NE Wales newbie

[Cymro]

Hi everybody,

Found this site yesterday and registered - just got a welcome message from Admin so thought I'd introduce myself.

Living in North-East Wales - born and raised 2 miles over the border from those 'Saes' (or bl**dy Saes as I've heard them described . . . ) Moved to present location 35 years ago 'just for now' and forgot to move on.

First interested in detecting nearly 30 years ago when my daughter was a tot - built a BFO detector to keep her amused on the beach. We took it on holiday to Aberdaron and found a few quid and the world's supply of ring-pulls on the beach at Porth Oer so I determined to build a bigger and better one. I did some research (no internet then . . . ) and discovered that I needed a discriminating VLF machine, so eventually built the Practical Electronics 'Magnum' designed by Andy Flind. Got it all working but never used it because I had trouble making a decent shaft for it - the recommended plastic waste pipe was too flexible and there wasn't much else about back then.

Fast forward to 2006 and I bought a detector from Maplins, which seemed to tick all the boxes - LCD display, discrimination and all. Took it on holiday and tried asking the owner of a Caravan Club CL we were staying on near Newport for permission and discovered that I got tongue-tied about asking . . . Eventually blurted it out and he was OK about it but I found nothing but one of those hypodermic needle-looking things you get with airbed pumps.

Last year a friend was retiring and wanted to get into detecting so asked me if I would join him. I already had the Maplin detector (virtually unused so we went to a field belonging to a friend of his, and found a flintlock action almost straight away. That piqued my interest no end but I didn't feel the Maplin was reliable enough - it used to chirp away at nothing; even just sitting on the ground while I was digging an alleged signal . . .

So I got a secondhand Minelab X-Terra 30 which I thought I would grow into, rather than growing out of. Great machine, but I really needed more features so I started looking around again and found a Whites Eagle Spectrum which I picked up on Saturday. Haven't even tried it outside yet - spent most of yesterday trying to absorb the instruction manual . . .

We had permission on one local farm but felt we needed more so I researched a lot of areas locally and wrote to a couple of farmers in likely positions - one wrote back and gave us permission on maybe 100 acres - haven't been back to detect yet but we will . . . Then my detecting buddy was talking to a girl he works with who said her husband had a farm, so he asked if we could detect it and she said, 'Yes - no problem. Well, actually we have two farms.'

So from one field we now have four farms and life has just got busy.

Looking for programs for the Spectrum if anyone has any, please. I know it's an 'older' machine but I gather the later XLT programs will work . . . ?

[Val Beechey]

Welcome to Detecting Wales Cymro.  Can't help with you query about the Whites Spectrum but maybe some else can, there's plenty of experts on  here.

There are a few up your end and they also have their own club. Perhaps some of them may contact you.

Val

[dingdong]

Hi cwmro,and a very warm welcome to detecting Wales,I hope you find it as interesting and fulfilling as I have,and i also hope you find all in which you seek.

[Chef Geoff]

Welcome to DW Cymro
Have a try with this:



Basic Adjustments

Target Volume: 45 Audio Threshold: 14 Tone Adjust: 221 Audio Disc.: ON
Silent Search: OFF Mixed Mode: OFF A.C. Sensitivity: 77 D.C. Sensitivity: 3
Backlight: OFF

Pro Options

Audio
S.A.T. : ON S.A.T. Speed: 4 Tone I.D.: ON V.C.O.: OFF
Absolute Value: OFF Modulation: ON

G.E.B. / TRAC
Autotrac: ON Trac View: OFF Trac Speed: 16 Trac Offset: 0
Trac Inhibit: ON Manual G.E.B.: AUTO

Discrimination

Disc. Edit
Accept: NEG 20 TO POS 95 Reject: NEG 95 TO NEG 21
Block Edit: S/A Learn Accept: OFF Learn Reject: OFF Recovery Speed: 20
Bottlecap Reject: 1

Display

Visual Disc.: ON Labels: ON V.D.I. Sensitivity: 85 Ground I.D. OFF
Accumulate: ON Average: ON Fade Rate: 7

Signal

High Transmit Power: ON Low Transmit Power: OFF Transmit Frequency: 4
Preamp Gain: 9

[david995]

wow geoff that looks more involved than a mine lab

[Chef Geoff]

I bought the Eagle Spectrum when it came out back in 90-91 and after 6 months I gave up lol (no internet help back then) 10 years before that I gave up on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum so needless to say now I avoid anything with "Spectrum" in the name
Yes Whites are quite technical machines that you can adjust to basically work anywhere and everywhere but this is too much for many users

[Cymro]

Ta for the replies, everybody.

I think the technical aspect was what attracted me to the Spectrum - as Chef Geoff says you can tune it to any situation if you know what you're doing.

Love the X-Terra but I can only block the numbers which appear - the local farm we have permission on is absolutely riddled with iron so I blocked everything from -4 to +8 and never heard from iron again. Very impressed with the discrimination on it - I could wave my spade under its nose and it never flinched. But that's basically all I could alter apart from the sensitivity. Looked at the 705 and would love one but the plain truth is that I can't afford one . . .

So the Spectrum turned up at a price I could afford and I bought it - had to drive to Cheltenham to collect it but still seems to be a bargain.

Took it out on our local farm this morning and I'm very happy at this point. It's heavy but very well balanced - a couple of hours on I still couldn't tell I was swinging it. Weirdest thing though - I set a bit of threshold tone on it just so I knew it was still alive and when it came across any iron the tone disappeared . . . I showed my buddy the effect and he said that my detector had just 'not found' my spade . . .

Found a copper coin 3 feet into the first walk down the field - only a couple of inches down but at least it found it . . . Also found what may turn out to be a Victorian penny and a small brass button which was quite deep. They're in the ultrasonic tank right now trying to get the muck off them but the coins seem very worn with very few discernible features.

Also got a signal which said it was a screw cap so I dug it anyway and guess what - it was a screw cap still attached to the broken neck of a bottle. Got a foil  signal which was foil so I'm starting to trust its judgement!

I also found a Dinky-type car, a length of brass angle and other junk, but at least I'm finding stuff with it, which is a bonus

So, Chef Geoff, can you please tell me what the program you so kindly sent me is suitable for? I will try it, obviously, but it's probably best to try it in the right place! I've been using the Jewellery and Coins setting in the Basic Program menu but I can save yours in the Custom Programs.

On the subject of settings, there are Relic and Prospecting settings - anyone know what they do? I have the manual but it's in American and I'm Welsh . . .

[Chef Geoff]

Relic and prospecting is an iron program very deep but you'll dig everything as the name suggests, coin and jewellery is a good all around program an the one I put up just tweaks it a bit, the trick with all machines is to "NOT" change the settings when you find one OK you can alter you preamp if it's noisy otherwise you'll never get used to it.
As you say the manual is very American and so is the machine and those foil and screw top symbols are where small hammereds and Romans would come in Europe so don't trust it too much, the disappearing noise is nulling (iron discrimination) and all machines do it but you only get to hear it when you have a threshold but beware when it nulls it's not detecting so if you have lots of iron slow your swing right down to allow the machine to recover.
+8 on the XTerra may lose your spade but it will also lose 90% of Roman grots too so again be careful

[Cymro]

Thanks for the tips - I'll keep them in mind in the future.

I'm going to spend half an hour inputting 'your' program to try next time I'm out (maybe tomorrow, weather permitting.) Nothing too bad forecast - just cold - so we'll have to see.

BTW, just had a look at the Minelab and I've only notched out -4 and +4, not the +8 so hopefully I haven't been missing anything other than iron . . . 

[Cymro]

OK - I've done all that!

There was only one adjustment I can't make on mine; the Manual GEB settings on mine don't have an AUTO option so I left it as it was (possibly an XLT program?) I wasn't planning on altering Ground Balance settings manually at this stage anyway so it'll be OK at its default settings.

Also took me a while to work out the Disc Edit function - I'm used to Windows these days and naively imagined that I could select a block of numbers to accept or reject so I've just spent quite a while checking and changing the 190 numbers available.

Hope to try it tomorrow - will report back with results

Thanks!

[Dungbeetle]

Are all Whites machines as complicated as this ? I've never used one and don't see many about.

[Val Beechey]

I had a Whites M6 and I don't remember it being complicated at all.  But I do remember it was a nightmare on the beach. By the time I got it stable I wasn't picking up anything at all.  Also it loved coke.

So Cymro, if you're intending to do any beaches, hang onto that Minelab.  You'll need it.

Val

[Chef Geoff]

No Val the Eagle is more like the DFX so isn't too bad on the beach the Xterra on the other hand is useless 

[Val Beechey]

I guessed it was Geoff.  My mistake, I thought all Minelabs were good on beaches. 


Val

[Dryland]

Welcome to DW Cymro, The Whites Eagle Spectrum was my first detector and it took me quite a while to get used to it, especially getting to grips with the programming of the machine, saying that I still have trouble using a video player.  The other issue for me was the weight,
but all in all it was a good detector.
                                                       You seem to have got to know your machine pretty quickly and you are already finding with it. One of
our fellow members Mark Newberry has been using the Whites xlt which is virtually the same machine, for the past couple of years, and he has made a lot of good finds with his.