Fast On, Deep Off for deeper targets (for me anyway)

[wharghoul]

I've made a few recent posts detailing my frustrations and I received a lot of great tips and encouragement.

I wanted to share one that has helped a little. I've always run Deep On, Fast Off in the attempt of finding deep coins.

Well, up to now I just have not been able to isolate a deep coin (over 6"). So, I decided it certainly wouldn't hurt to try switching to Fast On, Deep Off. I read somewhere that when running Deep On that the Etrac can blend the Ferrous #'s of two close targets. Example, a coin (12 ferrous) and piece of iron (33 Ferrous) will blend and give a bouncy signal and stays around 27 ferrous.

When I switched to Fast On, Deep Off it seems like I get a little bit better target seperation. At this point, I don't even care about digging 10" coins. I'm happy just getting a good signal at 6-7". I've been digging some deeper targets lately (all clad) and I think this setup will put me on some silver pretty soon.

Thanks again,

Brad

 

[Ray-Mo.]

Fast On, Deep Off is the way I run most of the time and it has worked well for me with good depth.Ray.

 

[NebTrac]

Your day is coming Brad, and you'll be posting that first "old" coin find here! Keep it up. I might be wrong, but I'm going to predict it won't be as deep as some of your clad. Stick with it!

NebTrac

 

[N2Treasure]

Hey Brad,
I was reading what the guys here were saying last night on a Ferrous thread about the fast on and the deep on as well. It seemed to me if I understood them right, that you got the better separation from bypassing the filters in turning the fast ON rather than turning your deep OFF. They said you can run both FAST and DEEP ON and maybe you'll hit the 10" coins with less ID blending???

Still learning, Duane

 

[Gaz]

.....yep, you got it Duane.

The truth is that you probably just haven't walked over that deep coin you want Brad. Don't worry mate, it'll come with the more coil time you put it.

The DEEP and FAST Recovery settings in actual fact do nothing to effect how deep or shallow the ETrac will find targets.

Just to re-cap........the Recovery Deep setting just turns on the amplification of deep, faint signals. (I think on the Whites XLT & DFX it was called Modulation but I maybe wrong!)
Recovery Fast gives you a choice to turn either on or off a set of filtering. It kinda works in reverse here......turning Fast On turns the filtering off. Turning Fast Off turns the filtering on.
It just gives people more choice depending on if they put more importance on stable ID numbers and slower speed or faster speed and fluttery ID's.
That's the way I see it.

Hope that helps a little,

Gaz.

 

[N2Treasure]

Hi Gaz, also if I'm right, Just like my explorer, I would bump the gain to max amplification of deep signals therefore NOT turning deep ON because it would be redundant?

HH Duane

 

[onemore]

Running with the gain at max makes it more difficult to differentiate the deeper signals via the volume of the tone.

 

[gregliss]

I mostly run Deep ON and Fast ON and don't have any problems with depth, lots of deepies. I used to turn fast off in low density sites, but I read some tests that fast on is critical for detecting targets close to/under iron (see through).

I understand what they do, but I never really noticed much difference in the field.....bit of tone lag and that's about it.

Cheers,
Greg

 

[ziphius]

I did a little experiment with two deep coins prior to digging them. This was my experience which I posted earlier this year:

I tested DEEP OFF vs DEEP ON on these two coins and was convinced after 2 targets that DEEP OFF is the way to go. The difference was more than subtle. With DEEP OFF, the signals are fuller, less chopped and the machine responds quicker, apparently because less

 

[NiagracountyNY]

Ive been Running Fast -Off ,Deep -Off myself.Ive been digging targets up to 10 inches without a prob.Got a really small musket ball at 10 inches a few days ago.Now the soil conditions for everyone could play a role in what works best for everyone.Im sure youll get them deep ones if they are there Brad.Good Luck HH

 

[Gaz]

I have my Gain set to 25. I think 24 is the preset. Looking at the graph in the manual, I think 24 is the optimum setting.
I used to bump mine up to 30 thinking that it would give me maximum chance to not miss deep targets. I found that it was amplifying everything including the ground so it was getting very poppy and chirpy with some falsing so I tweaked it back.

I'm not sure if DEEP ON uses extra processing power or not? Perhaps one of you guys may know more??

This is a great forum with some fantastic threads.
The way these settings issues are being discussed between us can only be a benefit to all of us!!

Gaz.

 

[The Beep Goes On]

I think Deep is similar to recovery delay and allows the processor more time to massage the signal. Fast provides, as said, additional filtering if Off. In general, I prefer Deep Off and Fast On.


Recovery Deep

The Recovery Deep and Recovery Fast settings allow you to select the way the discrimination process works. Recovery settings affect both the detector

 

[Hotcz70]

a gazillion hours experimenting in the field with both the E-trac and explorers...has told me this is where I want to be.

I began "messing" with the E-trac about 2 months after it came out but didn't tell anyone...not even my closest friends.

The response Ziphius gave below is exactly what I've found on the Explorers... and it carried over to the E-trac as well..

Fast ON just simply chops the signal too short for me and I don't like it. I don't even use it in trash unless it is extreme...and I mean extreme.

The processor is already faster on the E-trac than it was the SE...and I did fine with the SE in high trash by going slow.

The E-trac has no problems hitting deep coins co-located with trash and iron as long as you are going at a snail's pace...which is probably how you should be hunting anyway unless you want to take a chance on missing targets such as a deep silver coin coming through the iron nulls.

Deep ON distorts the signal too much for me. I already have my gain jacked to max...so there is no need to have the weak signal amplified any further.

I'll deal with a little falsing from running gain at 30 if need be... in order to dig an 11" dime I could not hear with it set at 24.

I am a SLOW...TEDIOUS hunter and creep along. The parks I hunt are pounded beyond imagination...so I either go super slow and listen very carefully...or I go home with an empty pouch.

Many times I go home with an empty pouch anyway

All I have stated is just my opinion ...derived from lots of experimenting over actual in field targets before they were dug.

Not a debate...or a "my way is better than your way" statement because we all have certain things we listen for and different ways we obtain those signals.

There is NO right or wrong way...ONLY the way that works best for each of us as individuals according to our preferences.

 

[jbow]

turning them back off (once you've found the target) can help get a better TID, even switching to neutral ground can help with the ID once you've found it.. but don't forget to switch back. Sometimes though you can get a worse ID by switching fast off if the target is really masked, and pinpoint will sometimes give a worse ID because it will hit bigger iron colocated.

Anyway... I like fast=on and deep=on. It was said of the Explorer you should run either fast=on or deep=on, but not both on.

IIRC, when the ET came out being able to run fast and deep on at the same time without losing much TID was a point in favor of the E-TRAC. I see nothing but good from having both on.

J

 

[jbow]

I am going to try fast=off and deep=off for a while and see how I like it. I have been hunting for the last 10 days or so in conductive/multi rather than ferrous/2tone and I am finding coins that I would have missed in ferrous/2tone. I know because I checked a couple of them by switching over and swinging up to the target as if I didn't know it was there.

What do you do with trash high/low and ground difficult/neutral and how is the mineralization where you hunt?

J

 

[onemore]

I don't like the signal I get from Fast=ON, but I do believe it helps a little bit in the super heavy trash areas where you are trying to pick something out with a very s l o w sweep.

The best normal set up for me is to have both DEEP and FAST off. I get the truest, easiest to interpret signal / audio when running in this manner.

HH

 

[captn_se]

After spending hours and hours hunting with these two settings (one ON, the other OFF, both ON, both OFF), I am most comfortable with both of them OFF. I did find plenty of silver with FAST ON , but eventually, I turned FAST OFF because I started noticing that on the real deep targets, or targets in areas of high ground mineralization, I would get a very, very narrow response (a little chirp) on the deeper signals. To me, it is barely recognizable from chirpy iron. With FAST OFF, deeper signals were more pronounced (a full bodied sound). I never did use FAST ON again, and never felt I was missing out.

I had tried DEEP ON also, but couldn't get used to the delay in response on the deepies. My machine felt sluggish, less responsive, with that filter ON. I just couldn't hunt with the delayed response. I also found I wasn't getting any better signal enhancement on the deepies(7"+ targets), if my gain was already boosted up (a few notches just below max). I tested this countless times on a deep target with high gain settings....no difference.

But I feel that what's most important is to "believe" that the settings we use really work for us.....have full confidence in them....if we start finding deepies with a certain setting, we're most likely to use those settings on future hunts.

HH,
CAPTN SE
Dan

 

[Gaz]

...I have to honest.....the DEEP OFF setting is a revelation to me and I don't know how I missed the explanation in the manual. (Thanks guys!)
I've just always had it on because I hunt mainly old pasture land in the UK on club farms.

It seems to me now that if FAST ON, DEEP OFF and VOLUME GAIN is 30, you get the best of everything.

If you when you hunt, you place more importance on audio, by having Fast on and Deep off removes most, if not all of the additional filtering.
By increasing Volume Gain to 30, you can amplify the faint signals without employing filtering to slow things down.

This hopefully will improve target separation even more and reduce any target blending.

Gaz.

 

[moseng]

Ok, so my personal take FWIW

Recovery Deep

What the manual says - This setting affects only weak target signals, enhancing identification of deep targets. This setting should be selected in relatively uncluttered areas where deep targets are anticipated. Strong signals are unaffected. In the deep setting there will be a slightly slower reaction in target signal and Target ID due to the extra filtering that is employed in the processing of the target characteristics.

What I do and why - I leave this off because I noticed that the target signal and ID'ing is affected and I'd rather have those over amplifying a deep signal any day. I still leave my gain at 25 as well so I can "hear" the target depth a bit. This seems to work for me because I believe I have gotten my share of deepies! Of course I'm sure I missed some as well!

Recovery Fast

What the manual says - By selecting this setting, the detector will react faster to target signals, but the discrimination and Target ID may be slightly more erratic. Use Fast in areas littered with objects, where a desired target could be hiding next to unwanted objects.

What I do and why - This setting is a little more tricky because it also messes with the ID'ing a bit. Also at first glance one thinks, "Hey the E-Trac is a target separating monster"!! That's what makes it so much better than other machines in it's class so why even turn this on?. Well I do turn this on for trashy areas because one needs all the help they can get. In addition to fast on I also set my pattern a lot tighter (more discrimination) and set the response to long (even though it annoys the heck out of me ) so that I can hear what otherwise might be just short chirps. Of course a smaller coil can also help. Doing this has really helped to pull out good signals in these places for me. I can also say that I have seen other people throw up their hands in disgust at places I can usually squeak a silver or two out of by using these settings. So, any advantage is worth using IMO.

These settings as with any on the E-Trac are purely by preference so do whatever works for you and HH!

 

[Hotcz70]

J...I don't even worry about either of those settings.

I'm not saying this is right...or wrong. I'm just saying it has worked for me...and quite well.

I hunt with the E-Trac in the stock coin program with only these 4 changes .....

1) I jack the variability to max 30 so it will mimic my Explorers sweet high pitched warble over deep silver.

2) I jack the gain to max 30 so I can hear the deep silver chirps as loud as they can be heard.

3) I switched from semi auto to manual sensitivity 26 because I got absolutely no depth until I did so.

4) I dropped the threshold volume to a barely audible hum.

I'm sure there are a million settings I could tinker with...or analyze why one should or shouldn't work...or why one is supposed to be better...or deeper...or separate better...or sound better....and on and on

My honest opinion though is that sometimes people worry too much about tinkering and settings instead of just simply hunting and learning.

I found a group of settings that worked for me and left it alone...no more changes...no more try this or try that...etc.

Instead of tinkering.. I spent all the time training my ears to listen and interperet what the machine was saying to me with those exact settings.

Each tiny change a person makes can change what your ears hear...which will in turn change how you interperet good signal from bad signal.

I was asked on the explorer forum if I would share my settings changes made when hunting some iron infested sites while field testing the 12" Sunray coil for Western & Eastern Treasure magazine.

My answer was quite simple...absolutely ZERO. I just simply slowed way down...payed close attention to "warbly" chirps...then investigated them to see if they were iron chirps or coin chirps...then trusted my ears to interperate what the coil and machine told me.

Click on the link below...and you'll see the answer I gave....and good luck to you with whatever settings you try. You will find the right combination that works for you

http://www.findmall.com/read.php?19,1209501,1209945#msg-1209945