My Garrett ATX Run Down Video ...Updated with In field Ground bal operation

I was lucky enough to get hold of ATX to try out...

I have had and used the infinium and the Recon Pro 1000...

The ATX is definitley a blend of the two and that's a good thing..

Now this is just a start up video and in no way a in the field hunt feedback.

I expalin things in the video so no need to repeat here...yet I should mention that the non motion mode is a 2 tone mode , only low or high for each target not low/high high /low for each target like the motion mode does ...

I will go into that in the next video outdoor's...

The machine is quite the heavy uit as is the Recon....
Yet the machines is built like no other machine made that I know of...A true Military Grade piece....


The machine is very very stable for a P.I. The DD coil is very cutting edge design you can tell..

Im looking at it for a relic Hunter so remember My info is for that type hunting...From my point of view...

[www.youtube.com]

I hope to use it in some very very harsh ground relic site's. after January 1st...Deer season end's!

Ground Bal Demo..
[www.youtube.com]

Keith



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/28/2013 11:28PM by Keith Southern.

Great video Keith. For all you Northern guys when Keith says "urn" it means iron, and when he says "coal", it means coil. :-)

Thanks for the video Keith, heck I was born-n-raised in central Illinois, friends north of Peoria call me hillbilly cause of my southern drawl! Wanna wrassle? signed HBR(hill billy roy) HH

Great video Keith. Thanks for taking the time to do it. I have an Infinium with the 10x12 mono I use for salt water beach hunting and you are correct in how it bangs on lower conductors. Found me lots of great gold targets with it. One has to know how to go through the frequency check and the ground balance process, as well as how to adjust the discrimination and threshold to get it to run optimal in the wet sand sand and water, but when you get it purring, it's a great beach unit.

Since I have mounted the Infinium on a straight shaft, with the control box behind the elbow, the balance is perfect...I can swing it all day long.

The ATX has some nice new features, but at this point I am concerned about the weight. Looks like it can take lots of punishment though, which is a major plus when hunting in salt water environments. Seems it has a more stable threshold than the Infinum too based on how it sounds in your house. The Infinium can sound like a pin ball machine in the house when you turn it on. Having the controls right there in front, where you can iron check and adjust discrimination, can be very beneficial...I can't do that on the fly with the Infinium due to how it's mounted. Even hip mounted, it's somewhat tedious, especially in the winter with gloves on. Looks like those buttons are nice and big and seem to be very durable.

I never liked the stock DD coil on the Infinium, and sold it. The mono, on the beaches I hunts, works much better. I do like the new coil design on the ATX, and the small region looks like it can pin point much better than the old DD designs. Seems more sensitive to small, low conductors too.

One cool thing about the Infinium and ATX is as a coin hunter, you can hunt for copper and silver by only going after the low/high tones. You will miss nickles and gold, but there are spots where I hunt where old silver is lurking deep, and honing in on those targets using the tone ID can save lots of digging time.

Question on the headphone jack...is it the same connector for the Infinium ? I have a pair of GG underwaters with the Infinium connector, and wondering if I can use them on an ATX. The Garrett headphones are brutal ( Sorry Garrett !).

Can't wait to hear your thoughts on the ATX when you take it out in the field.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/28/2013 04:27PM by therover61.

It certainly looks rugged, but I saw a Garret Recon (same case),on eBay with a broken arm cuff. On another forum, someone just posted pix of how their ATX case broke where the headphone connector is located when the detector fell and the connector hit the floor. I wonder what Garret's warranty policy is for case breakage?

EDIT: I re-read the post on the othr forum and Garrett is fixing the detector under warranty!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/29/2013 12:28AM by lytle78.

Hey Rover the same headphone jack as the AT-PRO and the Infinium.. Yes your GG should work well..

Yes I dont care much for the Garrett phone's

Thanks

Keith

Nice looking machine looks even better wet! The Infinium DD coil was interesting looking coil but like Rover said also with the new DD coil on ATX guess looks aren't everything? Having trouble getting mineralized bricks out of my head, guess I never thought about that, make sense though & Keith demonstrated it! HH

Keith,

Thanks for the video on the ATX ground balance, and the comments about the iron check and EMI compared to the Infinium. Seems the automatic frequency check on the ATX is improved over the way you have to do it on the Infinium. I always freq check first when using my Infinium but I always wonder if there is a better channel than the one I select.

I agree with you based on what I have saw and read, that the iron check is a different circuit/process on the ATX than on the Infinium.

Have you ever run the 10x14 mono on the Infinium in your test garden ?

The ATX is looking better n better but the darn weight has me on the fence.

I have ran the bigger coil but I had problems with EMI...

The ATX is just so much more quite..not sure its any hotter than the infinium but the noise is gone!

And I must say ,, Not sure you can hear it in the video but the newer coil is more demensional...by that I mean it has more nuance to it...really can talk to you compared to the infinum coil's...

Good targets sound good bad target's sound bad... espacially in the coin size group.. the coil is well designed!Really dotn need the iron check with that coil...it WARBLES very well!

you know what's funny I ran through alot of freqs looking for noise and I just could not find any? Its shielded better or something? not sure...but it's nice..

yes the weight is a weak point .. but it is what it is...Im wondering if someone could figure out a hipmout for it like the older explorer's..the problems is the connector''s..Where could you find them?


but all in all it still doable for a few hours like it is...!

Keith

Steve Herschbach has already figured out a hip mount solution with Infinium coils. Scroll down the page a bit at the below link.

[www.detectorprospector.com]

Where theres a will theres a way...

And yes if using the older Infinium coil its a no brainer as to what i would do also...

now we need to figure out a way to get the ultra nice stock coil cable longer...it can be done but would require adding a different connector inline and still using the stock end. you know cut and splice..might be the only viable option if that route is to be taken.

Thank's for the Link!

Hmmmmm Wonder if we can garrett to make the ATX coils with 8 foot cords as a option?

Keith



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/30/2013 12:02AM by Keith Southern.

Since I would run the ATX mostly at the salt water beaches, I like how the cable is inside the shaft. Built to withstand the elements too.

ATX with less noise, better frequency check, better DD, more rugged and the controls at your thumb tip are some big advancements over the Infinium. The lights also seem to help out with target ID as far as strength of signal goes.

Darn it....I want one.

Hey Rover..

The Coil is the best sounding coil I have heard on a P.I.!

it can really paint a picture for you..

And the more I study on it the more Im certian theres more going on besides just a pulse advancement for Iron check like the infinium....Since the iron check only works with the DD coil's it is more along the lines of the 5000 from minelab...

Must be some Circuit doing some algorithims of some sort...

Its not fool proof by no means especially on the deeper nails I noitice, but it is a plus to have when needed...and yes coupling it with the intensity meter and the smoother operation I see it as a positive progression for Garrett's P.I. platfrom...

Nice unit..

and I love how Coil design is playing an even more important factor in detector design now more than ever...There is some serious thought process going on in coil development of late!

will know more once deer season end's..

Keith

Keith,

What is interesting is that a lot of the iron trash that gives PI's fits in the wet salt sand beaches I hunt are rusty nails that aren't that deep. If the ATX can give some sort of idea/target signature on 1-4 inch rusty nails (washers and other round iron objects are far too hard to tell), and have that probability at 50% higher than other PI units, then that's a win in my book.

Its not that hard to dig a 2 inch deep rusty nail in the wet sand...it's when you have dug hundreds of them, that it becomes a nightmare !

I have found on the ATX even the bigger iron like horseshoe's can give the iron tone if you use edge pass identification....

so there more going on for sure than delay manipulation...

Still only good for shallower target's but stil helpful...

Keith

Thanks for the video Keith, ATX is looking better and better appears to be a nice Pi.

Careful with the Infinium coils, Steve said only the Infinium DD coils will work on the ATX the Recon or infinium mono coils may damage the ATX.

Thanks again for the video,
Paul

Testing an ATX.

Very nice setup ivall, Cool hip-mount.

How is the Infinium 7"X10" DD compared with the stock coil on sensitivity, And depth wise as well on smaller targets do they both fare about the same?

Good job!

Paul (Ca)

Good picture ivanll. Sweet hat. How do you like the ATX so far?

Good thinking outside the box Ivanill!!


Keith

Ive been out in bad ground wiht the ATX over the weekend..

no earth shattering find's..

but I can tell the machine likes smaller targets than the Infinium...and seemingly smaller than the TDI...

The iron check is still only for surface to a few inches on a nail..but is helpful..but what I can tell more than anything is the quality of the signal on Non-ferrous is way better than the Ferrous target's if the targets again are not past a few inches..

At high gains the machine will false on shrubs and rocks stick's by bumping if tracking is locked...when tracking is on fast its less noticable...slow tracking is noticable...

I see it it as a do all P.I. more than a dedicated machine for say Gold...

The Strong point of the ATX seems to be try and do it all in a water proof housing...

If you want small and or deep gold get a GPX..

If you want the ability to really cherry pick coins out of park areas and iron and such get a TDI.

if you need a waterproof do all P.I. get a ATX.. it's also very EMI resilient..

For me I would rather have a TDI in a waterpoof case if I was to need the ability to go in water...yet thats not made is it...

I like the infinium/ATX for low conductors like button's .thats were it seems the hottest.. yet the TDI is hotter across the board when comparing them..

I do like the talkivness of the coil over the infinium coil's.. yet the TDI is talkitive too...

more hunting coming this weekend..

Oh its still heavy LOL!

Keith

More info on the ATX...

Not sure if theres many on here who are interested in a P.I. But maybe a few...

Ok I have found some deep button's in bad dirt and also other period brass like J hooks and finials and such...And for the first time with a P.i. in my dirt Im digginf P.Caps out of those red iron !

The iron check function seems to work best on the strongest signals as expected...But whast neat is I dont have to fool with horseshoes hardly at all!

You will be fooled by small bits of iron and nails if you rely on the iron check if they are past say 2 inches... and good size nail like 3 inches will grunt to about 6 inches...

but I must say its better than any P.i. I have had for at least some sort of I.D. of iron and to me that coupled with the High def coil has I think taken the Garrett P.I. platfrom to a new level...

the iron check feature has not been wrong yet if it say's iron .. it has been wrong saying its not iron, so far that's a good thing...

Im going to explore some more coils as I get a chance... thinking of modding in a 5x10 shortly...thanks to Paul for the Idea...And Steve H. for the Confirmation that it will work...

I at this point can say the ATX is a 21st century P.I.

Keith



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2014 03:02AM by Keith Southern.

Just watched the ground balance video, Keith. As always, superb reporting

Was always curious to this on your videos...do you have the buried target locations marked off or something? How in the heck do you remember the precise location of everything?! I tried spotting a little marker or similar thing, but, nothing.

Your video made me reconsider Might be picking one of these up for sniffing out those deepies my ML can't hit.

Joe

Hey Joe!

The targets I know where there at because you cant see it but theres slight depressions in the ground...

again the ATX is a 21 st century P.I.



Keith



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2014 09:00PM by Keith Southern.

Keith,

Here's another idea for a shaft appears it's going to work great!

Have two Infinium coils ordered won't be here unit this weekend but will post pics when I slap them onto this shaft setup, My current 5"X10" DD shaft setup is on loan. In the meantime, have a 3"X7" and the larger Infinium DD coil on route so will be playing with these this weekend with this shaft setup.

It's an old military Pi shaft, Collapses down too looks like it's going to be a neat addition for the AXT. With this shaft, Can either go with the cable running inside the rods if I cut the coil cable and reseal the cut or go with wrapping the cable around the shaft connecting the cable connecter from the outside.

Paul (Ca)

thats pretty slick Paul!!!

Whats holding the rod inside the housing?

what do you think of the 5x10 on the machien as far as depth goes....

Im thinking it might be one to obtain...

That 3x7 has me intriqued to ...

have you had any luck hunting wihth the ATX in a say house site..With small coil?

I have some very old house sites that I want to work with a small coil on it ...Very bad dirt but just nails no big iron ... but alot fo nails ...I want to try and hunt the edges and see if I can work something up...

I like to use machines for unintened purpose at times..

Keith

hi Steve,

Added two sleeves to the rear lower shaft that locks the shaft inside the ATX housing, Trying to keep this shaft setup as light as possible without tacking on too much stuff.

I like the 5"X10" DD coil, It's my main coil I think you'll feel the same once you start using it for your type of hunting. Depth wise is less than the stock coil but that's to be expected, It'll more than make up for this small depth loss due to better balance, getting in tighter places and it's one pound lighter.

Sensitivity is a little less as well, But not by much you may even get fooled less depending on the site. Haven't tried it at an old house site yet but mostly for gold jewelry hunting, I feel you will really like this coil.

The new shaft setup I'm currently working on is going to be a winner, Can't wait to use it this weekend when the DD coils arrive. My current modified 5"X10" DD coil is on loan so ordered both the 3"X7" DD and Larger Infinium DD, Curious to see how they play out with this new shaft setup.

Trying different ideas with the ATX, some may work and some may not so it's a stab in the dark. You're extremely good with modifying detectors, You shouldn't have any problems putting together an Infinium coil shaft setup for the ATX. Don't wait too long, You're missing the boat not using the 5"X10" DD coil.

HH, Paul (Ca)





Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/16/2014 08:26AM by Old California.

Here's an example of one of the two setup options this shaft can take, Now this is with the cable inside which is great but will be limited to a fixed coil/shaft setup not allowing usage of other coils only one. Or, Second option is to mount the cable outside just like any detector only connecting to a pig tail connector running from the inside housing to the connection portion of shaft and housing. This will allow usage of all Infinium DD coils without disconnecting the shaft from the housing, The pig tail connector will be enclosed running inside the housing exiting the housing shaft portion nothing will be tangling will actually be mounted on a cool looking small bracket with just the connector portion showing.

Paul (Ca)

The 5x10 DD runs like a dream on the ATX. I have the 3x7 but have not actually used it yet.

Thanks Paul and Steve for the info on the 5x10...

I like a 5x10 on alot of platform's ..

Hey Paul thank's for the detailed explanation on the shaft's...

If I ever do some sort of mod on the ATX...probably not though .. to much cash for me take a chance...I would swap out the connectors on the coils and add a inline conector to match the new coil connectors...Im not fond of the Garrett small Pin connectors...

Wish I had not sold my recon...I had a brand new one I bought for peanuts and let it go....I would not minded chopping up that housing ...

You know Paul I get to modding on something and it starts to be a work in progress...Its like you get it back together and running then you have an idea that such and such could be done different then you tear it back apart...and before long it becomes more consuming than the actual in field use...

I guess thats where you need a partner if you was building items to make money on...Someone would have to tell you when its time to stop and start producing..LOL!!

Keith