More initial thoughts on the BHID 300

[JohnA]

Have used it for about 15 hrs now. Tried gobble-gobble's tip of using discriminate for rusted bottle caps and listening for broken signals like the Excal hits. Helped some, but I also got a broken signal on a crusty penny. In supertune it is plenty deep, but on my machine I need nearly maximum sensitivity for acceptable depth. Haven't found anything deeper yet than I would have with my Excal, but I think it may hit a little better on shallow and fresh objects. A shallow and heavy Tungsten ring gave me an overload signal today. Where it shines is in a sanded- in hunt where one may want to go back and forth from dry and wet sand and the water. It is very light with a straight shaft and belt mount setup. I will be hunting in a site where the current is strong, targets are waist to shoulder deep and rusted bottle caps are numerous. I will bring both machines and start with the BHID, but if I am digging too many rusted bottle caps, it will be Excal time.

 

[therover]

Do you feel the Excal has an easier sound that distinguishes bottle caps ? I have an Excal and the BHID 300. The Excal gives that shallow, long WAAAAH sound on the bottle caps, where the BHID does not. However, I was in the dry sand and although bottle caps sounded good on the BHID, there were flashes of red on most of them ( I only dug 5 ) so that may be a way to not dig as many with the BHID.

This was when hunting in discrim, but I should have switched to all metal to see if the sound was harsher or broken. I would imagine there would be quick flashes of the red light as well.

After digging about 4 or 5 pieces of iron in all metal ( even though the red light indicator informed me it was iron), I wanted to check it out. After that, I did not dig any iron due to not digging any target where the red light would flash at any point during the swing.

I like both machines, but for my next 4 or 5 trips, I will be using the BHID to make sure I give it a really good work out and learn the machine. I still like the Excal a lot, but I can swing the BHID much faster and I feel I can use the all metal mode more efficiently on the BHID than the Excal due to it's ability to still ID in all metal. To me, that's a great feature. I do run the Excal with zero discrim, so it's like all metal, but the BHID's tone in all metal, to me, is a little different and the smaller targets ( coins ) sound crisper. Could be due to the concentric vs DD coils....the coil on the BHID is great and pin pointing is dead on.

 

[JohnA]

are harder to tell, so I end up digging them with the Excal just to be sure. Am going to play with the BHID some more and hopefully pick up on some auditory and visual clues. Another learning curve. Can definitely swing the BHID faster but having to overlap a lot more more than the Excal means about the same coverage for the time spent. However, as you pointed out, the BHID is like a feather compared to the Excal even with the Excal straight shaft and belt mounted.

 

[therover]

Yeah, that's always the catch 22....the rusty ones are easier to distinguish then the new ones. I dug all new ones the other day....any rusty one would ( I think) flash the red light on the BHID and sound awful on the Excal. That low, wide, WOW sound on the Excal is a definite sign of a rusty bottle cap.

You are correct about the coverage but to me, if there are a lot of targets concentrated, I am more comfortable with a concentric than a DD. Just me I guess, but I seem to be able to sniff out good targets among the trash/iron with a machine with a concentric coil.

Keep on swingin and diggin


JC