Choice - New Minelab 180 DigiSearch Meter - or - SunRay DTI ?

[Elton Noway]

First... I'm not even sure if you can buy a new DTI II or III anymore. (Have only seen used ones being sold)

Anyway, I did a few preliminary searches trying to find if anyone that is familiar with both meters and if they have an option as to which they prefer... and why. I believe I read that Mike Bearden owned both meters at one time but can't remember if I ever read of any comparison. Mike... any comments?

So... how does the new Minelab 180 meter (on Elite) or as the GT option... stack up against one of the DTI meters. I have the new Minelab meter but its not the best design! On the GT anyway... it mounts at an angle awkward for viewing. Almost forces you to do an after market mod like Mike B did (elevating the front) Also, it would have been real nice if they would have incorporated a back lit display... or any kind of light for that matter. (Or are we supposed to stop detecting when the sun goes down?) :lol
Elton

 

[Rick(ND)]

Elton,

Sun Ray dont make a DTI meter at this time, so we look for the used ones if we want one. I picked up a used DTI 2 and a DTI 3 since the first of the year off the fourms. The DTI 3 has a back light in it for those that like to hunt in the dark.
I haven't tried the new Minelab digital meter they make for the GT with the 180 numbers, but used a couple that were the 550 meters and were rescaled to read 180. My finding is the rescaled meter seems to stay calibrated a little better, that is if you don't bump the adjustment control or put a O ring under the adjustment knob to hold it in place better. Being it stays calibrated more it seem not as sensitive as the SunRay meter on the close target numbers. Some may find this odd, but if I calibrated the Sunray to read 179-180 on a new dime my copper pennies and clad would read the 179-180, but silver would stay more at the 180 numbers and we have seen a few silver quarters and half read 180-181. I never seen this on the rescaled Minelab meter as it seem to be 180 on them all. I also notice on the Sovereign XS series the meter would be shorter and made it more streamline looking, but the viewing angle was a little off. Now on the Elite series is you used a SunRay probe a SunRay DTI meter would sit too high as it had to sit on top of the probe switching box unless you took off the control box mount under the shaft and replaced it with a V clip.The Minelab meter seem to work better if you used the probe switching box on topof the shaft. On the new GT as you notice the V clip for the meter is mounted further ahead on the shaft in order for you to see the meter because of the hand grip on the new straight shaft. I put the SunRay DTI 3 meter on mine and it is at a perfect spot and easy to see. I added a S1 probe to mine and mounted a V clip under the top one, but moved it back towords the arm cuff a little to keep it from being nose heavy and the toggle switch easier to get at.
Myself I preferre a SunRay DTI meter over the others, but havent tried one of the Patriot meters Joe Patrick builds and sells. I hear he will be making a new mounting bracket so it can be used on top of the handle on the GT which will be nice, but like I say I wonder how good it really will be compared to the SunRays for IDing.

Rick

 

[Mike Bearden]

As far as I'm concerned the new meter for the GT and it's mount left allot to be desired.
First off it would NOT stay calibrated no matter what I tried, an O ring, hot glue on the shaft or whatever just didn't cut it .. just bump the meter and it was off by 3-4 numbers and sometimes more.
And YES it was aggravating to have to look over the hand grip to see the meter and I just had enough and went ahead with my mods. This GT is such a great machine and with the mods done now I really ENJOY using it.
Now about comparing the meters. The Sunrays are absolutely great and I wasn't sure how they would compare until the mods were done on the stock Minelab meter but here's what I found.
The GT meter with a detent knob and the calibration reset internally will give the EXACT same results that RickND was talking about with the Sunray meter. It's very consistent on the silver quarters and halfs reading 180-181 and copper pennies will hit 179-180 depending on depth.
Clad dimes and quarters will never read over 180 and I even pulled a 1976 half at 5" that read 180.
So ... bottom line for me, if I had bought a GT without the new meter and was trying to make a decision on picking up a nice used Sunray or the new GT meter ... it would be the Sunray although after the mods are done to the GT meter it will perform admirably and is just as accurate.
But .... you should NOT have to do this to a new meter,:rant however, I do like the low battery feature.
H.H.
Mike

 

[Dan R.]

I have no experience with other meters other then the new meter for the GT Sov.

I had inquired about the 170 or 180 setting with minelab and was told its up to personal preference as far as the setting . I set my meter for the 170 on a clad dime.
Aside from the easy to move adjustment knob I find the setup in numbers for my meter very accurate and enough differences to allow me to determine most all coins apart, the silver, the clads the pennies the pullabs the nickels. Whether its BBS , this is the most accurate meter I have experienced as far as number id readouts from other types of detectors with the number id. Yes the angle to read it can be a pain but I don't primarily rely on reading but mostly on sound. I think what I seen on Dixie Dave the meter mount would solve the angle read thing even with the straight shaft.
doesn't require a redesign of the detector to bad MInelab had not offered it with the new straight shaft. I do like the idea of being able to adjust the meter to work with my detector. I don't subscribe with each and every detector being exactly the same so maybe thats why I am contrary to same same for all detectors. I make my own chart and don't rely on a 180 chart designed from some other sov model even when it may be two models removed from the sov I use.


HH

Dan R.

 

[Mike Bearden]

and I can appreciate where you're coming from Dan
I guess I've gotten so use to the 180 number system on a Sovereign that anything else just seems out of the ordinary to me. Just kind of goes against my grain.
Glad yours is working out so well for you, I tested another new GT meter on a different GT and got the same results as my personal set-up ... go figure :wacko
I just got in a few minutes ago from that old school yard and found some more goodies with the GT and will post them later.
H.H.
Mike

 

[Dan R.]

Regardless about the meter setup there is one thing in agreement on and that is the GT Sov is sure a fine detector. I am just still learning to appreciate how good it is. I have to learn more about hitting on the real deep ones yet but have been finding less deep stuff down to 6 and seven inches with the 8 tornado coil in among a lot of iron I had missed before using other detectors. A few places I tried it in bad ground it will do pretty good in the all metal tracking mode. I had a problem with most detectors detecting the ground and not being able to ground balance very well at those places , but the GT Sov does best there so far then other detectors. While using it in id discriminate mode it would null pretty much constant and not to good a depth or stability unless I had sensitivity way down to nothing and even in auto sense mode it was not stable even running threshold in the bad ground area I refer to meter was useless there also as it mostly showed minus and big numbers in the 400's. The auto track all metal mode made the detector seem almost like having two different detectors , one that worked and one that didn't. From what your saying about the meters it seems that the individual meters are slightly different in their internal calibrations. It may be my meters internals along with the outside calibration matches up better in a slightly different range which I prefer to use rather then attempt the mods mentioned in the different posts. Not disagreeing or saying the mod and 180 setup is not a good thing but just offering the possibility that using a different setup number may be the easier way to go and have accuracy.

HH

Dan R.