EMI is killing me. What are the best detectors for use in high EMI environments?

I'm an inland jewelry hunter. Besides parks and athletic fields, my sites include the woodchips playgrounds at the public schools. Especially those where the school's fields and playgrounds also serve as the local community park. The EMI is awful at these places, some way worse than others. I tend to hunt these with a Tesoro/Cleansweep coil combo unit for a variety of reasons, mostly coil related. That coil has a narrow footprint which allows it to get close to the large metal and curbing that are used at these places and it covers a lot of ground and, at high sensitivity settings (and some detector mods) it gets decent depth on low conductors. Its a very efficient coil for this purpose. But the EMI is requiring reduced sensitivity settings, which kills the depth of the coil.

Normally the Tesoro's do ok but my last run with my Golden Sabre II/Cleansweep combo was fustrating due to the EMI. The GSII has to be ran at a 7 sensitivity setting minimum, I prefer a setting of 8, to achieve my mininum acceptable depth on my 18kt white gold test ring. When EMI requires me to run less than 7 to maintain stability it kills not only my potential jewelry finds, but it kills my enjoyment of the hunt as well.

I guess what I should really be asking is:

[*] who has the tightest coil foot print? even at the surface.
[*] which detectors are the most EMI resistant.

I guess I could build upon the answers to those questions and come up with a replacement although I am going to sorely miss the efficiency of the Cleansweep coil.

All opinions/feedback appreciated.

Thanks,
Mike



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/04/2016 06:21PM by Mike Hillis.

Have you used a F19/G2 in these area's?

Have you tried a xterra 705 with 10x5 18.75khz?

I'm just asking because these seem to be emi resistant or emi avoidance whatever you want to call it and hot on gold.

My experiences show,, Minelab FBS or FBS2 detectors,,,,if you can't operate one of these after doing noise cancel--- Likely others brands/models will suffer even worse.

One problem here though--- the smallest of lower conductors these FBS/fbs2 not the greatest,,, but ctx3030 fbs2 seems to be better than FBS detectors like etrac.

tnsharpshooter Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My experiences show,, Minelab FBS or FBS2
> detectors,,,,if you can't operate one of these
> after doing noise cancel--- Likely others
> brands/models will suffer even worse.
>
> One problem here though--- the smallest of lower
> conductors these FBS/fbs2 not the greatest,,, but
> ctx3030 fbs2 seems to be better than FBS detectors
> like etrac.


No way would I even mention FBS for jewelry hunting. Quiet, yes. Sensitive to small gold....not at all.

Mike, I have used my G2 in some amazingly terrible emi areas. the CZ I had was really good, but there are three in-town spots I hunt that I could tell the CZ wasn't handling the emi because i would get lots of pops and crackles, and eventually stop giving any tones until I backed up to a certain range. I could take the G2 twice as close to those overhead lines with the 11" coil before getting cycling IDs. If I put the 5" coil on the G2, I could go right under those lines. The only thing that struck me oddly, and I never found anyone else with the issue, was if on the G2 my battery was showing less than 2/3 bars and I was getting static, I replaced the battery and solved the issue. It happened multiple times when using the 11" and 13" Ultimate coils over 2 years so I knew it wasnt the coil or the isolated battery.

Depth ID is not very good (gets very spread out very fast) with the G2 and 5" coil, so when I think something is fairly deep, I take the highest ID i see regardless of all the lows and variances between swing numbers, and use that for my reference. Has worked out quite well.

I do alot of EMI area hunting..

the 19Khz range is usually the most resilient

Yet a MXT is also very forgiving if you use DD coils not so with Concentric..

cibola and vaqero and tejon work well in EMI areas..

The NOK/MAK machines do well whit Emi and are AWESEOME Je hunters..The 56Khz Gold racer can get talkitive around 60 cycle. though..

I'm sure you've used the F19 if that does not work for you then you have some weird EMI going on..is it like that everywhere or just the main spot you frequent?

Keith

“I don't care that they stole my idea . . I care that they don't have any of their own”
-Nikola Tesla

detectingMO Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> tnsharpshooter Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > My experiences show,, Minelab FBS or FBS2
> > detectors,,,,if you can't operate one of these
> > after doing noise cancel--- Likely others
> > brands/models will suffer even worse.
> >
> > One problem here though--- the smallest of
> lower
> > conductors these FBS/fbs2 not the greatest,,,
> but
> > ctx3030 fbs2 seems to be better than FBS
> detectors
> > like etrac.
>
>
> No way would I even mention FBS for jewelry
> hunting. Quiet, yes. Sensitive to small
> gold....not at all.


I would 't sell the CTX short; especially with small coil in the environments the gent was mentioning. In some of his sites,, depth not really a factor.
Yes the smallest gold certainly., but rings and jewelry items bigger it will hunt.

I can almost guarantee,, take the CTX disc out 35 conductive and higher and hunt,,op won't be digging any high conductors,, with the way a lot of other machines work with their up averaging and down averaging ; especially with mixed targets-- op could dig about anything looking for gold jewelry- low conductors

And don't forget tone bin can be set to high tone on lower conductive numbers,,, and if an op wanted they could even add to,, by opening up say 43-50 conductive up,, and while hunting for gold jewelry,, find even a silver coin or jewelry.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/04/2016 06:58PM by tnsharpshooter.

Iam not really a big fan of Garrett, but FWIW the ones I have used have been the most stable in terms of EMI. This past weekend I used an AT Gold and hunted directly under some high voltage transmission lines- the big boys, not the ones that deliver power to your house- very stable! I should also say I have never been able to use a detector in my backyard except for Garrett and I have tried Fisher, Tek, Nautilus, Tesarro and Minelab. i am curious how these new detectors perform, see my previous post.

Brian

Mike, have you tried the 5" DD on the F75 LTD2 with DST? If so, still a no go? I'm sure it's not as good on jewelry as some of the others, but was just curious.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/04/2016 07:09PM by DFinTX.

I to have had EMI Issue's lately, with some of my detectores, Just sold one because of the constant Ghost Signals... It was driving me Nuts.

I made a mistake and sold my T2 Classic last month, believe it or not, The T2 ran very smooth For me.

The T2 and The Nel Sharpshooter Coil would be a jewelry Vacuum very fast & swing friendly machine

The Safari / Etrac / CTX Are Totally immune to EMI for me.... But The Etrac & CTX are just to Darn heavy to swing .

The Safari is ok to swing, Buts hates Iron sites, whicth a lot of my sports fields have.

brianf7408 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Iam not really a big fan of Garrett, but FWIW the
> ones I have used have been the most stable in
> terms of EMI. This past weekend I used an AT Gold
> and hunted directly under some high voltage
> transmission lines- the big boys, not the ones
> that deliver power to your house- very stable! I
> should also say I have never been able to use a
> detector in my backyard except for Garrett and I
> have tried Fisher, Tek, Nautilus, Tesarro and
> Minelab. i am curious how these new detectors
> perform, see my previous post.
>
> Brian

Forgot about AT's. Great as well and hot on gold.

Answering questions and thinking out loud at the same time. I experience this level of EMI at a lot of this type of site.

I have used the GoldBug Pro, the G2, and the F19 at these sites. They require the sensitivity to be decreased to about 75 -80 to be stable. They do ok but I dislike the way 1st Texas does the modulated audio. The sensitivity control acts like a volume control and so any decrease in sensitivity decreases the audio response. I should have tried to fix it when I had the F19 in my hands but I was busy with other aspects of it.

I have used the Xterra 70 with the HF 5x10 coil, not the 705, and not at these sites. I'm not a fan of the Xterra line, although the 70 setup did do well with broken bands and half rings.

The Garrett AT Pro did real well at these type of sites. Better even than the GB/G2/F19. Very quiet, sensitive and the coils are pretty tight.

The Lobo ST did real well at these sites and it has better audio than the GB/G2/F19. Very quiet, sensitive enough, and it could be operated with a sensitivity setting of 1 without loosing audio volume or a lot of performance. I wish I’d put more time on it before I sold it.

5" coils are out of the equation at these sites. Ground coverage = finds. That is why I have a love affair with the Cleansweep coil. These are recover everything non-ferrous sites and I have no need of separation or mineral handling. Although tight coil footprints really help with the iron and curbing. The F5 allowed great coil control but the EMI really reduced the available gain.

FBS have no place in these sites. Too slow, too heavy.

Been watching the Racer's but they need some more time to establish.

I'm focused on the V3 in the turf. But it might work here. I need to spend more time on the coil footprint aspect.

I also have a mental limitation. I can't do single tone. I can do VCO audio, and multiple tone audio but I cannot for the life of me hunt with a monotone with any kind of enjoyment. Hunting with a monotone unit leaves me feelling like I just got off an 8 hour non-stop highway road trip.

circles circles circles.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/04/2016 09:00PM by Mike Hillis.

Another thing about these type of sites is that the hunt window is so small. I have to be off them by 9AM because the kids come out about then. So I'm there at daylight until the first kid shows up and then I switch units and move to the turf. Hunting with the very small coils means I never get it all covered. That is the great thing about the cleansweep coil. I can be on sight when there is enough light to see by and have the place completely covered by the time the first kids show up to run me off.

I have some places like this that I only hunt in the very worst weather just because they are inclosed liked a private park and only bad weather keeps the people off.

I think I've talked myself into my third AT Pro.

HH
Mike



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/04/2016 09:20PM by Mike Hillis.

Mike....ever try the Shadow X3 or X5 with small coil ?

Keith Southern Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> cibola and vaqero and tejon work well in EMI
> areas..
>
> Keith

Ditto

tabman

I think I would call Rusty at Tesoro and see if he can put on a upgraded coil cable on ur Clean Sweepstakes coil. One with more shielding. The Nel coils might be an option also with the think cables and heavy shielding. Just something I noticed the new Tesoro coils have a way thicker coil cables

None of my cz's have ever had a hint of emi interference.

------------"Cz's still bad to the bone".------------
Living on a big ass Astroid.
The woman that got my rib,I want it back.

As you're after any reply: there are coil designs that pick up little EMI. The ones I have in mind have a receive coil that's a figure-8 shape, so each 'half' of the 8 picks up equal and opposite EMI. But they do have odd detection behaviour, having two 'sweetspots'. But if you have the need, there's folks out there who could build one for you.

My mirage P,I is really good around EMI

Curantly own a Mirage P.I made by sven , and a silver Umax with ground balance mode, and a Tesoro Tejon

Tesoro clean sweep must not be as Emi proof as the Bigfoot coils. As my bigfoot I never had a single issue.

Hi all, I don't post much here but have been a lurker for many years.

I was under the impression that detector frequency is a big factor in eliminating EMI. Lower frequencies (4, 7, 8,12 kHz, etc.) are more susceptible to EMI. Smaller coils will help but at the expense of depth and at a much smaller footprint (= less coverage). I would think using the V3(i) at 22 kHz would help. Keith S. eluded to using the 18 kHz units already. I'm not sure how a Gold Bug II would favor running at 72 kHz. I'm not sure what frequency some of the other units mentioned run at - I have a V3i, and know you can tweak that more to suit your needs even in a single frequency like 22 kHz. I seem to remember NASA-Tom stating he tried a frequency offset to get rid of EMI... sometimes it works and sometimes not.

Rob

Cant believe nobody has mentioned the Deus here? I am not a huge fan of the Deus myself but they are excellent in EMI prone areas and you can cover a lot of ground quickly.

Mike........... I'm heavily leaning towards the XP GMP for your quest/application.

* Extra sensitive to low conductive alloyed gold.

* EMI resistant.

* 3-Tone unit.

((( For inland hunting...... you are not looking for micro-jewelry; hence, no high-freq units for your application. )))

Mike how does the GS ii do on jewellry with the clean sweep coil. I here alot of noise about that coil for jewellery but can't figure why it would be any better than say a 8" doughnut other than covering more ground,but also more tras also?
I ask because I have a GS 2 also.

------------"Cz's still bad to the bone".------------
Living on a big ass Astroid.
The woman that got my rib,I want it back.

I know that Steve H has good things to say about the Gold Racer for jewelry. You may want to ask him about the emi and the GR.

The F75 is a great gold detector, with the F75 LTD2 w/DST it handles EMI well and with BP mode it's killer on gold. Lots of coils for it, the NEL Sharpshooter would be great for sniffing out gold and the NEW coils are more EMI resistant then the factory coils.

Xp deus and atgold are the best I'very triedo for Emi. Hunt under or next to power lines all day. Have heard the xp deus doesn't like electric fences tho.

I agree with NASA TOM although I do not own a GMP. Also the Vista Gold works very well in EMI and like the GMP has great target seperation and very good depth with all coil options....Stuart

Mike have you tried the T2 Classic?

Tom

Higher freq seems to handle EMI..... where lower will a bit better in bad soil. .3 grams is what I get with a BBS and the FBS may do a bit better because of their recovery.