Minelab Equinox 6” coil commentary with pics

Put whatever stock you choose into this supplied info..


First test down the barrel of nail using clad dime. Ruler in pic to show nail size and orientation.

Nox in gold 1 passes test speeds 5-8, iron bias 0-1.
Park 2 gives trailing tone off the left.

Deus using elliptical coil fails all freq except 74khz band.

Impact using 4x7 coil passes 20khz only.

I like reporting of Nox better here than Impact though.
This just took the beginning of testing., more later.



Another pic.
Nail suspended two 2x4 thick over clad dime.
Sweeping across nail lengthwise.

Nox 800 using park 2speed 7 nails dime and IDs accurately -25 in the window.

Impact using 14khz don’t like, using 20khz hits but a user has no clue to targets conductivity level.
Deus hits using elliptical Hf coil, no ID at all until I lowered reactivty to 2, and ID here not accurate.



Another test.
Nail suspected above clad dime sweeping down nail longways to detect dime. Notice just one 2x4 thickness high for the nail.


Nox using gold 1 jumps on this dime using speed 7 iron bias 0.
I should mention sweeping all nails previously solo with Nox, even at iron bias 0 quiet.
Park 2 speed 7 hits the dime too not as well (more coil sweep speed sensitive vs gold 1 mode.
Both modes yielded 17 in the meter.

Impact only chirps on the dime, in a site with a lot of iron, a user just might walk right by.

Deus using 14.4khzwas tied up in knots. Fail.
Using 28.8khz is a pass. Better use no reactivty lower than 2.5 though or you might miss.
Deus tests was disc at 6.2 pitch tones.

All detectors ground balanced to concrete sterile steps.
No trick boys and girls.
I just report what I see.

Anyone needed more info a far as setting used any detector feel free to ask and i’ll Try an answer.
Btw my Nox 800 unit, a full factory reset done as soon as coil was on.
So so far I have have done is played with speed and iron bias setting.

Another test with pic.


That’s a big nail suspended 2 boars thickness high.
Sweeping down nail lengthways to detect nickel.
In configuration shown both gold 1and Park 2speed 5-7 gives good 2 way hit signal, 5is the shakiest though of the bunch.
Amazing how hast I can swing and hit the nickel.

Impact hit using 20khz, tone not as pure sounding as Nox though.
Deus hits using both 14.4 kHz and 28.8 kHz, gotta watch how low you set reactivty using lowest freq band.
Disc of 6.4used on Deus pitch tones, had to raid disc due to size of nail.

Some air test data.
Measured from top of coil.
Park 2 outside with single phase power lines nearby overhead. Noise cancel done.
Speed 7 iron bias 0
Clad dime approx 9”
Us nickel approx 11.5”


Speed 5 iron bias 0
Clad dime approx 10”
Us nickel approx 12”

Smaller coils performance on steel bottlecaps seems to be very similar to stock coil.

Thanks. I was waiting for your info on this.
Your time is much appreciated.

The predominant impression is that it looks like it's built like a tank!

How does it balance ,feel,compared to stock coil?

Thanks for sharing this info, obviously we all have many questions, and look forward to more analysis.

More info.
I like this coil!!!!

I did a few depth tests, not exactly scientific but will share. An almost 9”deep nickel. Park 2 bingo. Gold 1 and even bigger BINGO. Could even get this nickel at speed 7 in both modes with advantage signal going to gold 1 mode.

A 7”deep clad dime.
Park 2 hits, need to be in speeds 4-6, speed 7 dodgy to nonexistent.
Gold 1 mode tried worse than park 2 by a good margin.

This small coil is a low conductor hound!!!
I compared Impact on both of the coins above using 4x7” elliptical coil.
Impact out of its league here.
Signals provided by Nox so much more pure sounding.
Something else to mention and I never saw thisnwith Equinox and stock coil.
I could hit both coins using single freq ops.
The nickel I could get in 10,15,20and 40khz. Only problem was it would ID way high into upper 20s and 30s, flip to multi and Nox would ID 10-12 on sweeps.
The 7”deep dime, would ID using multi in the mid 20s to low 30s. Definitely telling me higher conductive target exist.

If we could devise a score card and measure every VLF detector’s attributes, it is my opinion right now just based off of what testing and small use I have done, Equinox 800and 6”coil would get a very high score. Could be the best score period. I haven’t run all detector models though.

I can I think too say, for folks living where soil minerals are even higher than mine, these folks will definitely have a ball with this coil.

I will do some more testing tomorrow.

The feel of Nox with 6”coil is nice. A person can extend rod a bit and rock and roll.

woodbutcher said:

How does it balance ,feel,compared to stock coil?

Click to expand...

It feels good.
Nox feels more like a Deus wearing elliptical Hf coil.

Oh, better tell the mighty At Pro to look out. Nox with 6”coil just might best the Pro on nickel depth with At Pro wearing stock coil.

Just thought I would warn you.
Wouldn’t want you to be shocked or anything,

Big Thanks

I'll be watching for more test results. I also want to know how it would do on the 600 ?? Thanks for sharing the testing info. Going to order the coil this morning.
Bubbaron NOX 600, AT PRO, AT CARROT PIN POINTER

bubbaron said:

I'll be watching for more test results. I also want to know how it would do on the 600 ??
Bubbaron NOX 600, AT PRO, AT CARROT PIN POINTER

Click to expand...

The 600unit should be one deep sucker (for such a small coil) on nickels, gold rings, and the tiny 3cent pieces made out of nickel. And smaller gold coins too.
Oh and you get this depth on these type targets while at the same time getting some grand separation.

Hardcore relic hunters will I think benefit more using this coil with the 800 model. Gold mode 1 is hotter than a pistol on lower conductors. Not like park 2
isn’t.

Just wait when you see a fbs user running along with a Nox user all using 6” coils. The fbsers may be surprised a bit.

Wonder how this is on the beach?

Darth_Finger said:

Wonder how this is on the beach?

Click to expand...

Seems this person likes theirs on a beach.

https://www.detectorprospector.com/forums/topic/7091-3-rings-on-the-beach-with-6-inch-coil/

tnsharpshooter said:

Seems this person likes theirs on a beach.

https://www.detectorprospector.com/forums/topic/7091-3-rings-on-the-beach-with-6-inch-coil/

Click to expand...

Thanks, I thought that if I get one I'd like to use it in the water, should be easier to swing plus a smaller pinpoint footprint.

Alright I spent around 2.5 hours out in the wild this morning using Equinox 800 and small coil.
Made a coupel stops just to check Emi, these spots I think seem to paint a good pic of how a detector can cope with Emi.
Nox sounded good.
Found one clad coin about 1.5”deep. So after recovery I swept area and sure enough a what seemed like a big piece of ferrousnwas the blocker, the why likely I didn’t find this coin when this area was swept just a couple months ago with both Nox and Etrac with stock coils.
Dig one other signal that was trying to hold 13innthe meter but would trend 14 ID. I suspected no nickel, but had to see. Sure enough the square tab in pic.
I think a lot of folks will be able to run at least 24 Sens in a lot of places if this is what they desire.

Next I went to one of the roughest sites (old) I know of with loads of iron, various shapes, depth.

I’ll say this right off, Equinox 800 in an environment suchnas this running 0-2 iron bias will not run totally quiet on all the ferrous in the ground,
Dialing iron bias up will snuff out a ,lot of it, but a user risk missing some finds that are detecfor is capable of locating.

I stayed primarily in park 2detect mode.
Did use field 2 toward the end of my short hunt this morning, and liked what I witnessed.
This particular site is in pretty good shape to hunt right now.
When owner rakes and rolls the hay (it’s thin) it will be in real good shape for summer to hunt.

Using pinpoint with small coil likely won’t be used much to pinpoint a target. Operator just needs to sweep using detect mode and mark your spot and dig. The pinpoint feature does however give some valuable intel to expose some bigger iron or bigger nonferrous not targets (which a re usually junk).

Also, iron, Nox with this coil tends to give what I call labored tone. Not smooth at all.

Will post a pic.
Did find one item that’s a bit unusual. This area pounded hard in the past too. Checking this particular target depressing horseshoe button yielded clean edges on both sides of target (zero iron tone).
Don’t know what it is or was part of.
The what looks like a 22 caliber bullet older, was deep for this small coil.

Thanks for the info TN. and Thanks for purchasing from Antiques Detectors!!

Look lclose in this pic.
A #6 shot on the left and a #9 shot out of 2 different shotgun shells.
Let’s see airtest wise what the Nox and small coil does on them.
Standby.


May through the Bic pen point data in here too, if I an find one.

Here’s is pic of the Bic pen I use daily in test.

The 2shot were taped to plastic thingy so Nox wouldn’t detect my rich in iron blood. Lol

I will post data shortly.
First off, Sens run at 24 all detect modes. Ground balance zero, threshold 0, noise cancel done in each detect mode. Iron bias 0 used in all.
Bic pen, and the 2 shotgun shot checked using speeds 5 and 7.
Interesting data here I think.

I think this data should be viewed in a relative fashion when looking at the different modes.
For whatever reason both beach modes seemed less stable vs other modes, I still didntest with Sens at 24 in these 2detect modes.

So here we go.

Park 1
All 3 items checked speed 5 and 7- no detection unless I brushed the coil, and signal gotten inrate as I knew the I items were veing waived in front of coil.

Park 2
Bic pen speed 5-detected to approx 2.5”
speed 7- detected to a tad less than 2”

#6 shot speed 5- detected to approx 3.5”
speed 7- detected to approx 3”

#9 shot speed 5- detected to approx 2”
speed 7- detected to approx 1.75”

Field 1
Bic pen no detection using speeds 5 and 7

#6 shot speed 5- detected to .125”. Not a typo either.
speed 7- detected only by brushing coil.

Field 2
All 3 objects - no detection using speeds 5 and 7

Beach 1
Bic pen speed 5- detected a tad longer than .25”
speed 7- detected to .25”

#6 shot speed 5- detected to 1”
speed 7- detected to .5”

#9 shot speeds 5 and 7 no detection.

Beach 2
Bic pen speeds 5 and 7 no detection

#6 shot speed 5- detected tomapprox .75”
speed 7-detected to approx .25”

#9 shot at speeds 5 and 7 no detection

Gold 1
Bic pen speed 5- detected to approx 3”
speed 7- detected to approx 2.25”

#6 shot speed 5- detected to approx 3.25”
speed 7 - detected to approx 2.75”

#9 shot speed 5- detected to approx 2”
Speed 7- detectorist approx 1.25”

Gold 2
Bic pen speed 5-detected to approx 3.25”
speed 7-detected tomapprox 2.75”

#6 shot speed 5-detected to approx almost 4”
speed 7-detected to approx 3”

#9 shot speed 5- detected to approx 2.25”
speed 7- detected to approx 1.25”

More info using small 6”coil.

Time is building on unit for me. Easy unit to manage with small coil attached. Very pleasant to swing and get into position in sites.

I will post a pic of what I have found in the last three outings. Weather was hot today and I got hot both this morning and this evening.

There are lots of ways to use this coil for relic hunting.
Park 2, Field 2 or either of the Gold modes.

Park 2will be more sparky in iron vs field 2.
I haveexperience using gold 1 mode.

Using small coil I really like Gold 1 Mode.. A good trained ear using this mode will pay off for folks hunting in sites, even previously pounded sites.

So far all my hunts have been in 2spots where I have killed multiple times with some other good detectors, like Deus LF coils and Hf coils, Nokta Impact, Nokta Relic, Minelab CTX primarily with stock coil, Equinox with stock coil.

Don’t let anyone tell you this small coil isn’t deep for its size. Lower conductors especially I dug one of the flat buttons at approx 8”deep using gold 1 mode, a very good signal,too. Field 2woukd hit but to be honest I don’t know if I would have located this button initially using.

This evening I used gold 1 mode majority of the time, dug very little iron and did well I think considering how hard and how many times I have busted this area.

I have been running GB tracking on using gold 1mode too and it seems to work well.

I have not been to an area I consider a coin area using the coil yet.

The bigger find in pic seems according to my magnet is actually ferrous in some spots and nonferrous in others.

I should also mention, back when I hunted these 2places was earlier this year. Even though these 2spots have fresh cut hay and the hay hasn’t been gotten up by owner, the stems to the grass make me have to keep my coil higher than I had to back realer this year. Coil height using small coils running .5”to 1.5” above the ground depending. I am not done with either of these spots using this coil either. To be able to hunt in a relic site this time of year I cosnsider myself lucky.

I think I can say there will be folks who buy this coil, use a few times and get rid of. I won’t be getting rid of mine. I also think for whatever reason i don’t think the smaller coil is due to smaller size finding things smaller on average vs stock coil. But make no mistake the small coil does perform.

I will continue to use weather reporting and posting. I have a couple sites that could hold a nice coin I may try the coil on. These sites too hard hunted previously by me.

Thanks again for another update.
Can't wait to get one.

Using small coil, if you see things detected reading 07-15 ID wise, don’t be too quick when digging to give up. These conductive level targets seems can be deeper hence a person may prematurely after digging think they were fooled or find a piece of ferrous thinking they were fooled.
How do I know this?
Guess.lol

I have been experimenting this morning using Gold 1. Need to take what I have seen with this experiemring back to my proving grounds and have a look see. The use of horseshoe button checking suspect targets vs how suspect target sounds with horseshoe not used may give clues to finding the more/most heavily masked targets. Will a person dig some iron in the process. Likely.

More field time.

Before I share some of what I witnessed this morning. I did a couple tests using clad dime and nickel doing down the barrel tests.

I am bringing this up for a good reason.

I and I am sure lots of folks here watch you tube videos when folks are testing/comparing detectors on these nail and usually a coin test.
I think now where I and maybe some folks have been going wrong here is we look at these tests in a go/no go fashion.
And in doing so we lose sight of some very important things.
The coin may be should be moved so detector used at least a borderline whatever is heard.

Yesterday while hunting I dug only certain quality signals.
Did I miss some stuff by doing??
Yes!!!

I went back this morning and applied what I witnessed this morning after doing nail tests on top of the ground with its clad dime and nickel.

Using Gold mode 1 on Equinox 800 and small coil, detector tells user far more about what’s under the coil than superficially meets the ears.
Notice I said ears.
What about eyes?
Yes we see it said a lot listen to the tone and put far less stock in meter readings for choosing to dig or not.
Well, I’ve got news for folks.
You want to be on top of your game relic hunting sites using Equinox and 6” that have been blistered you need to use your ears to locate suspect targets, and then use your eyes and ears to make a dig or no dig decision.

Equinox using Gold modes can can make a lot of different noises when sweeping in sites.
Sure there are the clean no brainer signals.
Some of these signals can be weaker.

But some nonferrous bound up by ferrous can indeed be heard, but due to signals produced a user might just think iron and walk.

I made some more finds in the area I hunted yesterday, this same area I talked about after getting my Equinox and stock coil and witnessed targets located with Equinox that Deus Andy LF coils, and yes at times even the Hf coils would struggle on or not detect period.

Equinox is different than fbs/fbs2 in an area of IDing higher conductive targets. Equinox seems to trump Fbs/fbs2 units when it comes to IDing say nickel range conductive targets bound up with ferrous much much better.

So knowing this behavior of Equinox here I find it useful when hunting primitive sites.
I think it is also fair to say, Equinox a far better unmasker in heavily challenged scenarios of lower conductors vs higher conductors.

So what I am saying is Equinox more likely to give mid range and lower ID when actually sweeping heavily masked her detectable nonferrous targets.

There are degrees of signals Equnox will provide using Gold 1.
Hard reject signals I call them, and these objects when pinpoint is used will be blaring...sound ie coffee can or car hood size whatever.
The nice clean no stutter, no quick reverse of the tone heard.
Btw using gold mode on Equinox does to me anyways remind me somewhat of a GPX Minelab plies machine.
This tonal transition heard when using Gold modes is key.
Ferrous like to report louder vs nonferrous which is a bit softer.

Singnals that don’t sound like textbook all the way around yet don’t meet this hard reject signal I call it, can have some stutter with and LIKELY when swept will provide positive meter readings with no negative readings noted- SHOULD be deemed suspicious and dig!! And these meter readings likely to be mid range and lower. Not high teens, 20s, or 30s, these likely ferrous.

I plan to get back in this site and do some head to heads using ox and some other detectors.

I should also point out, using gold 1 mode even at speeds of 6 and 7 seems to be a trailblazer in both separation and depth for a 6”coil.

Moving soil out of holes seems most time seems to make detection of nonferoud find more difficult or impossible with the find still in hole.

So in a nutshell I had an ah ha moment ( multiple momensts) with Equinox and 6”coil.

Thought I would share.
Cheers
Stay tuned.

Good info TNSS. Thanks for posting.