Garrett Infinium Forum Classroom

Hey guys!
I just wanted to take a minute and thank you all for your contributions to this community. Your first hand experience and input is greatly appreciated.
I can't wait to get wet and go play!
P.S. Anyone else in out pillaging the beaches in Sarasota?

Todd I'm in the area and just got an infinium too. It will probably not be my main beach hunting unit though!!

I took it out yesterday and all I can say is DEEP!!!! I was digging caves out there! I got some really deep finds. I think I dug about 20 inches to retrieve a machbox car. The machine seemed to get a little chatty after I got it wet. Before when I was only on the dry sand it held a very smooth hum. Even when it's chatty it lets you know when you hit a target, big time. I need to get it more dialed in though. Before I went into the water I got a faint hit, dug, dug some more, and more. And at about 12 inches there was a junk ring. I have a feeling deep rings are going to be faint hits and not hard crisp tones like shallow trash.
Awesome machine, nice day on the beach, I'm happy.

Hey cntrydncr1, What are you using on the beach and what are your thoughts about it? Know of any awesome local spots I can go explore?

2nd trip out with the infinium today. It's still pretty noisy in the surf. I've read a few ways to de tune it but not sure which would have the best results. Any one want to share their techniques? I enjoy the machine but would like to dial it in a bit more.
Thanks!

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Diggin pull tabs in Sarasota

Hi Todd, just turn up the disc. a little. Try to keep it between 1 1/2 to 3. This will quiet it down for you. What this does is change pulse delay. Try not to go past 3 or you will start to lose the sensitivity for gold. Good targets will come through loud clear. All you need is more hours with unit. I have an Excal and have not picked it up once since getting the LS. Happy hunting,,John

I was sure to keep it under 3 and it screams when I hit a target. I was just concerned about missing a faint, deep target because of the bit of chatter. I dug all kinds of trash off Lido tonight and my brother was amazed how deep I was digging. Tent stakes at 16+ inches. Bottle tops at 12 and deeper. The tip end of a zipper at 10+, etc.. this thing goes deep, no doubt there. I'm going back out on monday and will spend most of the time in the water. Should be a good day of learning the machine some more.
Thanks for the tips!

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Diggin pull tabs in Sarasota

With the Infinium,

Iron items like tent pegs and nails give a lo/hi tone that give a double blip in one direction of sweep when they are lying flat in the sand and a single lo/hi when end on. In reverse disc the tones will reduce in volume but not by very much when compared to a silver ring which reduces considerably.

The disc of the Infinium is designed to seprate gold from iron. The signal from gold, if it is lo/hi in normal mode will change to hi/lo in rev disc and the signal strength will reduce considerably; If the tone from gold is hi/lo in normal mode it will be hi/lo in rev disc at a very reduced level.

Any signal that changes from lo/hi in Normal to hi/lo in Rev Disc or that is hi/lo in both modes at a reduced signal strength in Rev Disc should be investigated.

When using the Infinium (or any other detector for that matter) as a beach machine it is wise to dig all signals because as I have said on other forums; Too many good targets give bad target signals which means that if you use any discrimination at all you will walk over a lot of gold thinking it is trash.

TID detectors are great when you want to restrict your target range to specific target types

Trying to identify coins is not what the rev disc is designed for, so in order to achieve any sort of accuracy you will have to practice a lot with as many different coins as you can get your hands on, but do not expect the same results that you might get from a good VLF with TID.

If the Inf is noisy at the beach, do the frequency adjust first. Make sure that the mode is in Lock and start with the disc at zero. Try to get the threshold as quiet and as smooth as possible.

When doing the frequency adjust, move thr disc control in very small steps and wait a few seconds between each adjustment for the change to take effect.

To ground balance; Place the disc at zero, threshold at around 5 and mode in Fast Track and if you are going into the water do the GB on the wet sand.

When the GB is as good as you can get it and if there is still a bit of noise from the salt, set the disc up to approx 3; That is usually enought to quiet the salt. Then select Lock. If when in the water there is a bit of noise then do a gb in the water. Donot lift the coil out of the water when doing this and remember to reset the disc to zero before you carry out any ground balance adjust.
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Then do the Ground balance

Fishers Ghost
aka
Adrian SS



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/03/2012 08:02AM by Fishers Ghost.

Great post, Ghost! Thank you. I'm going to ditch work for a few hours today and hit the water. Last time out I stayed in the sand. Today I'll work the water and see how it goes. Looks like a beautiful day to hunt already! Here's hoping today is ring day!

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Diggin pull tabs in Sarasota

The Infinium and Discrimination.

I wish discrimination on any detector was cut and dried simple but it isn't.

Very generally speaking, Infinium Lo/Hi tones will be iron &steel and a lot of rusty iron will often produce a Hi/Lo tone. Small Gold nuggets (0.1 gm to around 20 gm mostly will be Hi/Lo and beyond that the larger nuggs will mostly be Lo/HI depending on what other metals are in the nugget.
The main thing to remember with gold is that no matter what tone it gives in the Normal mode it will give a Hi/Lo tone in reverse discrimination.

So a simple rule is that you should always dig a target that produces a Hi/Lo tone in rev disc at a lower volume than what it produced in normal mode.

Small gold nuggets will disc out in rev disc therefore ANY weak signal that discs out in rev disc should be uncovered enough to determine what tone it is in rev disc. If it is Hi/Lo then it Might be gold. ( but not always, Discrimination is not foolproof)

Silver often gives a Lo/Hi tone in normal and rev disc (some is Hi/Lo) at a reduced strength to what it gives in normal mode; ( A silver target does not reduce in strength as much as a similar sized gold nugg) So what you are looking for is a target that reduces in strength and or changes to Hi/Lo in rev disc if you want to find gold or silver.

When you use the Rev Disc to check for a tone change, always turn the control full clockwise.... and remember to reset it to zero before you continue detecting. Also whenever you re ground balance , make sure the disc is set to zero first.

Steel Bottle caps almost always give a Hi/Lo tone.
If you get a very strong Hi/Lo in Normal mode that discriminates out pretty much completely in reverse disc, then the odds are pretty good that it is a steel bottle cap. ( A strong signal from gold will not disc out completely in rev Disc) If you get a strong Lo/HI in normal that is still strong in rev disc then you are likely to have a coat hangar or tent peg or iron bolt/nut type of target. (but might be silver)
Bobby pins are Hi/Lo and give a multiple signal tone change in one sweep direction as do small bits of steel wire.

Some rusty steel bottle caps can give a signal very like gold and you have no choice but to dig these signals.

Aluminium drink cans are mainly Lo/Hi tone in both normal and rev disc (but not always, so you might find yourself digging a few of these.

If you are searching mullock heaps looking for small gold tossed out from the lead below then I would sugest that you use the 8 inch mono or either of the two small double Ds. The mono is very sensitive and gets good depth. The small dds will find the same size gold as the small mono but at less depth.
Scan very slowly and listen for the quiet Hi/Los, donot bother with the Rev disc in this case and dig All targets.

I could go on forever about the Infinium but this will do for now.

Cheers,
Fishers Ghost

Just printed your post so I can toss it in my bag. It's my new field guide! Awesome tips! Thanks again

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Diggin pull tabs in Sarasota

G/Day ToddD,
I wish you success with the Inf.
Have a bit of patience with it as there will be times when it drives you nutts and if/when you find anything re the infinium that goes against any of my comments, feel free to drop me a PM.
Just remember that the disc on this detector is no different than other machines in that it is a guide only. You will need to bench test a lot of different targets at different disc settings to get the best use from it and that the Reverse Disc feature is designed primarily to seperate gold from iron.

I'm mostly working on the beaches right now. I only have 8 hours total with this machine now. I dig every target. It's a bit tricky in the surf and it's been a ton of fun on the sand. I realize there is a lot of 'class' time with this machine. If you can really call strolling the beaches class time! I haven't been using reverse disc as much as I should be but I'll use it on every target from now on to get used to it's operation.

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Diggin pull tabs in Sarasota

I went to siesta beach for 2 hours yesterday. Spent the entire time in the water. An unbelievable 0 targets found and crazy noise from the machine. I spent much of my time trying to tune it. Each wave would cause a long drawn out tone like mentioned in this other thread. Obviously I didn't get it balanced correctly. Total time with the machine now at 10 hours.
I'm going to use this thread as a bit of a journal to record my experiences.
I want to mention that I was in a hurry as it was close to sunset. Lesson learned with this machine. Take your time, or waste your time.

This is a great gem of advise in that other thread.
Basically what Ghost said but with bullet points. :-)

"1. Switch Off.
2. set threshold to 4 and disc to zero.
3 With coil flat on the sand, switch on straight to Lock and wait for the battery check and then let the detector stabilise for a minute or so
4. Listen for any elec interference and adjust for the quietest position if necessary.
5 Reset disc to zero and threshold to 4 after frequency adjust. Carry out frequency adjust with mode in Lock.
6. Select Fast track and attempt to ground balance on the wet sand by pumping the coil up and down several times until the ground balance is as best as you can get it. and then select Lock.(while coil is still on the ground) and then set Threshold to where you like it.
7. Lift the coil off the sand, if it produces a tone then the Ground Bal is still not right. Re Do the above until tone changes are minimal. When all is OK;
8. Set Disc to 3 to compensate for the salt. This should remove any remaining tone changes when the coil was raised.You can set the disc as high as 4 without loosing too much sensitivity to 10/18ct gold.
If all is well the machine should be fairly quiet when you scan the wet sand.
Now take the detector into the water just a few inches deep and retry, it should still be fairly quiet.
If the machine becomes noisy as you get into deeper water then re ground balance as per the above instructions. Do not let the coil come up out of the water while attempting ground balancing in the water. (REMEMBER TO RESET THE DISC TO ZERO BEFORE RE GROUND BALANCING)."

Salt Water ground balancing thread

Wanted to ad another article I found. Some great pinpointing tips.
LS article, review with pinpointing tips

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Diggin pull tabs in Sarasota



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/08/2012 10:34AM by ToddD.

HI Todd.

I have experienced the Crazy Tones that you mentioned and they are caused by rapidly changing salt mineralisation as the waves pass over the coil,.
They are not easy to eliminate but with carfull setting of the GB and disc they can be reduced conciderably. Try running in fast track for a while and as soon as you hear a smooth threshold, select lock and see how that works. Also you may need to switch to the 8 inch mono or the 5 x 10 DD.
The big mono can be a bit difficult to quiet down in the wave action.
I have yet to find a beach where I have not been able to achieve very satisfactory operation in the waves.
I will say that even in all of those drawn out long tones you will still hear a target signal as a quick hi/lo or lo/hi in the middle of it all if a target is within range.

Ok, i went to a new beach that is a busy fishing spot (trash) because I wanted to go where I knew there would be a lot of targets (more trash) and am feeling much better about the machine. It really is just a matter of time and getting used to how it operates. Also, scored a 1942 war nickel. That was a nice bonus. To date the most valuable coin I have found. Hopefully that changes soon but still a cool find. I also found a spoon at 12 inches down in the dry sand which was a surprise.
Thanks for all the tips! I'm really starting to enjoy this machine.
I meant to take out the stock 10 x 14 coil and use it but I forgot it. I'll give it a shot next time.

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Diggin pull tabs in Sarasota