Minelab Equinox tips and questions

[Lesgold]

Hi Folks,

Thought Id have another play with the Equinox and continue the little test/ comparison with the SDC. Decided to try a different spot about 1km from where I was playing yesterday. Went to a mullock heap that produced a little nugget for the gpx last year. I remembered that the clay/ gravel had good colour so I cleared a small section and detected it carefully. Unfortunately it did not give up any more gold for me. Being basically lazy and not wanting the work, I decided to run the NOX and SDC over that area and see what these machines would reveal. I wasnt overly confident as I worked this small area quite thoroughly with the Evo coil. I was quite surprised to get a faint signal with the NOX within a minute of starting. It was very faint and did not even register on the target ID. Decided to check with the SDC before disturbing the ground and the signal was very clear on the blue Hoover. This is what popped out:

about .05g. Not bad for the 11 coil. I then worked the area with both machines without disturbing the ground or digging any targets. Coloured buttons indicated a target, with red representing the SDC and white the NOX.

All up, 6 targets were identified. The SDC was able to ping all of them and the NOX only got another 2. Went through and dug them all. Gee they were small. One that the NOX could not see was quite deep:

Found a couple more a bits further along the mound with the SDC but did not check with the NOX.

The small pieces were sending target ID signals of around 3 to 4. Tried maxing out on sensitivity but it made the machine a bit noisy. 20 worked well in this area. Did crank it up for target recovery as some of these pieces were minute. Had tracking turned on today. Will try the NOX in a noisy gully in a couple of weeks to see if it can be tamed to handle the conditions. Performed an air test on some larger gold yesterday afternoon. Target ID came in at 15 to 16. Looks like the physical size of the nugget and how solid it is has a bearing on the response. Small fly sh..t seems to come in at numbers between 1 and 4.

Cheers for now

Les

 

[Ridge Runner]

Well done, you gotta be happy with that, It's a pitty you did not get a chance to check them all with the Nox but there will be plenty of other times by the look of it,

thanks for posting.

 

[Lesgold]

Thanks RR. Hopefully this will get a few people started on this machine in the gold fields. There is so much to learn. If we can all add a bit as we find our way, it helps everyone in the long run. Looking forward to hearing what people find out about the NOX in the triangle,WA etc.

Cheers

Les

 

[Ridge Runner]

Thanks RR. Hopefully this will get a few people started on this machine in the gold fields. There is so much to learn. If we can all add a bit as we find our way, it helps everyone in the long run. Looking forward to hearing what people find out about the NOX in the triangle,WA etc.

Cheers

Les

I am impressed with what you have achieved with yours, It seems better at prospecting and being able to Disc out junk makes it a winner in old mining camps etc, I am a firm believer that every PI owner should own a good VLF/LF machine, I would not use it for general detecting because it does so well at prospecting,

I hope you get the chance to give us more updates, This is going to be good, :Y:

 

[Smoky bandit]

Wow well done
Nox haters wont be happy.
Thanks for your input.Much appreciated :Y:

 

[Lesgold]

Thanks Smokey and RR. If there are haters of the NOX, hopefully they will speak up. If they are unhappy with the machine they will be able to say why. This should be seen as a positive as any deficiencies or limits that come out in the conversation will help people make informed decisions in relation to where and how the machine can be used. From a negative perspective, I do find that the coil is bump sensitive. You cant scrub it like a gpx or SDC coil without it falsing. This combined with the open style used in the coil construction, means you need to keep the coil off the ground. I tend to scrub the coil if I get a slight signal thats worth investigating. Ground also needs to be clean and free of rubbish. It will also be good to see how bad ground impacts on the machines performance.

Cheers

Les

PS Noticed that NUGS MONEYs Gold Monster was very sensitive and appeared to pick up hot rocks. Havent seen this with the NOX at this stage. Will need to investigate and compare the two machines in the field. So come on NUGS, lets do it when I get back back home in a couple of weeks...

 

[Goldpick]

Would be good to do a comparison in single frequency mode using 40kHz vs multi-mode. Just to see whether it will hit on those smaller nuggets a bit harder, and also to see how well multi-mode actually copes with mineralisation vs using a single frequency.

Is it also worth manually adjusting the ground balance to reduce the touch sensitivity?

 

[robmoto]

Quite a bit on the US Forums about the brackets being broken before even being worn, I'm sure you won't have an issue with getting them replaced by Minelab though. Havent had an issue yet with mine, I'm just rapt to have true wireless.

Chriss I too am rapt in the wireless one of the reasons why I bought the nox 800, I don,t use that box I phone thingy that came with it I paired the earphones straight to the detector .

But what I do hate is when you do a factory preset you then have to pair them up again pain in the bum , but then what happens is you are flat out trying to see what light are on with the headphones for pairing during daytime light, pretty P//s poor minelab.

 

[PhaseTech]

I was recently out playing with a few VLF's. I compared Multi & 40 kHz and Multi does (as Minelab state) have a slight edge on a broader range of targets. Where 40 kHz started to show its niche was on low conductors but particularly in hotter soil. Have only tested this once in some pretty nasty clay, and didn't have the 6" with me, as they weren't out yet. In a Mullock heap in loose soil, MultiIQ was clearly better, but worked best with a slower sweep.

In the red clay, the 40 kHz was a little better behaved, and allowed a slightly higher sensitivity to be used.

P.s. the clay was fairly wet.

 

[Ridge Runner]

Thanks Smokey and RR. If there are haters of the NOX, hopefully they will speak up. If they are unhappy with the machine they will be able to say why. This should be seen as a positive as any deficiencies or limits that come out in the conversation will help people make informed decisions in relation to where and how the machine can be used. From a negative perspective, I do find that the coil is bump sensitive. You cant scrub it like a gpx or SDC coil without it falsing. This combined with the open style used in the coil construction, means you need to keep the coil off the ground. I tend to scrub the coil if I get a slight signal thats worth investigating. Ground also needs to be clean and free of rubbish. It will also be good to see how bad ground impacts on the machines performance.

Cheers

Les

...

,

There is no reason to hate any machine, It's more of a matter picking the right machine for the task at hand, I got one that's a Pig but it has it's uses, I have owned some bad machines and still have some of them but they are good in a pinch

 

[robmoto]

I bought a 10x 5 double D commander coil yesterday for my 4500 for poking into difficult places between rocks and stuff and thought I wished they would make a coil like this for the nox and also thinking it might stop that very annoying 4 times signal you get with every sweep using the 11 inch, also a small elliptical is very sencitive at the tip for pin pointing it would save a hell of a lot of stuffing around just using the tip so EASY.
I asked where I bought it from is there an adaptor to use this coil on a nox and was told if there was it still wouldn t work , bugger eh.

 

[Ridge Runner]

Just found this else where, looks interesting,

https://md-hunter.com/minelab-equinox-coil-x-ray-is-it-really-the-half-of-machine/

 

[mxt sniper]

Complicated coil for sure. Doubt there will be many if any aftermarket coils. I am wondering what is inside the GM1000 coils? I notice that the edge sensitivity is lacking, is it a PCB coil? Generally a wire wound coil has good edge sensitivity.

 

[Ridge Runner]

Don't know Mate, but I would have thought that putting an Item in the coil would cause a slightly less sensitive spot ? But on the other hand look at all the junk that is in the Deus Coils so maybe it has no effect ?

 

[Gizmo]

Now that is seriously cool. Amazing how you can see the gold wires in the ic chips... Thats amazing detail. I cant help wonder how the metalic components dont reduce the overall sensitivity of the coil but hey it works...

 

[Secret Squirrels]

Hmm. I dont seem to get any 4 times signal when i swing my nox Quiet as a church mouse unless it's passing over a target.

 

[Secret Squirrels]

I find it difficult to see the lights on the headphones in the daylight as well. :| So i found it easier to listen to the chirpy beeps that sound on them when the bluetooth search is activated. :Y: .

Quite a bit on the US Forums about the brackets being broken before even being worn, I'm sure you won't have an issue with getting them replaced by Minelab though. Havent had an issue yet with mine, I'm just rapt to have true wireless.

Chriss I too am rapt in the wireless one of the reasons why I bought the nox 800, I don,t use that box I phone thingy that came with it I paired the earphones straight to the detector .

But what I do hate is when you do a factory preset you then have to pair them up again pain in the bum , but then what happens is you are flat out trying to see what light are on with the headphones for pairing during daytime light, pretty P//s poor minelab.

 

[robmoto]

Hmm. I dont seem to get any 4 times signal when i swing my nox Quiet as a church mouse unless it's passing over a target.

I was told today I swing it to slow, going out tomorrow with someone in the know to teach me a few things tomorrow, hopefully I will get a better understanding of the 800.

 

[Heatho]

I've found the Equinox responds to targets better with a brisk swing, not to fast like slashing the grass but brisk overlapping sweeps and you won't miss much. I think using a swing speed that matches the set recovery speed though is the trick.

 

[Smoky bandit]

I've found the Equinox responds to targets better with a brisk swing, not to fast like slashing the grass but brisk overlapping sweeps and you won't miss much. I think using a swing speed that matches the set recovery speed though is the trick.

Yes as heatho said..The higher the recovery speed the faster the swing needs to be :Y: :Y: