I’ve dug more iron today than I think I’ve ever dug in my life. I’m not even kidding. Great sound, ID,etc…Gen program, 5 tone, stock disc screen, multi,,sens at 22 and recovery at 5..Noise cancellation and gb in clean ground too..This thing loves iron, nails,bolts, etc..I’ve messed with the adjustment, did a master reset and started from scratch, same results..I have never dug a nail or any iron in this park with the equinox 800.

woodbutcher said:

I’ve dug more iron today than I think I’ve ever dug in my life. I’m not even kidding. Great sound, ID,etc…Gen program, 5 tone, stock disc screen, multi,,sens at 22 and recovery at 5..Noise cancellation and gb in clean ground too..This thing loves iron, nails,bolts, etc..I’ve messed with the adjustment, did a master reset and started from scratch, same results..I have never dug a nail or any iron in this park with the equinox 800.

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I would get on Youtube and consume as much Manticore videos as possible. Iffy Signals does Manticore videos. There has to be something you may have overlooked. I personally Do not have any experience with a Manticore. Many people Rave about them. Sometimes newer detectors have more adjustments that need to be tweaked to get the performance you’re looking for. Just some thoughts. hopefully you will get in tune with the Manticore. I Struggled with the D2 at first but now I wouldn’t trade it for anything! HH Tony

woodbutcher said:

I’ve dug more iron today than I think I’ve ever dug in my life. I’m not even kidding. Great sound, ID,etc…Gen program, 5 tone, stock disc screen, multi,,sens at 22 and recovery at 5..Noise cancellation and gb in clean ground too..This thing loves iron, nails,bolts, etc..I’ve messed with the adjustment, did a master reset and started from scratch, same results..I have never dug a nail or any iron in this park with the equinox 800.

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Did you have iron audio turned ON?

jmaclen said:

Did you have iron audio turned ON?

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Yes

The only times that I dig iron or steel by accident is when they are at edge of detection depths. Otherwise, iron and steel targets that are mid depth to shallow are easy for me to determine by their audio responses, intermittent red numbers and target traces.

I had the same issue with the 900. Upgraded from the 600 and was digging more iron than I ever did. Sounded good from multiple angles, no iron grunts. Dig it and then swing again when its out and I get obvious iron sounds from it. Figured it was just the angle of the item but it kept happening. Ended up selling the 900 but this really doesn't make me want the Manticore either.

woodbutcher said:

Yes

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I use All Terrain General with a similar setup to what you described. I did have to turn up the ferrous tone volume a lot to be able to hear it clearly. The M105 headphones have a more lively sound quality than the previous model that came with the 600/800 but at least to my ears, they still sound kind of muffled especially on the lowest and highest tones.

Sounds like a cherry pickers worst nightmare.

In my limited experience, Manticore is very hot on nails but it also has the tools to mitigate the falsing. Consider using the stabilizer at 4 or 5 and see if that helps quiet down the nails. Watch the 2D screen and if the target is showing in the iron area and not on the center line, pass on it. Also, use a slower sweep speed when you are in iron and be sure to hit each target several ways, 90-degrees etc.

What Tony-OK said about videos is valuable. I watched tons of hours of video before even getting the machine. One creator has an excellent 20-minute video where he goes over and digs "bad" signals along with good signals in real-world detecting. The iron falsing audio sound is different. It is scratchy, and not solid.

I'm gonna get into the settings a little more to try and tone it down, but I'm not sure that's gonna do a lot for the high numbers and the great audio associated with the iron falsing.. on the bright side I'm eliminating the iron in my park now with the manticore for future machines and hunts..

I have said that in quite a few of my posts. The Manticore loves iron. It mostly comes down to tone. And a bit of TDI. I have to agree with Woody about getting a great tone. Something I don't ever remembering with the Equinox was a tone so smooth and round sounding and it turned out to be a small bent nail. With the Manticore I have had that happen, more than enough times, a signal so smooth I would have bet lunch that it was a silver or at very least a non ferrous keeper. One thing I have noticed along with a smooth tone a keeper will generally give a tight VDI within three numbers. Another thing I use is 5 tone. My bins have different pitch and volume for each one, so if I get a nice high tone, which starts at 79on my machine and the VDI is reading in the 20s-30s and so on, pretty good indication it ain't the prom queen virgin I was hoping to find. I'm still fairly new IMO to the Manticore but the success I have had so far tells me it has a lot more to give if I take the time to learn it. Training my ear, learning the trace will pay off in the future. I still dig those " what if " "well it could be " signals knowing full well its probably iron but in my mind its part of the learning curve. The one problem I've had the last half dozen hunts or so are those smashed flat aluminum twist caps down in the 6-7 inch range. They sound and trace so good you can't pass them up. Well Woody I hope you give a few more tries before you sell it. Good luck. Mark

markinswpa said:

I have said that in quite a few of my posts. The Manticore loves iron. It mostly comes down to tone. And a bit of TDI. I have to agree with Woody about getting a great tone. Something I don't ever remembering with the Equinox was a tone so smooth and round sounding and it turned out to be a small bent nail. With the Manticore I have had that happen, more than enough times, a signal so smooth I would have bet lunch that it was a silver or at very least a non ferrous keeper. One thing I have noticed along with a smooth tone a keeper will generally give a tight VDI within three numbers. Another thing I use is 5 tone. My bins have different pitch and volume for each one, so if I get a nice high tone, which starts at 79on my machine and the VDI is reading in the 20s-30s and so on, pretty good indication it ain't the prom queen virgin I was hoping to find. I'm still fairly new IMO to the Manticore but the success I have had so far tells me it has a lot more to give if I take the time to learn it. Training my ear, learning the trace will pay off in the future. I still dig those " what if " "well it could be " signals knowing full well its probably iron but in my mind its part of the learning curve. The one problem I've had the last half dozen hunts or so are those smashed flat aluminum twist caps down in the 6-7 inch range. They sound and trace so good you can't pass them up. Well Woody I hope you give a few more tries before you sell it. Good luck. Mark

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Hey Mark, I'm gonna give it a go. I was all prepared to kick this thing to the curb but I figured I'd try to figure it out..My stabilizer was turned off , so that could attribute to some of the iron. I have it set at 7 now and it's on..But the bent nails, and big iron whatnot were giving such a sweet round tone like you said I just knew I had a coin,and silver..In the end I was digging 8-10 inch rusty junk..
I had my sens at 28,no problem with emi and halfway through digging the iron I lowered it to 22 to see if that helped,,no dice, didn't help..
We will sée, I thought about a 9 inch coil but I figured I really prefer a 11 round over the 9 , preference..

I'm thinking you have some great ground for iron erosion.
Giving you that wonderful Halo effect.
Those iron crystal halos will fool the best detector's.
In an area like that with lots of Old iron.
I use a 1/4" 12" long screwdriver.
I push into the ground near the target and give it a good wiggle to break up that fragile crystal halo.
Depending on depth and ground a good heal stomp can break it.
Then rescan your target.
If you ever dig in blonde sand.
Digging up an old nail or iron you'll see the halo as an orangish red stain in the sand.
It's like the iron leaches out into the ground around it. It makes a bubble of iron crystals around it. And it is quite fragile.
Good Luck.
Never give up.

Odanscoils said:

I'm thinking you have some great ground for iron erosion.
Giving you that wonderful Halo effect.
Those iron crystal halos will fool the best detector's.
In an area like that with lots of Old iron.
I use a 1/4" 12" long screwdriver.
I push into the ground near the target and give it a good wiggle to break up that fragile crystal halo.
Depending on depth and ground a good heal stomp can break it.
Then rescan your target.
If you ever dig in blonde sand.
Digging up an old nail or iron you'll see the halo as an orangish red stain in the sand.
It's like the iron leaches out into the ground around it. It makes a bubble of iron crystals around it. And it is quite fragile.
Good Luck.
Never give up.

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Most of the iron I dug went away after I opened the hole. I didn't dig one coin that day, not even a screw cap,,all iron..I shoulda knew when the signal went away after I opened the hole it was all iron, but after the work of doing that I wanted to see what was in there..I guess I'm gonna try to trust the machine after the holes open, if it disappears I won't even turn the pp on.
Problem is I've had a lot of machines that wouldn't see the coin after the hole was open, but id get in there with the pinpointer and I'd find it..So it's hard not to go in after something

woodbutcher said:

Most of the iron I dug went away after I opened the hole. I didn't dig one coin that day, not even a screw cap,,all iron..I shoulda knew when the signal went away after I opened the hole it was all iron, but after the work of doing that I wanted to see what was in there..I guess I'm gonna try to trust the machine after the holes open, if it disappears I won't even turn the pp on.
Problem is I've had a lot of machines that wouldn't see the coin after the hole was open, but id get in there with the pinpointer and I'd find it..So it's hard not to go in after something

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This is something I use sometimes to help me decide to dig or not. It might give you another diagnostic option.

I switch to All Terrain High Conductors to investigate a questionable target that could be a piece of high tone falsing iron. I have ATHC setup with the same 5 tone audio as All Terrain General. If a deep target is giving me enough high tone audio responses to possibly dig but I am not sure I just hit the settings button and go to search modes-ATHC and swing over the target from the exact same direction. If the high tone audio is gone or not as good and I am getting some red numbers I may walk on. If the high tone audio is still good but goes away with even a slight turn on the target (less than 45 degrees), I will also probably walk away.

I don't hunt all the time in ATHC. There is just too much iron mineralization here and that makes mid and low conductor target responses very iffy. I am always looking for gold jewelry too and I am older and hunt time has to be optimized so AT General is the best option for me.

Anyone that has read my posts knows that I have had incredible results with the Manticore and Deus 2 with minimal settings changes using their General programs right out of the box for finding deep edge of detection high conductor targets in moderate to high iron mineralization in public parks that supposedly were hunted out as far as older US silver coins. That is still happening. I may miss some here and there by thinking they are iron. However I will take a 50/50 chance for a silver coin all day. When I am using these detectors for deep silver the iron to silver ratio for what I end up digging is roughly 3 to 1. The wheat penny, Indian head, copper memorial ratio to silver is more like 10 to 1. So digging a lot of deep pennies instead of silver is more of an issue for me than digging deep iron. Using ATHC can help with that too since it usually tightens up the target IDs.

jmaclen said:

This is something I use sometimes to help me decide to dig or not. It might give you another diagnostic option.

I switch to All Terrain High Conductors to investigate a questionable target that could be a piece of high tone falsing iron. I have ATHC setup with the same 5 tone audio as All Terrain General. If a deep target is giving me enough high tone audio responses to possibly dig but I am not sure I just hit the settings button and go to search modes-ATHC and swing over the target from the exact same direction. If the high tone audio is gone or not as good and I am getting some red numbers I may walk on. If the high tone audio is still good but goes away with even a slight turn on the target (less than 45 degrees), I will also probably walk away.

I don't hunt all the time in ATHC. There is just too much iron mineralization here and that makes mid and low conductor target responses very iffy. I am always looking for gold jewelry too and I am older and hunt time has to be optimized so AT General is the best option for me.

Anyone that has read my posts knows that I have had incredible results with the Manticore and Deus 2 with minimal settings changes using their General programs right out of the box for finding deep edge of detection high conductor targets in moderate to high iron mineralization in public parks that supposedly were hunted out as far as older US silver coins. That is still happening. I may miss some here and there by thinking they are iron. However I will take a 50/50 chance for a silver coin all day. When I am using these detectors for deep silver the iron to silver ratio for what I end up digging is roughly 3 to 1. The wheat penny, Indian head, copper memorial ratio to silver is more like 10 to 1. So digging a lot of deep pennies instead of silver is more of an issue for me than digging deep iron. Using ATHC can help with that too since it usually tightens up the target IDs.

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Have you tried ATLC and then switch to A THC to discern iron ?
Just curious.
Being nearly bed ridden I've hardly gotten past the front yard with my Manticore and Legend.

I wish somebody would try the old screwdriver trick and report how it worked for them.
Saved me from digging a lot of iron back in the day.
You want to be within an inch or two of the target.

woodbutcher said:

Most of the iron I dug went away after I opened the hole. I didn't dig one coin that day, not even a screw cap,,all iron..I shoulda knew when the signal went away after I opened the hole it was all iron, but after the work of doing that I wanted to see what was in there..I guess I'm gonna try to trust the machine after the holes open, if it disappears I won't even turn the pp on.
Problem is I've had a lot of machines that wouldn't see the coin after the hole was open, but id get in there with the pinpointer and I'd find it..So it's hard not to go in after something

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Your digging tool broke the halo.
Though when that happened the good target usually spoke loud and clear.

The only time I've experienced loosing a target after breaking ground.
Was when the halo was caused by a tiny piece of iron that completely dissolved.
Like wire or small nails.
After breaking ground the target would completely disappear.
We used to call those ghost targets.
So many people thought their was something wrong with their machines.

That's been my experience in the US anyways.
With American coins over the last 50 years.
Don't know about coins from Canada or Europe.

Anyways.
Wishing you better Luck.
Now I wanna see some Gold.
Silver would be good too.
Reading your stories is about all I can do anymore.

Odanscoils said:

Have you tried ATLC and then switch to A THC to discern iron ?
Just curious.
Being nearly bed ridden I've hardly gotten past the front yard with my Manticore and Legend.

I wish somebody would try the old screwdriver trick and report how it worked for them.
Saved me from digging a lot of iron back in the day.
You want to be within an inch or two of the target.

Your digging tool broke the halo.
Though when that happened the good target usually spoke loud and clear.

The only time I've experienced loosing a target after breaking ground.
Was when the halo was caused by a tiny piece of iron that completely dissolved.
Like wire or small nails.
After breaking ground the target would completely disappear.
We used to call those ghost targets.
So many people thought their was something wrong with their machines.

That's been my experience in the US anyways.
With American coins over the last 50 years.
Don't know about coins from Canada or Europe.

Anyways.
Wishing you better Luck.
Now I wanna see some Gold.
Silver would be good too.
Reading your stories is about all I can do anymore.

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I will do the screwdriver test next time I’m out at those iron filled sites and let you know how it works..
I had some time today to mess with a few settings. And do some reading..This machine is definitely different than the equinox, it’s a lot alike but a lot different..
I don’t do the test bed thing ,but I do have one I made for personal use ,to judge my own stuff.li made it around 2011 or so ,it’s been there awhile..I didn’t clean out the holes, or add anything other than a coin to the holes..
The 800 at sens of 22 and recovery of 5 crushes all 8 inch coins, they could be deeper now, who knows.
The manticore at 22 sens and recovery of 5 isn’t anywhere near as hard of a hit as the 800, I’d probably not hear them or assume they’re junk..Both machines in multi..
I dropped the manticore recovery to 3 and that’s where it clearly pulled away from the 800, I could hit my 10 inch coins hard with the manticore, no matter how I set up the 800 it won’t hit them as hard..When I raise up the sensitivity on the manticore past 22,23 it behaves just like the explorer SE does in my test bed…You can over power the manticore, same as the SE pro.. 22 sensativity on both the manticore and the SE pro and the 10 inch coins hit hard…Raise both of those machines upto 25 or more and the coins are gone…it’s almost like the machines blow past the coins and hit iron or whatever is below.
The etrac doesn’t do that , nor does the equinox..I can raise the sensitivity on both of those machines and they still hit the coins..I always knew the SE done that, never had another machine do that until I got the manticore..
The recovery speed imo affects depth more on the manticore than the sensativity does.I believe for now that the higher you raise the sensativity the more depth I’m losing anyway, past 22 sens it’s almost counter productive..At least these are my experiences in my test bed..
I’m gonna do a little more tinkering with this manticore and get some field time cause that’s where it really counts, I’m not into wearing my test bed out.lol.