Coin Digger
Sr. Member
- Jul 13, 2008
- 328
- 47
- Detector(s) used
-
Whites Classic 3 SL
Fisher F2
Bounty Hunter Platinum
Whites XLT
Nokta Legend
- Primary Interest:
- Metal Detecting
I’ve owned the Tesoro Cortes for 2 months now and have used it as my main detector during that time. When I first received it via UPS the box it came in looked as though it had been through WW3. The first thing I did was I read the manual and then performed air test on it to see if it had been damaged due to rough handling.
I was getting 6.5” on a dime in Disc mode and sensitivity set on 10; a quarter came in at 8” just barely. I didn’t think that was all that good especially when you hear about Tesoro’s ability to go deep. So I called Tesoro and talked to one of their Tec heads and was told that detectors can go out of tune over time and that since mine was rough handled I should send it in for a tune up. So I did and it came back with a clean bill of health. Customer service was excellent.
Needless to say I still got the same results on my air test after getting it back from the shop. After 2 months of heavy use I would have to say the air test where proven accurate for where I hunt in mild soil.
The machine has many good points. The quality and workmanship are the best. I found that when there’s a small piece of iron and a coin in the same hole it will sound off with a good tone and show a good target at the same time showing iron on the segments scale. I found that it will give you a TDI number of what it thinks the target is and by cross checking it with the segment graph it will tell you how confident it is in what it found. If it lights up 2, 3 or 4 segments that means it’s not sure. I found you still need to dig any good repeatable sound.
I also liked the fact that the All Metal mode and Disc mode where a thumb switch away. I found I liked to hunt in A/M mode and throw the switch over into Disc mode to check a target. The machine is also light and can be swung all day with little fatigue.
What I don’t like about is it doesn’t have pin point feature. I never thought to check before buying it to see if it had a pin point feature; I guess I just assumed a detector in that price range would have one. Let me tell you it can be a challenge to pin point. It took a lot of practice before I got any good at it.
I found the sensitivity setting had very little affect on its depth either in the field or during air tests. I didn’t find A/M mode to be any deeper than Disc mode. I had to put it in boost mode before I noticed any really change in depth but unfortunately the detector became unstable.
Hunting even a moderately trashy area meant swinging very - very slow with the stock coil and Sens turned way down. If you don’t it would miss most targets.
The depth read out was so inaccurate after a while I wouldn’t even look at it and would just go off the strength of the sound to determine the depth. Which lead me to wonder if the depth read out is so far off how accurate can the graph and ID numbers be? I never really found the SUM feature to be of any real help in ID’ing a target.
Overall I would say it’s a very good coin shooter but in today’s market I feel it’s over priced and that a fair price should be in the $300 - $400 range.
I was getting 6.5” on a dime in Disc mode and sensitivity set on 10; a quarter came in at 8” just barely. I didn’t think that was all that good especially when you hear about Tesoro’s ability to go deep. So I called Tesoro and talked to one of their Tec heads and was told that detectors can go out of tune over time and that since mine was rough handled I should send it in for a tune up. So I did and it came back with a clean bill of health. Customer service was excellent.
Needless to say I still got the same results on my air test after getting it back from the shop. After 2 months of heavy use I would have to say the air test where proven accurate for where I hunt in mild soil.
The machine has many good points. The quality and workmanship are the best. I found that when there’s a small piece of iron and a coin in the same hole it will sound off with a good tone and show a good target at the same time showing iron on the segments scale. I found that it will give you a TDI number of what it thinks the target is and by cross checking it with the segment graph it will tell you how confident it is in what it found. If it lights up 2, 3 or 4 segments that means it’s not sure. I found you still need to dig any good repeatable sound.
I also liked the fact that the All Metal mode and Disc mode where a thumb switch away. I found I liked to hunt in A/M mode and throw the switch over into Disc mode to check a target. The machine is also light and can be swung all day with little fatigue.
What I don’t like about is it doesn’t have pin point feature. I never thought to check before buying it to see if it had a pin point feature; I guess I just assumed a detector in that price range would have one. Let me tell you it can be a challenge to pin point. It took a lot of practice before I got any good at it.
I found the sensitivity setting had very little affect on its depth either in the field or during air tests. I didn’t find A/M mode to be any deeper than Disc mode. I had to put it in boost mode before I noticed any really change in depth but unfortunately the detector became unstable.
Hunting even a moderately trashy area meant swinging very - very slow with the stock coil and Sens turned way down. If you don’t it would miss most targets.
The depth read out was so inaccurate after a while I wouldn’t even look at it and would just go off the strength of the sound to determine the depth. Which lead me to wonder if the depth read out is so far off how accurate can the graph and ID numbers be? I never really found the SUM feature to be of any real help in ID’ing a target.
Overall I would say it’s a very good coin shooter but in today’s market I feel it’s over priced and that a fair price should be in the $300 - $400 range.
