Hi Everyone,
I've been metal detecting for about a year and a half with my teenage son, and just before that wicked storm hit I broke down and bought a Nox 800. Yes, I was out in my backyard using it with a couple of inches of snow on the ground. I didn't dig anything at that point, but did put some old cable company flags in the ground where i found what I thought good targets. Since the snow melted and it was 50-60 today, i went out and dug and came out with some all the usual: clad, foil, can slaw, etc.
I've been reading the book, watching the Minelab Youtube tutorials, Watching Sod Busters Youtube, Gigmaster, DirtFishMish, and a host of others. Because of the weather I've probably got a good 100 hours in of watching Youtube! Who needs Netflix?
I ran my detector in Park 1, Noise cancelled, and ground balanced, with the standard settings since I'm still learning it. So here are my questions:
Ground balance: My yard came in at 44. I understand what ground balance does, but is that a significant number? Some of the reading I've done says you can leave it at zero. I was able to manually ground balance really well with my Bounty Hunter and as such was able to find some things I don't believe I would have found if I didn't. My question is when does that number become significant? (not that it matters as I am always going to ground balance, but I'm just curious).
All Metal button: When I find a target tone that sounds good, I switch directions to see what happens to the tones. If it still sound good, I've been hitting the all metal button. If I hear the iron "grunt" I'm assuming two things: 1). the item is ferrous, and 2). There could be a ferrous item next to the non-ferrous object. Are these correct assumptions? Am I missing something? In my limited sample size, this has held true so far, but I just haven't used it enough to be confident in that yet. I'll probably be diggin' everything for quite awhile. So again, just curious if my line of thinking is correct.
Frequency: Ok, this is brand new to me. I understand the concept of the Multi-IQ frequencies. What I'm trying to understand is how a tip I read about works. If you're ringing up something in a low conductivity range (i.e. gold jewelry) in Multi, why does the tone and TDI number stay almost the same if you change to 10kHz if it's gold, but both change if it's some kind of non-gold object? I tested this with some gold rings and bottle caps I have and it seems to hold true in an air test. I haven't actually dug a gold ring yet to see this in action. My question is why does this work? I can memorize strategies all day and use them in the field, but I'd much rather know WHY and HOW something works so I can modify my practice to meet the needs of the situation.
If you've read this far, and care to reply, Thank you!
Next steps are to make a test garden this weekend and maybe get out to a park and see what I can come up with!
HH
DrMRM
I've been metal detecting for about a year and a half with my teenage son, and just before that wicked storm hit I broke down and bought a Nox 800. Yes, I was out in my backyard using it with a couple of inches of snow on the ground. I didn't dig anything at that point, but did put some old cable company flags in the ground where i found what I thought good targets. Since the snow melted and it was 50-60 today, i went out and dug and came out with some all the usual: clad, foil, can slaw, etc.
I've been reading the book, watching the Minelab Youtube tutorials, Watching Sod Busters Youtube, Gigmaster, DirtFishMish, and a host of others. Because of the weather I've probably got a good 100 hours in of watching Youtube! Who needs Netflix?
I ran my detector in Park 1, Noise cancelled, and ground balanced, with the standard settings since I'm still learning it. So here are my questions:
Ground balance: My yard came in at 44. I understand what ground balance does, but is that a significant number? Some of the reading I've done says you can leave it at zero. I was able to manually ground balance really well with my Bounty Hunter and as such was able to find some things I don't believe I would have found if I didn't. My question is when does that number become significant? (not that it matters as I am always going to ground balance, but I'm just curious).
All Metal button: When I find a target tone that sounds good, I switch directions to see what happens to the tones. If it still sound good, I've been hitting the all metal button. If I hear the iron "grunt" I'm assuming two things: 1). the item is ferrous, and 2). There could be a ferrous item next to the non-ferrous object. Are these correct assumptions? Am I missing something? In my limited sample size, this has held true so far, but I just haven't used it enough to be confident in that yet. I'll probably be diggin' everything for quite awhile. So again, just curious if my line of thinking is correct.
Frequency: Ok, this is brand new to me. I understand the concept of the Multi-IQ frequencies. What I'm trying to understand is how a tip I read about works. If you're ringing up something in a low conductivity range (i.e. gold jewelry) in Multi, why does the tone and TDI number stay almost the same if you change to 10kHz if it's gold, but both change if it's some kind of non-gold object? I tested this with some gold rings and bottle caps I have and it seems to hold true in an air test. I haven't actually dug a gold ring yet to see this in action. My question is why does this work? I can memorize strategies all day and use them in the field, but I'd much rather know WHY and HOW something works so I can modify my practice to meet the needs of the situation.
If you've read this far, and care to reply, Thank you!
Next steps are to make a test garden this weekend and maybe get out to a park and see what I can come up with!
HH
DrMRM