Hey all you Etrac user lurkers

[Jim upstate NY]

please start posting your thoughts.. There has to be more than a dozen of us using it.. and about half seem very happy with it and the other half up in the air or not happy.. I would like to see everyone give impressions.. and as far as I am concerned they are all first impressions it hasnt been out a month yet.. I sure don't know if I like it or not yet, or come close to be knowing if I even have all the settings the way I am supposed to, other than knowing for sure I cant use factory defaults in my pounded spots and expect coins to jump out all over.. but I dont think its a total piece of junk either.

Not sure when the field testers got their hands on them, if a long time they did a good job at keeping it quiet, didnt even hear rumors of a new machine till week of release.. be nice if they could post their true impressions, but I know thats not possible if you want to be considered for testing any of the new ones.. at least for posting things they are not happy about..

I loved all my Minelabs I have owned(Well wasnt to happy with the xterra50, but didnt keep it long either), but am not afraid to say any of them have their down falls, but you take the good with the bad.. if they do anything better than another they are still the machine to use, or at least add to your arsenal.. and we know they do plenty others cant... at the same time.. the weight and sweep speed thing can be a problem for some.. but you know what? anyone that thinks they can blow thru trash and get all the good stuff is simply fooling themselves no matter what machine it is.. I would rather hunt slow and get as much as I can, and at the same time covering every inch of ground than to run around swinging wild anyway but at a new fresh site it is nice to be able to go faster though to get as much of the better easier stuff.. especially if you only have limited time or may never get to hunt the spot again.. and or you are hunting a new spot with someone who can do that

The way I see it if you have unlimited sites, you can just go onto another.. Me I haven't really gotten any new sites other than a few a year.. so I must try and make the most of my old ones.. Some I hunt hundreds of times, and they are no bigger than an acre of land.. I have many I say every time I go That I will never go back again those are the places I like to test the new machines at.. if they start finding things there then I am happy.. If they dont then I figure my old machine must be doing just fine and no sense in changing from something I know so well and love.. But that doesnt necessarily mean it too wouldnt have found what you did already

So far out of all the minelabs I have had.. to make me the perfect machine.. would be the style/weight of the Xterra, nice and light, good power time on batteries.

The menu and settings functions of the etrac, with the explorer ferrous iron mask type added as one more option..
That is the machine I think they would sell the most of.. and I think maybe even going back and having a digital conductive mode as well.. where people that dont care about ferrous reading wont get confused.. if you get a high conductive reading dig it...
The old sovereign type and EX XS type pinpoint where it was just a blip in motion.. that was the best sizing pinpoint you could have, as well as for hearing separate targets close by.. may have not been the best for pinpointing itself, but was without a doubt the best for sizing.. and I can pinpoint well enough in disc mode.. adding it as a pinpoint mode would be a huge plus.. the sizing mode in etrac is not the same as that

I like to have as much info as I can, but shouldn't be forced to have a screen tell me I should dig or not... its just part of the fun.. calling targets before you dig them, the more accurate the better... I got it down pretty good with the explorer.. at least if it is junk you can get a little pleasure from calling it before digging and every once in a while you get a nice surprise..
At the same time I like that I can use audio and be almost positive its a good target without having to sweep it 10 times and trying to see what the meter is saying it is good as well..

So Minelab if you could make us a machine like above I think you could keep a lot of people happy, and get alot more users that dont buy FBS because of weight alone.. the Xterra was a good bend in that direction, but its not FBS.

Ahh but I suppose if any Mfg built us a perfect machine all at once, we wouldn't need to buy a new one would we.. they certainly dont want to put themselves out of business.. and also if everyone had it.. there might not be much left after a short time either

I often wonder why they havent put the FBS electronics in a small detachable box.. where battery and controls be hip or chest mounted, display could be face up where you could see it, maybe better by shading the sun.. or serial attached, heck why not fiber optic attached, to a display on the rod..

Myself as long as i am digging targets I dont have an issue with the weight, at least yet unless... I am just swinging for hours without stopping to dig once in a while.. I would rather have a sore back or knees from digging too much, than be sore from just non stop swinging...

I sure missed not having these type discussions with others that use the machines as long as I have.. and what is good for one may not be good for another.. a machine that put them all together would keep us all happier .. And I think the etrac is the machine that could do it, with a few software changes or additions.. well except the weight thing.. and like I said not a big deal for me anyway.. Just turned 50 though.. maybe it will start catching up soon

 

[grumpyolman]

I got one just a few months after I got the SE. The SE was going to be a problem for me until I got the X1 probe and the SR 8" coil. Then I started making progress. The ET came out and I grabbed some of my discretion airy dollars and ordered one. I have had lots of fun with it and it is certainly more user friendly than the SE. I only had a week of use with it when the ground was damp and I could go after 'deep' targets. The last 3 weeks it's been so dry I am purposely hunting surface, shallow coins so I don't destroy the places I like to hunt. I'll be able to tell more after we get some rain. I never used all metal and ferrous tones, even though I would try it 15' at a time experimenting, so so far that is not an issue with me.
The one thing that grips me is how everyone complains about the weight of the SE and the ET and I don't hear them saying they have tried the Swingy Thingy. I have used it since the day I started with the SE and the weight of either machine is not a problem with me. Also, it's kind of nice to be able to let go of the machine and blow your nose or scratch whatever it is you want to scratch and not have to bend over and put the machine on the ground then bend over to pick it up. All the weight is hanging on the bungee and you just sort of steer it with the forearm cuff and the grip. There is a clever little adjuster on the bungee that allows you to quickly tighten or loosen it just a 1/4" or less at a time. When I am working down hill it's a bit longer and conversely when going up hill. I only have one and I don't own stock in the company. It's just a good solution to a whiny problem that saves your arm and shoulders.
Since I am not even a good user with the machine the FE coins coming up in the same area is helpful. I have dug a few pull tabs to be sure what they were but I have found some interesting things I wouldn't have dug with the SE.I also now dig nickels and I never did with the SE I find myself using the digital numbers more than I did with the SE and I'm not sure that is a good practice. However, it certainly gives more information to calculate in your own brain before digging. I kind of think the more things you evaluate before you dig the higher the potential to dig the good ones. Just how this has struck me so far. Jim

 

[EddieB]

Hey Jim, I'm just curious since this is the first production run of the Etrac, is it possible that some has received hot machines and others a machine not working properly. I myself was just really starting to get the handle on the explorer and I decided on the ET. I'm really not having much of a problem with the transition to the ET because I hunted in conductive iron mask. I really never did like ferrous. According to Digitrich, ML told him that his problems are normal, I posted a question about falsing when pivoting the coil, ML told me that was normal. I have noticed that my ET falses on most every setting.The TID numbers are way off the ID when they are deep. Here in Ky we have had little rain and the ground is hard as concrete but I can truly say that I have dug 8-9in targets and had volume to spare. I'm new to detecting, this is my 2nd year and have only hunted with the explorer. The one thing that I have learned about detecting is that you are not going to find good targets if they are not there. I really can't wait till we get some rain here to really give the ET a fair chance at those really deep targets. I wish you all great success!!! EddieB

 

[Arturo de Zorro]

So far the only thing I don't like about it is the ferrous # issues, I am digging more aluminum screw caps then coins at each hunt. With the Explorer II maybe one or two screw caps for every four to five hunts, and they were the ones that had a gold color to them. I hope Minelab will do what Tesoro did to up grade the tone on the cibola & vaquero for and extra $25 bucks, I would pay extra to put the ferrous numbers like the Explorer.

 

[mham2]

well I like the etrac but I don't know why. I have only found a couple of wheat Penny's been out 7 or 8 times to some really old sites and have found nothing old or deep. I don't know if it,s me or the sites i,m going to or if it is a problem with the etrac. I am certainly no expert but I,m used to going out with my Excalibur and coming home with 30 to 40 targets out of the water.I will say it is very dry hear that could be a problem or maybe the sites i am at are hunted out, I doubt that, or maybe I just don,t know what I,m doing but I would think I would have stumbled into something.I read these post about guys finding all kinds of good deep targets and I,m getting a little discouraged.I will hang in there maybe we will get some rain and conditions will improve. good luck to rest of you! Mike

 

[Jim upstate NY]

that seems to be common factor from those not getting deeper.. Havent had the ex out since geting the etrac.. tonight I am gonna mess with both a little.. targets getting harder to come by at the spot across the street.. hope I get enough to compare..
I know more is there though... 1790 to present, and all I have is 2 large cents, a half cent, flying eagle, and a barber quarter.. other than that all wheats and clad... wheres the Silver even modern and indians? like no coins were lost except pennies and stopped after flying eagle till wheats I know it was lived in from at least the 40's as the people that lived there now live next door since the 70's.. and I assume the entire time... my 1875 map shows it with a name... weird

 

[mattockman]

n/t