9" & 10" Deep Coins with AKA Signum

[earthmansurfer]

I've been looking for a lighter E-Trac so to speak and came across the Signum. It certainly has depth, not as refined as an E-Trac (e.g. VDI) but a nice machine depth wise, VERY powerful.
Here is my story from a few days ago...

What a crazy day yesterday was. I went to a detecting spot where my friend the day before found a grenade (I'm in Germany). I left before him and thought he would call the police. He market the spot with a stick. Yesterday the grenade was still there! I told some city workers there (in my bad German) and they called the cops, and had me check it with my detector. The grenade was picked up by the cop. He wasn't sure if it was a grenade and he walked off with it. I heard no explosions so guess all was ok. BTW - The guy who found it is my neighbor who digs terrible holes (made a video of it and it got an interesting response last year on Youtube!) I really get the feeling that the Universe rewarded me for a deed well done...

Anyway, I was detecting the area he had hit yesterday which coincidentally is an area I had marked off and hit with my E-Trac from MANY directions. I also hit it with the CTX lightly.
Well, 2 minutes in I got a nice signal showing depth. I didn't film from the start as bottlecaps at depth are tricky and I had dug my share (more to learn the machine, was only fooled on a few of them.) This coin was 2" farther than my Lesche blade - 9" down there. A slightly smaller than quarter sized silver 1934 D-Mark. Here is a short video. [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kw1R71ukaw8[/video]

Just a couple of minutes later I got a nice signal about 8 feet away that showed an intensity level of 1 to 3 (deeeeeep) and gave a VDI of 45 or so. That is often a coin, but not a silver one. So, I didn't start filming. But, at 10" down, I saw a hint of silver and started the camera. It is a very collectable coin, a Moroccan French coin from the 1920's (looks silver but is nickel). Nice short video (I think!) [video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgnyuSelYXE[/video]
This is INSANE depth in my soil. I had dug coins hitting 9" but this was a solid 9 AND it hit fine with Turbo off and the sensitivity at 5! (I was using a sensitivity of 10 with Turbo on in STL-RT mode, with RT at 0 for a quieter hunt.) Gary was right, this thing is deep even when not run hot. What the heck is AKA doing under the hood?

This detector is so damn powerful, it blows me away. And with VID and tones to boot. So flexible in how you can set it up. The intensity meter (depth meter essentially) and VDI is not accurate like an E-Tracs. It seems much more sensitive to the iron in the ground so it gets jumpy. BUT, I pay that price every day as the machine is just a pleasure to swing. The balance is spot on. I have basically found my E-Trac replacement. I wouldn't use it to cherry pick like the E-Trac can do, but I still would take it as a general replacement if I had to choose just one. I have used this detector 2X, 4 hours each. And in that time, I have found the deepest coins ever. I hope you guys that know me realize I am pretty critical of machines and I say the good with the bad (as above), but this machine is the real deal. I don't know how they get the depth with such great stability, but they do.

EMS

 

[azsh07]

I have been using the SIgnum MFT here and have been getting great depth on coins. Nice to someone else post on here using the Signum or Sorex even.

I have ordered the Berkut 5.15 which is on it's way now. Has a different set of features in the menu than the Sorex and Signum.....more ability to edit some settings and has up to 91 tones but lacks the multiple audio tone styles like ST-P.....so it is mostly ST with 1,2,5,10 or 91 tone settings.

Nice coin and I believe the depth...it is a deep machine...especially with the correct coil size and frequency.

Also...I wrote the English version of the manual.....just curious as to what your thoughts were in reading it. I will say it was NOT FUN to do. Trying to interpret Russian using software and then changing it again to something that resembled English was a pain. If you notice you can see where I had to just leave the rough Russian explanations as I was not sure sometimes what they were saying. Only a few spots where you get the direct Russian to English text.

Now I have to translate the Berkut manual...even worse..and longer.

 

[earthmansurfer]

Hi azsh07,
Thanks for the manual! Couldn't have used the detector as well without you. You did a great job in that it is very readable and looks like an excellent translation. I'm an English teacher so can say that with some honesty.
I forget the spot but there was one or two sentences I wasn't clear on but that might have just been me. I'll PM you if I have that happen again.

I WISH the Signum had 91 tones, would be more E-Trac like. But to be honest, I don't hunt primarily in the ST-P mode (polyphonic) and like the "dink" sound of the STL-RT mode (which I use with RT at 0 = Quiet). I know there is good leading information with the RT side but it is too much audio fatique where I hunt. The polyphonic mode is much more sensitive (and sometimes to a fault) with iron.

The depth is real BUT it came from a bit loamy soil as you can see. I did find the 7.5" button (different video) in a harder soil, but same spot. Have you gotten depth in harder packed soil, bit more mineralization, etc?

What do you think of the S mode (Bottle Cap reject)? It works most of the time but on deeper coins or coins in iron, you MUST be careful. I notice I dig way more targets with the Signum as the VDI is a bit jumpy.
Also, any ideas on sensitivity as it relates to gain? e.g. high sensitivity, lower gain vs the opposite - case uses.

I'm looking forward to that dual frequency coil (or machine) they are working on.

EMS

 

[azsh07]

The polyphony mode IMHO does not seem to ID iron sometimes as well as the other modes. If you center over some iron it will lock on to a good high tone sometimes....others seem to think different but I don't use ST-P in iron trash.

I do like the RTM mode in iron but it is a lot of audio to deal with but the mode with the best iron feedback. Not a mode for everyone.

On the S mode. It only works reliably with a signal rating above 15 ( upper right number) and best above 20 IMHO. Below those numbers I don't use it as it seems to be a cr@p shoot..especially below 15. Manual says 10 I think but 15 and above to me. Then only if the target is flat and round of symmetrical. If it is large rusty horse shoe lets say then S mode is not as useful. it is designed for bottlecaps mainly. target has to be swept completely off the coil with no other targets coming into play....so you don't want to do a narrow wiggle on it.

So for bottlecaps and washers etc that are under 8" deep it works well.

As for sensitivity and gain. Gain is transmit power, or current, going to the coil. higher number then obviously more current through the coil with TURBO being ultra max current.

ST and RT sensitivity sets the receive amplifiers break over threshold for responding to received targets. The higher the number the more sensitive it is to smaller and smaller received signal. Hence why it gets jumpy when set high.

Which way to set them up depends on what you are detecting in. In heavy trash I don't run Gain very high or if the ground is highly mineralized. The old analogy to headlights in the fog. The Gain would be like setting the brightness of your lights and sensitivity would be like adjusting how sensitive your eyes are to light. ( I am sure you know this..just saying). So...in heavy trash and minerals pumping more power into the ground is counter productive and I will drop it a bit and turn up sens a bit on the ST channel until I get it as sensitive as possible without chirping.

On clean soil then I will pump up gain quite a bit and get max depth and then adjust sensitivity down now until it gets stable.

in areas with high EMI you can pump up gain and drop sens to try and over come the EMI......or also adjust the frequency offset...also try AF1 AF2 Af3 modes for EMI as they help.

Anyway so when to raise and lower each one depends on what is in the ground and what the ground is like. The more ground interference from trash and soil the drop the gain and adjust sens as needed. Also remember there is the ground filter for chirpy soils. Works well just keep it no more than half way or you will lose sensitivity to medium and large silver ( above half way..anything less is no issue).

On the sections where the manual was difficult to understand yah...I left it as I probably did not understand it either. the rough translation from Russian to English reads like a bad Russian impressionist....I laughed cause all I could hear Was Yakov Smirnoff in my head...." In Russia metal detector detects you..ah..ah..ah)\"

 

[earthmansurfer]

This was fun and I'm so glad I got it on film. This is a dime sized silver coin - German Pfennig .50 cent piece.
The interesting thing was I was hunting with Gain at 7 and Sensitivity at 10. Sensitivity at 5 WOULD NOT pick the coin up.
The larger silver coins hit at 5, but not this one.

I'm remembering that when shooting for depth. My Signum runs stable with gain at 8 even.
I tested a few other deep targets and if this was any thing like them, dropping the gain to 5 or 6 would not have picked the coin up
with the sensitivity at 10.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6X732ZYB8gg&feature=youtu.be[/video]

 

[earthmansurfer]

aszsh07 - Sounds like you really know the machine! Thanks for the great info.

Look at the video I just uploaded. I get that all the time in polyphonic - that iron edge while STL gives none. I thought I'd like poly sound more (E-Trac like) but prefer the STL for some reason.
Do you have any idea which modes are better where? You also don't like Poly in iron but you say it doesn't id iron well?

Thanks for the S mode tip - usually I just slow the swing a little and clear the target but now I know to keep doing that!

Yeah, sounds like sensitivity and gain are like on the V3i, as I felt. Do you ever open the Signum up? Note my video above and the response.


in areas with high EMI you can pump up gain and drop sens to try and over come the EMI......or also adjust the frequency offset...also try AF1 AF2 Af3 modes for EMI as they help.

Also remember there is the ground filter for chirpy soils. Works well just keep it no more than half way or you will lose sensitivity to medium and large silver ( above half way..anything less is no issue).

What did you mean with "above have way" here? Do the filters have an adjustment within?

Thanks again for the great manual,
EMS

 

[azsh07]

The ground filter is in the sub menu...this is the menu you access by holding the menu button down for a longer time than just the quick depress to get to the main menu. By half way I mean with it off the setting is 0 so if you set it on then anything from 1 to 6 is usually fine.

The Poly mode is ok in iron and some like it what I found was that sometimes if you are over a target like an oxe shoe, which we have many of, and you narrow your sweep over it all you will get is the high tone. For normal hunting it is fine...like maybe more modern areas like parks. I still prefer RT-ST...or RTL-ST. In heavy iron I subject myself to the RTM mode..I like it but it can get to be a burden in audio but it has the best un processed signal. Again some people love the STP mode in iron...so it really is a personal preference.

Which mode is better is just personal preference I think. They all work well and are all just as deep. I have talked to the Engineer in Russia who designed it and he said well the RTM mode is not as deep as the others but I never found that to be so....maybe in an air test but not in ground. I use RTM mode for checking probable rusty iron. I hunt in RT-ST and when I find an iffy target I swap to RTM. I then come in REAL slow from the edges and listen to see if I get a long iron tone lead in from two sides. If it is deep and I get a very quick short iron grunt before it swaps to a good tone I dig it. Deep targets especially mid range ones will have just a TAD of an iron sound on all sides...just a tad....whereas higher conductors wont.

Actually I can tell the target range best this way...as iron and even foil has a long iron sound leading in on the edges when you creep up on it. Mid range stuff is less by quite a bit....and deep copper and silver has almost none...IF DEEP...shallow targets have none at all. This is also good for targets that are next to each other where iron is next to a good target. You will get a very clean no iron sound from one side but iron along the other edges where the iron leads the target sweep. Works great...not perfect but about 80% accurate....the only target that trips this up is rusty tin roof material but...here the Hodograph then comes into play as it will be twisted.

Now a couple notes on the video and VDI numbers. First off on deep targets it does what many single frequency machines do and that is the VDI creeps up. My T2 and F75 did this...not uncommon. BUT...there is one mistake you are not aware of. You can't sweep a coin in the air in front of the coil and get an accurate VDI ONCE THE MACHINE HAS BEEN GB TO SOIL. I capitalize that because it is important. The software and design of the machine is such that......the VDI scale of the machine is set to compensate for the affects of soil minerals on the signal from the target and its affect on VDI skewing. SO...when we GB it takes into account the current GB offset from a Ferrite reference point. It then adjusts the VDI accordingly to compensate for the affects of ground that are a different degree of GB from Ferrite. If the degree of difference is 7 degrees then the VDI would be off by 8 numbers so..it loosk at this degree offset and adjust the VDI when you GB.

Now scan a coin in front of the coil while in the air...the ground signal is not there BUT the VDI correction factor is according to the current GB setpoint. Now place the coin on the ground and scan and you will get a different VDI number which should be correct.

OK...how do we know then what the correct VDI number is. Well...we test in air by using one of two methods....GB to a piece of ferrite THEN do an air test. Note the VDI number. Next time you GB to soil toss the same coin on the ground after the soil GB and the VDI will be almost exact or within 1-2 digits.
This skew is made more noticeable the more the soil GB point is off from ferrite.

The quick method to GB for air testing to get an idea of true VDI is if you do not have ferrite grab a CD or DVD. Put the detector in manual GB modes. Scan the CD slowly about 1-2" max from the coil. Adjust the GB line until it is VERTICAL. Then go to detect mode and scan again. A CD should VDI at 0 or within 1-2 digits of 0. This is just a quick cheat to set the GB manual without ferrite to get the GB offset close to what ferrite would normally gives. When GB to ferrite a CD will always give an air test of 0 plus or minus 1.

No need to do this more than once to test targets in house.

A simple point is do this..test your .50 Pehig in house. Then next time you detect do a GB on soil and toss the coin on the ground and scan...the VDI should be VERY close to in house..if not the GB is off and how far off is simple. 1 degree of GB error will give 1 VDI error in direction of GB error. Too positive GB and VDI will increase and vice versa.

last after you GB to soil and the cin VDI's close to in house air test....now raise the coil and sweep the coin...usually won't be the same as VDI on the ground....difference will tell you how many degrees ground is off from ferrite. This is also why a positive GB error will cause silver to push up and out of the +89 range and over into the -(0 range and be lost.
Ok thatw as way too much info I know...but play and see.

 

[earthmansurfer]

Great info aszh07. Noted in my Signum Book of Tips (Which I will share. I actually had a very popular V3i book of tips I had collected as well.)

Some more questions (and I hope this benefits others following this thread.) (I'm looking for maximum depth on coins.)

Turbo - If I can run at e.g. 7 on gain and 10 on sensitivity with Turbo on, would that be similar to 10 on gain and 10 on sensitivity, no Turbo? I mean is Turbo really just more gain, and if so, should we turn gain all the way up before even turning Turbo on? I'm trying to understand how it functions like in my hypothetical question. I want to know what is the best way to use Turbo for deeper coins. (BTW - My ground phase is usually at 23 or so, low to mid- ground mineralization I think.)

Ground Filters - I haven't heard anything on these. Are the 3 ground filters just stronger filters (for more mineralization) as you go from GF1 - GF3? (Much like on the V3i)

Sensitivity/Gain/Turbo with a ground filters - If I want maximum depth in my above noted soil, might it be better to try to max everything out by using a ground filter. (If the filters are as I describe them above, then probably GF1).

ST-RT vs STL-RT - I have tendency to use the latter as it is more quiet. What do you see as the differences? I often run my RT at 0 (due to so many targets) and STL is quiet there, but ST is still giving threshold it seems with RT at 0?

Thanks in advance,
Albert

 

[GroundScanner]

I sure would like a copy of the book of tips on the V3i. (Hint,hint) lol

 

[azsh07]

Turbo sets the current through the coil to max. It would not much matter what the gain was at. While gain also sets the current through the coil Turbo punches it even higher...above what gain alone can set. So would not think in Turbo Gain settings matter much although never tried really.....but no need to max Gain out to make Turbo deeper. Turbo depth is max depth no matter gain settings.

The ground response filter simply helps to reduce falsing from highly mineralized ground. If your ground is not causing any false responses then do not worry about it. You have to know if the false noise is ground or just your sensitivity set too high. Sensitvity too high will cause random noise where ground noise usually will repeat in the same area....plus sensitivity will chatter with the coil still.

Now the ground filter GS setting simply goes from 1-20 and lowest is less filtering and higher is more. Best used in highly conductive soils etc. if your soil is mild again don't need it. But it is one filter with 1-20 levels of filtering.

Really if you set your gain and sens so that they are stable but as high as possible..and still stable...depth will be fine. Sens at 10 is fine...gain at 8 is fine...yah if you can go higher great but really not a lot more depth to be had...just more noise.

How I use Turbo mode is to amplify deep weak signals. it drains the battery so fast I rarely hunt in it constantly. I run my gain around 8 or so...sens at 10-11 if possible but lower if too noisy. If I get a deep weak signal I tap the Turbo mode and it makes the target pop and strengthens the audio as well as the graph signal.

on the RT sensitivity settings. a setting of 0 will not make the RT channel quiet...nothing will....you can't turn it completely off on this machine....all you can do is make it less sensitive. On the Berkut you can make it silent search.

 

[earthmansurfer]

Ground Scanner - This should still work - V3i Advanced Book of Posts

azsh07 - Thanks again for the thorough explanation. One point though, you can hunt silently. In STL-RT with RT set at 0, iron volume at 1, you get ZERO threshold tone. I find it strange as when I do that in ST-RT, it doesn't work and you always get the threshold. For some reason that is not true in STL and it is generally how I hunt in trashier or target rich areas (quite successfully). Try it out and let me know if it works for you.

All the best,
Albert

 

[azsh07]

Well new one on me but also why I like when other people fiddle and find out new things. Nice to know as others have wanted to do silent search. Not sure why it works other than in RTL the tone goes quiet once the ST tone kicks in so...maybe this is why.
I sold my Signum to someone what wanted to try one and now have the Berkut to test. The Berkut does not have all the audio modes the other two do. Just RTL-ST. But you have a threshold level adjustment and when you set it to 0 there is no all metal or RT tone at all....plus as you increase it you adjust volume of threshold...but no sensitivity for the threshold tone. Much like a Whites that runs a threshold...like a Quantum I think..if I remember correctly.

Anyway nice to know when people ask me about making it quiet....RT sens at 0 and iron volume at 1....well cool!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[earthmansurfer]

Also, another intersting "oddity" I came across (don't think I saw this in the manual), Under detector settings when you set the recovery speed to MM, the only choices on the sound settings menu that I then see are ST-RT and STL-RT (for the respective user program).

I'm not sure why, but that is how it is. It drove me nuts at first as I thought only program 3 (where I had it set) was broke! lol

Thanks again for all the nice tips,
Albert

 

[azsh07]

Also, another intersting "oddity" I came across (don't think I saw this in the manual), Under detector settings when you set the recovery speed to MM, the only choices on the sound settings menu that I then see are ST-RT and STL-RT (for the respective user program).

I'm not sure why, but that is how it is. It drove me nuts at first as I thought only program 3 (where I had it set) was broke! lol

Thanks again for all the nice tips,
Albert

This is intentional due to the way that the MM mode works. You could not use the Polyphony mode in Metal Trash Mode (MM) so they eliminate it...also you could not use RTM either so that is also eliminated as an option in MM. This is due to the speed of the audio signal in MM and STP would just not work right..neither would RTM

If you had a Sorex yould see that the RTM and STP modes where listed but had an X through them when in MM.

Scott