Minelab X-Terra 505 tips, settings, questions

[Smoky bandit]

Thanks mate.
Ive already found a few nuggets with my old GT16000 years ago, but would like to find a sovereign before i fall off my perch.
Anyway, i have the coil that you recommended but didn't think it would have the reach.
So I'll give it a try.

Cheers.

If you were after big silver coins I would say the 15 inch in 3khz.....But as it's gold coins your after you won't beat the 18.75 for the xterra. :Y:
Again just my opinion.

 

[Curl]

Thanks for the info.
Cheers.

 

[Curl]

I've just tried to use the 15" Coiltek WOT 18.75khz on the beach.
Could'nt even ground balance it on dry sand........probably not suitable for beach i guess.

Wondering if anyone is able to recommend a Coil suitable for the beach on the Xterra 505?

Cheers.

 

[Smoky bandit]

DD 7.5khz will be your best bet..But some have said they work ok with the concentric as well.
The xterra 705 was very noisy on wet sand.
I would assume the 505 would be similar.

 

[Curl]

Thanks.
I'll see if I can locate a DD in the 7.5khz and try that.

Cheers.

 

[Goldpick]

I still think you will have trouble achieving ground balance on the beach regardless of coil used, that leaves you with having to reduce the sensitivity by a fair margin for it to run more stable. How far did you manually adjust the GB by, did you try running it down to zero? Also the 505 is not alone in having trouble on wet sand, many VLF's will have the exact same issues. Sometimes when detecting dry sand, you may find it is still wet not far underneath causing falsing issues - some people notch out the lowest numbers where often the falsing occurs. You will also need to run the coil off the beach surface by an inch or two, especially on the wet sand or you may get excessive falsing.

I used to have a x-terra 305 and didn't really care for it regarding beach ability, some of the new VLF detectors like the Nokta/Makro VLF units will actually successfully GB over wet sand and even in the water - even my Ace 250 was a very good detector in the dry sand, just not so good on the wet with its fixed GB.

Ultimately I gave in to the frustration of trying to detect wet sand with a manual ground balance VLF, and moved up to a multi-frequency detector to get at those deep targets in the wet sand.

 

[Curl]

Thanks for the info Goldpick and Smoky Bandit.
Minelabs advice for trying to GB the 505 on the beach was to set the GB halfway at 25.......thats all that can be done apparently.
I'll try your advice on setting it on zero next time I'm back at the beach, otherwise I'll leave the beach detecting to the Multifrequency machines.

I'm still keen to try the 3khz Coil in a 15inch to get max depth.
Just wondering if its(3khz) is going to handle mineralisation better than the 7khz on land.

Cheers.

 

[Guest]

Hi Curl
Think we'd all like to find a sovereign before we "drop off our perch". Good Luck
GR

 

[PhaseTech]

Thanks for the info Goldpick and Smoky Bandit.
Minelabs advice for trying to GB the 505 on the beach was to set the GB halfway at 25.......thats all that can be done apparently.
I'll try your advice on setting it on zero next time I'm back at the beach, otherwise I'll leave the beach detecting to the Multifrequency machines.

I'm still keen to try the 3khz Coil in a 15inch to get max depth.
Just wondering if its(3khz) is going to handle mineralisation better than the 7khz on land.

Cheers.

Wet sand is like a big conductive target, the less you see of it, the better the detector can handle it. So most often than not, a smaller coil is less affected by the salt than a larger coil. A small concentric is going to be better than a big DD, but a small DD would be even better. But then if you go too small, you physically can't get the depth. In saying all that, the best compromise between depth and stability I could get out of a 505 was to use the 10.5" round DD in 18.75 kHz.

And as Goldpick said, this is key to stability "You will also need to run the coil off the beach surface by an inch or two, especially on the wet sand or you may get excessive falsing."

 

[Curl]

Appreciate all the advice fellas.
I decided to purchase a multifrequency detector for the beach......and will sell the 505.
Still got my old GT16000 though...........just can't part with it.
Cheers.

 

[Smoky bandit]

Appreciate all the advice fellas.
I decided to purchase a multifrequency detector for the beach......and will sell the 505.
Still got my old GT16000 though...........just can't part with it.
Cheers.

Good choice for the beach mate :Y: