excal vs cz20/21

when and where is one better than the other? sweep speed in the water, wetsand, sensitivity to small gold, white gold, tiny gold, soft loose sand, hard compacted sand, ability to compensate for salt, etc: technical answers appreciated.
chuck.

In my years of learning and using both, I have come to the conclusion that performance wise for both is neck and neck. The main differences, in my opinion, are what a hunter prefers in a unit and what conditions the hunter will be using it in.

Do you want a concentric coil or DD ? There are pros and cons to both.

Manual or automatic GB ? The CZ does have the ability to offset the GB due to it being manual, which can be a plus in certain situations.

3 tones or a variety of tones ? CZ easier to distinguish gold targets due to the mid tone which is very different than the low or high, making cherry picking easier.

Threshold based or silent search in discriminate mode ? In all metal mode, the CZ can give you a bit more info on the target ( but you have to have learned the all metal language of a CZ to use this as an advantage).

Do you want to null on iron in discriminate mode, or hear it ?

As far as sensitivity to small gold, the 8 inch coils have the advantage over the bigger coil. Easier to swing in the water, and easier to pin point with the smaller coil, but sacrifice coverage.

Being a mutli frequency unit, the Excal may have an advantage in highly mineralized sand, but I do not have first hand knowledge of that since the salt water beaches I hunt are not mineralized like those in CA for example.

Sweep speeds for both units are pretty close in terms of what speed you need for optimal performance. Excal is probably a bit slower. Recovery speed is a bit faster on the CZ.

I roll with the CZ's because I know them the best.....which is probably the number one asset a hunter has...knowing his/her machine.

For various wet salt applications.......... a well-tuned Excal/Sov/CZ are nearly identical. Not enough of a differential to give you any 'edge'.

CZ slightly more durable/reliable.

therover,............... i have both the cz20 and a excal 800/1000 (swicthable coils) im just looking for any scenerios where i should be using one over the other.

tom,.......................does one or the other perform better... in the soft wavy sand you might find in a trough? with high sens settings on the wetsalt beach?

just looking for a little edge smarter hunting method for this upcoming summer since i dont have a aquastar and know its capabilities!!!!!
chuck.

The only other option to get a possible edge is to get a PI like a Whites Dual Field or Garrett Infinium. And that edge is possible depth advantage ( and in the case of the Infinium, a possible advantage in getting gold...but lots of iron as well).

Having an Infinium as well as CZ's and an Excal, I know in the conditions I hunt in, the Infinium is more sensitive to smaller gold targets depth wise ( that is to say, it gets small gold at greater depths than a CZ or Excal, as well as hitting small gold in the wet salt sand that the CZ or Excal cannot hit).

Have not used a Whites DF long enough to compare to the Infinium, but I do know you can set up the Infinium to adjust for conditions better than the DF as well as have more coil options.

Go with the excal and let the other guy dig the tiny pieces of gold because he'll also be digging falses and tiny pieces of other stuff. Blast by him and get the rings. Also DD pinpointing in rough or cloudy water (where you can't see the bottom) is way faster than concentric.

Probably a dead tie and personal preference but certainly the best two in saltwater sand situatons both wet and dry...Personal preference and experience probably the tiebreaker in most situations...
Do bear in mind on some beaches due to harsh conditions only PI units will work....

Chuck,

There's just no 'measurable' edge of Excal over a CZ. In addition.......... I'm keeping my eyes open to certain equipment........ and trying to think of a way to find you a better 'edge'.

Chuck, I had similar questions concerning CZ vs. ML, and will give you a little info as to what I decided and why...

I like hunting the beach but don't get there very often, so I wanted a beach detector that would be easy for me to learn without a lot of work involved. If I hunt in the water, it's very shallow water, at the most below the knees. I prefer the wet sand as that area "was" under water earlier in the day/night and so now I don't have to fight the wave action to find anything that was lost "in the water" earlier. What few detectorist I saw had basic dry sand machines and had to stay on the dry beach. That improved my odds conciderably right off the bat by being able to hunt the salty wet sand. I'm getting up in age and tried to look realisticly at just how much time I wanted to invest in a detector to hunt the beach. I concidered the ML GT and the CZ6a since I would rarely venture out in the water (neither are waterproof). The CZ6a had a bit of edge as it "was" weather resistant, so if it got splashed accidently, it would almost surely not be in danger of being damaged. The ML was not weather resistant.

Some say the ML really talks to them, but I wasn't willing to invest a lot of time learning a somewhat complex language (as far a detectors go) in hopes of being able to better identify a good target. The three tones of the CZ6a was simple... low tone, leave it where it lays, high tone, dig if I wanted coins, middle tone, gold rings and of course... everything else not iron or silver. I think they're both neck and neck as for depth, so that was not a deciding factor (and both were deep). Being able to just hear a middle tone, dig and retrive, go on to the next target. Quick and simple. Don't have to play around with the target to decide if it might be a ring or not. I figure I could dig many more good possibilities in the time I spent deciding "is this a possible good "ring" target".

I don't know if this makes sense or not. When I watched Toms first DVD on inland hunting, I realized how important it was to be able to make a decision quickly to dig or not. ...don't diddle dallie around deciding if your target is something worth digging or not, especially in easily dug sand! I learned this lesson when panning for gold. I learned to work my gold pan down to the black concentrates and gold in about a minute while others around me wasted precious time playing around with their precious dirt for 5, 10 or more minutes. Pan fast! If there's nothing there, move on. Detect and dig. If it's nothing of value, move on. So I chose the CZ6a because all I had to do was listen for the middle tone and dig. It would be the same for the CZ20-21. I've no doubt the ML is a great machine, but I just did not see myself putting the time into learning it's language. Time's short. I'd rather dig 100 targets in hopes that there might be a ring, in the same time that I would have played around with 20+ possible targets trying to decide if I even wanted to dig. Some folks like listening to multiply sounds and trying to figure out just what the target may be before digging. I'd rather dig it, get it over with and move on. Nothing against ML, it's just not condusive to my method of detecting.

Weigh the differences well. How much time do you have at the beach and how much of that time are you willing to spend learning your detector?