First hunt with Omega

[atomicscott]

Received my Omega yesterday with the 8" concentric already mounted. I took it to an old torn down home site about 2 miles from me. I was there last week with the F2 & found a lot of 60's era coins as well as a 1954 wheat. Hoping there is some silver here, as the coins I found were in the right era at least. This site (as most I hunt) is loaded with chunks of iron, different sized nails and foil/aluminum trash. I set sens to 65, as there were overhead power lines about 50 yards away. I bumped it up to 69, with no noise at all (EMI or otherwise). It was working so well, I ran it into the 80's and even with the threshold noise, it was really not annoying at all. A bit of chirping when setting the detector down to dig, but ZERO noise when swinging. I ran zero disc mostly, switching between 3 & 4 tones. I ran AT2 for a bit, I definitely was hitting on deeper targets that didn't get a signal (or got a very weak signal) in disc mode. I did not dig these targets as the ground was hard and it was difficult to get even 5 or 6" deep with the Lesche in some spots. I've already started to realize that there are some subtle nuances built into the programming that seem to help discern trash from the good targets. I dug 9 copper pennies, 12 zincs 1 dime 1 nickel. I found the dime with disc set to 16 (as many have recommended) among much iron trash. I am very leery of using disc at all due to possibility of masking, so this was encouraging to me, to say the least. I like this machine a lot after just trying it out on the less than 2 hours I had to play with it. I have a NEL Sharpshooter on the way, can't wait to try it! I know the DD may be a bit more susceptible to EMI, so we will see...

 

[Elton]

The Omega is a much under rated "COIN" machine. In my opinion it is one of the better coin machines with a perfect frequency for finding all things coins.

 

[Monte]

Received my Omega yesterday with the 8" concentric already mounted.

That's a surprise to hear you got the Omega with an 8" coil. The 'standard' coil is the elliptical Concentric of 5½X9¾ which is a good coil I like, but I found the round 8" Concentric I swapped off of a Delta to be a little better for coin hunting. Tighter read-outs, easier to Pinpoint with, and just a little more comfortable to hunt with. My 2nd favorite coil on the Omega, especially for brushier and trashier places, is the round 5" Double-D coil. Coming in 3rd is the stock Concentric elliptical coil.

I took it to an old torn down home site about 2 miles from me. I was there last week with the F2 & found a lot of 60's era coins as well as a 1954 wheat. Hoping there is some silver here, as the coins I found were in the right era at least. This site (as most I hunt) is loaded with chunks of iron, different sized nails and foil/aluminum trash. I set sens to 65, as there were overhead power lines about 50 yards away. I bumped it up to 69, with no noise at all (EMI or otherwise). It was working so well, I ran it into the 80's and even with the threshold noise, it was really not annoying at all. A bit of chirping when setting the detector down to dig, but ZERO noise when swinging.

I'd enjoy working an old building tear-down site as any urban renovation or vacant lot or former structure site, that had enough human activity to make it possibly a good site, and I'd use the 8" Concentric , then follow up on the same entire area with the 5" DD coil. A good working coil and a slow, methodical search with ample overlapping and you can often make some very good recoveries.

I ran zero disc mostly,...

The Omega adjusts to a numeric setting of '1', and even the G2 which can adjust to '0' are not really at a true 'Zero" Discriminate mode setting. They do adjust very low, but not to a true 'Zero Disc.' setting.

... switching between 3 & 4 tones.

My favorite with the Omega was '4' Tones when I was in trashier areas and most coins were shallower, like in the areas around picnic tables and other typical urban locations. If the site was lower in targets and not a typical urban Coin Hunting place [size=small](like around a picnic area or playground)[/size], and more open [size=small](like a large grassy area or a sports field)[/size], I choose the 2-Tone audio function.

I ran AT2 for a bit, I definitely was hitting on deeper targets that didn't get a signal (or got a very weak signal) in disc mode

AT2? Do you mean Auto-tune Al, Metal and the 2nd tone or frequency shift? Yes, the All Metal mode can get a little better depth than the Discriminate mode, especially if the Disc. mode Sensitivity is lower.

I did not dig these targets as the ground was hard and it was difficult to get even 5 or 6" deep with the Lesche in some spots.

It sure is frustrating when the ground gets that hard. I actually enjoy most of my ghost towns and homestead sites as I generally have easier to work ground, seldom hard packed.

I've already started to realize that there are some subtle nuances built into the programming that seem to help discern trash from the good targets. I dug 9 copper pennies, 12 zincs 1 dime 1 nickel. I found the dime with disc set to 16 (as many have recommended) among much iron trash.

With the Omega I used two Discrimination settings. Either '1' when there was very little trash and targets were well spaced, or '16'/'17' as that was just enough to reject most iron nails. I never set it higher than that.

I am very leery of using disc at all due to possibility of masking, so this was encouraging to me, to say the least.

That's why I use the two settings I just mentioned.

I like this machine a lot after just trying it out on the less than 2 hours I had to play with it.

I think the Omega is one of the best general use Coin Hunting detectors for a lot of urban coin hunting tasks.

I have a NEL Sharpshooter on the way, can't wait to try it! I know the DD may be a bit more susceptible to EMI, so we will see...

DD's, as a rule, can have a little more EMI problem, and they can often be less consistent on target read-outs and their Discrimination isn't as good as a similar-size Concentric, especially in iron trash.

Continue to enjoy your Omega. If you don't have the 5" DD, I'd suggest getting it to compliment the 8" coil you have as it will work in and around trash better than other coils.

Monte

 

[atomicscott]

Thanks for your response Monte, I appreciate your knowledge. I did a trade for the Omega & the previous owner (I believe per your recommendation) had the 8" already mounted. Experience with my Vaquero & X-Terra, was that I found more targets with the 6" DD coil (5,75" on Vaquero) compared to the concentrics due to the better separation. These sites I'm at have sometimes 12 or more targets per swing. I realized after re-reading my post, I realized that I should have said "minimum disc" in disc mode, not zero. Being only the first time out, I spent a bit of time in AT (tone 2) but mostly in 3 & 4 tones. I was at a super trashy site again yesterday, a small airport was about 200 yards away, ran into the 90's no EMI to speak of. I still feel like I have 2-3 targets always under the coil at once, I am just so used to using a smaller DD (or the 4" sniper on the F2 which amazes me sometimes). I thought the NEL Sharpshooter may be a good compromise being 5.5" wide, at least decent separation side to side. The ground is fairly hot here & I hunt in some gold bearing areas so I like the DD coils in these sites due to the mineralization. I will see how things go with NEL, but I already had been thinking about the 5" DD in the future. I like the fact that I should be able to trust the disc when set at 15-16. Other machines I have had tend to mask coins out even at fairly low disc levels. I noticed when running at 16 disc, it was much more quiet not hitting on all those small nails! I did notice I dug a few rusty bits that rang in as coins, but I may have been excited & not scanned them at different angles before deciding to dig. I noticed I dug less aluminum junk that rang in as coins. That is a good thing. It seems good at avoiding different sized foil & aluminum pieces. I noticed a definite junk 'pattern' in the tones/numbers on trashy (non ferrous) targets. Thanks again for your input Monte, after nearly 2 years with my last detector, I have a lot to learn I appreciate any help you have to offer. HH, Scott