Newbie to pulse induction detecting

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I'm not new to metal detecting but I've never used a pulse induction detector. I bought a Golden Mask Mobile ST which will arrive tomorrow. I bought it to look for military relics at a decommissioned army base where I know for certain there are things like collar disks, medals and hat pins that can be at least as deep as two feet and maybe more - including spot dumps where they dug a hole and threw in buttons or marksmanship badges or medals.

My first question, without ever having used a PI detector, is about coil sizes. I will have three different sized coils: 7, 11 and 16 inch. Does a PI detector see deeper with the same size coil than a VLF detector on something like a brass collar disk or a silver quarter? Or does it face the same basic depth limitations as the VLF machines based on coil size? The soil will be somewhat mineralized due to the amount of rust iron nails of different sizes.

I'm sure that I'll have more questions later but that is my first for now. Thank you for your help.

Sent from my SM-G998U1 using Tapatalk
 
There's a lot of "ifs" with respect to what you can expect with various coil sizes compared to a VLF machine. All things being equal, you might see some depth gain with the PI over a VLF but that's going to of course be dependent on ground, target makeup, target size, etc., etc. Generally speaking, the larger the coil the more depth you will get but there's also the issue of larger coils and very small targets. So there's no real easy answer here.

You do know that with a PI you essentially have no discrimination - so you'll be digging everything. If you're good with that then you should have a lot of targets to dig.

What you might do is use the big coil to search out those dumps, as I imagine a dump of a lot of metallic objects will look like one huge piece of metal. Then start digging and excavate and use the smaller coil to get the individual smaller bits.

I don't see a lot of advantage though to a PI in this situation - I think a comparably-sized VLF would be a lot easier due to being able to easily knock out iron, which I imagine you'd want to avoid? But, if iron objects are considered good here then even so, a VLF with a big coil and set to run in all-metal mode would likely be comparable.

Now, if the ground was REALLY mineralized, the PI might have some advantage. But typical ground I'm not sure there's a lot of advantage there. Maybe someone else can prove me wrong.

Regardless, have fun and let us know what you find!
 
Thank you the advice. Supposedly the pi detector I've bought has discrimination but only in the iron / not iron sense which is all I need.

Depth was the other goal. There are areas where I can literally scrape away a few inches of soil with a hand rake and I'll start picking up signals again that are just that far out of reach for my vlf detectors. It kind of drives me nuts sometimes to know that so much is just out of reach.

I have some crazy big coils for my vlf machines but they are way to big for the woods and scrub areas.

Sent from my SM-G998U1 using Tapatalk
 
I'm not sure about the area, but what MAY be happening is that as you scrape away the surface dirt, you're scraping away a layer of either highly mineralized dirt, or dirt that has a bunch of decayed iron dust in it. That happens in old well-used sites, the rusting and decaying of iron all around deposits a layer of rust and decayed iron over the surface that is like a blanket. VLF detectors would have a horrible time with this and you'd likely get no depth in those spots. PIs would do a little better, and is sort of the environment that they were designed around (highly mineralized salt sand beaches). So you may have better luck with the PI there, especially if it has some way of rejecting iron. Sometimes this is done via pulse delay and other pulse timing tricks - it probably won't be a sure thing but hey, if it cuts down the iron by half you're doing great.

Good luck!
 
I'm not new to metal detecting but I've never used a pulse induction detector. I bought a Golden Mask Mobile ST which will arrive tomorrow. I bought it to look for military relics at a decommissioned army base where I know for certain there are things like collar disks, medals and hat pins that can be at least as deep as two feet and maybe more - including spot dumps where they dug a hole and threw in buttons or marksmanship badges or medals.

My first question, without ever having used a PI detector, is about coil sizes. I will have three different sized coils: 7, 11 and 16 inch. Does a PI detector see deeper with the same size coil than a VLF detector on something like a brass collar disk or a silver quarter? Or does it face the same basic depth limitations as the VLF machines based on coil size? The soil will be somewhat mineralized due to the amount of rust iron nails of different sizes.

I'm sure that I'll have more questions later but that is my first for now. Thank you for your help.

Sent from my SM-G998U1 using Tapatalk


i read a little on the detector its either eliminate small targets and only sound off on large targets for leave the reject off and dig everything... it says making it ideal for relic and meteorite hunting...


Where are you planning to hunt with it?

I started with a pulse but I was hunting with it in the saltwater... unless you are a relic hunter its probably going to drive you crazy in the dirt....

https://www.goldenmaskdetectors.com/deep-hunter-details-id-71-en.htm
 
The PI you are receiving tomorrow purchasing I know nothing about

secondly a PI machine will see quite a bit deeper then a VLF I use a whites TDI or did I have since sold the TDI and am in the market for a different PI, the ground I detect is extremely mineralized all my VLFs will not see a target much deeper then 6 inches and its a struggle at that its closer to the 5 inch mark where the TDI will see a target at 12 inches or deeper it really depends on the ground you are detecting my main detecting is for gold nuggets the ground I detect has extreme amounts of magnetite which makes for a difficult detecting situation and all VLFs struggle for depth single frequencies have a better shot at depth then the multi frequency detector in the VLFs
 
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