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E Trac and relics

F

flashs

Member
Hello all,
I have had my E Trac for almost 2 yrs now, and have mostly hunted coins and jewelry in yards, parks, and school yards. I have many hours on the machine and while I haven't set the world on fire, it has found coins in places that I hunted with all the detectors I owned before I bought it. I don't do as well as many I read about, but I figure a lot of them have better sites to hunt. I think it's a good coin machine, especially in the trash.
Having said that, I just had my eyes opened while hunting with a partner at a Civil War battle site just South of Winchester, Va. I was using TTF and had my sens. turned to manual 26. My buddy called me over and asked me to check a signal. I ran the head over the target...nothing! Put the machine into pinpoint and there it was, back it to hunt mode, nothing...tried QUICK MASK...nothing. He dug the target, a dropped 3 ringer at about 7-8 in. He dropped the bullet back into the hole and I tried to read it again...nothing. Picked it out of the hole and laid it on top and it read OK. He found 6 or 7 more and my machine would not read them. I could get hits if I left it in pinpoint, but they would not give me a signal or a number in any other mode. THE only targets I COULD GET WERE 3-5'' DEEP. I tried changing everything I COULD AND NOTHING HELPED. What did I do wrong?
 
I'm not sure my friend...

Was it giving you a null\ when you went over the target? Perhaps it was a channel issue? Proximity to his detector?

Hopefully a professional relic hunting E-trac user will come by and give you some help... I'm still a little vanilla on this thing.

I hit musketballs nice and deep all the time. It doesn't make sense...
 
I did try a total open screen, and it made no difference. Every time I changed a setting I went through the ground balance procedure. My friends machine was turned off ( he was using a PI and I couldn't get within 10 yds without hearing his machine.) I've been hunting Civil War relics and coin shooting for over 40 yrs. and have loved every second of it, What a Great Hobby! I have used Whites top end machines up until 10yrs. ago when I switched to Minelab. I have a Sovereign XS-2, an Xterra 70, and an E Trac. I know that in some areas of Virginia people have problems with some machines. But in all my years of hunting I've never seen this before. Maybe it's time to pack up the machine and send it in?
 
Sorry, I forgot to answer the first question... there was no response at all from my machine, no null, no target, just a steady threshold. If I hit the pinpoint I had it loud and clear, but if I dropped back it to hunt mode NOTHING. Tried TTF, Quick Mask, Minelabs Relic mode, Minelabs Coin mode, My own Relic program, and my own Coins and jewelry program. Nothing made any difference. Changed the sensitivity, gain, fast on/off, ground difficult/normal, trash low/high , Changed everything I could think of, it never helped. This is not acceptable. Only thing I didn't do was a Master reset. No idea why it behaved this way, or what to do to work around it. Everything seems to be functioning normally.
 
I don't think the soil was the problem, I actually tried the neutral ground setting as well as difficult, and could not really see much if any difference. When run in auto, my sens. was about 20-23 most of the time so I didn't think that the soil was the problem. Got up this morning and hunted in exactly the same program here (Md.) and everything behaved normally. I really have no clue why it did so poorly, but it has made me rethink the idea that this machine is capable of doing better than most other detectors. What it did was give me a bad case of lack of confidence...and we all know that if you don't have faith in your machine and our own ability it's not much fun. Now I'm really beginning to wonder what I've walked over and left in the ground for the last 2 yrs. Any ideas on how to adjust out this problem would be greatly appreciated.
 
Tough ground most likely. Just because the sense was running high doesn't mean there weren't problems there. It just means the EMI was low probably. Not only that but a PI is going to have you on depth in many applications. He has depth, you have discrimination. I hunt the beach and some relic sites in pinpoint. It gains depth and I'm in a dig all situation anyways so why not max things out! Another trick is to try doing the noise cancel with the coil on the ground instead of in the air. Sometimes helps a little, sometimes not. Were you by any chance hunting in soil with lots of clay? Etracs often don't do well with the iron content in clay where a PI will punch right through it.
 
Yes, the ground did have a fairly heavy clay content. I tend to agree with you, and if the targets were all deep I probably would have just given up and moved on. Some of the targets he found and called me over to check turned out to be minnie balls only 4-5'' deep. I've hunted several hundred hours with my E Trac, (mostly for coins and jewelry, but maybe 25% for relics) And I don't believe I've ever encountered a situation quite like that.

Maybe it's just my individual machine, but I don't believe that the E Trac is a particularly strong Relic hunter, Even using TTF it just seems to not handle some soils very well in my area (Md. WV, Va, and Pa.). But you are right when you say it's a Coin magnet, although I don't seem to dig them as deep as some of the others on this forum I do find coins and some jewelry in areas that others have hunted and given up on. For the last couple of years I've mostly hunted sites that have been hit very hard by myself and many other hunters.

In normal soil the machine is sometimes amazing...it will find coins in places my other detectors have missed,although I believe that most of these were masked by other targets and not because they are deep. Overall, in my typical soil the machine does give outstanding discrimination, and in most cases acceptable, though not outstanding depth. It may be that I'm just not hunting areas with very deep targets most of the time. But, I tend to think that the machine is missing the deeper targets more often than not. I do hunt in Auto +3 and not manual, so maybe it's time to crank it up and learn to hunt that way!

Am I happy with my E Trac? Most of the time. Do I think it is worth the money? SOME of the time. Would I buy it all over again knowing what I know now about the machine? Honestly, probably not. It's a great machine, but maybe not the best answer to some of the areas that I hunt. Would I recommend to E Trac to someone else? To a coin hunter...absolutely! To a relic hunter...probably not. Having said that...please remember that these are just my opinions, based on what I hunt for and where I hunt it. Your particular area may get you completely different results.
 
Im betting its the soil content. I have an ETrac,but its not my goto machine for relic type hunting but, I have used it relic hunting,both in TTF and Multiple Conductive. And I have found 3 ringers,sharps and other lead targets as deep as 9 inches with it;BUT, the soil where I hunt is much different than what is in places in Virginia.
I really dont read much about the hunts/contest they have for Civil War relics but I recall reading somewhere in Virginia of a contest and the ETrac did poorly and if I recall correctly, it was a Fisher machine that excelled there.
We have to remember our machines are tools and sometimes it takes a different tool for the job.
I use my ETrac mostly in town/city on sites with a bit of history to find older coins. I enjoy using my ETrac in spots that contain more modern trash.
But Ive had a hard time with it in older spots where iron is the culprit, but Ive read where others have done well with the ETrac in these areas with heavy iron. I havent. So I opt for another machine.
Dont loose confidence with it, there is no perfect machine.
HH,
John
 
flashs said:
Hello all,
I have had my E Trac for almost 2 yrs now, and have mostly hunted coins and jewelry in yards, parks, and school yards. I have many hours on the machine and while I haven't set the world on fire, it has found coins in places that I hunted with all the detectors I owned before I bought it. I don't do as well as many I read about, but I figure a lot of them have better sites to hunt. I think it's a good coin machine, especially in the trash.
Having said that, I just had my eyes opened while hunting with a partner at a Civil War battle site just South of Winchester, Va. I was using TTF and had my sens. turned to manual 26. My buddy called me over and asked me to check a signal. I ran the head over the target...nothing! Put the machine into pinpoint and there it was, back it to hunt mode, nothing...tried QUICK MASK...nothing. He dug the target, a dropped 3 ringer at about 7-8 in. He dropped the bullet back into the hole and I tried to read it again...nothing. Picked it out of the hole and laid it on top and it read OK. He found 6 or 7 more and my machine would not read them. I could get hits if I left it in pinpoint, but they would not give me a signal or a number in any other mode. THE only targets I COULD GET WERE 3-5'' DEEP. I tried changing everything I COULD AND NOTHING HELPED. What did I do wrong?
Click to expand...

If you was able to get target in Pinpoint mode looks like your Etrac is Ok, I suspect you was using auto sensitivity thinking you are using manual, try to do air test, you will see big different in auto vs. manual sensitivity. Another useful instrument in Etrac is Tone 1, its all metal mode called by Minelab differently. try it with or without discrimination.
 
I did try it in auto, and also in manual from 16 all the way on up to max. Made no difference no matter what it was set on. The one thing I didn't think to try was 1 tone...that just might be the best idea yet. It never crossed my mind to use that after I tried a wide-open Quick Mask and still could not read the target. I will try that the next time I can get back down there to hunt. I've been hunting coins and relics for over 40 yrs. and that is the first time I ever encountered anything even close to what was happening. I truly thought that the machine was busted! But the next day I hunted here close to home and it worked just fine in TTF, and in my custom coins mode. It still has me dazed and confused, it was a reality check...not often that someone puts the E Trac to shame! It is a great machine in most of the areas that I hunt.
 
Multiple Conductive... I think it means hunting with the NUMBER OF TONES set to MULTI in the audio settings. And in the audio settings open up TONE ID and then set it to CONDUCT as well. When set this way it will give you a different tone for every object your discriminate setting will allow, with the frequency of the tone being determined by the second (conductive) number in your display. Lower frequency for lower numbers, higher frequency for higher numbers. I think most coin hunters more or less use this most of the time under normal hunting conditions.
 
flashs said:
I did try it in auto, and also in manual from 16 all the way on up to max. Made no difference no matter what it was set on. The one thing I didn't think to try was 1 tone...that just might be the best idea yet. It never crossed my mind to use that after I tried a wide-open Quick Mask and still could not read the target. I will try that the next time I can get back down there to hunt. I've been hunting coins and relics for over 40 yrs. and that is the first time I ever encountered anything even close to what was happening. I truly thought that the machine was busted! But the next day I hunted here close to home and it worked just fine in TTF, and in my custom coins mode. It still has me dazed and confused, it was a reality check...not often that someone puts the E Trac to shame! It is a great machine in most of the areas that I hunt.
Click to expand...
Flashs make simple air test and you will see what is going on wit your Etrac, from my experience tone one with respond Long or smooth is deeper then in pinpoint, but very little.
 
I know I'm a little late on this one but just in case the OP is still here and hasn't figured it out yet

OP

the guys in VA mostly use PI machines as the ground in that area of the country is well known to be some of the worst soil you can hunt in the US and almost nothing punches through it except the PI machines
 
I hunt an area with this devil dirt and what I have learned is that you can pretty much forget the tones.Anything beyond three inches is going to sound like iron until you uncover the target.If you hunt this ground with an Etrac waiting for a high tone squeal,you will miss more than you will find.
 
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