discrimination??

[Anonymous]

As some of you know,I just purchased an expl II.Like I have posted here a few times,my son has a tesoro compadre.I can turn the one adjustment past pull tabs,then nickels are discriminated,but I can dig lots of quarters,dimes,and its a killer on pennies and even rings.My observation from the forum here is to "dig" everything??I would think that the discrimination on a thousand dollar machine verses a 150 dollar tesoro, would have to be MUCH better,but a lot of you are saying irons a problem?.Cut me some slack here , as the grounds still frozen here in michigan,so I have not had any experience with the expl yet except all the research I am doing here and everywhere to get ready for spring.thanks

 

[Anonymous]

Heck you are talking about cherry picking recently dropped clad coins with a 5-6 inch machine and we are talking about 10 inch plus coins that may have been buried for 100 years..Iron mask is simply hearing the iron so we can detect a deep silver coin without undue masking. I feel many newbies or even oldbies new to an Explorer are being totally confused by some well meaning people makig an easy machine seem hard..Do yourself a favor and run with the preset mode until you get a feel for the machine or go to Jim Voke's page and try his simple setup until you can experiment.As far as digging all seems like some of the fellows hunt way in the woods armed with large shovels and do dig every repeatable signal and do make some nice finds digging all. I admire you for preparing for the Spring but all you read on this forum is not for the newbie, but more experienced users and for that matter not written in stone.

 

[Anonymous]

I would not need a top line machine to hunt new drops anyplace
But to get in well hunted or real trash thats the user ability and knowing what to use and when that will shine <img src="/metal/html/smile.gif" border=0 width=15 height=15 alt="">

 

[Anonymous]

ya learn as you go along that cherry pickin has advantages and disadvantages <img src="/metal/html/shocked.gif" border=0 width=15 height=15 alt=":shock">
when you hit a very nice productive site and you make some sweet finds cherry pickin you may want to continue if you can to hunt that site and not be so picky <img src="/metal/html/biggrin.gif" border=0 width=15 height=15 alt="">
You would be surprized at what ya find... thats the dig it all comes into play
Sometimes just a short hunt or certain site wont allow a dig all and you have to go for just the sweeter targets <img src="/metal/html/smile.gif" border=0 width=15 height=15 alt="">

 

[Anonymous]

The 2-D display and tones on the explorer will give you MUCH more information about what is in the ground than any cheaper(or maybe as or more expensive) detector. Whether you dig based on this information is what takes lots of experience. When you first start out it is pretty good advice to start digging almost every signal to get an idea of what the machine is telling you. You'll get tired of this soon, but it is a good place to start.
The real trick in becoming proficient is being able to pick good targets out of trashy areas. The reality is that unless you have some virgin sites most of the remaining coins are there because they are masked by trash. Many of us who have been using the explorer for years still profess to be learning more about this every time we use it.
The posts of finds on this forum are proof it can be done. Many sites that were considered "worked out" come alive again with the explorer.
Probably the most common misconception is that you can program the machine to do all the work for you; set up a discrimination pattern and only dig the good targets while never missing any of the oldies and deepies. It simply doesn't work that way. It takes quite a bit of work to become proficient and people that stick with it are almost always rewarded for their efforts.
Chris

 

[Anonymous]

Would think a couple simple sentences covered a lot...

 

[Anonymous]

Still am throughly confused as to why hunt in Iron Mask. Last time out was finally able to find deep coins and was hunting in advanced smart.Is IM a function of every screen or something seperate. In IM there isn't any depth information.

 

[Anonymous]

Jim
Iron Mask is a special way of discriminating based upon the Ferrous reading of the target.
Iron mask is independent of which screen you are hunting in. Iron Mask blacks out a portion of the screen in such a manner that the blacked out region is always a rectangle from the bottom to the top of the screen. Targets that fall in the blacked out region are discriminated out.
* If you set the Iron Mask to -16, then the entire screen is open (white) which means that there is no discrimination.
* As you change the mask number from -16 to -15, then you get just a narrow vertical black strip on the extreme left of the screen.
* You can continue to adjust the mask number to 0. For this case the left half of the screen is black (discriminated out) and the right half is white (every thing in this region is accepted)
* Most people that use Iron Mask probably use a setting between -10 and -14.
AN IMPORTANT NOTE
If you use the Digital Screen, then the amount of Iron Masking does not appear on the screen, but it is still in force. In the Digital Screen mode (and any mode for that manner) You can tell when you are in the Iron Mask mode by the the shaded box above the Iron Mask button on the front panel
Hope this helps,
Glenn

 

[Anonymous]

Jim,
When you first hit the iron mask button you have to PICK the level of iron mask you want to use. After you pick the level (-16 to -6) then hit the detect button and you're set. If you did everything right your screen will not have any discrimation patterns but will have a darkened vertical line on the left side. How wide the darkened area is dependenton how much iron mask you are using. The screen you hunt in will have the same icons as before but the screen will almost total be white/cleared of any darnkened areas. There WILL be a depth gauge where it normally is. There are two screens in which iron mask can be active. The one with the ferrous/conduct values and the screen with the crosshairs. Either one will work. It should say right above the iron mask button if it on or not is denoted by a darkened '-' above the on/off writing.
Why hunt in iron mask? Operating the Explorer in iron mask will help you get targets that pull to the left of the LCD ID and thus out of the 'normal' accepted discrimation target ID but the sound ID will still sound correct. This allow you to hear the targets better because they don't have a 'clipped' audio. Sometimes in discrimation mode you wouldn't even hear the target because it gets pulled so hard to the left and out of the accepted range. A target gets pulled to the left due to alot of different circumstances. Iron and a coin close will pull the ID to the left. A deep coin sometimes get pulled to the left also. Learn your sound IDs and don't rely on the LCD IDs and you will become very proficent with the Explorer.
I hope this is what you were not understanding.
-Bill