairly repeatable signal that was just begging to be dug, but it was mostly iron signals, with this button peeping through and with the iron audio set low it allowed the signal to be clearly heard. I wish I'd taken a before and after photo of the button, because it was so crudded up that we thought it was just a flat button, but I decided to try to clean off some of the crud and I could start to make out lettering around the parameter of the button. After several soaks in ezest and picking the crud off with toothpicks, the button started to come back to life. You can still see iron rust lines on the front where it was next to nails, but it's clean enough now that you can fully read it and see that it's a No. 26 Phoenix button (number 11 for me).
Also got a large flat button, a pistol ball, and some trash. The group of three nails with the large square nail were in a hole that I had Tom check and he felt there was nothing but iron, but I was getting a decent dig me signal. After getting the nails out I found a piece of melted camp lead that was the signal.
My detecting buddy is a die hard Explorer2 user (and he does very well, even in iron infested sites amazingly) and we flagged a lot of targets to check. I was able to find a few that he couldn't hear, and everything he flagged not only could I hear just fine, a couple of them I called as crap targets, and sure enough when he dug the hole there was nothing there, so hopefully that will reduce digging some trash in the future.
Also wanted to do a shout out to Craig of Show Me Treasure. I pre-ordered a R2, and he went out of his way to get the unit to me before the weekend as I had a detecting window and he delivered! When I opened the unit, it quickly became clear that the detector had been used. After some checkingh around, it turned out to be no fault of Craigs at all, the manufacturer had inadvertently mixed some field test units in with the new ones when they shipped them to the disty and when it was brought to their attention, Makro stepped up and made everything right. You cannot go wrong ordering a machine from Craig, and as always Makro stands behind their business with integrity and is quick to own and resolve any mistakes. Thanks to Craig and Makro I'm excited to see what the R2 can do in the future.
HH,
Brian
It did pretty well for it's first trip. The cross is made of lead, and was in the midst of the iron, but the target that most amazed me was the No. 26 Phoenix cuff button. It was a squeaker that came out of thick iron that was about 6-7" deep, and it was on edge. I got a fairly repeatable signal that was just begging to be dug, but it was mostly iron signals, with this button peeping through and with the iron audio set low it allowed the signal to be clearly heard. I wish I'd taken a before and after photo of the button, because it was so crudded up that we thought it was just a flat button, but I decided to try to clean off some of the crud and I could start to make out lettering around the parameter of the button. After several soaks in ezest and picking the crud off with toothpicks, the button started to come back to life. You can still see iron rust lines on the front where it was next to nails, but it's clean enough now that you can fully read it and see that it's a No. 26 Phoenix button (number 11 for me).
Also got a large flat button, a pistol ball, and some trash. The group of three nails with the large square nail were in a hole that I had Tom check and he felt there was nothing but iron, but I was getting a decent dig me signal. After getting the nails out I found a piece of melted camp lead that was the signal.
My detecting buddy is a die hard Explorer2 user (and he does very well, even in iron infested sites amazingly) and we flagged a lot of targets to check. I was able to find a few that he couldn't hear, and everything he flagged not only could I hear just fine, a couple of them I called as crap targets, and sure enough when he dug the hole there was nothing there, so hopefully that will reduce digging some trash in the future.
Also wanted to do a shout out to Craig of Show Me Treasure. I pre-ordered a R2, and he went out of his way to get the unit to me before the weekend as I had a detecting window and he delivered! When I opened the unit, it quickly became clear that the detector had been used. After some checkingh around, it turned out to be no fault of Craigs at all, the manufacturer had inadvertently mixed some field test units in with the new ones when they shipped them to the disty and when it was brought to their attention, Makro stepped up and made everything right. You cannot go wrong ordering a machine from Craig, and as always Makro stands behind their business with integrity and is quick to own and resolve any mistakes. Thanks to Craig and Makro I'm excited to see what the R2 can do in the future.
HH,
Brian
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Re: First trip out with the Makro Racer2 and a dealer shout out! March 23, 2016 01:57AM |
Brian,
A nice report for an interesting evaluation trip and some nice success to boot!
The Makro Racer 2 is most definitely one of the best detectors available in the market today as an all-purpose model. We have a stormy weather day, but Oregon Gregg & I are headed back out to the closes ghost town to me first thing tomorrow ... again. We've made four trips out there so far this past month or so, and I was only skunked on one trip. I always have several Makro & Nokta models along with me, but have mainly been working the FORS Relic and Racer 2 with their smaller coils in the dense iron debris. I do have one unit with the 7X11 for very open/sparse-target hunting, and a couple with a 5½X10 equipped models for modest-trash areas. Most of where I hunt (as you know from the Welcome -to-Hunt Outing sites) tend to be ugly-nasty dense iron trashed places, so small coils rule!
The Racer (original) is a very good performing detector, to be sure, but doesn't balance very well with the original 7X11 coil. The Makro Gold Racer and new Racer 2, however, have a much improved balance with the better 'S' rod design, and the new 7X11 DD coil (an almost duplicate size/design of the Nokta series) feels much better for open-area hunting. I have the original 'OOR' coil, but also the new 5½" coil (it measures over 5" and close to 5½" with the thin coil cover), and both are what I use the most.
In the very trashy, iron-filled sites I prefer the 3-Tone audio, but in more open, sparser-target areas I favor the 2-Tone mode and in clean urban parks I occasionally use the 'DEEP' mode. You had very good success, but I didn't see the search mode and settings you used, or the search coil. Care to share that info with me and others?
Best of success on your next trip, and I hope to see you on the WTHO in two months.
Monte
PS: The Makro/Nokta folks are excellent at handling consumer concerns!
A nice report for an interesting evaluation trip and some nice success to boot!
The Makro Racer 2 is most definitely one of the best detectors available in the market today as an all-purpose model. We have a stormy weather day, but Oregon Gregg & I are headed back out to the closes ghost town to me first thing tomorrow ... again. We've made four trips out there so far this past month or so, and I was only skunked on one trip. I always have several Makro & Nokta models along with me, but have mainly been working the FORS Relic and Racer 2 with their smaller coils in the dense iron debris. I do have one unit with the 7X11 for very open/sparse-target hunting, and a couple with a 5½X10 equipped models for modest-trash areas. Most of where I hunt (as you know from the Welcome -to-Hunt Outing sites) tend to be ugly-nasty dense iron trashed places, so small coils rule!
The Racer (original) is a very good performing detector, to be sure, but doesn't balance very well with the original 7X11 coil. The Makro Gold Racer and new Racer 2, however, have a much improved balance with the better 'S' rod design, and the new 7X11 DD coil (an almost duplicate size/design of the Nokta series) feels much better for open-area hunting. I have the original 'OOR' coil, but also the new 5½" coil (it measures over 5" and close to 5½" with the thin coil cover), and both are what I use the most.
In the very trashy, iron-filled sites I prefer the 3-Tone audio, but in more open, sparser-target areas I favor the 2-Tone mode and in clean urban parks I occasionally use the 'DEEP' mode. You had very good success, but I didn't see the search mode and settings you used, or the search coil. Care to share that info with me and others?
Best of success on your next trip, and I hope to see you on the WTHO in two months.
Monte
PS: The Makro/Nokta folks are excellent at handling consumer concerns!
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Re: First trip out with the Makro Racer2 and a dealer shout out! March 23, 2016 02:29AM |
The racer 1 or 2 should keep the computation scratching their heads wondering what they can do to catch up
LowBoy
TAKE A LITTLE TIME KICKBACK AND WATCH SOME OF MY DETECTING VIDEO'S BELOW ON YouTube
[www.youtube.com]
If you don’t dig it, then how are you going to know what you’re missing!
How can you have your pudding if you don’t eat your meat!
LowBoy
TAKE A LITTLE TIME KICKBACK AND WATCH SOME OF MY DETECTING VIDEO'S BELOW ON YouTube
[www.youtube.com]
If you don’t dig it, then how are you going to know what you’re missing!
How can you have your pudding if you don’t eat your meat!
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Re: First trip out with the Makro Racer2 and a dealer shout out! March 23, 2016 05:12AM |
Hi Monte,
I used the new 11" DD coil and I really like it compared to the original Racer 11" DD, seems more stable (no falsing when hitting bumps, rocks, etc), with better separation. I meant to try the OOR coil on the R2, but just didn't get to it on this trip, even though it is very iron infested. It would be interesting to go over the same site again (it's not that large) with the OOR coil and see if it can detect anything the larger coils have missed.
I used 3 tone audio at 90 gain, ID filter 2, left the tone break and tone audio at defaults, with the iron audio set to 2. Interestingly when I tested out the iron audio at home, I didn't get a lot of difference in the iron audio volume until I dropped it way down, 2 was perfect as I could still hear the iron just fine, it really let non-ferrous conductors shine through the iron, without the repetitive audio tones becoming fatiguing. I tried to mimic the settings I typically use with good success on the R1, except for the iron audio as to not throw too many variables into the equation until I got a good feel for the detector.
I have a good old site to test the deep mode on next month when I'm near it, I might try it with the 15.5" DD coil, that might be a great combination for those deeper targets as being a heavier coil I tend to swing it slower anyhow.
I really wish I could make the WTHO trip, but I recently accepted a new position as a Systems Engineer at a cyber-security company so I'm unable to take PTO for a while (dang jobs!). I hope to be able to make the September one though if you do it!
HH,
Brian
Monte Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Brian,
>
> A nice report for an interesting evaluation trip
> and some nice success to boot!
>
> The Makro Racer 2 is most definitely one of the
> best detectors available in the market today as an
> all-purpose model. We have a stormy weather day,
> but Oregon Gregg & I are headed back out to the
> closes ghost town to me first thing tomorrow ...
> again. We've made four trips out there so far
> this past month or so, and I was only skunked on
> one trip. I always have several Makro & Nokta
> models along with me, but have mainly been working
> the FORS Relic and Racer 2 with their smaller
> coils in the dense iron debris. I do have one
> unit with the 7X11 for very open/sparse-target
> hunting, and a couple with a 5½X10 equipped
> models for modest-trash areas. Most of where I
> hunt (as you know from the Welcome -to-Hunt Outing
> sites) tend to be ugly-nasty dense iron trashed
> places, so small coils rule!
>
> The Racer (original) is a very good performing
> detector, to be sure, but doesn't balance very
> well with the original 7X11 coil. The Makro Gold
> Racer and new Racer 2, however, have a much
> improved balance with the better 'S' rod design,
> and the new 7X11 DD coil (an almost duplicate
> size/design of the Nokta series) feels much better
> for open-area hunting. I have the original 'OOR'
> coil, but also the new 5½" coil (it measures over
> 5" and close to 5½" with the thin coil cover),
> and both are what I use the most.
>
> In the very trashy, iron-filled sites I prefer the
> 3-Tone audio, but in more open, sparser-target
> areas I favor the 2-Tone mode and in clean urban
> parks I occasionally use the 'DEEP' mode. You had
> very good success, but I didn't see the search
> mode and settings you used, or the search coil.
> Care to share that info with me and others?
>
> Best of success on your next trip, and I hope to
> see you on the WTHO in two months.
>
> Monte
>
> PS: The Makro/Nokta folks are excellent at
> handling consumer concerns!
I used the new 11" DD coil and I really like it compared to the original Racer 11" DD, seems more stable (no falsing when hitting bumps, rocks, etc), with better separation. I meant to try the OOR coil on the R2, but just didn't get to it on this trip, even though it is very iron infested. It would be interesting to go over the same site again (it's not that large) with the OOR coil and see if it can detect anything the larger coils have missed.
I used 3 tone audio at 90 gain, ID filter 2, left the tone break and tone audio at defaults, with the iron audio set to 2. Interestingly when I tested out the iron audio at home, I didn't get a lot of difference in the iron audio volume until I dropped it way down, 2 was perfect as I could still hear the iron just fine, it really let non-ferrous conductors shine through the iron, without the repetitive audio tones becoming fatiguing. I tried to mimic the settings I typically use with good success on the R1, except for the iron audio as to not throw too many variables into the equation until I got a good feel for the detector.
I have a good old site to test the deep mode on next month when I'm near it, I might try it with the 15.5" DD coil, that might be a great combination for those deeper targets as being a heavier coil I tend to swing it slower anyhow.
I really wish I could make the WTHO trip, but I recently accepted a new position as a Systems Engineer at a cyber-security company so I'm unable to take PTO for a while (dang jobs!). I hope to be able to make the September one though if you do it!
HH,
Brian
Monte Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Brian,
>
> A nice report for an interesting evaluation trip
> and some nice success to boot!
>
> The Makro Racer 2 is most definitely one of the
> best detectors available in the market today as an
> all-purpose model. We have a stormy weather day,
> but Oregon Gregg & I are headed back out to the
> closes ghost town to me first thing tomorrow ...
> again. We've made four trips out there so far
> this past month or so, and I was only skunked on
> one trip. I always have several Makro & Nokta
> models along with me, but have mainly been working
> the FORS Relic and Racer 2 with their smaller
> coils in the dense iron debris. I do have one
> unit with the 7X11 for very open/sparse-target
> hunting, and a couple with a 5½X10 equipped
> models for modest-trash areas. Most of where I
> hunt (as you know from the Welcome -to-Hunt Outing
> sites) tend to be ugly-nasty dense iron trashed
> places, so small coils rule!
>
> The Racer (original) is a very good performing
> detector, to be sure, but doesn't balance very
> well with the original 7X11 coil. The Makro Gold
> Racer and new Racer 2, however, have a much
> improved balance with the better 'S' rod design,
> and the new 7X11 DD coil (an almost duplicate
> size/design of the Nokta series) feels much better
> for open-area hunting. I have the original 'OOR'
> coil, but also the new 5½" coil (it measures over
> 5" and close to 5½" with the thin coil cover),
> and both are what I use the most.
>
> In the very trashy, iron-filled sites I prefer the
> 3-Tone audio, but in more open, sparser-target
> areas I favor the 2-Tone mode and in clean urban
> parks I occasionally use the 'DEEP' mode. You had
> very good success, but I didn't see the search
> mode and settings you used, or the search coil.
> Care to share that info with me and others?
>
> Best of success on your next trip, and I hope to
> see you on the WTHO in two months.
>
> Monte
>
> PS: The Makro/Nokta folks are excellent at
> handling consumer concerns!
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Re: First trip out with the Makro Racer2 and a dealer shout out! March 23, 2016 12:16PM |
I am headed out the Phil's Place (name we gave a ghost town) in about 30 minutes, and after I work the small coils ('oor' & 5½) for a while to re-hunt the area we copied each other on Saturday, I might work the 7X11 in a very sparse-target section of the town off to the west to try and find any early-day activity. The new Makro coil is built with the same solid housing and design as the Nokta FORS series and they are rugged!Quote
Cal_cobra
Hi Monte,
I used the new 11" DD coil and I really like it compared to the original Racer 11" DD, seems more stable (no falsing when hitting bumps, rocks, etc), with better separation. I meant to try the OOR coil on the R2, but just didn't get to it on this trip, even though it is very iron infested. It would be interesting to go over the same site again (it's not that large) with the OOR coil and see if it can detect anything the larger coils have missed.
Thanks for the settings info. My 'turn-on' setting is 3-Tone w/Gain @ '85' and ID Filter @ '03'. I also have the Iron Audio Volume set at '02' on the Racer 2 when using the smaller coils in dense trash, and Tone break is at '10' and '65' in the 3-Tone mode. I reduced it to '65' to allow a better likelihood of early wheat-backs and Indian heads responding with the Higher-Tone. I used 18 old Indian Head and Wheat-Back cents and their 'air test' VDI numeric Target ID read-out ranged from '67' to '72' so I reduced the higher Tone Break in the 3-Tone mode.Quote
Cal_cobra
I used 3 tone audio at 90 gain, ID filter 2, left the tone break and tone audio at defaults, with the iron audio set to 2. Interestingly when I tested out the iron audio at home, I didn't get a lot of difference in the iron audio volume until I dropped it way down, 2 was perfect as I could still hear the iron just fine, it really let non-ferrous conductors shine through the iron, without the repetitive audio tones becoming fatiguing. I tried to mimic the settings I typically use with good success on the R1, except for the iron audio as to not throw too many variables into the equation until I got a good feel for the detector.
Hearing changes in the Iron Audio Volume (IAV) setting can depend upon individual hearing ability and headphones used. In the 'DEEP' mode and in 2-Tone, is I am using the 7X11 for slightly deeper targets, I set the IAV at '03' to hear iron a little better due to my impaired hearing.
I have taken advantage for the 'DDEP' ,mode using the 7X11 coil, and even a few locations with the 5½" DD coil, and it has helped, but the only 13+X15+ DD coil I have is for the Nokta FORS CoRe. I'm interested in how you report of the results with that bigger coil w/DEEP mode compared with the 2-Tone mode on located targets.Quote
Cal_cobra
I have a good old site to test the deep mode on next month when I'm near it, I might try it with the 15.5" DD coil, that might be a great combination for those deeper targets as being a heavier coil I tend to swing it slower anyhow.
Sorry to hear you can't make the WTHO in May.Quote
Cal_cobra
I really wish I could make the WTHO trip, but I recently accepted a new position as a Systems Engineer at a cyber-security company so I'm unable to take PTO for a while (dang jobs!). I hope to be able to make the September one though if you do it!
If you know of anyone interested in hunting old places on a four day outing, with six or seven old site locations to choose from, and GUARANTEED to challenge them with Iron, have them get a hold of me. As for later this year, yes, there might be a 4th WTHO in September, but I am considering a site or two that would move it to sometime between mid-October and mid-November in a different state.
Matter of fact, if you know of a handy meeting location and 2, 3 or 4 old places to branch out to for a group of folks on an Outing, just e-mail me. Who knows, we might end the year with a WTHO in your state?!?
Monte