Whats more important depth P I or discriminationVLF

[neilo]

I wonder how many people are using P I machines because they were told they go deeper than the Vlf machines and not considered the downfalls. The biggest downfall with ?most of the P I machines is their lack of ?discrimination and tendency to be affected by tiny pieces of iron. I am mainly refering to beach and water detecting. I use a Minelab Excalibur VLF machine for my main water detecting and always use it with the discrimination set to the minimum so it is only rejecting iron. There are many occasions when targets are very deep and it is impossible to recover them due to the nature of the sandy bottom which continually collapses and this is using my Excalibur Vlf machine I have often recovered good targets eg heavy 18 ct gold rings at depths of over a foot deep. Remember that my machine is rejecting iron targets as I go along and only giving signals on non iron targets. But if you were using the P I machines every small piece of iron would be ?giving you those signals as well as your good targets at a supposed greater depth. How much needless digging is being done on non retrievable junk. I dont know how you feel but ?detecting time is precious and it goes by quick enough so you dont want to be wasting it digging craters chasing unwanted iron rubbish.
I know there is the Garrett infinium PI machine which has a reasonable iron discrimination set up on it but whats the point of the extra depth ?of this machine if the targets are impossible to recover.
Then there is always the ?point of where else you are limited in using the PI machines they are no good in ?play grounds, public parks and sports grounds where good discimination is a must due to the excess junk targets and their poor pin pointing makes target recovery difficult as well and also doing as little damage to the ground in recovering your targets is very important.
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Seeya Neilo

 

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[rvbvetter]

It would seem the P I would be Ideal for the ones that say they dig everything. But I've rarely, if ever, seen where any of them use the P I.
Then the VLF Disc., better suited for the ones like me with a little less patience or time. HH

 

[jeff of pa]

My main Problem with the PI machines,
Is, I searched in the 60's with a BFO, The thought of maby going back to that
Makes me avoid them.

of course I may be completely wrong, on my assumption they are close to the same.
except with more depth.


JEFF

 

[bakergeol]

Your point may be well taken for the present but not in the future. Attitudes and viewpoints will change when discriminating PIs are eventually introduced. Perhaps your viewpoint would change when Dave finally introduces his discriminating PI the Pulse Devil and Surf Devil in the future.

I can already see this in my new discriminating PI the GS5. It can do things a VLF is simply not capable of doing and I am not referring to depth.
It is impossible to confuse a 1/2 oz(or a 20 oz) gold nugget with iron at any depth with the GS5. It is also impossible to confuse a silver coin(any size) at any depth with iron of any size, any conductivity, any depth with the GS5. VLFs can't do the above because they are always going to be limited by ground mineralization and will read good targets as iron the deeper you go. PIs not being affected by ground mineralization as severely do not have this handicap.

Times are a changing.

George

 

[Michigan Badger]

Here in Michigan, when your machine can detect a silver quarter at an honest 10 inches, the only advantage of greater depth is greater ground coverage. The exceptions to this are far and few between (in Michigan).

I'd love to have a super fast rock solid iron discriminating detector that could detect a quarter at 30 inches. Most old coins and relics in Michigan are in the 3 to 5 inch range. With a machine like that I could really cover the ground fast!

As for PI, I tried it years ago and hated it (land hunting only). In theory it sounds awesome; in practice it was very bad. I had a detector I bought from KellyCo that was advertised to go "twice as deep as any VLF." I don't think I ever found anything more than a Memorial cent with it. It was pure junk. I lost nearly $700 on it when I sold it.

I'm thinking our top brand VLF's today are about good enough. Shoot! we have to leave something for our grandkids? ?

 

[Monty]

I have a Garrett Sea hunter MarkII and it is a PI machine and it does offer some degree of discrimination. You can discriminate out all but very large pieces of iron and even pull tabs. But like the VLF machines, if you loose the pull tabs you also lose the gold. I have had it out only a couple of times at the end of the summer so I reallly haven't had a chance to give it a proper workout. My one and only shallow under water adventure was a planted hunt sponsored by my club. I had no trouble finding targets but I had a heck of a time manually digging the target after I had detected it. This is something I suppose I will learn with experience. If you are looking for PI depth and some discrimination you might explore the Sea Hunter MarkII. Monty

 

[U.K. Brian]

Why does anyone detect out in the surf ? Because they think there's more to be found. At the low tide periods of the year a high power P.I. can be worked near the low tide mark and pick up what is beyond the waders detection and/or recovery depth.
Iron has had plenty of time to corrode by the time its got there and much of whats left can be identified by shape or target width compared to audio volume. I've got Minelabs too, with a range of the larger coils, but for 90% of the beach I use a P.I. It just means every day is a finds day and many modern P.I.'s have an adjustable SAT control that transforms their use.

 

[Willy]

One advantage of the Infinium over VLF's is discrimination at depth. If a person is just hunting for low conductors (GOLD!!!), digging the hi/low tones will leave most of the big iron in the ground where it belongs. This works to basically the full depth of detection, unlike a VLF which is generally adversely affected re. ID by depth /mineralization. Hunted a freshwater beach last winter where I actually did better with the PI than with the VLF's; dug less trash, iron or otherwise. Mind, I'm talking about targets 6" to 18" where a penny in this ground at 6" would read as iron on a VLF. ..Willy.