thoughts on metal detectors for what it's worth

[farmerboy856]

I've been a member hear for a while but i mainly fall in the 'lurker' category. I really appreciate all the great information and i thought i would take a minute from dairy farming in west central wi to thank everyone on here and share a few of my thoughts. My uncle started me metal detecting roughly twenty years ago with an old whites blue box gold master i believe and a metro tech that looked sorta like a vintage egg beater with a pan cake on the bottom. we had a lot of fun with those dug everything and made some good finds. Using the whites i found my first coin spill three mercurys under an old oak! from that day i was hooked! I saved all winter and bought a classic 3 plus the old style one. that machine was fun but as soon as i seen the 'new' idx pro i bought one of those. i made some of my best finds to this day with that machine. indians v nickels my first silver quarter and so on. then came the mxt and the dfx. Me personally i wish i would have known of this forum and read some posts on coils and invested the money from the dfx on some coils for the idx and the mxt. Don't get me wrong i'm sure the dfx was a great machine just not for me. It seemed to love emi no matter how i set it. i bought the books reread the manual but i still could't get the hang of it. By this time i had lost confidence in that machine and shied away from using it and went back to using the mxt and idx pro and back to having fun and making good finds. now if your wondering where i'm going with this is just because theres a newest latest and greatest doesn't mean it's going to automatically improve your finds just by using it. Don't get me wrong i love reading my tector is better than yours stories on here and it helps pass the winter time and sometimes you learn something. But for me my mxt and idx pro got better as i did. meaning that as i learned them more and more i found more and more older and better items. Now this all is not to say that i don't dream of owning and mastering the v3i i just don't know if i would be able to put the time in to learn it well enough make it worth while. I'm not saying people should never upgrade either. Guess now i'm just thinking out loud lol anyways thank you all for the great info you post on here every day! soon as the cows come home or winter gets over which ever comes first i wish you good luck and happy hunting!

 

[JamesBondaka]

I think you summed it up. The mxt is a great machine and its a proven "hunter". Some people do just fine with some of the older machines. Some of newer machines just give you more info and features that some people like/need and some dont. It sounds like you dont. You will know if YOU have to change.

Good Luck!

 

[Nauti]

It's a good post and a true one.Gimmicks have certainly come a long way in the past few years but in terms of actual performance there has'nt really been a major breakthrough for years......there are still old designs that are brilliant in the trash and still old designs that get great depths.You are completely correct in saying if you spend time learning your machine your finds will get better.The problem these days is that new machines are being introduced regularly with the promise of better performance and the latest gadget and many are tempted to swap and change detectors without really ever learning any of them.These are the people who write the "this machine is better than that" type posts,the people who never get the full potential from any machine because all they are interested in is owning the latest piece of high tech equipment.
I've owned quite a few machines over the years and I like to try and get the best out of each one.I can honestly say that not one machine has stood head and shoulders above the rest,they have all been good at finding stuff when they are used to their full potential.
The machines I use now are very simple in comparison to the latest on offer but because I know them well I do very well with them and none of the latest gadgets are going to inprove my finds rates.

 

[TH'er]

I've been a member hear for a while but i mainly fall in the 'lurker' category. I really appreciate all the great information and i thought i would take a minute from dairy farming in west central wi to thank everyone on here and share a few of my thoughts. My uncle started me metal detecting roughly twenty years ago with an old whites blue box gold master i believe and a metro tech that looked sorta like a vintage egg beater with a pan cake on the bottom. we had a lot of fun with those dug everything and made some good finds. Using the whites i found my first coin spill three mercurys under an old oak! from that day i was hooked! I saved all winter and bought a classic 3 plus the old style one. that machine was fun but as soon as i seen the 'new' idx pro i bought one of those. i made some of my best finds to this day with that machine. indians v nickels my first silver quarter and so on. then came the mxt and the dfx. Me personally i wish i would have known of this forum and read some posts on coils and invested the money from the dfx on some coils for the idx and the mxt. Don't get me wrong i'm sure the dfx was a great machine just not for me. It seemed to love emi no matter how i set it. i bought the books reread the manual but i still could't get the hang of it. By this time i had lost confidence in that machine and shied away from using it and went back to using the mxt and idx pro and back to having fun and making good finds. now if your wondering where i'm going with this is just because theres a newest latest and greatest doesn't mean it's going to automatically improve your finds just by using it. Don't get me wrong i love reading my tector is better than yours stories on here and it helps pass the winter time and sometimes you learn something. But for me my mxt and idx pro got better as i did. meaning that as i learned them more and more i found more and more older and better items. Now this all is not to say that i don't dream of owning and mastering the v3i i just don't know if i would be able to put the time in to learn it well enough make it worth while. I'm not saying people should never upgrade either. Guess now i'm just thinking out loud lol anyways thank you all for the great info you post on here every day! soon as the cows come home or winter gets over which ever comes first i wish you good luck and happy hunting!

I agree 100 percent with your comments on the DFX. I have been a White's owner for over 44 years and this is the only model I have been disappointed with. EMI is terrible and trips back and forth to White's for the detector and the coils did not help at all. White's was good about replacing the coils and they made sure my detector was working right but I have to keep on paying postage to Oregon. I finally went back to using my Eagle Spectrum. Also the depth is not good with my DFX. Using essentially the same programs and same size 950 coils my DFX gives up about 3" in the air and almost that much in the ground on a Civil War bullet (depending on the soil) to my Eagle. You may not be able to find one but I am very impressed with my recently purchased White's Classic series IDX Pro (Mr. Bills) in trash.

 

[Southwind]

I think the DFX is a really misunderstood machine. I've used one for 10 years. I've also owned the MXT and while I did feel it was deeper compared to the basic DFX setup, I felt the DFX was a much better detector. I will agree with the EMI and the DFX. Especially if you have it setup incorrectly the EMI can be almost unbearable. Like all the high end White's machines once you've tuned them in they can compete with the best of the best. There is a good reason they still stand as a top machine.

 

[farmerboy856]

Thanks james, neil, "The problem these days is that new machines are being introduced regularly with the promise of better performance and the latest gadget and many are tempted to swap and change detectors without really ever learning any of them.These are the people who write the "this machine is better than that" type posts,the people who never get the full potential from any machine because all they are interested in is owning the latest piece of high tech equipment." Neil i couldn't agree more! And like i stated originally i am just as guilty wanting the v3i and a etrac and many others cause someone somewhere did awesome with that machine and its newest bell! Every time i read one of those posts i find myself wandering over to that co's website and i start dreaming! Always very tempting but i always think back to a buddy of mine that every year he would buy a brand new high end rifle and spendy scope top of the line ammo hire it bore sighted then head to the woods and get mad cause he could never hit a deer. then soon as season was over he would sell the rifle at a loss and start over again next season with another new gun. I see that alot with detectors as well.

TH'er; i never sent mine in and i probably should have. Mine had the old style pancake 950 loop on it not sure if that mattered but anyways i always blamed myself. even after i went through the manual several times and reset the few things i did mess with back to original i couldn't make it run right. i really do wish i could have mastered that one. Your right an idx pro with Bills mods would be great i have never seen one in person and only seen one for sale on line. still very happy with my stock idx pro though!

Southwind as much as i hate to admit it you are very right the dfx can be an awesome machine in the hands of the right person. i only wish i would have been one of them! In fair defense to whites i'm sure if i was shown i could have mastered it and solved the emi even in factory presets. i simply just did not understand what to adjust to solve it nor how much which way when i would try. One thing i do member is i did have some good luck with it on nickels. I was hunting a side walk strip i had down several times with my other machines and the dfx did pull a 3 in v nickel that i had missed the other times along with some clad. Just for the record you won't hear me straight up bash a detector, some might be better than others but none are better than the person running it! you are right i'm sure the dfx does deserve it's earned spot near the top i just need to make sure i'm willing to learn such a machine before i buy one next time. thanks again all. farmer

 

[skookum]

Hi,
You also have to take into consideration, that quite often you will hit strips of land that produce absolutely nothing/zilch/zero/nada.
Not even a rusty nail or pulltab.
Even the most expensive machine wouldn

 

[IDXMonster]

Where ya at Farmer? I'm just south of Madison,got a couple more guys down here too. I have 2 stock IDXPROs and having never used anything else I am so glad to have started with these. It is simple,yet takes a little tweaking,it's powerful,yet not crazy with noise and garbage,the weight and balance is perfect with either coil and they're robust. Rechargable battery packs go forever and a day. I'm not going to bother boasting about them anymore,as soon as someone uses one,they will know what we know....

 

[farmerboy856]

I'm up the super mega high way and through the pasture a bit to the north of you. East of Eau Claire. And your right no need to brag a classic they 'speak' for them selves just read on any forum and you will find many success stories. I sure wish winter would get moving on here soon but i'm afraid its only gonna get worse fore it gets better. I actually took my idx up to my sand floored machine shed just to get out last week. I found more parts in the sand than on my shelves lol. For sure agree with you bout the ids and idxs not being noise makers one of my favorite things bout them! They only speak when they have something worth saying!

 

[Ronk]

I've used the same Classic 3SL Mr Bill modified for almost 20 years and it will hold it's own with just about anything out there in trash or out of trash!
So I DO know what YOU know!!!

Ronk

 

[Mega]

What a quality post and you are totally correct in what you say,but i will admit i am one of the few who kept the DFX and thoroughly learnt it and still learning even after 8 years,i also have 2 other main detectors a Pulse and T2 and of course a selection of coils for those machines.

Your comment about the more you learn about your machine the more you find,that about sums it all up,over here in the UK i see exactly the same posts on the detecting forums over here,as soon as a new machine is launched they must have it and they expect the finds to double straight out the box,it just aint going too happen.

As most are aware that no one machine can do it all,so hence this is why i usually have 3 machines to cover most scenario's,i also have some mint old classic machines in my collection like the Silver Sabre and Arado120b these may be nearly 30 years old but in the enviroment they can beat the most upto date machines going.

I still say that its not what machine you own but that 10inches of space between the headphones that makes the differance,regarding the DFX i bought mine about 8 years back i will admit it was not new but was only a few months old and looked like it had just come out the shop it was that mint condition,but someone had bought it as it was one of the latest must have machine but sold it on as he could not get on with it,so basically i bought a brand new machine for just over half price as he moved onto the next latest must have machine.

So i do totally agree with you in everything you say i am one of those that did stick with the DFX,like yourself spent years alterning about evry setting going till i found the magic combination a prog that was developed by a guy who helped Whites up in scotland and just by adding that one prog it changed it all and then i never looked back,these days all i do is install it and maybe just alter a few basic setting but very rarely.

Once again a great post

 

[IDXMonster]

Ronk-

 

[bowser]

wow ,you guys have said everything i thought for years,simplicity might be the key to having fun,I also have both the mxt and the idx-pro combo, for a while i liked the idx over the mxt,until i got used to using it.The idx is very accurate about coin identity and the iron rejection is great, My best finds have been with the idx-pro so far.HH

 

[Coast]

Very well said, the DFX is a commitment, I have found that some of the older parks that at one time were camping areas were considered hunted out, making subtle changes to the Dfx was like hunting the area new again .

 

[jimmie]

Use the factory programs with adjusting preamp gain and DC,AC only, then ditch the 9.5 coil for a 6x10. Used mine like this for years with out hardly any change later on. Jim

 

[david bull]

I tried the DFX when it first came out,read and retread the manual and books and after three or four weeks went back to the XL-PRO.I too think this hobby is more about having fun and not looking at jumping numbers on a digital screen.Simplicity means a lot and I understand detectors may have improved somewhat in the past fifteen years they all tend to revert back to the technology developed in the eighties &nineties.I say just use what you know and are comfortable with.

 

[Larry (IL)]

I moderated the DFX forum for many, many years and of the hundreds or maybe thousands of DFX users that complained of jumpy VDI's, not a one of them (that I remember anyway) tried reducing the VDI Sensitivity adjustment for a more stable VDI display. Like you said David, it boils down to using the detector you know how to use best.

 

[Southwind]

Agreed Larry!

To this day my idea of the perfect detector, for me, would be an E-Trac with the DFX VDI system. The CTX 3030 is very close.

 

[farmerboy856]

After reading you guys posts here makes me wish i would have just shoved the dfx into closet. could have pulled it out and tried learning it again. didn't know bout all of you here when i sold it though. i will admit that the machine intimidated me as to all the settings and my not understanding what they did alone and together. Thats why you wont hear me straight up knock a machine. especially when its one that i couldn't get the hang of. Maybe i'll have to watch around and pick one up down the rd make it next winters project to learn. My hats off to all of you that have mastered that machine usually i get frustrated enough at something that i keep at it just to say i won! Wont be looking at one for a while though working on picking up a m6 for mrs farmer right now! No Hurry below zero again here for what the 54th or 55th day this winter the fella on the radio said. can't help but think of grumpier old men when max sees the weather report snow snow and more snow max says shut up #$% !@** ! Calling for 31 inches month of march according to farmers almanac ohh boy!