Racer Beachmode

[Cal_Cobra]

My Racer Pro Pack landed yesterday, and it's impressive from the moment you see how well they packaged it, heck even the rain cover on the display housing is impressive (nicely designed).

I was running through the menus inside the house, and as to be expected it's chattering away in all the modes w/the stock settings as there's a fair amount of EMI inside the house, in all modes that is, EXCEPT Beach mode. Beach mode was extreemely quite.

I found that to be very interesting. I don't believe they'd dropped the sensitivity in beach mode, as watching the various beach hunting videos posted thus far, it appears to have no problem getting deeper targets (although I do wonder how well it'll do on small gold on wet salt beaches?), but I wonder what exactly they've done with the Beach mode programming to make the machine so quite? Could it be a nice option to use in heavy EMI ladden non-beach areas?

~Brian

 

[jimmyjiver]

Hi Brian,,,,I think the ID FILTER value is set to 40 as a default value that might be why? I thought I read it was the weakest mode?.......JJ

 

[Cal_Cobra]

JJ I saw that, and you may well be right. Just amazing how quite it was in Beach mode.

I'll set it to 2 & 3 tone mode with the disc/ID filter set to 40 and see if it achieves the same results, that should tell all.

HH,
Brian

 

[Rick(ND)]

Brian,

I tried a few different things when I got mine and seen how bad it chattered in my bar. I lowered the sensitivity to 1 and it was a lot better, but still chattered. Tried upping the ID filter and was up to 70 I believe and still was there, but not too bad so I tried a few coins and with the gain as low as it was at 1 it still seen the coin, but not real deep. I never tried the freq adjust or ground balance as I was air testing and it may make a difference I don't know and when I went to the beach mode with the factory settings it really quiet down and notice it didn't have the depth the d2 or d3 had. I took it outside away from the buildings and it was real quiet and as I got close to the buildings it started to chattering again, so I feel the beach mode maybe more then just just a gain or iron ID myself, but I am new to this detector also.

Good luck with your test and I would like to know what you find out.

Rick

 

[Cal_Cobra]

I took the Racer and set the disc/ID filter on 2-tone & 3-tone to 40, and it was quite. It actually got quite with the ID filter set at 20.

I did an airtest on all four modes, stock settings and beach mode clearly achieved less depth then the other modes. I then changed the sensitivity to 99 on all modes, and definitely saw in increase in depth on the airtest across the modes, but again the beach mode was the least deepest mode.

So the beach mode seems to be more then just the ID filter, they may have reduced the sensitivity, OR altered it in a way that it will work with salt environs where it's still hot, but not blinding itself to handle the wet salt as to not false. Should be interesting to see what it can do on a wet salt water beach on the west coast. We have some pretty nasty beaches, loaded with black sand. I didn't really buy this to be a wet salt water beach detector, BUT if it could do it, and do a good job at it, I'm all for it. Perhaps that large coil would be a good investment if it does well at the beach.

 

[taco77]

I cannot wait for more salt beach test results. I think it will be like an atpro or mx5 for the salt beach being a single freq detector.

 

[Des D]

Interesting post & comments.

A few days ago, I got to test the 'Racer' at 2 saltwater beaches in conjunction with a PI unit.
What I can say is the 'Racer' appears to have some extra ground filtering (salt) active.
BUT, it still remains very sharp to various conductivities albeit with a [ sensitivity ] drop especially in the very wet and right at the surf line.
However, the GB function is extremely good and usually balanced in seconds no matter where I was and even balanced with the coil submerged with waves hitting the coil...amazing!
On the semi-dry sands it had good sensitivity but was fooled a couple of times by iron [ thumb size thin pieces not heavily rusted ] but was 'sharp' to several pull rings and pull tabs pointing to it being good on rings?
However, I was "suspicious" about these as the Target ID's read in the low ' 90's e.g. 92 as well as lower e.g. 84 - on the ferrous finds not the tabs and pulls which were Low ID's, 61 and 65 if remembered correctly?
Typical of many single frequency machines, it will 'false' if the coil touches the surface but, it's easy to hold the 'Racer' and that can be easily avoided.
Several signals were compared with the PI unit and some 'nulled' the 'Racer' and these turned out to be very small but heavily rusted nails (from fires) as the beaches are popular with kids in the summer.

Overall Result: I was extremely pleased with the 'Racer' on saltwater beaches and I should add, compared to a BBS or an FBS unit was just [ as quiet ] but in no way as deep.

NB: I also tested the Beach Mode in a very iron laden site and got mixed results.
Ground Balance wasn't a problem with standard and small coils.
I had hoped for a similar 'X-Terra' experience as the 705 in Beach Mode ground balanced inland [ can knock out heavily rusted iron ] even better than the regular Disc Mode due to the filtering reading the rusted iron as part of the ground matrix.
If you've used an X-705 in this manner you will know what I am saying.

Testing continues

Good Hunting

Des D

 

[Nuke em]

Very honest opinion Des . Interesting machine , will keep an eye on new machines like these for the future .
Who knows if Minelab will bring out a new FBS that will suit me and if not then I will have to find an alternative.

You would love testing machines on the beaches I go on , rubbish tips are less trashy !

Out with my Terra later. Still my machine of choice for the dry .

What type of tones has the Racer got Des ? if they are like the Terra's then that may clinch the deal.