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Excal vs ct x

Steve

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May 23, 2013
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port-a-potty-beach
Hoping for some opinions from people that have used both .
Excal with 10" Or the ctx? Salt water wetsand, sometimes up to knee deep but rarely. Only discrimination will be iron. Everything else will get dug up.
I find at least 6 gold targets a year that are between 0.4g~0.8g with a pi.. will either of these units hit that and still knock out iron?
Thanks
 
Can't speak for the CTX but my Excal kills the small gold... I'm an expert finding tiny gold which I hate finding :lol: I like big fat meaty gold finds... unfortunately the beaches I hunt were used by tine people from back in the day... ;)
 
I've had both.......sold the CTX

Either is a good choice, I believe a lot has to do with the users abilities.
 
Looks to me like the excal has more mounting options but the ctx has more coil options. Fresh drops next season I'm considering dumping the pi if I can find a sth that fits all my needs. My ideal detector is a pi that can knock out iron
 
Looks to me like the excal has more mounting options but the ctx has more coil options. Fresh drops next season I'm considering dumping the pi if I can find a sth that fits all my needs. My ideal detector is a pi that can knock out iron

Dew and I are waiting for the new fisher Pi...hopefully in 4 years.
 
Either is a good choice, I believe a lot has to do with the users abilities.

I agree with OBN. I've never owned a excal but have owned a Sovereign GT. About the same machine I think. I use the CTX all the time in and out of salt water. I prefer the CTX not because it'S better but it just fits my expectations and cofidence. I think either is the right choice if you apply your self to learn the machine.
 
Dew and I are waiting for the new fisher Pi...hopefully in 4 years.

I've had an atx. I will probably buy a 2nd or 3rd generation if they keep making them. Currently it's too heavy, the iron disc only works on shallow items, and it has to be run hot to get deep depth... it was however deeper out of.the gates than my tdi sl.
 
CTX sounds take some getting used to and even then sounds like a computer game. PI and excal much more pleasing sound but no discimination. If you dont need discrimination your PI is still best. CTX doesnt move through the water well or work well in black sand. I like the CTX as it makes my brain do some of the work with the added information. You move the coil more trying to find that special sounding target whereas with the others you will have to dig until all targets are dug up. Wait to see what the Equinox will do.
 
Went out the other day with the CTX for my 4th hunt or so with it. Mostly in the water. Found 2 gold rings, 1.2g and .7g. Both hit hard. Pretty impressive.

The most impressive part is being able to call targets before you dig them. Very useful when cherry picking.

With that said, for wet sand I will still grab the TDI with 14" coil... and for water deeper than waist deep I will still grab the CZ21. I just don't trust the waterproofness of the CTX.
 

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You can expect to get a piece of gold about .3 grams with either. If you set your 5 bins up right then adjust the tone freqs for each, there wont been any of that computer sound with so many tones. We are hunting a beach..... really no need for all the different tones. There is just NO machine out there that dislikes iron as much as an Xcal. The tones on the Xcal are more modulated size wise if its a big taget it sounds big..... not as much with the CTX. I think the CTX recovery is so fast that sometimes it will chop a near target...... you could miss. In the water the Xcal in PP may be deeper..... as you move out of the water the CTX starts having a depth advantage. CTX swings hard in the water and sometimes feels like its floating if you move it try to move to fast. The extra coil size on the CTX really gives you no advantage for coverage....... why? Because most of us use a straight shaft on the Xcal and the swing difference more than makes up for coil size. You can disc out Iron really well thou with the CTX..... swap coils easily....... as well as headphones. BUT..... we now do that with the Xcal if modified. IMO the CTX is made pretty darn well. There are advantages to tone adjustment and having a TID screen as well. When its all said and done.........at the end of the year id be very surprised if either had an advantage over the other IN THE WATER. Personally....... id wait and see what the new ML EQ does.
 
I have both. Use CTX on land and 8" Excal for water. The original plan was for the CTX to be for both but 6 months after I bought it in 2012 back when Lake Michigan was down pretty good, a few of my buddies were pulling gold left and right in a nice big cut down 12-14" below the sand with their Excals and I couldn't even get a whisper on the CTX the same day right along side them. Tried a few different modes and settings, couldn't get it to pull the real deep gold. They pulled 7 or 8 gold between them and 15 or so mercs and a few walkers. I left with one silver dime for the whole day. Bought an Excal a week later and love it.
 
Solution

Get 2 Ctx3030s, one Excal 8, one Excal 10, and some 17 Ctx coils , and use all of them, charged the Battery up to swing the Excal Blue 10 tomorrow, less fatique on the arm with the plugger strait shaft- than the Ctx with the 17 inch, my pick in your shoes, Excalibur 10 inch, spend some bread bro, good luck.
 
I have both My excal has a straight shaft, a remote pinpoint, ctx connectors for headphones and quick disconnects for the coils. I have a 17, a 15 and a 10" coil for the excal.
The CTX, I have all three. The 17" the 10" and the 6". 6" is for parks and when erosion gets VERY low.

Preference? I can tell you that on EVERY hunt I bring BOTH detectors. I've had times where I took the excal and the beach had me falsing like a mo-fo. completely useless regardless of sensitivity settings. I'd then run and get my CTX and it'd be smooth as silk. Other times, just the opposite.

I prefer to hunt in the deeper water hunts with the excal. No guess work. If a tone hits in discrim and pp, I'm digging it! .. The CTX can be a guess game but it does kill it with iron discrim. And as mentioned the CTX is harder to swing in the water. I've pretty much waterproofed the holy heck out of the CTX but it still gives me doubt. 3 yrs of hunting and still no water intrusion except for the external speaker which recently got replaced on warranty. The CTX's 17" coil is nice on the dry but can be hard to correctly tell where to dig sometimes as it halo's quite a bit. Nothing beats the excal in deeper water with the stock coil..
In the water the CTX's headphones SUCK!!!! I've tried em all.

I recently made some waterproof ear buds w/ctx connectors. Took them out today for the 1st time actually in shoulder deep water. I used some ear muffs over the buds and WOW... VERY LOUD... I was actually impressed. Got 2 silver rings, 3 silver quarters. No gold today sad to say...

The main reason I got the CTX was to ID pennies and decide if I wanted to dig them or not... They annoy the poop out of me. Most of the time I dig them regardless but when you're salted with pennies from a ... penny seeder especially ones with holes in them, it's nice to walk on by w/o a worry.

Finally, a machine is only as good as the person behind it. Read your beach, know conditions, understand where targets rest (yes there are fresh drops but what fun is that?) is what it's all about. I see so many people shuffling though different types of machines w/o learning them. It's almost tragic.
 
Low Tide....... make yourself some phones using the audiosears. Have you used the MAL phones? Cant believe youd think they werent good.

Never had a issue with the Blue Xcals and EMI...... i have with the Xcal II. The Xcal IIs dont handle coil flip as well as a blue either...... especially near the water line up the slopes. Xcals very. Ive had some that are very sensitive to small targets....... others clearly deeper and not as sensitive to those smalls. Components come from everywhere .... they very and you can get them not tuned correctly ..... right out of the box. I have tested my CTX and Xcals..... the CTX doesnt seem to have the coil halo my Xcal does in PP thats for sure. BUT...... ive not noticed a target that the Xcal got the CTX didnt depth wise..... especially id disc. There could have been a real game changer IF the CTX would have had a true AM mode like the Xcals PP mode. Some are saying the EQ, if like the Xterra will have. If thats so......... then the EQ becomes even more interesting to watch.
 
The CTX is a great detector. No doubt about it. Just too darn heavy to swing all day on a hot beach while lugging a scoop around. The screen isn't needed because every target that isn't iron gets dug. The 17 inch coil is for young men with big muscles. The Excalibur is fragile and needs mods to be great. If you are only hunting knee deep get a Sovereign. Just my opinion. Or better yet wait for the NOX. For 900.00 you can't beat it. Minelab is finally going to deliver that beach machine we all craved. The waterproof multifrequency detector in a machine you can swing all day.
 
I will try to get my hands on 1 of each. The EQ I I'll wait 6 months after release before even considering 1. I'm interested to see what kind if mods I can do to the ctx to balance it out... might try a skinny shaft if it's in the cards and I have time
 
I have both the excal with the 10" coil and the CTX .. I use the excal for hunting in water over knee deep. I just don't trust the ctx's waterproofing that much .... but other than that I use the ctx with a 17" coil on a harness.. With the harness I can hunt all day with no probs otherwise it's too heavy of a coil. I do quite well with it and have pulled some small deep rings with it. But I find that the ctx preforms better with a slower swing than the excal. I believe either machine will get you great finds just depends on how much u want to spend and how much time you put in to "learning" how to tweak the setting. Good luck
 
I like cfmct's answer on micro gold vs normal gold: With all due respect for earing studs and tinsel thin charms, I'd rather find normal rings.

Yes the ctx and Excalibur, with ccaarreeffuull listening can get you down to teensy items like wire-gold rings, or whatever. But no: they will not out-do a pulse machine for those tasks. You will miss tinsel thin chains, or earing post, etc..... But the benefits of passing nails is well worth it. At least on the beaches I hunt. :)

The depth and ability in wet salt is going to be the same between the ctx and the Excalibur. But I prefer the sounds of the ctx. The long tail bboonnggss on the Excalibur are annoying to me.
 
It's going to be a challenge for me to put down the pi machines... but I'm getting older and need to adapt my hunting style accordingly. If it can hit 0.5g reliably and discriminate that 1lb iron ball 3ft down that sounds like a gold whisper, then I'm going to give it a go
 
It's going to be a challenge for me to put down the pi machines... but I'm getting older and need to adapt my hunting style accordingly. If it can hit 0.5g reliably and discriminate that 1lb iron ball 3ft down that sounds like a gold whisper, then I'm going to give it a go

I have a handful of CZ stud earings that the CTX has banged on. Not sure what the weight is but its in the <0.5g range. Honestly it is more sensitive and (with the 17") deeper than by DetectorPro PI. It was as sensitive and deep (if not slightly deeper) than my Sea hunter PI with the big coil.

To find a down side to the CTX you have to be hypercritical and ultra selective in the environment of which you are comparing it to another detector. For salt water beaches, I just haven't seen, used, or heard of a more efficient and effective tool to find good targets.

Also agree with your statement about the Equinox. Sure, it may be a great machine but it needs to have at least a year or so to ensure the bugs are worked out. Look at the CTX. after a few years they updated the battery seals and arm cuff. Now you rarely hear any complaints.
 
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