How good is the 17"?

[CCadrin]

How good is the 17" coil? I here you get about an inch or two in wet sand. I also here there is no difference when used in a trashy park because of the number of targets.

 

[Jason in Enid]

you heard wrong. I get 2-3 more inches hunting in grass. I can't comment on beaches, I but I have heard of more gains there.

 

[mcb613]

I took the 17 and rehunted a trashy spot that I used 6 on this weekend. Snagged an early merc at 9 inches , that I missed with the 6. Sweet tone popped right through. Like a magnet.

 

[CT Todd]

It's a pain to me GKMan's been kicking my ass with one all last year.

 

[KinTN]

My thought is about an additional 2 inches, probably more in better loamy soil. Possibly more when its saturated too. Soil composition matters.

At the beach..... 0baby. I don't have an exact # for you, but I dug significantly deeper holes in the damp and wet sand. Too the point that I started to feel "oh *hit, another 12+" on the screen". It wore me out more than once this last vacation.

I don't buy those that run the 17 down in trashy areas. However, it slows you down + weeds out the amateurs imo.

 

[GKMan]

It's a pain to me GKMan's been kicking my ass with one all last year.

Ha, it is an awesome coil... The weight doesn't bother me in the least, and it is very sensitive to small buttons that are sometimes found at the older sites. In parks it is going to work well. Obviously there must be some separation capability differences between the stock and the seventeen incher, however if you feel you may be just out of reach of hitting those deeper, older targets it is well worth the effort to use it.
Overall, I think biggest benefit of the larger coil is the amount of coverage that you get out of it.

 

[tcornel]

I pulled out 3 quarters or the sand today. Each was 15 to 17" deep. My stealth scoop was two deep before they came out.

The signal was loud and clear! A couple days ago there was 2 pieces of gold earring that kept dropping through the holes in the scoop. They were about 9" down.

It is a must have in my mind,.

 

[Ray(Ca)]

Was wondering how heavy this coil is. I've used a WOT on my e-trac and my arm was done in a few hours. As I understand the CTX is better balanced than the e-trac. I want to use it on the beach and I have no problem digging deep holes with my T-Rex.

Thanks,
Ray

 

[tcornel]

Ray,

Get the harness or a detecting buddy. The CTX is very well balanced, much better than the etrac. But big coils are big coils.

That said get the T Rex ready as you will need it!

Tom

 

[KinTN]

Yep, I have to use a harness with the 17". I can only go about 2hrs without one, but unlimited with one. (and fwiw, also unlimited with the stock coil), Made my own- no way I'm paying ML prices for a simple harness.
Swinging it under any water at all is more work too!

 

[Porschephile]

Its a good coil and it does go 2-3 in deeper than stock coil in my soil. I have bagged silver dimes at 12in with it. The target ids are accurate and as stable as the stock coil. But there are trade offs... Most important to me is that using it requires much more careful pin pointing than the stock coil. If you only pin point two ways you can be significantly off target, especially if the target is shallow. You MUST pin point 4 ways or you will waste a lot of time and effort. Secondly, and almost as important, with the 17in coil on the CTX seems to over-state the depth of coin sized targets by about 2in. So depths that look like good stuff on the stock coil are more likely to be shallow clad/junk with the same indicated depth with the large coil. Thirdly, and less important imo, the large coil spoils the nice balance of the CTX,making the detector front heavy which will significantly increase your fatigue from swinging it. You can suck it up and keep swinging until your arm bulks up or get one of those harness things...

 

[mrwilburino]

Thanks for addressing the pinpointing issue, Porschephile. That has been my main concern about the big coil. I mostly hunt parks, and am very particular about keeping my digs as neat as possible. I don't like to cut my plugs any wider than six or seven inches at the most, so pinpointing needs to be reasonably accurate to keep from making a mess when retrieving deeper targets. Have not had a problem doing that with the stock coil but not sure how that's going to work out with the 17" coil. Thoughts on that anyone.....................................?

 

[Bryan V]

I'm a park hunter too. So accuracy is important.
Very shallow targets can be tricky to pinpoint but I can be very accurate with the 17" coil.
You just have to take more time and like porschephile said pinpoint from both directions.
My depth reading is also off by a couple inches and I have not dug a coin deeper than I have
with the stock coil so I'm not sure I'm getting more depth.
I need to test that this spring.
The ground coverage is very addicting though. I use a harness with the 17.
Bryan

 

[KinTN]

17 is indeed a bit harder to be exact with the PP, but youll get better with practice. say 90% of the time you will be as good as stock after you get comfortable with it.

 

[mrwilburino]

Thanks Bryan and Kin TN.

 

[Sweeping-4-junk]

I sold my 3030 about a year ago , i did use the 17 inch coil for a short while. Depth wise to be totally honest i did not seem to find coins any deeper than i did with the standard coil. I could never pinpoint with high accuracy and was often well off target by a few inches on quite a few holes. I did not like the weight , way too heavy to swing for more than about an hour without a harness. The coverage though is fantastic with the 17 inch coil , it misses very little if its under that big coil , excluding masked targets, i would not use it in anything other than low trash situations IMHO. On clean ground and beaches it would be my coil or choice. I would use an harness though. On large targets like a cache of coins this coil would give you quite a few inches better depth over the stock coil...

 

[CCadrin]

I was the original poster of the question. The reason I asked was to try to make a decision to purchase a CTX and Minelab was offering a free one if the purchase was prior to Jan 16th. After hearing about it I joined the CTX club and will retire from the GT club. Thanks for everyone thoughts and opinions.

I plan to mostly use the coil at low tide on the mud flats.

 

[trojdor]

I was the original poster of the question. The reason I asked was to try to make a decision to purchase a CTX and Minelab was offering a free one if the purchase was prior to Jan 16th. After hearing about it I joined the CTX club and will retire from the GT club. Thanks for everyone thoughts and opinions.

I plan to mostly use the coil at low tide on the mud flats.

Should be a perfect application for the 17.

Good luck, and HH

mike

 

[Bishop2012]

Haha! I bought the promotion is well. I hope to one day get to the beach but right now there is so much trash where I am hunting I ordered the 6" coil.

 

[KinTN]

I was the original poster of the question. The reason I asked was to try to make a decision to purchase a CTX and Minelab was offering a free one if the purchase was prior to Jan 16th. After hearing about it I joined the CTX club and will retire from the GT club. Thanks for everyone thoughts and opinions.

I plan to mostly use the coil at low tide on the mud flats.

Congrats, Welcome to the clan, and you better have an Outstanding digging device with you on your hunts!