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Explorer settings for hightly mineralized soil

A

Anonymous

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My son and I are going to a hunt in Va. and I am going to use my explorer. Do any of you know how to set the machine for totally extreme hot soil that we are going to encounter? Any help would be appreciated.
 
Well, I'm fairly new at this Explorer II stuff but not to detecting. And I have been doing very well with the Explorer II. Now here in Virginia Beach and surrounding areas, our soil isn't too terribly bad. But I've seen the red clay soil like they have in Danville and it's not much fun. I would think that with the Explorer you would probably do best by going wide open, if you can stand it. Because if you hunt in discrimination, you'll be nulling an awful lot, I would expect. So I would start out trying IM -16 and cut the sensitivity down a little, maybe 18 or 20. Run it hotter if you can, but in that situation it will just make it worse more than likely. I would also set my threshold down a little below normal and maybe the volume to, so as to make it more bearable. And then use a slow and methodical sweep and try to pick out the good stuff from the chatter. That would be my approach. Others may have different advice, not sure.

Where are you going to be hunting anyway?
 
If your going to the Brandy Station area be sire to use auto sensitivty, set around 20 at most... and run iron mask -15, dig all fairly repeatable signals except the hot rock signals of course
 
Diane,

The explorer automatically adjusts to ground mineralization. I believe it does this in both Automatic and Semi-manual mode. In highly mineralized ground it will be harder to detect deep targets and get an accurate ID on them. You may find that you'll have to run your sensitivity lower to keep the machine stable. Other than that you should be able to keep your normal settings.

Chris
 
I live in Orange VA. and have been relic hunting this area for many years. I also just recently got an Exp. 2. I have found that in this ground the best detection depth you will get with the Exp. is by running in iron mask -16 ferrous tones and auto sens. I will keep bumping up the sens in auto until it starts nulling and then I back it down to where it is smooth...I usually end up somewhere between 20 to 25 in auto. You can try running in manual sens. but I have found that in the hot ground you will have to turn it really low to get rid of the constant drumming noise from the machine reading the positive ground. I have done alot of testing on this and you are better off running in auto, iron mask -16...find the areas with the most iron trash and hunt slow, really paying attention to the tones and you will be able to pull relics from the trash that the other machines can't hear. I have hunted for years with the Whites machines and I can tell you the Exp. will find relics in the trash that the Whites can't, you just have to listen to everything in the ground...I have found that with the ferrous tones and hunting in the trash, the constant low tone from the iron actually makes the good high tone signals easier to pick out...Don't worry about running in auto with a lower sens. setting as I can tell you from experience the relics are not that deep around here in this clay soil...the only time the relics will be deep is if you are hunting in a field that has been plowed for years...the Exp. will do fine even with it turned down and it will really outperform the others in the trash.

Good Luck...HH
 
But one thing no one mentioned is make sure you push the NOISE CANCEL BUTTON before you start your hunt, and if you venture away from your starting point Push it again cause conditions may change in a diff. area even though you are on the same lot. Now how to hold the explorer can cause comments. I personnally hold coil flat on the ground where there is no targets to be heard and keep sens. to where I am going to be using it say 18 or 20 what ever I will be using....and push it and hold still till noise cancel is done.But Chris is right about Explorer automaticly adjusting to ground minerals.....Good Luck....HH:thumbup: ps...if you are in a high trash area and good targets are not very deep(under 8") don't crank up sensativity, you will hear more trash and multi targets at once...tame it down to 10-14 and hear one target at a time...including the good stuff!...OK now I am babbaling...BYE :blowup:
 
I have hunted in that Orange dirt when the explorer first came out, and I told everyone how to set up sensitiviy in manual like I did at home and it was a mistake.. that ground is close to being the worse I ever hunted in, the only thing worse is trying in a place loaded with hot rock.. And Auto Sensitivity is the way to go.. running in iron mask -15 or -16 is a matter of prefernce if its not omplete;y paded in iron -16 would be bearable.. Anyway I was getting bullets in the 8-10 inch range after going to auto sens, where manual was just too much for the ground and was lucky to hit them 4 inches or less
 
Hey Jim....yes, this ground around here in certain areas will make some people reconsider the meaning of bad ground...lol I have taken people to some of the places I relic hunt and they come out of the woods with that deer in the headlight look on their face...lol Most of the auto ground balance machines are absolutley worthless around here. You definitely have to experiment with various settings to see what works in this ground. I really like the Exp 2, I have been doing very well with it but I still have a long way to go to fully learn it's capabilities.

HH
 
You are so right. This is what I've been doing lately, along with going slow and checking from multiple angles, and I actually lower the sensitivity so that I can get better separation. It's the best machine I've ever used at getting goodies in trash.
 
I will be going to the Div V hunt in Virginia in March 2006. I have an explorer, and X5 and a White's XLT. My son loves the whites and he is going also. So I am just getting prepared with each machine. This sounds like it will be a real challenge and we are really looking forward to it. Are you going?
 
...questions...the guys talking about how you MUST have a manual ground balance machine are making me think my minelab explorer xs will be useless there. I don't want to have to buy a new detector that I am not familar with just for a 3 day hunt.
Good luck and HH
Brillo
 
Sorry, I have to get better about missing some of these follow-up posts.

I'm not sure if I'm going or not yet. Possibly. Should be a good time. Be ready to do a lot of digging, huh? I've hunted a ton of relics and literally have a bucket of bullets and many buttons but I've never dug a hut. Sounds like a lot of work and probably a lot of fun too if you get some productive ones.
 
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