ON THE HORIZON = MDT-8000

It maybe the cap not quit connecting not the battery. I alternate my batteries since I hunt about every day.

Square tabs seen to fall a digit higher than most of the gold I’ve found. But deep ones seem to up-scale on my machine to the mid 20s. With pull tabs on any machine depth changes things.

No, I always make sure the cap very tight.

Same w me regarding pulltabs. The old ring pull ones register around 23 when their 7-8”, then out of the ground register 7-8 VDI. Sqaures usually in the ground are lower around 17 VDI., and out of the dirt around 7-9 VDI. This is one of the things I’m trying to get used to regarding this machine.

Aaron I’ve only noticed pull tabs and pennies really up scaling. Gold seems to be a pretty solid digit and tone. My batteries are always ready and read 4.1 when the machine comes on. I did have to loosen that screw a bit in the cap for a better connection once. That’s why I mentioned that. How many bottle caps you digging? I’ve found them pretty easy to I’d ....even better in the water.

Yes same w me regarding pennies. Dimes and quarters seem to be consistent. Foil also seems to be. That gold I found last night too stayed down 4-5 range. Yeah bottles caps are not clicking w me yet. I dug a real rusty one this morning at 5”, sounded good too. Dug 2 others that weren’t rusty. IDK, maybe I need better headphones, using the ones Dimitar sent. Tried using my SunRays and the reducer jack was bad. Probably should just get some made w proper 1/8 jack and be done w it.

You mean that square pulltab is 7-9 vdi in the ground, then once out they read 17vdi?!?

So if the pulltab is 1, 3 or 6 inches, it will read each time different?

It's pretty annoying ...

Aaron Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I’ve got battery question.
> I had at least 30hrs on my machine before the batt
> erie FINALLY went down to 3 bars. Then I went to t
> urn it on after I hadn’t used it in close to 2 wee
> ks and it was dead.
> Anyone else experience this?
>
> Aaron

Aaron, unlike Dew, I change my battery about every third or fourth hunt depending on hours of use. Only once have I had it down to 2 bars, never had it go dead though....and the machine works just as well on 3 bars as when fully charged.

I know Dew could easily get two of his marathon hunts on one charge which would save on wear and tear on the battery cap threads and O-rings. Those batteries easily go over 20 hours probably closer to 30 hours per charge.

Cliff

Français,
No, I think he meant what he clearly stated,
"Squares usually in the ground are around 17 VDI., and out of the dirt around 7-9 VDI."

Depending on the severity of the ground, most single freq detectors shift ID on deep targets.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/03/2019 07:15PM by Mike in CO.

Thanks Cliff. I guess Ive got Toms type of thinking of running all the way down till it’s practically dead, then charge it.
Do you leave the spare on the charger?

Mike, correct.
Thanks



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/03/2019 07:22PM by Aaron.

Aaron Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I’ve got battery question.
> I had at least 30hrs on my machine before the batt
> erie FINALLY went down to 3 bars. Then I went to t
> urn it on after I hadn’t used it in close to 2 wee
> ks and it was dead.
> Anyone else experience this?
>
> Aaron

I haven't...but like others, I tend to swap out a fully charged battery before each hunt.

There might be a couple of things 'in play' to cause what you saw.
1. Because the discharge curve is so flat on LiON batteries, it's very difficult to accurately estimate the remaining capacity from voltage without calibrating each battery to the device.
Even minor variations in battery capacity will throw off the (voltage based) capacity estimates. That's why cell phones have a battery calibration process.

2. Some electronic devices that have a push-button 'power on' circuit (as opposed to a mechanical 'on' switch), have a very small power drain as the circuit needs power to 'watch' to see if the button is pressed.
This results in a typically (very) small parasitic power drain.

Those two things might have combined to produce the results you saw?

Either that, or your detector might have been abducted by space aliens.

Yeah it was really odd, as I had over 30hrs on it since I first started using it and it finally dropped to 3 bars. Next time I tried to turn it on, just dead.
No big deal though.

Okay ,

How do beach hunters who would not want to dig pulltab in an infested place?

Does Pulltab have a special sound with this detector?

Beach hunters......know better than to pass up a lot of pull tabs. Good example..... people say..... if im getting nickels im getting gold. Well i tested a lot of gold using the Nox..... guess what 9 gold rings came in at 14.... a pull tab...... and 9 gold rings came in at 15..... a bottle cap..... only 3 came in as a nickel. Moral of that story is you best leave digit 1 to a penny open on any machine. For me ...... its more about what a gold ring sounds like rather than the tab. Its also about the law of averages and TIME you have to hunt. On the Xcal or some of the water machines i use i can ALMOST tell you every time...... thats a pull tab..... BUT i dig um because they are in a range that a LOT of gold falls into........ id pass up foil before a pull tab. I try to learn two targets...... BOTTLE CAP and IRON everything else ill check...... like foil in most cases you can just kick the dry sand light foil isnt very deep. I dont mind seeing a pull tab come out at a foot either........ that tells me ive got a deep machine and its working. When you are digging targets as deep as this machine hears them....... you really have to check um IN THE WATER. Like most machines its got a pretty solid ID of the shallow targets ....... so its time vs effort vs pay off..... and its easy digging especially if you are recent drop hunting.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/04/2019 10:56AM by dewcon4414.

Everyone seems to be a little cautious about posting especially about improvements they'd like to see. There is NO machine ive ever used i cant make a Christmas list on. BUT ... those are clearly MY wish list and most people might just roll their eyes at them lol. But if Dimatar and Tom are looking ahead ... please at least send Tom a PM. Great machine as is or at least its sure doing good for me. We really needed a deeper machine in the water especially during the winter months.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/04/2019 10:52AM by dewcon4414.

Road trip to hunt with Cliff today. We were hoping to do some testing of the Nox and MDT.....as well as dig a little gold. Got there early....... and a bit after the sun came up .... so did the hunters. I was hunting in Beach 2, IB 2, RS 4, 50 tones, and sensitivity was 20..... and i still got a good bit of chatter off the hard bottom. He ended up with the prize 18K gold band...... i got a 1.2 gram B necklace do-dad. We hit it pretty hard for about 7 hours and i was having him check some of the small deeper targets....... dang the MDT sounds good on targets. Im not sure his settings but i believe he was in 9khz 0 and 8 sensitivity. I had no problem with my machine almost setting on his..... no feed back. Had one Xcal come by......he was a good bit away and i had to noise cancel him out.

It got pretty choppy and visibility in the water wasnt what we hoped. BUT...... we grabbed his 2.7 gram yellow band for a quick test. On the wet sand (water seeping in the bottom of the hole) we put the ring at 12". I was using the same settings as in the water so we could see just how much affect the water had. The Nox hit it ... but if you were moving fast forget about it. The MDT sounded very good. In the water........we figured things might change..... kind of go south.... so we put the ring down 10". With the Nox..... it was a bit chatty again..... i doubt i would have stopped. The MDT CLEARLY would have hit that ring MUCH deeper. So ...... does Salt Balance work...... sure seems to. Id say we got the same depth in the water as in the wet sand. Ill let Cliff tell you about how deep he had to dig for that 18K and how it reacted.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/2019 07:04PM by dewcon4414.

Dew, let me add that the MDT did hit that 12" deep ring in the wet "hard" and had correct TID....also hit it in Disc. Definitely would have/could have hit it deeper.

The 18k band TID was bouncing with +/- digits (similar to bottle caps), after taking 2 scoops off the target, the TID settled down with + numbers and the ring came out with scoop 3. One real benefit of having a mask on is being able to see the coil location to make a more accurate dig as compared to guessing target location and coil position with your foot...., actual depth of the ring will never be known but it was a deeper target and quite nice to see in the scoop.

Settings used for the hunt and the testing were 9KHz, Salt Balance 31, Sensitivity 7 and Threshold -1, Black sand OFF

Dew, I changed my settings shortly after starting the hunt today and never told you.



Cliff

Nice report Dew and Cliff. Thanks for taking the time to do the test and sharing the results. I have had the EQ for a little while now and am pleased with its performance, but do have reservations with it while in the salt water. Number one is turning down the sensitivity to 19 or 20 to lessen the chatter, and second is "loosing" the signal after a scoop is removed. If the target sounds deep I will remove several scoops and dump them next to the hole. Saves time from digging then sampling then wondering where it went to digging again, etc. Sure enough the target is usually in the deeper dug scoop of the piles. I feel that the gold chains are not going to appear in the water unless they are large. So far 4 chains in the wet sand but nothing too deep. MDT sounds nice but any luck on chains and small gold in the water? Some small gold shown.

Irks....I’ve posted my finds at the end of each month take a look and see if they meet what you believe as small gold. I’ve got 1 bracelet with the MDT and I had 6 with the Nox last year. But most could have been found by any machine I believe. Oddly my smallest last year was a POINT 3 gram on ....with the Xcal. The MDT seems to be finding some higher K gold for me.... I believe that’s because it’s heavier and deeper. I tested over 150 pieces of gold which was found by various detectors including the Nox. There were only two pieces that the Nox did better on....a very tiny cross and a hollow gold earring. I agree with your thinking and in fact we talked about that today. The fact that you have to run in beach 2 which ML says is running at a reduced power, it uses a salt setting, and as you said after all that you have to reduce some settings....like sensitivity. What just happened there? Think about that compared to beach 1 in the wet....and I’m not seeing a lot of chains or tiny gold posted even from that. So I’ll settle for 2 or 3 inches depth in the water on a machine that runs smooth than the Xcal in PP mode.

Thanks Cliff

Dew...….. when you say: "we got the same depth in the water as in the wet sand" -------- are you talking: You and Cliff?

Tom, I believe Dew "meant to say" we had the same results in the water and on the wet. MDT had correct TID and hit the target hard with more to spare, Equinox was iffy at best 10 in the water and 12 in the wet.

Cliff

Tom..... i was talking about the MDT getting what appeared to be the same depth in or out of the water. So to me it really substantiated that the SALT BALANCE did exactly what it designed to do. Cliffs right his machine was getting a good ID on that 12" ring as well as hitting it in both AM and Disc modes. We see a lot of tests in the wet and dry sand .... but rarely waist deep in the salt water. I still want to test WHITE gold.... AND the Xcal as well. This machine could be getting 3 inches on the Nox out there deep on larger rings. If it does the same with the Xcal....... and i cant determine im loosing much smaller gold ... ill be hunting more with this machine. Settings make a difference obviously. The Nox could be running hotter..... but then Cliff wasnt running nearly as hot as i do in the water. Anyone else using this machine that has another water machine and can get in the water...... try it

Ok...…. I'm following you guys now. MDT did not lose depth on the gold ring IN the saltwater.....and...… OUT of the water (on the wet slope). Equinox does lose depth IN the saltwater..... as compared to Equinox on the wet slope. This parallels my validation results. Now get a small band 10Kt white gold ring...…….. put it on edge...……. and see what happens!
(((Cliff, Dew …. or anyone else) = With a gold ring: Have you performed a IN-the-water...……. vs...……. on the wet slope,,,,,with the Excal???
Yes...….. nearly all flavors of metal detectors lose substantial performance (depth) IN the water.....as compared to being on the wet slope. This includes my AquaStar-II. To the best of my knowledge...… the MDT is the only platform that shows nearly zero loss-of-performance whilst hunting in the water.

Dimitar is (slowly-but-surely) seeking to improving/enhancing the waterproof feature of the MDT. Nothing has been solidified yet...… but/yet... may go in the next model. Cliff & Dew...…. you sure are 'risking' that IP68 waterproof rating! Dimitar wants all to abide by the 5-feet deep at 30-minutes (control box only) rule.

Cliff...…. I'm happy to hear that you were achieving these comparison results (EQX vs MDT) with those lower settings on the MDT.

Tom...... you bet i want to test the Xcal...... but i want to test it in PP mode where i can run it just out of auto for top performance just like id run it in the water. This should prove real interesting because .... i feel the Xcal is deeper out there than the Nox. We will see. I honestly believe we both were a little surprised by the results..... dont want to say i was a bit skeptical .... but. I just know from the machines ive been using there just isnt that much depth difference in them when in the salt water. Out of the water yes there is. You notice it right away....... by just the way the coil field (HALO) is reduced. Ive not tested a ring on edge in the wet sand.......ill have to try that as well. Looks like in the water testing is still on hold ... cant see much out there and we got some big waves going to shake it up again for 3 or 4 days.

NASA-Tom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

Cliff & Dew...…. you sure are '
> risking' that IP68 waterproof rating! Dimitar want
> s all to abide by the 5-feet deep at 30-minutes (c
> ontrol box only) rule.

Dang, I feel like I just got told to go to the Principal's Office..... warning understood, will comply!

Tom D., I Finally joined the Threshold 0, Sensitivity 9 group!!! Not all hunts are golden so today I took the slack time to fine tune the MDT. Sometimes I'm my own worst enemy......it was so simple to squelch the chatter …..all I needed to do was massage my Salt Balance setting a little. Now to get out that test ring again and see how/if it changes the depth on that small ring. Just from some of the holes I dug today I think it increase the depth over -1 Threshold and 7 Sensitivity!

Cliff

Bump



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/2019 07:15PM by Aaron.

I just keep learning things about this machine. Had to do some dry sand hunting today. I was running AM and just watching the screen go digits 13 and under. I found out there is a LOT of tint pegs and bottles that thankfully I could call without having to dig them. One of the targets I got BANGED at digit 4. About 5” down I had a nice 4 gram 10k cross. Then I realized ....going back over it .... it would go bang bang. With other detectors a cross can sound broken when you have several tones it’s trying to report. I like hunting in AM for this reason....one tone that just sound like ....bang and you can move along pretty good without it missing many if any targets. The machine actually be used to cherry pick gold pretty well



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/12/2019 01:17AM by dewcon4414.

Has anyone found the part no. To those O rings in the cap yet? They are an off size from any you can get at say Ace. Oh and here another heads up. I ordered the red ones from Maclaster-Carr I thought that seems high for shipping 25 rubber O rings. Received them today..... Fedex delivery truck....big box with bubble packing....for a small zip bag of little O rings. Next time I’ll get them from Orings.com. O rings were like $11....shipping was $8....ugh

Alright..... just got a call from Dimitar... the BLACK O ring part no. Is McMasters PN 9262K657 100 piece pack $16. Just ordered some. I appreciate his time on this. I wanted to have the correct one.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/15/2019 05:10PM by dewcon4414.

Typical for McMasterCarr, GRAINGER ect. Big industrial, defense companies don’t care to pay extra to get it fast.

Are you sure 100 will be enough?

You could sell them to us for a buck a piece through the mail.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/14/2019 08:36PM by Badger in NH.

Thats how they come 100 to a package........lol. I think i see why they shipped UPS. There is an option for OTHER.... but i couldnt get it to use USPS first class mail. No big deal..... ill have enough to last for years..... cant have to many parts laying around. ... and boy do i have part lol.

The first 100 hours....

Well that is what I calling it as I dive head first into the MDT-8000.
Hour #1:

Below are bits and pieces of what I found. I am clearing out the back yard from a 40's era house. Specifically using this and the Gold Maxx to micro clean the test garden area. An education onto itself!
initial settings:
Sens 6
TrH -2
All Metal
18kwz
Dsc -1

The crusty thumb tack was 4.5" down and sounded really clear-strong for something that size. (Impressed to say the least)


What was once impossible..... is now easy and obvious. BUT.......... if : You don't know...what you don't know........ it continues to appear/look impossible.
-Thomas Dankowski