Having had my detector only three days I decided I needed to do some practice after a short 1/2hr beach stint that had me chasing my tail a bit and another 1/2 session along a roadside verge where there is little foot traffic and I only expected to collect trash, which I did.
So today I set up in my yard a straight line test using my brick retaining wall as a guide, every three bricks long and out about two feet I placed an item in the following order, nail, bolt, nut, locket, 5c, us dime, 10c, 20c, 50c, US dollar, $1, $2, gold bracelet, platinum eternity ring.
I the spent the next hour in coin and treasure mode on my exterra 705 setting the noise cancelling mode first, followed by ground balance, threshold and sensitivity, volume and tones and proceeded to swing along the line carefully taking note of the differing tones, I the set about altering the sensitive and threshold and repeating the procedure, then I started to use the discrimination mode after running in all metal mode first up. It was interesting to see it completely ignore some items in the different modes.
Next up I ran in prospecting mode, carefully listening for the variations in pitch as the detector passed over the various items.
All this was done with the targets sitting up on the grass, clearly visible.
Lastly I got my wife and daughter to spread all the decimal currency coins below grass level in an area approx 18m sq. without me knowing where they were. I then reset the noise cancelling mode, ground balance etc, put the unit in all metal mode and set about sweeping the ground and I'm pleased to say I found all the coins within twenty minutes and even managed on a few occasions to evaluate trash signals.
I know I am still nowhere near proficient but I do believe it helped considerably with familiarising me with my detector.
So today I set up in my yard a straight line test using my brick retaining wall as a guide, every three bricks long and out about two feet I placed an item in the following order, nail, bolt, nut, locket, 5c, us dime, 10c, 20c, 50c, US dollar, $1, $2, gold bracelet, platinum eternity ring.
I the spent the next hour in coin and treasure mode on my exterra 705 setting the noise cancelling mode first, followed by ground balance, threshold and sensitivity, volume and tones and proceeded to swing along the line carefully taking note of the differing tones, I the set about altering the sensitive and threshold and repeating the procedure, then I started to use the discrimination mode after running in all metal mode first up. It was interesting to see it completely ignore some items in the different modes.
Next up I ran in prospecting mode, carefully listening for the variations in pitch as the detector passed over the various items.
All this was done with the targets sitting up on the grass, clearly visible.
Lastly I got my wife and daughter to spread all the decimal currency coins below grass level in an area approx 18m sq. without me knowing where they were. I then reset the noise cancelling mode, ground balance etc, put the unit in all metal mode and set about sweeping the ground and I'm pleased to say I found all the coins within twenty minutes and even managed on a few occasions to evaluate trash signals.
I know I am still nowhere near proficient but I do believe it helped considerably with familiarising me with my detector.
