QED users - how are you faring?

[madtuna]

Just got back the QED from its upgrades and auto GB. Wow! what a huge difference! Its a diff machine now. Lots more quiet and handles the ground so much better that I can boost the gain and bias. Been out for only 6 hours with it and the results speak for themselves. Im just using it as a SDC killer with the 12x4 AI. Sad thing is, the Missus says I prob have to sell it next week to get our car back on the road https://www.prospectingaustralia.co...0568/1509101920_wp_20171027_18_54_01_pro1.jpg

Hi Krisco (AKA Pennyweight),

Saw your gumtree ad and wonder if I was to purchase your QED "SDC Killer" what guarantee is there you wouldn't just take my money and I would actually receive the machine? I mean, we know how things have gone in the past.

P.s. how's the paranormal industry going?

 

[Jarrod84]

Just got back the QED from its upgrades and auto GB. Wow! what a huge difference! Its a diff machine now. Lots more quiet and handles the ground so much better that I can boost the gain and bias. Been out for only 6 hours with it and the results speak for themselves. Im just using it as a SDC killer with the 12x4 AI. Sad thing is, the Missus says I prob have to sell it next week to get our car back on the road https://www.prospectingaustralia.co...0568/1509101920_wp_20171027_18_54_01_pro1.jpg

Hi Krisco (AKA Pennyweight),

Saw your gumtree ad and wonder if I was to purchase your QED "SDC Killer" what guarantee is there you wouldn't just take my money and I would actually receive the machine? I mean, we know how things have gone in the past.

P.s. how's the paranormal industry going?

Got a better idea, buy mine

 

[Guest]

So much for the Minelab killer

On some very small gold the QED will match the sensitivity /depth of the gp/gpx or SDC2300 and with big coils will match/beat the gp/gpx for depth on some bigger gold. JP reports that he is finding some gold with his QED. "I could never find a nugget with the GS5b but have found quite a few pieces with the QED"
Reg Wilson has posted some of the latest QED info on a forum.He now has a fully updated production QED model as well as a prototype.

 

[Ridge Runner]

The QED seems to be tearing it up out there on the Gold, How they got all that Tech in such a small box is amazing and the new updates have really given it a boost, You just need to look at Reg's posts to see how his retirement fund is growing :Y:

Mighty Impressive stuff.

J.

 

[Jarrod84]

I totally believe it's awesome on small gold, I proved it myself finding sub .1g gold at a few inches with an 11" mono, and I believe it can also find VERY big gold at depth but it's the middle ground that I feel it lacks.

I finally proved this on the weekend with an un dug target vs a gpx4000.

As an sdc style for half the price I 100% agree, but don't tell me it matches a gpx on the mid stuff.

No issues with ground balance anywhere, handles the ground very well. Just doesn't have the same punch against the gpx we put it up against, but I have out done the gpx on very small gold.

 

[Ridge Runner]

There is no such thing as the perfect detector, The SDC does what the GPX can't and vice versa and the QED does what the other two can't, I would not compare these three machines to each other because they are so different, But from a price point of view the QED is the best bang for the buck when it come to a Gold finding PI, which is more than any other company has come up with.

The QED is a good down to earth Honest machine.

J.

 

[Jarrod84]

The 3 machines were just compared 3 posts above.

Mine's for sale for $1200, should be a bargain then.

 

[Ridge Runner]

The 3 machines were just compared 3 posts above.

Mine's for sale for $1200, should be a bargain then.

Yep they were but I put that down to user excitement,

Good luck with the sale, That's a bargain.

 

[Guest]

I totally believe it's awesome on small gold, I proved it myself finding sub .1g gold at a few inches with an 11" mono, and I believe it can also find VERY big gold at depth but it's the middle ground that I feel it lacks.

I finally proved this on the weekend with an un dug target vs a gpx4000.

As an sdc style for half the price I 100% agree, but don't tell me it matches a gpx on the mid stuff.

No issues with ground balance anywhere, handles the ground very well. Just doesn't have the same punch against the gpx we put it up against, but I have out done the gpx on very small gold.

All Gb pi detectors that use subtractive null summation methods to GB will have an electronic hole (where the target TC is close to or similar to the ground Tc)
ie some nuggets of a particular size and shape will be very poorly detected if at all over some ground. The smooth timings on the gpx is a case in point where nuggets with long time constants may suffer a depth loss of up to 50% compared to other timings. The QED electronic hole is probably around nuggets of 10 grams but this will depend on the ground mineralisation and where the gb, bias,gain and mode are set and the coil size.
What size was the nugget that the QED could not detect compared to the gpx 4000 and what were the QED settings you were using?
What were the settings on the gpx 4000?

 

[Jarrod84]

I don't know the gpx settings but it was a nice signal that you couldn't miss, I stood over the target and tried every combination of bias vs volume all with the gain around 6 in mode 2, even tried different modes just to be sure but mode 2 was by far the best with a 17X13 evo.
It was an odd shaped 5 gram nugget, other gold have been found and tested but this was the best un dug target.
We later did some testing with that nugget and found my 11" elite picked it up the best but was still about 3/4 the depth of the same coil on the gpx.
The 17X13 on the gpx gave it a decent amount more depth, probably 2-3 inches but it actually gave the QED less depth vs the 11" elite.
Also tried 14" elite with same result.

Basic conclusion.
Sub gram QED wins.
1-2 grams it's pretty even with the gpx getting in front.
2+ grams gpx clearly has an advantage.

In my opinion it's a match for the sdc with the option to put a bigger coil on to cover more ground, but it won't gain much depth unless it's a really big target.
Pretty sure that what JP also found out.
He said it was a very good small gold detector or light weight patch hunter, I'd totally agree.

 

[Jarrod84]

I will give it one massive thumbs up, and it 100% kicked the gpx's butt with emi. He kept complaining about emi when he got closer to houses and the nearby storm almost made him go home. None of this upset the QED at all, even when the lightning was literally over us (before we were sent running to the car from the rain) the QED would hardly even chirp for a second on the biggest strikes.
I was easily still digging up shot gun pellets with the 17X13 evo while this was going on.

 

[user 7268]

QED metal detector, Minelab SDC 2300 killer

Given SDC's rep that's a mighty big claim ......................... should be selling thousands of them I'd reckon

 

[mbasko]

After using an SDC almost exclusively for nearly 18 months I just don't see the QED is near as good on the sub gram gold that can be found. The QED will definitely find sub gram bits but IMO nowhere near to the consistency of the SDC. I pick up birdshot with the 11" Detech coil & even have with the 16" NFA coil so the sensitivity is there but with the SDC I would have a pocket full of them not the odd one or 6. It's sensitive but I can't get mine to get consistent SDC results (in areas I want that consistency for the gold there). The Detech 6" mono seemed like it could have been the ticket but I found that the coil was very "chatty" on the ground I tried & set up on the QED with low mode/bias for small gold - I found nothing of any worth that I'd missed with the SDC & found it too "chatty" in the areas I tried to make a worthwhile comparison to the SDC. The SDC ran well on these areas without a need for adjusting this or that is about the only comparison I can make. It may be that the 6" Detech was just too sensitive for the ground? May have to try an 8" Commander that people seem to find good?
In saying all that I didn't get the QED to compare or compete with the SDC. I don't spend much time detecting at the moment & looking for patches of sub gram gold makes up a very small percentage of that time. I prefer to use my time with the 11" coil (or bigger) on trying to find bits +1grams now & IMO the QED is more comparable to the GPX series than anything else i.e. SDC, GPZ. I find with the 11" coil it's very comparable to GPX5000 performance on the small stuff I've tested - IMO it will find some very small targets even under 0.1 gram but like the GPX just won't be consistent in comparison to the SDC on this type of gold.
The 5 gram bit I found was on a small area that I'd been over with the GPZ before & many others have been over with GPZ's, GPX's etc. including earlier that same day. It was between 2 x old dig holes so you would assume one of us had swung over it before. So why did the QED get it & not the others?
I wouldn't base too much on one bit of gold that didn't signal as well as the GPX4000 did. I'm sure there are plenty of bits of gold the GPX4000 may not be able to pick up well but other machines will. The same would be true of most metal detectors I reckon.
I don't know how you're running the larger coils in mode 2. I can't run any lower than about mode 4-5 due to picking up too many hot rocks & even the 6" coil I got specifically for small gold + low modes proved difficult to run on the ground I tried. Have you got the bias set neutral or towards larger gold? Or are you leaving it set low for smaller gold?

 

[Jarrod84]

It isn't based off 1 occasion with one nugget. It is based on many hours and many nuggets but this last nugget was the best proof of my concerns with mid depth mid sized gold.
I've already agreed that it competes on the small stuff.

I also don't under stand why the 17X13 evo likes mode 2, I would have totally agreed with you but in mode 2 it runs super smooth and quiet and doesn't like the other modes, something about that mode just works well. I have tested it over buried lead and gold and mode 2 is by far the best.
In the deeper ground I run bias neutral and have the target volume high, in shallow ground I'd have the bias a couple of digits lower and lower the volume to around 25-30 with gain between 3-6 depending on the ground.

With my 11" I run in mode 8 with the rest cranked up and mode 2 wouldn't work well at all, it would be way too noisy.

 

[Jarrod84]

I will add though that this is just my finding, after all the gpx user has 20+ years experience and I've only been doing this for 6 months.
I find it hard to see how I could make it gain the extra 1/3rd depth to hit the target after trying every different setting combination and 3 different coils but I could be wrong.

 

[user 7268]

Ever seen the film The Castle

 

[washgravel]

Basic conclusion.
Sub gram QED wins.
1-2 grams it's pretty even with the gpx getting in front.
2+ grams gpx clearly has an advantage.

I have found so far with my Commander 8" mono coil on both my QED set for max response on small targets and on my GPX 5000 in its Fine Gold setting the QED matched the 5000 on nuggets from sub gram up to 2 grams. Also matched the 5000 on 1 gram and 4 gram specimens. Although on a larger 3/4 oz nugget the 5000 produced an additional 4" result.

However replacing the 8" mono with an 18" mono on both detectors then the QED set for max response on larger targets and with the 5000 still in its Fine Gold setting the QED matched the 5000 on a 2oz and 3oz nugget.

Unfortunately my results are not an in-ground result or still in-situ result.

 

[Ramjet]

If it sounds too good to be true....

 

[davent]

Well, I gave it my best shot.
The QED is close to my 4500 in most areas.
The problem for me was that the QED was a difficult to use in variable ground. If you have the patience of a saint, it will still perform on par with the 4500, but lots of stopping and starting.
I'm now officially detectorless......for the time being.

 

[washgravel]

If it sounds too good to be true....

If you are referring to my results then it seems to me you are saying that my results are either true or not true?