Thinking about modding an Excal with a new coil

[Dig]

Hey Peeps! I'm curious to hear from some of you who may have modded you Minelab Excaliburs with aftermarket coils. I have been debating this back and forth with some of my local hunters for some time now and am not sure whether its a good idea or not. If I modded, I would probably look at the Sun-ray 12", 16", a WOT 15" or an SEF 12x15. Also, I would keep one stock machine with a 10" and do this to another older out of warranty machine. I would welcome any thoughts or experiences you might have about doing this, or any results/problems you have gotten/noticed by doing this. Thanks for your time and I look forward to hearing what you all have to share!

 

[tomcatpl]

i have the s-8 and s-12 on my excal s-8 works great the s-12 i went out on a windy day and i got some falsing on it (maybe couse of the wind )i could only run the xcal sens 5 the WOT WAS more stable for me on my beaches
also used the 10x12 SEF for a short time did not like the pin poiting with it


i have made swiching coils a snap

 

[John (west central FL)]

Get yourself a used Sovereign. It has interchangeable coils. You probably don't want to hunt in the water with anything larger than the 10" anyway. Get a meter for it and you will have a decent machine for coin and relic hunting too.

 

[grumpyolman]

Dig...something to consider but it sounds like some of the folks here have the problem solved...My friend had an old Whites underwater detector. You've probably never seen one. He kept getting water into the control area no matter how nicely and carefully the "O" rings were treated there was still a leak. You know well about ambient pressure. We discovered that the ambient pressure was pushing water in from the coil somewhere and the water was traveling up the coil cord, on the inside of the sheathing, and entering the electronics from there. We were fresh water so it was no big deal.
When making any mods to an underwater anything I am always paranoid about how good of a seal I can get. I wonder if the system they have on the Tigersharks for changing coils might work? You will always have the problem of keeping the water out of a coil not made for underwater use with a factory seal. You can probably get away with something simple if you just wade. But get down 30' and work there for an hour and you require a little better system than that what may come with the coil.
Since the Excalibur is just a sovereign in a waterproof enclosure there might be some info in the sovereign part of the site that might talk about sovereign owners, not waterproof, mods. At least you'd get a feel about how the different coils work. jim