Ok I got to spend about an hour and a half with the F70 and I have to admit it was quite frustrating. It was pretty chattery for me but what was worse was the noise seemed to out volume and cut better than the good tones. I expected the high pings to jump out at you more like the F2. I really hope once I've gone through the manual and gotten some advice from digger I can make it a keeper but I fear I'll have to turn it down so much it will be no deeper than the F2 making it pointless to have.
Really the tones was the biggest problem though. Just my first impression. Worst case I have 7 days to return but have to pay shipping and 20 percent restocking fee.
The units built on this platform are some of the deepest detectors out there.
The sensitivity/gain is not what you think it is.
At 40 it is way deeper than the F2, lower than that, even.
Watch this vid, notice he has the thresh up into the positive but the sense is set at....1.
Still hitting 8" coins.
I hunted with my F70 and by mistake had only 3 batteries in it, it worked perfectly and still got way deep.
In a coma this thing will find deeper targets than the F2 and I have way over 1000 hours using both...I have seen it, compared them in both bad soil and good and moved a lot of dirt finding this out.
I always read these are way overpowered out if the factory and you don't need to turn them up high to get deep but hard to wrap your head around these things at first.
I couldn't...until this happened to me...
http://www.findmall.com/read.php?37,2038678,2038678#msg-2038678
You just don't have a clue about the relationship between the thresh and gain and disc, how to balance them to get rid of chatter or any confidence in how deep this thing can get on lower than even factory settings because you have no experience with that...yet.
It took me a bit to get used to this upgrade after using the F2 for so many hours too, not easy to get a handle on all this extra power instantly but after you swing a bit it all falls into place.
First thing is do a factory reset.
After you change coils, after you set any notches or even if you are at a busy, noisy, chatter site do a factory reset at that site...you will find most times this quiets it down and brings it back into line.
As far as pinpointing there is a faint circle on top of the coil right past where the rod connects...this is technically the middle of the coil.
I only use that spot and the pinpoint button on the deepest targets, for most normal and common depths up to 6-7" or so I use the wiggle and pull back method.
Get your target under the center of the coil and using very short but quick side to side movements keep in the middle but slowly pull back the coil.
When the target drops out completely the target should be under the front edge of the coil in the place where the tone stopped...or just behind or in front.
In any case if you dig a small hole just a few inches wide and deep enough you will find your target.
Extremely quick and accurate with a bit of practice.
Maybe use the pinpoint at first to get a depth reading while you are learning but switch to the wiggle to find the spot to dig.
As long as we are talking about this wiggle thing I can tell you that this same technique can tell you when you are swinging over those hated crown caps with about 95-99% efficiency...something all DD coils are usually not very good at doing.
Using that same wiggle and pull back move watch the screen on these caps that usually come in from the dime to quarter numbers.
IF you aren't using a whole lot of disc right before that signal drops out at the rim of the coil you will hear, (using multi tones or DP), and see a drop in the numbers that is very noticeable.
Sometimes it will drop from those higher numbers down to the teens to 30's, most times they will drop into the single digit iron numbers.
If you don't want to hunt with disc that low you have two programs you can switch between at the push of a button.
Keep program 2 in all metal or disc set low and hunt in program 1 which is how I do it.
Program 1 always has some kind of disc settings I use, program 2 always is set in all metal.
I hunt using one and use the other as a check on all iffier targets.
It's like having two completely different detectors in one so take advantage of this feature if you like.
This bottle cap thing is one of the most important and useful techniques I have ever learned in my career considering I hunt in mostly very trashy park sites.
Without it I would rarely use any DD coil at most places I hunt.
If you only used concentric coils on that F2 these two techniques are going to be extremely important to you in the future.
Do the reset, set the sense and thresh low till it's quiet, play with the frequency button too because that can also help a lot in some sites.
I assume you are using multi tones now from 3-4H, that's what I did at first going to this one from the F2.
I used 4H for the first few months almost exclusively and found a ton of coins, silver and gold jewelry and a shocking amount of nickels too.
That is fine but there are advantages to using the other tone choices too...you have plenty of time to learn why, though.
I have a ton of settings I have played with, about a dozen that I use a lot depending on the sites I hunt and I can pass them on to you...later.
Right now think of it as a very powerful F2 on super steroids you need to swing for a bit to get used to.
It's easier that way at first for us F2 guys.
Soon you will learn to take advantage if all those settings and power but have patience...it will come.
Skim through this in the meantime...it will help.
http://metaldetectingforum.com/showthread.php?t=173474
You took it out one time and then started talking about 7 days to send it back.
That's kinda shocking to me, I hope you have a bit more patience than that.
If you can muster up that patience the rewards will be many and often.
I can point you to many Patriot owners that will tell you the same if you would like and like us a lot if them started with the F2 and were thrilled they made that move.