Big Boys Hobbies

Bounty Hunter Tracker IV Help

CTKidd

CTKidd

Elite Member
Joined
Aug 22, 2010
Messages
644
Location
Colchester, CT
I have been at this a little over the week, and I had my first outing to beach yesterday, and I loved it. I have a Bounty Hunter Tracker IV and want to use it near the waterline along the beach.

1) Has anyone had any success with this machine on the beach near the water?

2) If so, how did you adjust your settings?

3) Any special tricks or tips?

Thanks. This forum has some of the most helpful and nice people on any forum I have ever been involved with, I am glad I found you guys.

HH,
CT Kidd
 
CTKidd said:
I have been at this a little over the week, and I had my first outing to beach yesterday, and I loved it. I have a Bounty Hunter Tracker IV and want to use it near the waterline along the beach.

1) Has anyone had any success with this machine on the beach near the water?

2) If so, how did you adjust your settings?

3) Any special tricks or tips?

Thanks. This forum has some of the most helpful and nice people on any forum I have ever been involved with, I am glad I found you guys.

HH,
CT Kidd
Click to expand...

It didn't work in the wet sand for me, but it did along the edge of the dry and wet sand. Dry sand fine. I haven't fooled around with my settings for the beach so I don't really know. I'm not a big beach hunter so tip wise I'm also not that sure, But I did do the best along the edge of the wet sand and the entrance to the dry sand. Hope this helps some!
 
It also might make a difference in fresh water beach or salt water beach.......

I used my BH2200 in dry sand in Clearwater, FL. and found a bottle cap no problems lol but I only hunted about 2 mins. Too many good looking ladies down thereto follow around than to MD :lol:
 
I bought this machine about a year ago. it really has lots of trouble identifying the valuables from the junk. I remember digging up alot of soda/ beer cans along with bottle tops everytime that I hit the beach. For civil war relics in the all metal mode the woods which are mostly iron and lead and deeper objects it performed remarkably well and was able to determine what it was in thick compressed clay soil with vegetation and not so good in the sandy areas. I definatly prefer to use my brother's whites anyday though.

Some of the machines out there are pretty expensive and complicated to the amateur MD. But it takes money to make money as they say! Personally (and I think alot of others will agree) I got tired of pulling out rusty nails, barbed wire and the sort every time that I stopped to dig. the discriminator and tone modes makes it much more fun and less time consuming wasting energy digging for every target instead of getting only the good stuff.
 
For salt water you need a machine that is designed for it. I've taken my xterra 505 to Myrtle beach twice once last year when I didn't no how to use it and last week after learning how to use it. It wouldn't ground balance in the wet sand period it would still find shallow targets in the wet sand but my best finds were in the dry sand. If you want to hunt in salt water beaches get a machine that is designed for it. If you don't best case scenerio is you find a few things by pure luck worst case scenerio you get frustrated
 
young gun said:
I bought this machine about a year ago. it really has lots of trouble identifying the valuables from the junk. I remember digging up alot of soda/ beer cans along with bottle tops everytime that I hit the beach. For civil war relics in the all metal mode the woods which are mostly iron and lead and deeper objects it performed remarkably well and was able to determine what it was in thick compressed clay soil with vegetation and not so good in the sandy areas. I definatly prefer to use my brother's whites anyday though.

Some of the machines out there are pretty expensive and complicated to the amateur MD. But it takes money to make money as they say! Personally (and I think alot of others will agree) I got tired of pulling out rusty nails, barbed wire and the sort every time that I stopped to dig. the discriminator and tone modes makes it much more fun and less time consuming wasting energy digging for every target instead of getting only the good stuff.
Click to expand...

Respectfully, I must disagree with this. With experience the Tracker IV will discriminate just fine, keeping in mind of course that using any discrimination on any machine (even the most expensive) will inevitably mean leaving treasures in the ground along with all the junk you decide not to dig.

The Tracker IV has limitations of course, but this is to be expected given it's price. This does not mean one can not make excellent finds with in in both quality and quantity.
 
I don't have any beaches near me but I love my Tracker IV. Haven't been able to get out much this summer, maybe once a week for a couple hours the last month or so. Have found plenty of clad, several wheat pennies and a beautiful 1939 Mercury dime. I hunt in disc about 99% of the time. I keep the sensitivity to around 90-100% and only lower it if the machine is getting "chatty". I keep the disc knob at 2:00 (I guess that would be about 25%. I've also done some air testing because nickels get disc out if you set it too high. Someone on here told me anything over 9:00 will knock out nickels. The air test gave me closer to 10:30-11:00. I made a mark right off the dial with a silver Sharpie so I know how high I can go before nickels get disc out. Hope this helps you a little...at least if you do any dry land hunting.
 
wolf-n-wa said:
Ran mine in fresh water just fine. Never tried it on the salt water sand. WOLF
Click to expand...

Did some freshwater today, just to test it out, and it worked just fine. I only had like 20minutes and found 3 bottle caps, and a fishing hook. All metal mode, no discrimination, sensitivity around 12 o clock.

In regards to salt water the bounty hunter website says to,"...keep the search coil from contact with the ground. Contact with saltwater sands will cause the detector to beep falsely. For best result in saltwater, eliminate IRON to reduce false signals caused by conductive beach sands. Coil sweep technique is also important in saltwater; keeping the coil submerged is better than dunking and lifting. The detector needs time to readjust to the conductive salt water."

Anyone ever had luck with the Bounty Hunter Tracker IV in salt water, or wet sand?

Hope this is helping, HH!
CTKidd
 
I have the Bounty Hunter Quick Draw II and it is very accurate. I use All Metal Mode at the beach and dig it all. This machine has a Notch out feature on it too where you can notch out undesirables while still detecting jewelry, coins etc.
 
Tracker IV loves the salt water.

CTKidd said:
Did some freshwater today, just to test it out, and it worked just fine. I only had like 20minutes and found 3 bottle caps, and a fishing hook. All metal mode, no discrimination, sensitivity around 12 o clock.

In regards to salt water the bounty hunter website says to,"...keep the search coil from contact with the ground. Contact with saltwater sands will cause the detector to beep falsely. For best result in saltwater, eliminate IRON to reduce false signals caused by conductive beach sands. Coil sweep technique is also important in saltwater; keeping the coil submerged is better than dunking and lifting. The detector needs time to readjust to the conductive salt water."
ABSOLUTELY RIGHT!!
Anyone ever had luck with the Bounty Hunter Tracker IV in salt water, or wet sand? YES, READ BELOW

Hope this is helping, HH!
CTKidd
Click to expand...

Been using Tracker IV for 3 years in salt water and wet salt sand. Have had NO problems with it. I was amazed that it picked up really teenie sinkers, I've found silver, nickels, dimes, quarters, zlinc and gold (electroplate). I'm trying out my new Ace 250 and find it is not as friendly to the wet, salty beach at all. But then today was my first try. If you're reading this, then scroll up to someone that gave you some great advice on metal only, no discrimination. Yes, you dig more but you won't be missing any good stuff. The Ace read my gold ring (in a test) as a nickel. So.......I will dig every nickel reading with high hopes! Happy Hunting.
 
sandytoes said:
Been using Tracker IV for 3 years in salt water and wet salt sand. Have had NO problems with it. I was amazed that it picked up really teenie sinkers, I've found silver, nickels, dimes, quarters, zlinc and gold (electroplate). I'm trying out my new Ace 250 and find it is not as friendly to the wet, salty beach at all. But then today was my first try. If you're reading this, then scroll up to someone that gave you some great advice on metal only, no discrimination. Yes, you dig more but you won't be missing any good stuff. The Ace read my gold ring (in a test) as a nickel. So.......I will dig every nickel reading with high hopes! Happy Hunting.
Click to expand...

Would you mind sharing with us the settings you use while hunting the wet salty sand? Or low salt water areas? Anything special you have to do before it starts working? I see you wrote that you need to wait to let the metal detector adjust, how long of a wait? Does that also mean you have to wait if you go back up to dry sand after using it on wet?

Thanks again,
CTKidd
 
Tracker IV

You said "I see you said you need time to adjust". Nope, didn't say that...you
read that in the quote from BH Website and what they meant, I believe, was when your in really shallow salt water the detector gets crazy because it has to try to keep adjusting between reading the sand then the little waves wash over and it's trying to read those so, generally it wil just beep like crazy.

If you're going into the salt water go deep enough for the water to cover your coil a few inches and she won't scream. I go from dry sand to wet sand to the water in smooth transitions. BUT if you find your MD is beeping too much in the wet sand/water just lower your discrim. You asked for my usual settings, Toggle switch at ALL METAL, Sensitivity at about 10 o'clock (just past the screw) and discrim. at about 10 o'clock too BUT depending on conditions I will raise or lower the discrim. because near the water you get a lot of false beeps and you just have to lower discrim. a little bit. When I go back to dry sand I raise back up a bit.

Practice on your beach and you'll learn how user friendly the TIV is!

Happy Hunting :o)
 
Last edited:
sandytoes said:
You said "I see you said you need time to adjust". Nope, didn't say that...you
read that in the quote from BH Website and what they meant, I believe, was when your in really shallow salt water the detector gets crazy because it has to try to keep adjusting between reading the sand then the little waves wash over and it's trying to read those so, generally it wil just beep like crazy.

If you're going into the salt water go deep enough for the water to cover your coil a few inches and she won't scream. I go from dry sand to wet sand to the water in smooth transitions. BUT if you find your MD is beeping too much in the wet sand/water just lower your discrim. You asked for my usual settings, Toggle switch at ALL METAL, Sensitivity at about 10 o'clock (just past the screw) and discrim. at about 10 o'clock too BUT depending on conditions I will raise or lower the discrim. because near the water you get a lot of false beeps and you just have to lower discrim. a little bit. When I go back to dry sand I raise back up a bit.

Practice on your beach and you'll learn how user friendly the TIV is!

Happy Hunting :o)
Click to expand...

I had great results today with the BHTiv at the beach today, I will be making a lengthy post in the Beach / water forum, but I just wanted to say thanks to everyone for thier input. You really can use the BHTiv on the beach wet / dry sand.

CTKidd
 
Congrats!

Glad to hear you're in the water! TIV is a tough and trusty machine, if there's metal in it's range you'll know it. Now, get yourself a coil cover and then seal it with silicone. I killed my coil by not doing protecting it. A new coil costs about half as much as a whole new TIV.

Happy Hunting!
 
Last edited:
I was thinking of doing the bedliner spray trick to cover the coil. Can of bedliner spray. Tape off the coil..and spray on a layer of protectant. It doesn't hurt performance, and if you get a scratch or cut in the paint, just spray on some more.

CTKidd
 
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