Nox... and small gold

...and Dew these guys make soem great points amongst them the fact that as you get down into the micro range the ratio of goot targets to foil makss it hard to justify accepting say below "6". that's how I run and note that in my 39 years digging have never found a pendant-less chain. The bracelets Ive gotten were well above that "foil lid" cut-off. The EQ does lock onto these micro golds well but what are they worth in relation to digging tons of foil? Seeing some hopped up ways to run B1 that look interesting--a/m with tracking in 50 tones--still testing myself though. Thantks for your posts and keen interest--I've been comparing notes with you from day 1.
cjc

Here's some food for thought to beat this dead horse some more:

I knew a guy who had a certain park, in the San Jose area, that he had pulled a lot of silver from . But he, and all his buddies, just cherrypicked. No one cared to be heroic and angle for nickels or low conductors. This was back in the "silver rush" days of the 6000d, etc... of the 1980s & early 1990s.

After silver started getting thinned out there, he figured there must be a lot of nickels that they'd been leaving behind. And , of course, gold jewelry. So he decided to do a study : He gridded out a certain part of the park, that had, in prior years, been the most prolific producer of silver coins. And he went into all metal mode (yes, even iron) and was going to thoroughly clean out a section.

Every few days, he'd stop by after work, spend a few hours, and force himself to dig every single whisper. He kept careful notes and made spread-sheets, for an eventual study. After months of this, and countless targets from an area no bigger than a basketball half-court, here was the results:

A) He did indeed find nickels. some buffalos, a few V's, etc.... All of them worthless orange-ish brown corroded crap (since soil, as we all know, isn't kind to nickels).

B ) He did indeed find a few gold rings.

C) He did indeed find some micro-jewelry.

But he concluded that this is NOT the best bang for someone's buck (time spent vs targets gained). He concluded that the nickels are usually not worth a darn. And that if gold rings were someone's agenda, they'd have better odds , for the time, at a swimming beach. And as for the micro-jewelry, .... simply wasn't worth chasing endless foil-turds that were no bigger than a pencil lead tip. He went back to cherry-picking



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/2018 12:20AM by Tom_in_CA.

Awwww ye of little faith. I love a new machine........ but now i can pay $800 or $2500 and find the very same thing with a multi freq VLF for in the water hunting. Hopefully ...... Fishers PI will give me something DIFFERENT. Clive buddy....... et to brutus ..... lol. All my friends just left the building. Im honestly not as hard headed as i seem guys..... i never expected more of the bigger gold..... but i was kind of hoping they might make a step the other direction.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/2018 01:18AM by dewcon4414.

Gold in salt water - an unsolved problem.

Either call Tom D a misguided zealot or admit that most of the gold lost at the beach has never been found - why - because of limitations of existing detectors - the excellent Nox included.

Will the new Fisher PI crack the code on previously undetectable beach gold? Nobody who isn’t part of the development team has much of an idea and even they might not be entirely sure.

We can only wait.

Rick Kempf
Gold Canyon AZ- where there is no gold

I guess the question that hasn't been asked yet, is that when you DO find that big rats nest of fine gold chains that has been getting bigger and bigger with each passing decade, how do you untangle the thing? Or do you just mail it off to the refinery and call it good?


Rich -

------------------------------------------------------------------

Just one more good target before I go.

I promise. On nearly ALL "WET SALT SLOPES" (and in the ocean).... around the World…… there's nearly zero bits of tiny chewing gum foil 'zits'. It disintegrates very rapidly.
Yes........ in the dry sand..... and at inland dirt-hunting sites............. there's trillions of 'tiny zits' of flecks/flakes of chewing gum foil......... subsequently making the,,,,,,, 'good target' ..... vs..... 'bad target',,,,,,, RATIO to encroach asymptotic-infinity..... RAPIDLY; rendering your hunts(time/labor/efforts): 'useless'. But this is NOT what we are talking about here. Many folks are mixing apples-with-oranges. We are exclusively talking about WET SALT SLOPE.... ONLY.

NASA-Tom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ..... We are exclusive
> ly talking about WET SALT SLOPE.... ONLY.


I can accept the fact that even light-weight gold (tinsel thin chains) is WAY more dense that gum-wrapper foil turds. And as a nearly 40 yr. veteran of storm/erosion chasing, I have no doubt that there's some micro-jewelry we are all missing . Heck, I've even seen then on top of the washed out sand, but you can't get a signal on them when you waive the coil over it !!

However, when it comes to the Nox: The admitted ability to tttteennnnsssyy clasp size stuff : Is that ability going to be able to replicated that in the wet-salt sand ? Or is the wet salt beach modes "dumbed down" (for sake of stability) such that you are no longer getting micro-jewelry, in the first place ?

Tom..... the manual says beach 2 is working with less power. So id say yes you are correct about the machines ability to find small gold in the water..... aint happening. However...... you can tell significant difference in its ability to identify targets much deeper in the wet sand in the gold range. There isnt that talked about power loss in Beach 1. No double whammy. There also isnt nearly the trash to treasure numbers either. Im not the guy who intends to hunt the dry sand or a trash parks with the type of tweaks id like to see ML make here. But.... if you are going to make other modes that really do well in those areas.....relics, raw gold, and field...... why not go all the way and do it right in beach mode? They broke it down..... in the water...... wet sand..... and dry with these modes and allowed us to use single freq in the dry sand. I believe they just didnt go far enough with beach modes. Im not in the wealth game with this hobby...... ill take a small piece of gold .... i just like finding gold others havent no matter the size. Call it a little boys fascination with uncovering treasure.

Quote

Or is the wet salt beach modes "dumbed down" (for sake of stability) such that you are no longer getting micro-jewelry, in the first place ?

Quote

So id say yes you are correct about the machines ability to find small gold in the water..... aint happening. However...... you can tell significant difference in its ability to identify targets much deeper in the wet sand in the gold range.

Pretty much my feelings on the nox. This is why I don't think its worth getting rid of older machines if you are happy with them...unless of course those machines are breaking your back because they are 2x as heavy . I think the main advantage for us beach hunters is that the nox is lighter and cheaper than our other choices. Is it better at finding gold in the wetsand/water? Maybe but I haven't found it to make a difference in my finds.

_________________________________

Nox600, CTX, CZ21, Excal II and White's DF with 920i stealthscoop...I live and hunt at the beach in Wilm NC



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/2018 01:20PM by adamBomb.

dewcon4414 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> .... However...... you can tell
> significant difference in its ability to identify
> targets much deeper in the wet sand in the gold ra
> nge.

Yes, I have mused over this on other posts: That .... a benefit could be that it's "favoring" the lows and/or mids. Versus most of today's powerhouse machines (XLT, CZ's, Explorers, CTX, etc.....) favor high conductors. That is why some machines, for example, will find a dime a tad deeper than a nickel EVEN THOUGH THE NICKEL IS THE PHYSICALLY LARGER TARGET . The nox might even that out a bit. So that, ... for example .... if there were a day where all the targets were on the fringe of depth of detection (8 to 9"), then .... at the end of the day, perhaps the Nox has the higher count of nickels and/or gold.

This was a phenomenon noticed with beach pulse guys vs standard machine guys (nail-issue-aside for the moment) : When they counted their coin counts at the end of the day, the pulse guys tended to have a slightly higher nickel ratio.

If the nox has this tendency for "favoring", then yes: That would be a definite plus , for long term ratios, for beach hunters. If targets are shallow, perhaps not a noticeable effect. But if/when targets are deep, then the ratios may start to be evident.

Tom....... but the CTX really does a good job on killing nickels too. But it seems to lack a bit of depth on those gold items near that nickel over the Nox. IF we could get them to spread those digits out a bit over the entire digital range moving everything up we would be better off. I mean a quarter is at 28ish...... lot of digits after that.

AB.....im hanging onto all of my machines right now. But a good reason to sell might be .... your warranty is out and you are playing Russian roulette for repairs. If you feel the Nox is as good as....... and you can get a good price for an out of warranty machine that would pay for a NEW Nox with 3 years warranty. Then you are good i think just because of the advantages. Do you think the other machines out of warrantys resale will suffer?

You can replace a button pad or screen on a CTX or Etrac for a hefty but palatable price. If a similar gremlin appears on an Equinox that is located in the handle assembly , what do you think the cost of that repair will be? We have already seen leaking and button failure issues on warranted units , for whatever reasons , but these issues are not going to stop occurring when the warranty is over. Has anyone asked Minelab what the cost of the handle assembly would be? That , plus shipping and handling , is going to be the cost of most repairs on the Equinox in two years.

dewcon4414 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> AB.....im hanging onto all of my machines right no
> w. But a good reason to sell might be .... your
> warranty is out and you are playing Russian roulet
> te for repairs. If you feel the Nox is as good a
> s....... and you can get a good price for an out o
> f warranty machine that would pay for a NEW Nox wi
> th 3 years warranty. Then you are good i think ju
> st because of the advantages. Do you think the o
> ther machines out of warrantys resale will suffer?

I actually sold my CTX last month for this very reason. I had 1 yr warranty left. That had always been my plan with the CTX - buy it for 2 yrs then sell for a good price with a 1 yr warranty left. I kinda got lucky that that nox came out around the same time. I was able to sell it for 80% what I paid due to having warranty left over. I don't think the CTX or Nox are my favorite machines. I really prefer hunting in all metal like the Excal/CZ21 but they are sooo heavy vs the nox.

_________________________________

Nox600, CTX, CZ21, Excal II and White's DF with 920i stealthscoop...I live and hunt at the beach in Wilm NC



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/2018 07:02PM by adamBomb.

An out of warranty CZ-21 (or even CZ20) can be repaired at a very reasonable price. Not all devices are use and discard and not all metal detector manufacturers look on their repair parts as a major moneymaker.

Rick Kempf
Gold Canyon AZ- where there is no gold

It's not that the Equinox (or any wet-salt detector) has been detuned/dumbed-down for the beach; rather, 'wet-salt' is very (electronically) violent to handle/process/compensate...… which...….. in turn.,.,.,.,.,., requires certain electronic architect(s) to rid the salt signal. This...………….. in turn...…………….. does indeed severely hamper the detection of the one target we choose/quest to find: Gold.

To compare a different Equinox Mode (AND a different hunting location...….. ie Dry-Sand or Inland Dirt)…….. to a Beach Mode (1or 2) on the wet-salt slope (or in the ocean)…….. is a completely different comparison/world...….. deviating from OP question.

If I understand Dew...… his entire intent (question) for this thread is fairly simple...…. and has my highest interest also; ...…….yet, the quest/question/intent of the OP has been convoluted/distorted and redirected. I'm merely attempting to keep this question/thread: 'on-target'. . . . . . . for data-collection & engineering purposes.

Tom...... can these electronic architect(s) be achieved at reduced power in or near the water? Was there a need for a beach 2 mode..... since other machines just have a salt setting? Is it possible to have a single salt setting with the ability to adjust it much like a pulse delay rather than 2 modes or cant the machine do it by its self? It kind of already does if i read the manual correctly..... but we have to manually go to another mode. Its a bit of a pain flipping back and forth. If so....... where might we be with small gold in or near the water? Perhaps i muddied the water Tom.... i know what i want and WHERE id like to see a bit of tweaking...... NEAR and IN the water. Thats where i hunt ..... not in a Park, dry sand, or in some corn field some where now days. In and near the salt water is still an area being overlooked as a holder/producer or much more gold than we currently are finding there...... especially when you consider ....... HALF of beach hunting is near or in the water. Take a look at forum finds...... now do the math of those found in the water or on the dry sand.......which is more productive.... AND which has the less trash to treasure? Since each mode was designed specifically for each type of environment........ i think we missed the mark for the beach or should i say WATER and could have made the greatest improvement in and near the water........ other modes work well in the dry sand. Look out ML ...... Fisher just might up end your sales if a large group is buying the Nox for the water and find out their machine gets the smaller gold in the area most over looked.

Yes...…. on the upper-half of the hemisphere (above Equator on planet Earth) ….. it is beach hunting season. "Full ON" for summer hunting. This time of year...…. it is quite rare to see a dry-sand hunter. Nearly all folks are on the wet-slope or in the water.

Yes, Beach Mode-2 is somewhat redundant; yet, the reduced Xmit power does indeed allow for less blowback/feedback; subsequently, better stability in rough conditions...…. such as the 'splash/crash' zone of the wet-salt waves. A small amount of performance is lost whilst in this Mode; yet, a large gain in stability is achieved. Even my AquaStar-II has a high/low power switch. . . . for this exact same conditions/justifications. Only a little depth/performance is lost whilst in low power (1/2-Xmit power). BUT...… I CANNOT afford even the slightest bit of performance reduction; hence/subsequently...… I don't believe that I have ever 'hunted' in low-power setting. I've only used/cycled it ...for 'testing' purposes. It would amaze folks.... that 'Xmit power' has very little to do with detection performance; yet/rather...…. Receive "Sensitivity" is where it's all at.

At this time on planet Earth..... on our traversing time-continuum.,.,.,.,.,.,.,..... not one human has any idea as to the order-of-magnitude of the small, tiny and micro gold that is out there to be found. And...…. it's true value is severely underestimated. ((( And for additional unsuspecting reasons. ))) The wet-slope could easily retire every single one of us 'wet-slope hunters' on planet Earth. ((And this is still an underestimated statement. )) We just simply do not know it.
Again:
You don't know...….what you don't know.
How do you know what you are missing...……… If you don't know it even exists.

Blindness is blindingly bliss.

NASA-Tom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ..... This...………….. in turn
> ...…………….. does indeed severely hamper the detecti
> on of the one target we choose/quest to find: Gold
> .
>
>

You mean small alloyed gold. Because larger gold is no problem. Even for dumbed down settings. And, heck, some gold can read as high as zinc or penny . A $20 gold reads at about penny, for instance. And a 24k ring reads at penny/dime (thus you were meaning alloyed gold, of course, and smaller /dainty items, at that).

Tom-CA..... i think we are a long ways apart from what we are looking for or should i say willing to look for. Kind of like park hunting to me...... just way to much mower and modern day trash to sift thru.......and we get all excited about a wheat penny. Ive got a couple of jars of those wheat pennies...... doubt ill ever do anything with them and ask myself .... now why were i looking for them. Even clad pays for equipment...... but im not a fan of digging it. To me small gold (not tiny) interests me..... and if this machine was given a tweak in beach 1 im betting i could have a better gold to clad pay out at the end of the year.

Tom_in_CA Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
Even for dumbed down settings.
> And, heck, some gold can read as high as zinc or p
> enny .

I found my second gold ring today with the nox. 18-21VDI, similar to my other. It was 10K .2 ounces womens wedding band. I've found zinc pennies with VDIs ranging from 14-26. I am not relying on the VDI#s whatsoever with this thing. Its not consistent at all. I think my CTX identified 99% of all pennies I found, on the nox, no way. Not even close. Other clad seems much more consistent. Bottle caps are all over the place like the pennies.

_________________________________

Nox600, CTX, CZ21, Excal II and White's DF with 920i stealthscoop...I live and hunt at the beach in Wilm NC



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/17/2018 02:52PM by adamBomb.

dewcon4414 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Tom-CA..... i think we are a long ways apart from
> what we are looking for or should i say willing t
> o look for.

dewcon4414 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

..... but im
> not a fan of digging it. To me small gold (not t
> iny) interests me.....


We're both agreeing I think. Sounds like you too are acknowledging that dainty tinsel thin chains, or earring studs, are hardly worth knocking oneself silly for . (Unless, of course, they were in washed out sand, where there's not punishment for doing so).

And I think we both agree that if the Nox favors lows, of any/all sort, and assuming it attains the same depth as today's normal power-house machines, then : At the end of the day, all-other-things-being equal at the beach (and assuming target depth stratas that vary all over the board ), then .... Theoretically .... the Nox would end up with a slight ratio advantage on the lower #'s.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/17/2018 03:48PM by Tom_in_CA.

No disagreement at all on the Nox would end up with a slight ratio advantage on the lower #'s. I agree if we are getting away from there term micro gold to small near and in the water then yes. Currently thou id say we need a bit more of MLs adjusting near and in the water for the beach mode to gain the sensitivity needed to find this small gold not far under the sand. Just thinking in terms or rings, which id rather not, but if we are we know our machines miss an awfully lot of um because they are on the fringe of detection before even going in the water. Look at the number of small rings..... junk studs and other jewelry we find because they have copper in um. Its like some say ...... dig all that deep iron there are big rings that IDs as iron. Why..... because its at the fringe of detection. So im looking for that small gold that ALL water machines using multi freq are missing. Now to me there is the machine that obsoletes all others..... and we might have had it IF ML hadnt opted to make it run smoothly for anyone out of the box to use.

lytle78 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> An out of warranty CZ-21 (or even CZ20) can be rep
> aired at a very reasonable price. Not all devices
> are use and discard and not all metal detector man
> ufacturers look on their repair parts as a major m
> oneymaker.

My friend was quoted $650to repair a working but leaking CZ-21, so I can't say reasonable it the right word.

> I found my second gold ring today with the nox. 18
> -21VDI, similar to my other. It was 10K .2 ounces
> womens wedding band. I've found zinc pennies with
> VDIs ranging from 14-26. I am not relying on the V
> DI#s whatsoever with this thing. Its not consisten
> t at all. I think my CTX identified 99% of all pen
> nies I found, on the nox, no way. Not even close.
> Other clad seems much more consistent. Bottle caps
> are all over the place like the pennies.

Argggh... I have been skipping over all 20-21's. You are making me want to hunt with a CTX and a pocket full of pain killers.

The NOX puts Yellow gold up high. Found a 8.9 gram 14K that read 20-22 in fresh water. Based on that I will NOT be passing up dime TID's for for fear of passing the big one.
For reference a 10.9 gram 14K white gold ring came in at a solid 16



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2018 06:48AM by Jackpine.

Most machines ive hunted with puts yellow gold higher up the digits/tones than white gold. Copper vs nickel in most cases. So...... if thats the case how many of those small White gold rings you guys finding with the Nox?

Good news to some on the 6"coils finally hitting the street. But will these coils have any benefits for beach hunting? Will the depth, coverage and sensitivity be worth the price and effort? Some swore by the Xcal 8"..... that was really 7 1/2 ....but apparently they werent popular enough because ML stopped making them. You would really have to want to slowly work the wet sand..... and if theres no sensitivity to missed gold .... then wheres the pay off?

dewcon4414 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ...... and if there
> s no sensitivity to missed gold .... then wheres t
> he pay off?

Your question was as-it-applies to the beach. Since beaches are normally assumed to be spread out wide-open individual targets, then I'd say that the small coil is not beneficial there. And you're right: Since the Nox 800 is so fabled for it's affinity to small gold, then .... no need to go smaller-yet. The loss of depth and coverage would just make no sense.

I would think the smaller coil would be for ghost-townsy type hunt location, where targets tend to be co-located, masking, etc.... Not the beach.

Tom...... either one of you lol, given a gold target at say 4 inches that the Nox 11 wont hit on....... would the 6" coil? I realize we dont know how sensitive the 6" is..... but in general in the right conditions the 6" should hit targets at 6" even in the wet salt sand. At the 4" is there any sensitivity gain to be had or we get the same effect by reducing the sensitivity of the larger coil taking in less material? Let me add something .... dumb thought maybe. Why in the gold fields do they run the 6" over the 11 aside from open vs trashy areas for coverage? I know when i was out there the larger coil liked hot rocks IF the sensitivity was to high and of course it takes in more material to process. So going to a small coil ...... does it reduce the sensitivity toward hot rocks? If so wouldnt it also reduce sensitivity period?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/22/2018 11:37AM by dewcon4414.

dew, not sure if I understand your question correctly, but let me see if this sums it up: There is an old addage that one of the benefits of a small coil (besides target separation) is "better for smaller targets". So: In the same way that it's a "given" that larger coils are better for larger targets (like cache hunting with a hulla-hoop coil), then so-too is smaller coils .... likewise .... better for small targets. Right ?

But with the advent of more and more super-precision electronic manufacturing : This distinction is less and less pronounced. So whereas ... in the early days (BFO, TR, very-first VLF like the GEB-supreme, etc...) this might have been true . Yet nowadays, this distinction is all-but-gone.

If a machine can find an earring stud with a small Nox coil, then I bet that it can equally get it with the large coil.

I'm betting that if you could isolate any dot sized (pencil lead tip) sized item that the 6" on the Nox could just barely get, that so-too could you get it on the larger coil. But in any event, it's all sort of a moot point. Because it's questionable whether or not these modes could even be used on the wet-salt to begin with. Only something like dry sand or wood-chip locations. And there, I think most of the consensus here has been: "why bother?" and "what could possibly be the reward ?".

Thus I see utterly no benefit, on any machine, to go with a small coil on the beach. Unless your beach mimicked ghost-townsy conditions with nails & targets thick, overlapping, and everywhere.

But perhaps I misunderstood your question ?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/22/2018 02:57PM by Tom_in_CA.