Is there a detector that has an extra wide mid or nickel range?

A large mid zone would make it easier to seperate out gold , nickels, and aluminum.. Is there such a machine?

Take a look at the T2. Just the foil range is from ID 40 - 60.

The CTX and a few Whites units have adjustable tone dependent upon VDI. The F75, with heavy notching, can silence everything but high conductors (>65 VDI) and Au/Ni/Al (adjustable).

And then there is the AU-21X...

The Au-21x is specifically for foil range targets

Possum,
There are several units that have user adjustable widths....

Tesoro Golden MicroMax has a user adjustable nickel/gold tone notch width and tone.
The Whites V3 series is fully customizable and you can create your own personal tone notches.
The Whites DFX has a limited ability to create a customizable tone notch in Mix Mode.
The Bounty Hunter Tracker IV has user adjustable tone notch, the width is fixed but it can be rotated around anywhere below high conductors.
The Rutus Jupiter has the ability to create user defined tone notches.
Probably more but those are the ones that came to mind right now.

HH
Mike

Yes now that you mention it the Golden Sabre II w dual disc and notch window is another one. You can get one on eBay for under 2 C-notes

Running a Whites DFX in 15kHz, or V3/V3i in 22.5kHz with VDI Normalization turned off will expand the resolution, and offer a more detailed low conductive VDI response range.

Not really sure what you are looking for but Tesoro notch units old or new might help....guess a lot depends on the type of tabs and foil in your area...and the method to your madness...

Might be straying away from topic but as far as aluminum/pulltab resolution I've never had any machine more capable than the V3i. You really can tell the difference between new/old tabs, beaver tails and the new sq tabs. However in regards to helping find gold, I still wasn't able to discern....

thanks guys,
just thinking about a dry sand machine for gold rings. something that can be used to seperate gold & alum a bit better than a coin shooting machine.

Gold Bug Pro or a G2 makes an excellent dry sand gold hunting unit.

Try the Teknetics G2 I have no problem Iding a nickle it reads 58 all the time. Greg

The BEST in dry sand for finding foil range gold (most lost rings) is the Au-21x.

Nothing better.

I could be wrong but I think he means a detector with a wide range in the foil nickel area. Like Tom said, Take a look at the T2. Just the foil range is from ID 40 - 60. Thats a 20 point VID spread. If the nickel had another 20 point spread that would give you possibly 40 VID possiblities in the foil nickel zone alone.

You still have a way better odds finding ALOT more gold in the foil range in dry sand w the Au-21x than you would looking for larger gold in foil and nickel, which also will cause you to dig TONS of tabs and foil!
With the Au-21x your your trash count is significantly lower!

If he didn't specify dry sand I wouldn't have suggested it.

I guess the problem is, how many Au-21X's are for sale and will there ever be any more that will be built/converted ?

Shoot, I have a Tom D calibrated/verified CZ3D that air tests a clad dime at 12.2 inches, I would consider converting to a Au-21X if Tom still does that work. Since I mostly beach hunt here in NJ, that type of dry sand unit would be ideal.

With so few Au-21X's around ( how many are there anyway ? ), might as well not even include that unit in the mix in terms of what can be bought for this type of hunting the OP wants to do.

You'd have to ask Tom to be sure.

As far as how many Au-21xs are out there, I have a good idea and that's not many. A better question is how many who own one know how to properly use it?

If you live near a busy beach it's a perfect fit for the "arsenal".

Dry sand......

You could also buy a CZ5 and ask Tom to convert it to a AU21X.

The key thing about the AU21X is that a certain conductive range of targets have been given a tone to capture your attention. That is what you really want. You want the conductive range(s) that you are really focusing on to alert you so you can stop and recover them. My recommendation is to look at what is available today that will do that. The new toned Tesoro Golden MicroMax is very good for audio flagging of the gold conductive range in that the 1) the audio tone is easily heard, and 2) the conductive range affected by the tone is user adjustable. I'd recommend you check it out. They have a new 10x12 eliptical DD that would be great for beach hunting. The one draw back on the Golden is that it is a fixed gb unit, but can be ground balanced if you are willing to pop the faceplate and adjust a pot.

CyberSage mentioned the DFX/V3 expanded ranges. I'd like to add more about that and mixmode but I'm short of time. These also have good audio flagging abilities for specific conductive ranges as well as that very useful signagraph/spectragraph.

HH
Mike

Thanks for the responses. The tesoro has an interesting notch system. I would miss the target id system. The T2 looks interesting. By running in 2 tone, knocking out iron, listening for smooth audio signals, and checking visually most targets that are above iron, is probably the method that would be a comfortable fit for me. I'll research a bit more before a final decision.
Thanks again for all your responses. Gotta just love all the pros on this forum!

Hi from Ole EU !

I'm new here, and have been reading this forum for a while.

To the question asked in this thread, I have an answer many won't like...

I have been an avid beach hunter for 20+ years now, and never cared too much to find gold rings on dry sand. There are two reasons for that : 1°) too much trash, too many pulltabs, older "ringpulls" etc etc - 2°) our current coins are of higher values than yours in the US. Imagine grabbing 15 $ 2.5 coins - and many of lower values- in one beach outing. This happens here - productive beaches,- every single sunny day in the summer. So, when I disc out anything under, and including round "ringpulls", 90% of the beeps are coins. I even can leave 10 €cents in the sand if I wanted to, (But I don't...)

So, in those productive months, there's no point to lose time with tons of "ringpulltabs", while coins are there to be easily picked up, just to find the odd 5 grams gold wedding band.

Now, this is where you guys will laugh at me and ban me from here for lifetime lol !

yes, I found a unit that finds and IDs gold rings MUCH better than any of my other detectors (from Compadre to BBs, FBs, Millennium II,Goldbug, ...), and the (sad?) truth is that it is a Bounty Hunter, the Time Ranger.

But there's a reason why.

The Time Ranger is known to have four versions. The 3 first ones had an ID from 0 to 256 in the non-ferrous range. For some reasons, FT decided to limit the ID to 165 on the 4th (and last) version. Doing that, they "focused" on the TID of US coinage.

Normal.

Side-effect : all square and round tabs fall into the 5 C range. Yep ! I am still to meet a ringpull that will read "tabs". A steady, repeatable signal in the tab range is questionable, and delivered me 4 gold rings this year, in about 50 hours of hunting with that unit.

About current clad US nickels, they read 25 or 26, the square tabs are 26 (rarely)/ 27 up. But the coins give (up to 5/6") a repeatable ID, while aluminium is more "nervous".

Of course, I do own "better units" that produce much better results in beach (wet sands) gold hunting and beach coin hunting.

But I am still to find a better one than this "BHTR". Of course, It' s not my unit of choice for productive coinshooting, but for no-nonsense, more relaxed hunts after the summe season, I grab this "UFO"-unit and have tons of fun, and ... better ID on gold rings than any of the detectors I own or owned.

Cheers

Jim'

Jim....... sounds like that unit provides/presents better "ratio's" for your intent.

Which version of the Bounty Hunter, the Time Ranger are you using though? The older one or the newer one? I didn't see that answer. Apologies if I missed it.

It's out there fellows! Go get it!
"Ged Peacehavens"

From his post, it appears the 4th version.
He apparently has a created "notch" out for pulltabs.

Wonder if pulltabs are different in US than rest of the world?

Yet gold rings vary all over the scale of conductivity.....

Steve(MS) Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> From his post, it appears the 4th version.
> He apparently has a created "notch" out for
> pulltabs.
>
> Wonder if pulltabs are different in US than rest
> of the world?
>
> Yet gold rings vary all over the scale of
> conductivity.....

I can tell you here in Canada I have 4 ranges of pulltabs on the CTX3030. Some are around 12-10 to 12-11(old tiny circle), 12-13 to 12-17(square), then 12-24 to 12-25(old large circle), and 12-28 to 12-31(other kind of square tabs). Plays holy heck with trying to get a gold ring without digging 15million tabs. I *can* cherry pick a bit with the CZ-3D and just dig foil targets or old tabs. But this post has my ears tingling, you can pick up a Time Ranger new for around 171$ + s/h.

I'm really interested in how he sets it up. Mind letting us know Jim?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/22/2012 02:16AM by TheGeorgiaCanuck.

Hi all,

I use the Time Ranger in it's P1 mode (iron & foil notched out) when I C & J hunt on dry sand.

You can accept the foil range (and 4 iron segments named ir 1 to ir 4) in the target mode. I do not look for gold in the foil range, because I just have better units for this part of the conuctivity scale, plus the foil trash is much more complicate to saparate from good targets.

Small step aside : the TR (version 4) is a very versatile unit, having a no motion AM mode and a prospecting mode. There is "automatic" GB, called smarttrac, but on the v4, it doesn't track at all. When it's set, you have to look at the ground monitor for any GB offset information. The GB adjustments are only active in the AM and prospecting (P4) modes. Disc has a fixed GB. I can understand people were reluctant to pay $750+ for a Bounty Hunter unit, but at the actual "(long) run out" price, the detector is a real bargain and very fun to use. It is accurate and most effective in the first 7", though I found some larger coins up to 9" (with the "deep target" icon on and hazardous TID). The built quality is also better than their lower range units.

Back to settings : with iron and foil notched out, the 5c and the tabs range will cover 31 TID numbers : 5c range goes from 20 to 35 (and not 33 as stated in the manual), tabs from 36 to 50. Out of these 31 TID numbers, only 9 are "ringpulltabs" ones. the range is 27 to 35. 35 being large beavertails with tail bent flat upon the round tab.(And I am quite sure we share the same tabs as you guys). Strange enough, our highly valuable 2 €uro coin reads correctly in the tab range, some common tab range trash (other than tabs) too. But believe me, all aluminium tabs read in the 5c range and give the 5c low grunt tone.

Now, there are of course gold rings that will fall into that range. I have found two rings with other detectors, that read 28 for one, and 32 for the other.Even then, the TID is very stable for the rings. The latter is a 10 gram white gold wedding band. I think a quarter of all (18k) gold rings will fall in that small range, from 27 to 35. Some broken or bent modern pulltabs will read 26, the US nickels I found here (clad) 25 or 26.

But I have found rings with the Time Ranger reading 21, 24, 39, 40 and two reading 44, with stable TID, the deepest being 5"-all being 18K. One can imagine - in the fully programmable target mode - to notch everything out but the 5c and tab range -eventually including the Zn/Scaps range for 10K rings if wanted- (yes, you can notch out all US coins), and then decide to dig or not when a signal is heard. Digging all steady IDs outside the 27-35 range will improve probabilities to find gold rings. In areas I cleaned before, I dare dig round tabs TIDs that are stable, but it's a matter of hunting conditions and personal choices.

The unit has for me one drawback, and that is no manual adjust ground balance. On iron infested beaches, the BHTR is not what one can call "lightning fast", and, in order to make those areas "searchable", I try to get a wet sand GB (high numbers between 220 and 256 will do), so that iron would not respond in the no motion AM mode. There is little, if any, masking in this configuration, and I always check the signals in the target mode before deciding to dig or not. I know I miss some thin gold in the AM mode, but that's not what I'm after with the BHTR.

This way of hunting is very useful for coins with a steel core (I think of canadians coins here). For those WILL respond in the AM mode with high gb setting, and they will read in one of the four iron TID segments while checking in the target mode. Our €cents here do so.

So you see, this unit had not a great success in it's time, but it's a very good one. Of course, It ain't a Goldbug Pro, Vaquero, CZ, T², T75 and so on, and it looks and is a bit outdated. But it has many useful features for recreational use (C & J).

HH

JimNick



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/23/2012 07:01AM by JimNick.

Thanks for the quick reply. I'll let you know how it goes, I picked one up to test here in Canada. Should be here in 5days or so.

It's out there fellows! Go get it!
"Ged Peacehavens"

Well, I wish you to be succesful with it !

Once again, it's not a race car, but it IDs gold rings better than many oher units.

That being said, but coming at another price tag, there is also the Tesoro De Leon.

With this unit, every single bit of PURE iron will read ZERO, and every US silver and clad will read 95.

That leaves 94 segments for "unconventional" targets, But with the few times I borrowed a m8's EU version (Laser Hawkeye), I do not remember the Ptabs TIDs.

Maybe anoher trail (<----don't know if this word is correct) to investigate for those who are looking for a broad mid-range TID.

HH

JimNick

possum mo Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> A large mid zone would make it easier to seperate
> out gold , nickels, and aluminum.. Is there such a
> machine?

The Sovereign using any 180 scale meter has the sharpest resolution in the conductivity range of foil all the way up to copper penny that I've ever used on a machine. Foil starts roughly around 60VDI. Copper pennies around 178 to 180. Nickels are a cake walk with this machine, thanks to both it's fantastic detailed long audio and tone alerts and also it's VDI resolution.

Nickels normaly range around 143 to 146 in VDI and usually won't change by more than 1 digit no matter which direction you sweep, while odd shaped trash that reads in that range will often roam by 3 digits or more as you change angles. One of the other perks to high resolution.

Some old nickels in bad shape can range down to about 136 to 139 or so in VDI, but they'll still have that classic "round" "boing" sound to them versus a lot of trash. Because of the high resolution most foil will read well below the nickel range. Tabs? Easy as pie too. For me 99.9% of the time they start at 149 in VDI and range up to 169. I hardly ever dig round or square tabs when going after nickels.

One of the perks to high resolution in the low to mid conductivity range is it can be a deadly tool when gold ring hunting or being after other relics, buttons, or even some old coins that read well below zinc pennies. Make a mental note of the common tab numbers or that of other trash in the area and then start digging any targets just 1 digit off. Oddly, you would think that a crushed or bent tab would read different than an identical one that is still in perfect shape, but I've tested a ton of them and they almost always read exactly the same # as the unbent one...To an extent in being bent anyway.

I've found a ton of buttons and other keepers by just digging targets 1 digit off of the most comon tab #s at a site. Not just by the VDI method, but also the long detailed audio of the Sovereign will tell you what should be "round", like a button or a ring, versus a lot of odd shaped junk and such. Not always of course, and a lot of trash can have a quality sound to it as well, but there are some inroad distinctions that can be made when you're in the mood to be picky.

Yes, all coins above copper pennies will read 180, but when I'm old coin hunting I don't care what kind of coin the machine thinks it is. The conductivity resolution between various coins above copper penny, both silver and clad, is so fine that a machine can easily get fooled due to orientation in the ground, minerals, dry conditions, masking, being worn, and so on. I have dug silver dimes, for instance, on machines with the ability to split hairs on coin types, that read as pennies or other coins due to all the above reasons. Heck, I've even dug silver dimes that read as low as zincs at some sites without even being masked.

Only coin I really care about avoiding when being picky is zincs when there are millions of them at a site and I don't have the time to be digging all those. When it comes to old coin hunting I've got two rules at most public "dead" sites- If it's shallow (like say less than 5" ) I don't dig it unless it's masked by nearby trash and thus might be an old coin others have missed. And 2- I'll dig any coin deeper than 5", masked or not.

To me this is the best way to target the old ones and avoid the clads, and not depending on a machine to tell you what a coin may or may not be. Seen too many silvers pop up that read like other coins for one reason or another to in any way trust that. All I want to know is that it's a coin and then it's dig time when I'm after old stuff.

Also, having a wider window for all coins (copper pennies up to silver dollars) for me makes them less prone to look iffy at depth or when masked. A bigger net catches more fish in that respect. I don't want to be talked out of digging by a floaty VDI on a coin, which super high resolution in the upper coin range can cause for me. One of the reasons why the QXT Pro, with all coins above copper penny crammed into one zone, netted me a ton of old coins even though the depth of that machine was no where near my Minelabs, and it's also one of the reasons why I love the Sovereign.

Only time I want to split hairs is on the low/mid stuff when trying to avoid a ton of tabs or other trash at a site. Lacking a life time's effort to remove all those tabs, I feel a more productive use of my time is to avoid them and dig all other numbers in that range when after gold rings, relics, or other old coins that read lower on the scale than zincs.

We scanned in a large pool of random gold rings not found by biased digging as that would bias the results of the numbers, and we found that most gold rings do not read in the nickel or the tab zone as is often said. I think the reason for that old myth is because of machines with poor nickel/tab resolution, resulting in them taking in a wider window of foil below nickels and well into the tab and above range and such. About half of all the rings read in the foil range, below nickel.

PS- The Sovereign's 180 meter also provides a gap between the highest tab (169) 99.9% of the time and zinc pennies (173). For that reason, I love to dig those odd 170, 171, and 172 VDI numbers, and often come up with a keeper for doing that. My sites rarely have those numbers between the tabs and zincs show up, so I'm always up for digging those when I see them.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/10/2012 04:41PM by critterhunter.

I should add....The Sovereign GT has about a 12.5 digit wide notch window. We crunched the numbers and by adjusting it high enough to just barely kill a 165 tab number it will then block about 84% of all round and square tabs we sampled (numerous ones from various sites), while still recovering (by our numbers anyway) the vast majority of rings at a site. Yep, best way to find gold rings on land is to dig everything, but lacking a life time of effort at some parks and such I'd rather play the odds. After all, you don't bet all out on every hand in Vegas. You want to slant the odds in your favor as much as possible, or in this case the ratio of trash versus treasure. Only on the beach will I scoop every signal above iron, despite the audio telling me I know it's going to be junk due to the fine audio traits of the Sovereign.

We also noted not only the VDI of the rings as we scanned them, but also the quality of the audio. Most had a round, smooth, quality, warm, sound to them. Only a handful had a sick or warbly sound, and these were all either broken rings (no longer an intact loop) or had very fine spiderweb like webbing with many holes that scatters the eddy currents of the detection field.

One of the reasons why I prefer the Explorer's VDI, is that the Etrac/CTX have compressed the ferrous aspect into the 12th line on the 2D screen. Now you've pretty much made the ferrous # useless to some extent, as everything from coins to tabs to gold rings are compressed into that line mostly, and are then forced to rely on a 1 through 50 VDI conductivity range.

That's also why the smart find (cross hairs) are rarely used on those units, where as it's the prefered screen VDI display mode to use on the Explorer, as the non-compressed ferrous range can provide subtle hints to target traits when you are in the mood to be picky just by watching the cross hair tick across the screen.

Also, since they do indeed have the ability to split hairs on various coin types above a copper penny, a fair portion of that 0 to 50 conductivity range is commited to that, and not to the low to mid conductors resolution. For some this is what they want and it does have advantages for various styles and wants, but it's not my cup of tea in the way I hunt.

Far as iron rejection, the BBS units simply ignore most ferrous aspects of the signal and so don't use any portion of the VDI scale to ID that. Roughly small foil starts at about 40 or 60 or so, where as iron will give a negative number. Never really paid much attention to if some iron or even smaller foil will read in the 0 to 40 or so range but I don't think it does. The meter will simply display a large negative number for iron and null it out, and as said foil starts in the 40 to 60-some range.

With nickels usually starting at around 143 or so, let's low ball that to 140 (although some bad shape nickels can read down to perhaps 136 to 138). Let's also low ball where foil starts and put it at 60. That gives you a VDI range for foil alone of 80 VDI steps. Take tabs in the same example. At a VDI range of 149 to 169, that's a 20 digit scale on which to split hairs even inside the tab range.

All that said, the #1 rule among serious hunters is to make audio the first and final decision to dig. That is, when you are using a detector with long detailed audio. To me the Sovereign has the best of both worlds...The long detailed fine traits audio of the cream of the crop old analog machines, yet with the numerous tone alerts of a Minelab. Tabs will have a distinctly higher tone than nickels, as will most foil having a lower tone than nickels. Once you've learned the tone of nickels and also hear that round, smooth, boing-like response it'll stop you dead in your tracks before you even bother to look at the meter.

I just took my new t2se to the fresh water beach for a 3 hr test run. The beach has alot of 3-4" rocks laying on top, so I decided to use the CL mode for the air gap required. That mode requirs a slower sweep speed, which was a good speed for me , as Im used to swinging an explorer. ( In the regular modes, man this T2 is fast!) I dug a ton of aluminum crap, and any other sound that sounded consistant. No gold rings yet, but this machine would have found them , if I was over them. I picked up 15 clads as a consolation for all my digging. Its a real comfortable machine to swing, and depth so far is almost as good as my explorer. I really like the 2 tone / iron grunt audio. I plan on trying some woods hunting as well. Thanks Tom for your Recommend, and the others who have chimed in as well.