tones of excal II

[fisher2]

i cant hear any differance in tones between like parts of cans or copper brass etc i cant tell if im digging trash or a quarter is there a special setting?

 

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[Captain Loosechange]

Are you detecting in Discriminate or pinpoint mode. If in pinpoint (all metal) mode then there is not much difference in tones, although usually you can tell the squeal of a really junky signal, but in Discriminate there is differences in the tones, tonal range and smoothness of signal. You need some time bench testing and listening to different targets. Go to you tube and search for some videos of people using the Excal and listen to the sounds they make over different targets. Good Luck.

 

[fisher2]

im in disc

 

[OBN]

Fisher! You got a excal, congrads..............first glue a nickle to the inside front of your right shoe..kinda gives you a middle ground tone to go by when learning. Just sweep the coil over it everytime to give yourself some scale of variation in the tones. Silicon closed those 4 small drain holes in the yellow headphones on the top/bottom of the cups, will help on the ambient noise.

check out my other youtube site, post all my junk there........got like 30 vids on the excal, mostly short hunts, bottle caps, and silver/gold

http://www.youtube.com/user/oldbeechnut?feature=mhsn#p/u

 

[TexasRT]

I had the same problem when I first got mine. The tones ARE different, but sometimes the difference is so minute that it hard to tell the differences. I can tell what a few of them are now, but I still dig anything that doesn't null out because you just never know. The nulling helps stop a lot of trash digging. I'm sure there are more experienced detecting pros out there that can tell you what every tone is, but not me at this point. The bench test idea helped me too.

Good Luck & HH

 

[TexasRT]

Fisher
One more tip. While detecting you are going to get a null then the threshold is going to come back at a different pitch than normal. This is normal operation, it's telling you that you picked up something that was discriminated out. The detector will work normal even though the threshold tone changes, if it bothers you run the coil by your scoop and the threshold tone will go back to normal. The tone would also return to normal automatically the next time you pickup a signal that is not discriminated out.

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

"Special setting" is called dig it all if it doesn't null............Most pull tabs, any kind of aluminum can slaw or aluminum trash is going to sound about the same as a lot of gold and silver.... Nickels, will sound different, you may be able to tell the difference on some brass, depending, there is a slight difference in the tones, but for the most part till you have been using it a long time it is going to all sound pretty much the same to you.... Remember the tones are still based on conductivity, gold, silver, aluminum and brass are all highly conductive.....

If your beach hunting, if it doesn't null dig it, you will learn to tell the difference on many of the bottle tops by doing the "wiggle" but some of them can still fool you....

 

[erikk]

If U R right handed glue the nickel to the LEFT foot otherwise U will B hitting it on every swing as you walk. Good to refresh your gold tone and to reset the threshold but the "Dig it all" still holds

 

[Donutzzs]

This Speeds up learning the sounds

i cant hear any differance in tones between like parts of cans or copper brass etc i cant tell if im digging trash or a quarter is there a special setting?

It is still good to dig it all....Except when that "Alpha Hotel" throws a handfull of pennies in front of you,

 

[Can Slaw]

As the others are saying, dig it all and remember what the tone sounded like. Soon you will have a pretty good idea what the machine is telling you. Save all of your finds, trash and all and use those to bench test until the different tones become familiar. Use a gold ring to test that sound against your other finds to see how close what you dug is to the sound of gold. Not all gold will sound the same, but it will give you a good starting point.

 

[fisher2]

now i need to dig gold so i can test with it and yes oldebeechnut i have an excal now , and im still using the scopp you gave me i'll be buyimg a round scoop by end of year and then i'l be waiting for somone to need a scoop and return the favor you gave me just to pay it foward

 

[Les West Central Fl]

The discriminate tone and threshold tone give good clues. A pull tab can give you a medium discriminate tone and the threshold tone will end high where as a medium discriminate tone with a threshold medium or low tone can be a gold ring. How the tone on the threshold ends after going over a target gives an insite of what it may be.

 

[Buried Crap NJ]

Check out a sample of the Basic ear training CD there is two portions it really works you may want to buy one.
http://www.myspace.com/betfe

 

[Lou from downunder]

Personally, I believe the various tones to be a waste of time, just a distraction.

I have dug many signals that sounded like absolute crap, only to find that it was a low carat ring.
Conversely, I have dug real sweet, high tones to find not the silver I was expecting but a high carat ring.

Crucifixes, chains, big pendants, small pendants, deep, shallow, lying flat, on edge, low carat, high carat, combination silver and gold, on it own, next to ferrous etc etc. The variables are endless. And each of these all sounds a little, or a lot different.

Forget trying to work out if the signal your hearing is gold or not. Most of the time you will be wrong anyway.

Some people say that you should dig everything, including nulled signals. I don't do this, might as well have got a PI and dig every signal.
Having said that, at a lot of locations I hunt in PP (all metal) and do dig every signal, for ferrous objects are few and far between.

But there are also a few very good spots that I work that are loaded with heaps of ferrous. Some quite large, these I dig up and drag away just to stop them from blocking out large areas of ground, smaller pieces I pile up in selected spots, leaving absolutely hundreds of small coinish sized bits of rusty metal everywhere that I have to hunt over.

The point I'm making is that in amongst all this crap, with the machine making all sorts of weird and wonderful sounds, it desperately trying to null on the ferrous rusty bits while at the same time trying to sound off on the many coins, bits of brass, copper, lead and also jewelry in the area, the only way to work is to dig ANY repeatable sound, however broken or scratchy or crappy it might sound. And even though I've been hunting for nearly 4 years and have found 300 odd pieces, every time I do I'm surprised.

Pain in the arse hunting this way? Your absolutely right! But I bet I find a lot more gold than most. Maybe not as much as some of our friends in France but I find gold nearly every hunt and I hunt often.

By all means, listen to the advise of the learned folk on theses pages but do yourself a favour and don't stress too much about the tones.
If it sounds off, regardless of how good or bad, high tone, low tone... whatever.
Just dig it!

Lou.

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

If it doesn't null in both directions dig it.

 

[Silver Surfer]

Great advice from great hunters....
When I had to send in my Excal for repair, upon return I noticed the tones had COMPLETELY changed.. Pennies used to be a high tone (but not as high as silver), and now they are a lower tone, quarters are now the high tone.. Nickles used to be a specific low tone, now they sound like a good solid gold ring used to sound.. Bottle caps are easier to identify now than they were (now a very distinct "Waaaah Waaah"), so digging less of those, and pull tabs sound even more like gold USED to sound.. But now that I have learned the "new" tones, I am batting 1000 on pull tab identity before digging them.. Gold, no matter 18k or 10k, has a specific "ping" right at the end of the tone now... At least 70% of the gold I am hitting now I am able to say "now that sounds like gold" and sure enough, there it is in my scoop... I was really miffed at first having to re-learn the tones, but now I really like the change... It may just be me, but I feel the machine goes a little deeper now than it did before.. Even that old dime, which was a good 1 1/2 ft down in muck, gave a decent solid tone (although quiet), and after the first scoop, was loud...
The only advice I could give to you is just use your machine a lot, and although it's tough to do, forget the eye candy and other concentration breakers, and burn the sound of every target onto your internal hard drive. In time, you will know your machine and the info it is trying to tell you.. and dig even the warbliest of tones... I wouldnt have gotten that bracelet yesterday if I used the old "dont dig a broken tone" advice that I have read many times... Broken tones can (and have) meant intricate rings and chains for me...

Best of luck!

 

[Can Slaw]

Silver Surfer...Excellent advise. Especially on the chains and bracelets. Last week I dug a Milan Stainless Steel watch that sounded just like a bottle cap. Too bad the watch had been there for a couple of years, it was shot, but it could just have easily been a good one.