in the mountains

I just received my Equinox 800 from Rob on Monday 3-12. I charged it and read the quickstart guide, in fact i had the guide provided in my pocket the next day when i took it for a test. The only place i could use it was on a hill behind my house where i figured people may have sat to look over town. The rest of the area is under a foot and a half of snow. First I dug a few bullets , which was all i really expected to get from this hillside. Kind of got the feel of pinpointing and switching between modes and where a few target ids were. Pretty cold and some ground was frozen and some real muddy. Half hour into it and i got a strong hi tone 33 and out pops a 1979 Kennedy , rechecked the hole and one more 1983 half dollar. These don't really come around that often but i guess that was a good test for the excitement of this new detector. Thanks Rob for handling another detector transaction. Waiting list wasn't a problem. Put me on the list for a small coil you get in for the 800. i hear they are pretty good on small gold nuggets.

Rob helped me out on quite a lot of gear over the years. Most recently a GPZ 19 coil. All summer I have been trying to get to a particular place I wanted to go. The 14 coil has hit nice nuggets at an average depth of around 14 inches so I was anticipating some 2 to 5 DWT nuggets at around 19 inches. I have been trying to figure out the best way to swing this beast and what settings to use. This 50 x 50 Foot patch has small nuggets all less than 1DWT usually. I hammered it with the 14 and it was clean. Like anyone I had expectations of large nuggets at 3 feet , why not with such a coil. Not too much to ask for the price. Well 3 hours later at this location the results are in. All small gold the 14 missed. I am so impressed with the coil. The smallest nugget won't even weigh on my grain scale. The next smallest was a nice signal but I figured it would be too hard to locate and was probably trash so I marked it and put the 14 on. I could not hear it so I switched to the 19. Loud and clear at 4 inches. Total weight for the day 28 grains. I have high hopes for this coil even though it can't be used everywhere and it is very heavy. Use a Hip stick and it isn't too bad. The fact it recognizes small gold the 14 misses is a plus and I know their are big nuggets it will get. Note I put over 40 hours on this coil trying to figure it out. I just turned up the target volume from 3 to 4 to get better response on small nuggets. I have also found bigger nuggets with it . I was just real excited about this trip!

So this is what I am faced with. The late release of the 19 in the USA makes me wait. seven degrees and a foot and a half of snow. Earlier 2016 I found this 7 ounce nugget and wanted to go over some more ground with the 19. I guess I will have to wait ! FYI this was missed with all previous GP series detectors and I have owned them all.

I just received my new GPX 5000 from Rob. I am a long time GP user and just needed one. Wow I think it is great for coil selection and light weight. I used to think how heavy it was before the GPZ. The 5000 is an awesome machine! However if you use the GPZ correctly, it is hands down the best. I am one of those who has $20 grand in detectors.(absolutely crazy and we should start a detectors anon club for how sick this truly is) Not too happy with Minelab for dropping the price after loyal users rushed out to buy one. I use them all and they all have their place. Currently and only with the stock coil available, if I had to give them all up but one I would keep the GPZ no questions asked . Food for thought, wait til the new coil comes out.

I have been using the GPZ 7000 since it first came out. Today I confirmed , at least in my mind, you can miss gold if you are not in the right mode. I used Difficulty in a black sand iron rock mineralized area. Didn't get a thing. I switched to Normal and ran 20 sensitivity like I always do and went back to finding gold. I have been using sensitive 20 and normal for a few months and even though it is hard to use I don't back off much. I suspected difficult was losing gold all along and now I know it even in terrible ground. You can back off the gain and still get the gold but I tried several targets in Difficult and did not hear a thing. This is just to keep people informed that may not know about running between these two choices and what I believe. I tested this several times . I am a Gold Bug 2 user so I am used to noisy thresholds so I am comfortable listening to an erratic detector. Some people choose to run real stable , but I am not one to do so.

There is still snow and more storms on the way here but I decided to get out some more today. I found both these for a total of 6.10 DWT. Not too bad for a winter day. The biggest nugget was under some roots and I had to decide if it was a target or the roots acting as a signal. Pretty darn good stuff when the signal became clear. One side note , I used to crack coils on my old GP in cold weather and this GPZ seems to be holding up well.

Yahoo Rob. I use my Falcon to really check what could be hidden. Just think of what is out there waiting for all. Kind of cool.

I know how everyone in the desert areas wait for the hot weather to cool down so they can get out and detect. Sunday looked like 35 degrees so I decided to take my lucky nugget hunting dog and my GPZ out for a walk. We hiked 2.5 miles in hoping to find a hill side with no snow to just detect. It is extremely tough to swing the heavy GPZ with snow building up on top of the coil. Anyway I did prevail and only a few people would understand the reward of one or two tiny nuggets out weighs the $ factor for gas and time spent just to find what I did. If you look close on the coil you can see a small nugget found through 3 inches of snow and 8 inches of frozen ground.

I am not very good at the whole posting thing. I actually did mean to use the word MODE and not mod! I also left this photo out because I have stupid windows 8 without a touch screen. Sorry about that. Here are some of my most recent finds since posting this originally. I may ask the question, Has anyone tried Severe MODE realizing they may not get some small gold but actually hit a nugget extremely deep that no other detector can see? I promise I will get better at posting....

Thank you for all the input. I was hoping that someone had a threshold setting or tone that helps. The target response is so good but I am running everything too high I suspect. Targets are real loud and I have always run high threshold and sensitivity on all of my detectors. I have listened to gp5000 that people run with very little threshold, I don't like it but it works for them. This GPZ is a whole new animal. The combo of gain and Hi Yield ,General and sensitivity etc. will take a while to figure out. I get results and want to know what this detector can do. All combos people suggest are appreciated. Thank you.

Please put me in as well. Thanks for doing the contest. I am a nugget hunter but will also pick up an occasional coin now and then.

Gpz 7000 and GB2 and GB pro. Funny thing is the biggest gold was right on the surface with a GB2. So I spent ten grand plus , but I am totally satisfied. I sold and traded almost all my old coils and about 7 detectors and will never look back. Now if I can just get my hand on a SDC 2300 to try. Rob you should send me yours.

I use the GPZ 7000 and do ok with it. I just have a question for someone who may know. I find gold in Hi Yield and Difficult. If I switch to Hi Yield Normal soil , I can hear smaller , deeper gold . No doubt it will do better in Normal soil mode. The problem is the everything sounds like a signal and it is very hard to do. I have tried audio smoothing off in difficult and low on normal. The sens at 18. How to use normal soil and not use difficult to get a more stable detector is the question? I do not want to back off the sensitivity but someone may have a threshold pitch or something that helps differentiate real targets from ground and what works for them. Obviously I like to run the detector hot. I may not be able to get back to the topic for a few days so stay with me if you can. This gold is for two days detecting and is just under an ounce, too busy to clean it ! Have to get back out there. Thanks in advanced for tips on what you may use.

Hey everyone , thanks for the nice replies. There seems to be some real nice people that re- visit these forums. I can dig unlimited trash targets here, so not exactly virgin ground, but on that hot day I was real picky. Doc what are the chances of a super light type of coil or a carbon lower shaft to shave weight even with all of the wire?

Rob I am new to posting so excuse the post. One photo shows a fairly ugly quartz specimen (just under 1/2 t oz) . The nugget is cool cause you can feel the weight and it came in clear with the GPZ at 20 inches . I know some people do not believe depth with no photo, but it was right at 20 inches and I had witnesses. As you know I had to order an Apex pick to dig all these deeper targets. The gold I am finding is typically in the 14 to 24 inch depth. Attached is a photo under the microscope to show the character of the gold. Also I have read about how hot it gets in Arizona and I was wondering how bad could it be? Temp. is hovering at around 100 here which is not typical. I set out to find out just what you guys go thru. I walked two miles and dug three targets and the on the left of the coil is a small nugget. I almost did not make it back to the truck! This clearly shows the versatility of the GPZ. If I could add anything to the Minelab wish list it would have to be a super lite coil. It does not have to be much bigger and certainly not smaller , just lighter.