Ground balance & trashy sites.

[KSDfisher77]

I'm curious if any of you guys have any places you hunt that you can not get a proper ground balance because of the trash/iron in the ground. What is the best thing to do for your ground balance if this occurs? I got old homesites where I got to walk many yards/feet away from the hunting site to get a good ground balance. What kinda advice do some of you professionals reccomend to do? Thanks.

 

[DigDog]

I'm curious if any of you guys have any places you hunt that you can not get a proper ground balance because of the trash/iron in the ground. What is the best thing to do for your ground balance if this occurs? I got old homesites where I got to walk many yards/feet away from the hunting site to get a good ground balance. What kinda advice do some of you professionals reccomend to do? Thanks.

Curious myself as GB is the only thing that i was confused about because where i am at there is very little to no mineralization so no matter where you set the gb at doesn’t make a difference. Never really had much experience having to adjust gb but would be nice to know if i am ever in a situation where it’s needed.

 

[KSDfisher77]

Curious myself as GB is the only thing that i was confused about because where i am at there is very little to no mineralization so no matter where you set the gb at doesn’t make a difference. Never really had much experience having to adjust gb but would be nice to know if i am ever in a situation where it’s needed.

I personally think you need to ground balance at every site you go to, even if it's the same site at different times. I got some old home sites, that are soo trashy/iron ridden, that even with a 6" coil you have a hard time finding a clean piece of ground to ground balance your detector on. Unless you go a football field away to get in cleaner ground to ground balance. I'm just curious what is the best way to attack a site like this. Does a guy just ground balance on the trashy site? Does he turn sensitivity down some & then ground balance? I'm sure hoping so others can chime in, with their ideas. Thanks.

 

[still looking 52]

I would recommend a middle of the road manual ground balance on sites that are to trashy ground balance.

 

[KSDfisher77]

I read alot of guys just set ground balance at 0 & go. Some guys I read dont ground balance at all. I was taught GB is your most important factor when metal detecting. The trashy/iron infested sites has always made me wonder what is the best way to approach a site like this with ground balancing. Thanks guys.

 

[DigDog]

I personally think you need to ground balance at every site you go to, even if it's the same site at different times.

This is what has been confusing and frustrating to me in the past. I understand your concern as you probably NEED to GB but I don’t think some people understand what it is like here. I will try to explain it again as i have to others and maybe you can picture it most cannot.its easier to grasp if you had a analog detector with a gb knob that you turn to adjust. One way more positive and the other way more negative. Most detectors now you just press a button and it gives a value. Its more automatic and you have to assume the number it gives is correct but if you had to manually adjust it with a knob and go by sound you get a better feel of what is going on
Where i am if you try to manual gb according to the manual you pump the coil listen to the sound and adjust the knob positive or negative until you get the proper sound to be ground balanced correctly. Well in my soil no matter where you adjust the knob could be full positive or fully negative the sound does not change or vary at all. That is supposed to mean there is no mineralization affecting the metal detector so the gb setting doesn’t matter.
Maybe hard to understand that concept if all you know is ground with mineralization and having to always adjust and getting different values .
Picture it a different way. Say no matter where you gb and no matter when,it always gave you a gb number of say 60.
You can go out everyday of the year and to a different location each time and it will always say 60. So just set it at 60 and never worry about it, just turn it in and use it without having to adjust. That 60 is the factory preset gb so no need to adjust it.
Might be a little strange for you to understand but thats just the way it is here. I guess i can say fortunate to have such conditions. Not every detector even had adjustable gb. Some might need that feature to hunt in their area we could use detectors that just have a factory preset gb and not adjustable

 

[KSDfisher77]

This is what has been confusing and frustrating to me in the past. I understand your concern as you probably NEED to GB but I don’t think some people understand what it is like here. I will try to explain it again as i have to others and maybe you can picture it most cannot.its easier to grasp if you had a analog detector with a gb knob that you turn to adjust. One way more positive and the other way more negative. Most detectors now you just press a button and it gives a value. Its more automatic and you have to assume the number it gives is correct but if you had to manually adjust it with a knob and go by sound you get a better feel of what is going on
Where i am if you try to manual gb according to the manual you pump the coil listen to the sound and adjust the knob positive or negative until you get the proper sound to be ground balanced correctly. Well in my soil no matter where you adjust the knob could be full positive or fully negative the sound does not change or vary at all. That is supposed to mean there is no mineralization affecting the metal detector so the gb setting doesn’t matter.
Maybe hard to understand that concept if all you know is ground with mineralization and having to always adjust and getting different values .
Picture it a different way. Say no matter where you gb and no matter when,it always gave you a gb number of say 60.
You can go out everyday of the year and to a different location each time and it will always say 60. So just set it at 60 and never worry about it, just turn it in and use it without having to adjust. That 60 is the factory preset gb so no need to adjust it.
Might be a little strange for you to understand but thats just the way it is here. I guess i can say fortunate to have such conditions. Not every detector even had adjustable gb. Some might need that feature to hunt in their area we could use detectors that just have a factory preset gb and not adjustable

I'm curious to your GB question as well, I've never been lucky enough to be around ground with no mineralization so to speak. I've read about this subject somewhere, but cant remember where at now. It gave a scenario similar to yours & explained what is the best way to adjust settings.

 

[DigDog]

I'm curious to your GB question as well, I've never been lucky enough to be around ground with no mineralization so to speak. I've read about this subject somewhere, but cant remember where at now. It gave a scenario similar to yours & explained what is the best way to adjust settings.

Probably one of my questions lol

 

[Picketwire]

Use it in the default GB. There is a reason it is the default. It is balanced to ferrite. Detectors without ground balance adjustment find most everything one balanced finds. If you think the detector is noisy in trash, keep adjusting the balance more and more toward the negative side and you will find out what noisy really is. In my opinion, ground balance is not even close to the most important thing,

 

[KSDfisher77]

Use it in the default GB. There is a reason it is the default. It is balanced to ferrite. Detectors without ground balance adjustment find most everything one balanced finds. If you think the detector is noisy in trash, keep adjusting the balance more and more toward the negative side and you will find out what noisy really is. In my opinion, ground balance is not even close to the most important thing,

Yeah I think I had what you described happen to me on 2 different occasions. I remember once the machine GB at -6 & the other time it GB at -9. I remember that detector was really talking to me that day it was noisy. I think If I remember correctly I went into GB settings & increased it to a +9GB & the detector settled down for me & I started producing better finds. Thanks.

 

[DigDog]

Use it in the default GB. There is a reason it is the default. It is balanced to ferrite. Detectors without ground balance adjustment find most everything one balanced finds. If you think the detector is noisy in trash, keep adjusting the balance more and more toward the negative side and you will find out what noisy really is. In my opinion, ground balance is not even close to the most important thing,

With little to no mineralization I don’t even mess with it

 

[jim tn]

What I used to do when I couldn't find a clean gb place was to set the gb to the average gb number I typically got in my area. HH jim tn

 

[DigDog]

What I used to do when I couldn't find a clean gb place was to set the gb to the average gb number I typically got in my area. HH jim tn

Great idea as well. Got me thinking do all newer detectors have adjustable GB . Seems not long ago we were using ones with factory preset GB and you couldn’t adjust them. Weird how it seemed people just about everywhere just used them as they were and it was fine. How do you find what number where it would have been set to on a non adjustable pre set detector if that makes sense lol. I heard they basically set them slightly positive so it would work in most places.
Bare with me as i mentioned never really messed with gb as it doesn’t really matter here.

 

[jim tn]

I've been using Equinox's the last few years and I just set them to ground tracking and that seems to work quite well as far as I can tell. HH jim tn

 

[Picketwire]

Seems not long ago we were using ones with factory preset GB and you couldn’t adjust them.

It was not long ago the Minelab Vanquish series was introduced. I think it works pretty well.

 

[DigDog]

I've been using Equinox's the last few years and I just set them to ground tracking and that seems to work quite well as far as I can tell. HH jim tn

Back to KSD’s original point maybe just let the detector figure it out and hope for the best lol. I don’t know what detector he has but some older ones only have manual gb, no auto, no tracking and you have to set it.
I thought i also remember the only time gb is an issue where it makes any significant difference and you have to be able to adjust it is a location with really high mineralization. Something like 90% of places didn’t need adjusting where it made any kind of significant difference

 

[KSDfisher77]

Back to KSD’s original point maybe just let the detector figure it out and hope for the best lol. I don’t know what detector he has but some older ones only have manual gb, no auto, no tracking and you have to set it.
I thought i also remember the only time gb is an issue where it makes any significant difference and you have to be able to adjust it is a location with really high mineralization. Something like 90% of places didn’t need adjusting where it made any kind of significant difference

DigDog I'm running a Xterra Pro, but liked it soo much I got me a equinox 900 now. I have only got 10 hours or so of driving the equinox 900. I was wanting to hear what some of you have experienced with super trashy spots & ground balance. It was mentioned about GB on the negative side & your detector gets noisy, well I think I experienced that 2 times on a common place I hunt. I would like to know why the detector got noisy on the negative side of ground balance. I dont know the anwser or maybe I do & I'm over thinking it. I like to read about detectors I dont even own, cause there is times some great information comes out of it for me. I've only been detecting since 2003, soo there is much still to learn for me I'm sure. Thanks guys & gals. I appreciate it.

 

[KSDfisher77]

I read somewhere, either on another site, or possibly in a book from Jeff foster the effects of adjusting your ground balance towards the negative & positive sides of ground balance. I think it went on to say in what situations adjusting the GB to a negative or positive GB would be or will be helpful in some hunting situations. I got some old homesites I would like to see some of these well seasoned detectorist hunt with me to show me a thing or 2. Sometimes I feel as I'm missing some good targets, mainly coins & tokens as such at these sites. Maybe im not missing many targets. Maybe 20 years ago a detectorist came thru & sniped out the high tone silvers & large cents. I LOVE this hobby!!! Thanks.

 

[Picketwire]

Mineralization can be from iron (ferrite) to salt. Salt mineralization is the main problem with factory set GB. On detectors that use somewhere near 90 as default GB, salt comes in near 0. It is just the opposite on the Equinox and Legend that use 0 as default and salt near maximum numbers. If your ground is salty, the default setting is not good. If your ground has iron as the main culprit, the default is pretty good as it is balanced to pure ferrite. It seems that lots of people think the default balance is for perfect soil with no iron mineralization. It is not. It is for iron bearing soil which is most soil. It also works well when there is no iron or salt in the soil.

My T2 manual says if you are using threshold based all metal, you should GB, but it is probably not necessary in discrimination mode. I am sure this did not sneak by chief engineer Dave Johnson. Too high GB causes large silver to disappear. If you GB too negative, the small iron, iron halos, and iron mineralization start coming through as sound. Ground balance is basically a form of discrimination to stop these signals. It is like turning up the threshold, you can't hear the deep good signals because there are so many signals from these small targets.

 

[DigDog]

Mineralization can be from iron (ferrite) to salt. Salt mineralization is the main problem with factory set GB. On detectors that use somewhere near 90 as default GB, salt comes in near 0. It is just the opposite on the Equinox and Legend that use 0 as default and salt near maximum numbers. If your ground is salty, the default setting is not good. If your ground has iron as the main culprit, the default is pretty good as it is balanced to pure ferrite. It seems that lots of people think the default balance is for perfect soil with no iron mineralization. It is not. It is for iron bearing soil which is most soil. It also works well when there is no iron or salt in the soil.

My T2 manual says if you are using threshold based all metal, you should GB, but it is probably not necessary in discrimination mode. I am sure this did not sneak by chief engineer Dave Johnson. Too high GB causes large silver to disappear. If you GB too negative, the small iron, iron halos, and iron mineralization start coming through as sound. Ground balance is basically a form of discrimination to stop these signals. It is like turning up the threshold, you can't hear the deep good signals because there are so many signals from these small targets.

I read somewhere, either on another site, or possibly in a book from Jeff foster the effects of adjusting your ground balance towards the negative & positive sides of ground balance. I think it went on to say in what situations adjusting the GB to a negative or positive GB would be or will be helpful in some hunting situations. I got some old homesites I would like to see some of these well seasoned detectorist hunt with me to show me a thing or 2. Sometimes I feel as I'm missing some good targets, mainly coins & tokens as such at these sites. Maybe im not missing many targets. Maybe 20 years ago a detectorist came thru & sniped out the high tone silvers & large cents. I LOVE this hobby!!! Thanks.

Im in basically the same boat as you with everything only like i said fortunate enough not to need GB. Now salt water beach is a whole different story and no regular land detector will preform well in wet salt water sand and hence why there are water/beach detectors as well as beach mode on multi purpose detectors that adjust for the difference. Try taking a dedicated gold prospecting detector in the wet salt water sand and see what happens lol.
I assume why manufacturers set fixed ground balanced detectors you can’t adjust to a certain point slightly positive is because thats what will work the best in most areas most of the time.