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What was your biggest mistake in learning a new detector?

maxxkatt

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Joined
Sep 20, 2015
Messages
3,485
Location
North Atlanta, GA
My biggest mistake that slowed me down with my brand new 800 in March of 2018 was listening to some detectorists and copying other's settings of people who were using the 800. Especially some of the good hunters like Calabash digger. Now Calabash digger did not say, use these settings, but rather explained what he used and why.

The problem with the Equinox 600 and especially the 800 is that you must learn the settings and learn how to accurately apply them to your hunting site, not some other detectorist's hunting site. It does not take very much of getting your settings even slightly wrong to detune the 800 and make it not so good at detecting.

If you wish to really learn the 800 get Clive Clynick's three books on the 800 because are worth every penny. Some have complained they don't have enough pages. Well they don't contain any publishing fluff to increase the page count. The are packed with 600 knowledge and 800 knowledge on the advanced settings. You might as well highlight the whole book when reading one of them.
 
Swinging my Fisher F2 too fast, acting like it had the recovery speed of an Equinox 800.
 
booboo

One mistake I made was buying a cheap, about $15.00, pinpointer. Those things are a waste of time, energy, batteries and money. I bought a garret carrot next and that thing is fantastic.
 
I think learning your detector just takes time and you are right that not everyone's settings will be the same. Experienced detectorists will usually have a smaller learning curve due to experience with other detectors. I usually start with some sort of preset with a new machine and tweek it to my liking. Probably the biggest mistake that I have made in the past is to just run the detector wide open to try to get the most depth instead of running it at the best sensitivity setting for the environment I am hunting in. I got really good with tweeking my DFX and many times wish I had another one. With the simplex, there is not as many settings to concern yourself with but you can definitely squeeze some performance out of it with the right settings. I am learning little things about it every time I take it out.
 
... was listening to some detectorists and copying other's settings of people who were using....

I had to chuckle when I read this. Because I recall the days when the Eagle, the Spectrum, and XLT were "all the rage". And this is when the "scores of user adjustments " were introduced. Such that the control panel became like the console of the Star ship Enterprise !

And I distinctly recall that if someone at the club meeting showed off a good find @ the show & tell time, someone else would question : "what settings were you using" and "how did you set such & such ?". And if there was EVER a suggestion that the factory settings were wimpy, then .... Guess what the listening audience would conclude ? They would IMMEDIATELY go out and max out every setting. Why ? So that they would not be "missing out" :roll:

And then, naturally, they'd be in for a crazy chorus of audio and blare. And I recall trying to help some of these folk, who couldn't figure out all the mess-of-audio. And when I'd look at their settings, I could see they'd set every-single-setting on max. So I'd question them : "Here's your problem " and "why'd you do that ?" . They'd allude to the "didn't want to miss out" and "I saw/heard such & such" answer.

So it's like you say: the MINUTE any expert good hunters offer suggestions to get-an-edge, is the MINUTE that the newbies SKIP any remedial settings.

I'm sorry, but there is no skipping to the head of the class. There is no substitute for digging 1000 clad and 1000 tabs and 1000 foil and "wimpy settings", BEFORE you think you can go "be a hero" and use advance settings.
 
Simple; buying a NOX 800 for their initial price, plus a military discount and not giving my body enough time to adjust to the ergonomics, then selling it. In actuality, my pain was likely from playing 18 holes of golf a day after detecting, not the detector! I hardly ever played golf....and now I want another 800.....ugh!
 
I'd have to say something which has already been mentioned. Taking a new machine and tweaking for max depth instantly, and hunting. Treasures are for the most part not undetectable because it ultra deep. IMO most are missed because they are in a relative zone below 8 inches and masked, or slightly masked. I am not saying that I don't test for max depth. I purposely have deep 10" coins in my test garden. I just think I've been guilty of pushing an untested detector on virgin hunts, tweaked to max depth, and feel disappointed by not finding the general moderately deep targets, and waste time and patience with a new, never used detector. Time for tweaking for hunts is after putting in some time in the field with mostly basic factory settings, m-a-y-b-e one or two tweaks. I know that I lost a lot of fun with the first big machine, the V3i, always fiddling with it on the early hunts. I learned, and adjusted to a simpler method with the other machines to come to me. JM2C
 
Not giving the manual the respect it deserves and listening to other hunters instead
 
1: Trying to learn and understand the nuances of a talkative AT Max around very ferruginous, boggy, "hot rock" river sediments.
2:Not joining this forum for a year while trying to figure things out myself with only the manual. The manual is good but not comprehensive. Got some good advice around here on initial setups in various hunt settings, as well as other suggestions. It can be daunting for a newb.
 
... Taking a new machine and tweaking for max depth instantly, ...


Good post. The immediate knee-jerk notion by all of us md'rs (especially newbies) , is that depth is the name of the game. But as you say, this only applies to certain sites. In other sites, it's iron-see-through, and/or good TID that will spell the best-results. And most often times you have to sacrifice one, to excel in the other. You rarely EVER end up with the "best of all worlds".

There are times when a wimpy old Tesoro 2-filter will kick @ss over the star-trek enterprise balls-to-the-walls-depth machines. EVEN THOUGH THE WIMPY TESORO only gets 4 or 5" depth, and has no ability in minerals, poor TID etc..... SIMPLY because you're detecting in a bed of nails with shuts down power-house-deep-seekers.
 
For me, it was updating the Nox 800 to the latest version 3.0. Thankfully you can always roll back.


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Good post. The immediate knee-jerk notion by all of us md'rs (especially newbies) , is that depth is the name of the game. But as you say, this only applies to certain sites. In other sites, it's iron-see-through, and/or good TID that will spell the best-results. And most often times you have to sacrifice one, to excel in the other. You rarely EVER end up with the "best of all worlds".

There are times when a wimpy old Tesoro 2-filter will kick @ss over the star-trek enterprise balls-to-the-walls-depth machines. EVEN THOUGH THE WIMPY TESORO only gets 4 or 5" depth, and has no ability in minerals, poor TID etc..... SIMPLY because you're detecting in a bed of nails with shuts down power-house-deep-seekers.

True Tom....Also, some Md'rs and newbs take "air" testing to heart when it really only gives you knowledge that a detector can detect a metal and a "close" ID. The only real depth test is from a test garden and ones that have been there for a while......correct me if I'm wrong....and this varies with the soil and moisture content as well...
 
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Since the title reads “YOUR biggest mistake” not “THE biggest mistake”....mine occurred when first learning my Explorer 2. I didn’t TRUST it. It is still occasionally something I fight with, but only rarely now.
 
when I got my first E-trac I was told all about the numbers... it's all about the numbers. Well yes of course it is, but the tones tell you so much more... My biggest mistake was constantly staring at the screen for numbers to determine what I was looking at...
 
Not covering the ground that's in front of me, followed by a close second biggest mistake, swinging too fast.
 
when I got my first E-trac I was told all about the numbers... it's all about the numbers. Well yes of course it is, but the tones tell you so much more... My biggest mistake was constantly staring at the screen for numbers to determine what I was looking at...

For guys who ARE or already went through learning FBS...bingo^^^^^^^
 
I wasted waaay too many years trying to tweak or fine tune detectors like the V3i or even the XLT. Constantly questioning myself as to whether or not I have everything set just right for maximum performance. Then I bought my first FBS machine. An Etrac. Turned it on, noise cancelled and instantly started finding good targets at impressive depths. If I could go back and do it over, I’d have bought an Explorer or Etrac when they were first released. Those machines just took all the guesswork away and made the hobby more fun. Even other modern detectors like the Equinox are much easier to use than the mid to high end detectors I was using back in the day.


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I wasted waaay too many years trying to tweak or fine tune detectors like the V3i or even the XLT. Constantly questing myself as to whether or not I have everything set just right for maximum performance. Then I bought my first FBS machine. An Etrac. Turned it on, noise cancelled and instantly started finding good targets at impressive depths. If I could go back and do it over, I’d have bought an Explorer or Etrac when they were first released. Those machines just took all the guesswork away and made the hobby more fun. Even other modern detectors like the Equinox are much easier to use than the mid to high end detectors I was using back in the day.


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I’m bored so I’m going to comment on every comment.:lol: You’re totally on it DeWayne, when I got my Explorer2 it INSTANTLY did the exact same...good old coin targets at impressive depths. So much so that I had to immediately buy a shovel. No lie. Set the disc, reasonable sensitivity and off to the races. Incredible technology that changed the game of metal detecting overnight.
 
.... like the V3i or even the XLT. ..

....when I got my Explorer2 it INSTANTLY did the exact same.......

^^ Two good posts ^ ^ This was the exact same evolution I saw in CA. There was a time when EVERYONE here was swinging a Whites of some sort, a Fisher of some sort, a Tesoro of some sort, etc.... The only occasional Minelab you'd see was a few were dabbling with Excal's on the beach.

But within a few short years, starting in the early 2000s, everyone was swinging a Minelab. It became harder and harder to argue with results and getting your b#tt kicked. Doh ! :roll:
 
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