NEWBIE need tips on GTAx400 help!!!

[louiec60]

NEWBIE any body a GTAx400 expert please need help!! tips to use and program my gtax so it will ferfom accurately! my 9 year old son says. dad your metal detector lie!!

 

[cc8137]

You might try going to Garrets website ( http://garrett.com/manuals/GTA-350.pdf ) and download the manuel. Its fairly easy to operate. One touch-button and swing the coil. Other than that, don't know what you mean when you say "perform accurately".

charlie

 

[Uncle Willy]

Too vague. Clarify. Detector is easy as pie to operate.

Bill

 

[slingshot]

ALL metal detectors lie. They give an IDEA of what's in the ground and 35-75% of the time they get it right. I had a GTA 350 and got my best results by just omitting everything below foil. If I had it to do all over again, I would have just omitted all below iron. To be honest, it was more accurate than others I used. On a funny note: I had gone over a favorite schoolyard the day before with a detector that had an overload signal indicator, so I bypassed that target. I came back a week later with the 350 and sure enough the signal was large and loud-only the icon was on the dollar mark! I quickly dug to find 8 quarters! The detector had lied to me-it was $2, not $1.

 

[Uncle Willy]

Forgot to say - no detector made is 100% accurate on readings. It cannot see into the ground. It can only give probabilities not actualities.

Bill

 

[Bugar In. USA]

On the accuracy=awright, I had one of the first 350's that come out years ago, was the only detector i had, and used it all the time, amazing after 5 or 6 yrs of that being my ONLY detector and the ONLY one i used, how accurate it was, just before i sold it to my neighbor a few years back-(he is still using it), that detector was 80% accurate on coins, amazing how it got better after the years, musta been like wine, most detectors get more accurate with use iv'e found=it is the detector isn't it??????

 

[Uncle Willy]

As I've always stated my dear bud - 90% operator, 10% detector. The longer one uses his machine the better the machine seems to get. I've got a good friend who still hunts with a Compass TR 77- IB that he bought in the early seventies when they first came out ( I owned one also ) and if you go hunting with him with your brand new Gee Whiz machine he will thump your butt.

Bill

 

[Uncle Willy]

As I've always stated my dear bud - 90% operator, 10% machine. It's amazing how much better one's machine seems to become the longer they own it and the more time they spend with it.. I have a good friend who still hunts with his Compass TR 77-IB that came out in the early seventies ( I owned one also ) and if you go hunting with him with your new "Gee Whiz" detector with all the bells and whistles he will thump your butt.

Bill

 

[louiec60]

[attachment 110058 006.jpg] thank you guys for your support and advise!!! and funny tips!! i went out at the park with my son and now his a biliever!!! and he cant wait till next week end to go metal detecting! this is our 2days find. on our local park and vacant lots around our place.the GTAx400 is owesome on grassy area and regular soil but have problem on the sand playground. i got a strong signal on nickel and gold bouncing around so i dig it about 10" sand under the sand is very hard black clay i was using a sand scoop and a pinpointer but found nothing! i put the coil on the hole and the signal stiil there! what was this?? is it the GTAx400 shooting too deep? any idea guys?? thanks again for helping a rookie!!!!!!!

 

[Bugar In. USA]

Have found on some playgrounds the same thing you describe, and kept digging, only to find the pipe leg of an old swingset or whatever, wayy down deep and rusted where they left it in the concrete base and just broke it off, usually it's kinda verticle and who knows how long, gives a good false reading signal, and you ain't gonna get it out, and it may read about anything , depending on the rust-corrosion and shape of the thing , and Deep

 

[Uncle Willy]

Looks like you one pretty good.. On the phantom signal you were probably hitting something big and deep, probably junk.

Bill

 

[slingshot]

Wow! Wish I had kept my Compass 77B. You could finagle with the mineral control and make that thing run where the threshold wouldn't change. It was smooth as apple pie. If all these years I hadn't thought it was the detector, not the operator, and had put up with more trash-I woulda probably been like this guy-one detector for life. Wish I could go back thirty years and start over-and I mean that.

 

[Uncle Willy]

Yeah the old 77's were great in nail infested areas. I found a ton of stuff with mine but I just had to have the Relic Magnum 7 when it first came out so the 77 went bye bye. Actually I sold it to my friend and neighbor. When he passed away a few years back I tried to get it back but one of his relatives snatched it up. They had the first DD coil invented and designed by Don Dykstra at Compass. A lot of folks use them in competition hunts because of their lightning quick response and being able to maintain constant audio while hovering over a target.

Bill

 

[louiec60]

[attachment 111736 006.jpg] found on the local park today!!! on a GTAx400!!!!!

 

[dahut]

... to be technically correct, a cache is deliberately hidden. A jar ful lof coins bureied next to a fence post is a cache.
That looks more like a coin, or pocket, spill. I see what looks like abunch of quarters and nicks in there, though, so it still counts as g-o-o-d!

I thought it was interesting the way you said it was with a GTAx 400, as if there is something wrong with that model. Looks like it works pretty good to me!