What's the deal with the ferrous numbers?

[NealNoIN]

How come almost every target on the charts I read here show the ferrous number at or near 12? I'm assuming it's one of two things:
1. The Etrac does not have the wide range of ferrous ID that the Explorers have and only gives you a change of 1 or 2 numbers no matter what the target is.
OR
2. The Etrac is very sure an item is not iron and only reads it as iron if it absolutely is. Then and only then do the ferrous numbers drasticly change.

If it's number 2 then I would say that's a good thing.
But which is it?
Thanks,
Neal

 

[rbholt80]

its the second one.
its iron if it says it is but it will let you know if its iron with a good target. sometimes the ferrous numder will be a lot lower than the 12 line but the conductive number will right on were it should.
most of the time when i see its ether a deep coin or a coin with iron in near or sitting dead on top of the coin
that chart that shows that 12 ferrous line really doesnt mean much when your out hunting for deep coins.
iv had wheats read 17-40 and all around there when they are deep or mixed with iron.
thats my 2 cents worth lets see who has more info to add so we can all learn more.

 

[ziphius]

Yep, rbholt80 is right. And if you are running any kind of iron discrimination, it's less likely that deep iron will sound like a good high conductor. I still get fooled though. 2 days ago, I dug a sickly-sounding 1924-S wheat penny at 8-9 inches with green warts all over it. It had a high tone, but the ID numbers were all over the place and the depth meter told me it was deep. If I had paid any attention to the ID numbers, I probably would have walked right by it. - Jim

 

[bcoop]

The E-Trac was set up for all possible good targets to show up on the ferrous 12 line. Of course like Rbholt stated that can vary with the presence of iron or other junk mixed with a good coin for instance. Deep targets will also fall a line or two below the 12 line and soil type and conditions can make a variation. Your conductive numbers will remain close to right on the money. No pun intended.

This machine reminds me of my Garrett GTI 2500 with a straight TID line from iron all the way to the right to a silver dollar, except you have some conductive numbers and different tones to help annotate what the coil has seen.

BCOOP