Hi there GoldPandemic, No mate I dont have the 19" coil & I am not considering getting it as I dont think our small gold would warrant it. Well not here in Central Otago any way That coil is for the bigger stuff down deeper. Places I detect are pretty hilly & rugged country to & that coil would not be an easy swing on the uneven ground & in amongst the tussocks. The control box of the Zed is a piece of piss. Our ground being insanely mild makes it so easy. High Yield/Normal all the time. I run conservative sensitivity settings of around 4-8. I like to keep & maintain a real steady smooth even threshold. I get rid of the Zed warble (as it is called) as the Zedās target signal really lifts on the smallest of targets & it is those real faint ones you want to hear & not lose them in the warble. But even the GPX was a breeze once you had the settings dialed in. Again, because or ground is so mild once you are happy with settings they can pretty much stay the same. EMI may be the only cause to have a bit of adjustment or maybe if the ground gets pretty wet & ground minerals come to life a bit more. We are obviously so spoilt with our mild ground that it allows us to run our detectors pretty hot. I am able to run the Gold Monster 1000 in the manual sensitivity at full max on 10. It can be a little touch sensitive at times running it flat out but man does it ping some tiny gold.
I dont use the GPS as Central Otago is pretty big open spaces & if I find a patch I will know where to go back to.
Good to hear from you. Did you get off on that mission of yours?
Acutally I meant the new control box shape and how the battery is all-in-one sort of thing. Not the actual settings, but good info there.
No. I have some things to sort out. My equipment was all a bit heavy, so I have to redesign everything.
But I will be getting out more in the near future. Just have to repair my coil and make my detector absolutely waterproof - total overhaul.
Once Iāve sold my remaining possessions, Iāll make the shift to the South.
Gāday GoldPandemic. The Zed control box is great. Every thing is right there at the push of a few buttons & all done with the one hand & your thumb. Same as the Gold Monster 1000. No having to fiddle with dials & switches or going to a front panel. It is great not being tethered to the detector in any way. No battery or head phone leads. Makes for easier detecting & quicker digging of targets. People complain of the weight of the unit but with a hip stick or the supplied Pro Swing Harness that comes with it I dont find the weight an issue at all. The swing arm helps a lot in maintaining a very steady, even coil sweep & control & keeping the coil parallel to the ground. It is very important with the Zed to have that absolute coil control when running the detector in hot settings. It doesnt like having the coil moved about too erratically as that will result in the Zed āwarbleā & false signals. It doesnt like having the coil raised & lowered either & hence keeping the coil as even & parallel to the ground as you can. By keeping that coil in total control & smooth slow sweeping there isnt much it will miss, if it is there, for a 14" coil. Even small gold. I always push my detectors to the hottest I can get away with as that is going to give you the best chance of getting gold. Cheers.
Hi I am new to detecting and a few months ago I bought a kit for a P I unit from the UK Silverstream and over a few weeks after looking at the web site n how to assemble to PC board and wound up a few different sizes of coils which I still have to make a case for the coils but I have tried the unit and without any tuning of the pots The unit detects coins and gold wedding ring at about 20 to 25cm in the air. I donāt know if that is a great result but I feel quite chuffed it actually works at all
Yeah with the GPX series they went a bit crazy with switches.
Iāve plans to make my GPX control box and battery one unit as part of my other waterproof modifications.
GoldPandemic, You may be better off with the SDC 2300 as it is water proof to 3 meters & folds up in to a neat compact back packable unit & it loves small gold. Be more ideal for what you are planning.
The switches do all have a purpose when you get your head around using the machine & what they do & what they are there for.
r.pd.gill Sounds interesting. Good on you. Keep us posted.
I thought I should mention some of the other top VLFās which perform as good if not better than the Fisher GB Pro -
Teknetics G2 & G2+
Makro Racer (red) @14khz more sensitive to gold than GB Pro running @ 19khz
Makro Racer2
Makro Gold Racer
Nokta FORS CoRe
Nokta FORS Gold+
Nokta AU GoldFinder
Nokta Golden Sense
and of course there is the newish Minelab Gold Monster
If you are still under the impression that those GB Proās are all that, then thats cool, they are - However, donāt under-estimate NEW technology and fortunately for members here, there are Dealers in NZ selling these incredible Gold detectors -
Gold Snoop is worth looking into regarding how they performed in the highly mineralized Aussie soil - MD1023
I hope this info helps the new detecting prospectors -
Wish they would gift me one!! From reading and getting confused about which detector to buy it looks like the monster wins for me. If Iām quick enough think thereās a couple of days detecting on a claim somewhereā¦
just out of curiosity does anyone know if the excess cable from the coil to the control box isnāt wrapped around the handle properly does if effect the sensitivity of the machine. I have noticed the excess always seem to be coiled up nice and neat around the handle
A couple of things would be to wrap the cable so its not wobbling or moving about causing falsing and also getting hooked up on small brush and shrubs.
you can have the cable running straight up the shaft and gather the extra cable up by the control housing as well as another option -
just make sure at the end of the day the cable is not too tight or too loose
