Some great questions!
OldGT said:
Hi Nenad (and everyone else contributing)
I think the racer gold might be the perfect machine for me based upon my activities. I mostly coin shoot but I love getting into the alluvial gold panning and high banking.
I think the gold will compliment my style by giving me a chance on finer jewelry and double checking tailings piles especially in the white pipeclay areas where I'm always concerned the sticky balls left over from classifying might be holding onto some decent pickers.
My main queries though are as follows.
In highly mineralised areas will it still find targets as small as birdshot within the first inch of soil? or would I be asking too much of it reasonably speaking. I have used an Sdc in the areas I've been in with good success but no longer own one.
Nenad - Really depends on the actual mineralisation type. Every prospectors idea of what is highly mineralised might be different. If the ground is so hot that you are required to drop your Sensitivity below 40 and increase iSat to 9, then that is what I'd call pretty hot ground. In these spots the GRacer may struggle to pick up birdshot. In what I would class "moderate" mineralisation, the Gold Racer seems to handle it fine.
OldGT said:
Is it possible the gold could match or outperform an Sdc on white pipe clay mullock heaps and quieter less mineralised areas that have been surfaced?
Nenad - It depends what they surfaced down to - if it isn't very reactive, then the Gold Racer would be great for the job. In the surfaced areas I have come across in the golden triangle, 8/10 have been quite hot, so this is perfect SDC territory. White Pipe Clay heaps, no problem and yes I have found thin flakey pieces with the Gold Racer that the SDC struggles to see. In mild ground VLF's do stack up quite well, which is why in a lot of the US goldfields, for the Whites faithful a Goldmaster would be a better choice than a TDI for example; until a prospector experiences really hot ground, they have no desire for a PI.
OldGT said:
Does anyone know if the gold actually finds consistant fine jewelry? It would be great to have something that narrowed earrings chains (I guess thin rings) down a little more than the other machines I've used.
Nenad - It all comes down to how low in Target ID you are prepared to dig, as the lower you go the more foil and small bits of slaw you will pick up. I have picked up tiny bits of jewellery (mostly junkers) in playgrounds on a regular basis, so tend to dig anything over 40. I will even dig stuff it the 30's if trash levels are bearable. The clarity of signal makes you think you have something really good - the high freq bangs hard on stuff a lot of other coin machines don't even see.
OldGT said:
Are you confident the machine "upscales" target id consistently ? Is anyone still digging some nasty flaky rusty trash with halos or can a user be confident of more consistant non ferrous finds that would "normally" fall on other machines I'd scale. Paired with my Fisher F75 this might be a great compliment to the arsenal, if the F75 (or deus imo) has one fault it's the sliding I'd of nonferrous ID at depth that always leaves you questioning to dig or not. If the gold could improve on dig/dont dig ratio would be great.
This is a tough question as there are a lot of variables. How large is the target, how deep, how rusty/broken down is it, how is it laying in the ground, what is the soil mineralisation like etc etc. In simple terms, yes, you can get tricked on deep iron. The most I have been tricked is when running a high Sensitivity setting, and big flat iron targets. You tend to get a bit of a confused reading, but if it pings in the high range enough times to tell you you'd better investigate, then I usually do. After digging one or two of these, you will ignore the rest in that area. Go to a different spot, with different ground conditions and different type of targets and what you'll hear can be different. I only ever use the 7" elliptical coil when park hunting with the Gold Racer, as I want to maximise my separation, maximise my chances on jewellery, and the less depth the better as a: I don't want to dig deep, and b: that is usually where the big junk is.
The other variable is you have two Disc mode options. Disc 1 is the Fast recovery mode, and Disc 2 is the more aggressive "boost" mode, so you need to experiment and see which you prefer. I demo'd the differences in one of my videos.
OldGT said:
Lastly is any warranty transferable? If I buy new but sell does the new owner have warranty passed on to them inside the warranty period?
Nenad - Yes. I would just recommend any detector being sold to have the new owner details passed on to the dealer of original purchase.
Hope that helps, cheers.
