Etrac adventures.

[Heatho]

Over the next few weeks I'll be using an Etrac and posting the finds here, Barney has kindly lent me his detector while he's busy with other stuff like cutting gemstones and getting over his fractured leg. I'll be trying to get into the nitty gritty of it to get the best out of it by diving head first into some of the more expert settings it allows. Will be starting off just doing a bit of testing and then detecting some grounds that I've already covered with the Aldi detector.

I've read the manual but will need to read it numerous more times to get the info to sink in properly, will hopefully start using it over the next few days when I get the chance. It is very similar to the CTX 3030 in operation but lacks the GPS and is not water proof.

Should be fun and will hopefully get some nice finds and be able to show Barney how to get the best out of his detector also.

Let the fun begin.........

 

[Wally69]

To Mr Barney......I mean Sir Barney

You are a gentleman

Good luck Heath, go get them deep silvers.

 

[rocketaroo]

Very generous Be great to see what the aldi had missed

 

[Ramjet]

Downgrade from the Aldi?

 

[treasureman]

looking forward to this adventure

 

[Next1m8]

Best of luck Looking forward to the results Sir!

 

[silver]

Waiting waiting............

 

[rocketaroo]

The etrac is sposed to be hard to learn.

 

[silver]

Be waiting a while then........

 

[Heatho]

I'll get out on Tuesday most likely to give it a run, may even try it today, the manual looks a bit daunting but I think I can work it out no probs but yes it has a lot of functions and settings, will take a while to learn and master it but I'm confident I can do it.

If I get a CTX down the track then I should have a good grasp of how to run it straight away after learning the etrac.

I like the idea of being able to do target sampling with the etrac and ctx with the target accept/reject function, that will be interesting to play with. I'll sample my silver coins and give it a run over where I've been finding them lately.

 

[Goldpick]

You can set these FBS detectors to be as simple or as complex as you want, the factory default setting is fine to start out on for coins. Personally I find hunting with an open screen the best way to detect, use the tones & ID numbers as your discrimination. Using an open screen gives you a good insight into what is happening beneath the coil, and can help dictate things like coil choices for certain locations/conditions. Using prestigious amounts of discrimination in junky areas will often lead to excessive nulling, often masking good targets, hence why I like running an open screen when conditions allow.

The only downside to the learn function, is that the readings taken on coins will vary a fair bit dependent on depth, area and orientation in the ground, so you may have increase the size of the pixels or select more pixels around the scanned target to take any variations of the ferrous and conductivity readings into account.

I much prefer to run with "ferrous sounds" when using an open screen. This will designate all iron targets a low tone which allows you to concentrate on desirable high tone targets. This is not so much of an issue if you have selected to accept coins, as all mid to high value ferrous targets will be nulled out on, despite still reading in the high conductivity range. Though once again, if you get too much nulling from iron, you may end up masking out good targets.

I usually run the gain at about 3/4, enough to amplify deeper targets, but low enough to have some distinction between shallow and deep targets. Sensitivity settings are always dependent on the ground mineralisation, iron and EMI in any given area.

Even after owning this detector for a while now, I am still always learning new stuff, and probably still have a long way to go in mastering it. You only have to read Andy Sabisch's book on the Etrac/Explorer to realise every man and his dog has a different way of setting up and operating these detectors, even under similar detecting conditions.

 

[Heatho]

Excellent info GP, much appreciated, especially on the ferrous audio, that will help me heaps to start with. I was thinking of going with conductive audio first thinking about it but ferrous makes much more sense to me now.

Will run with an open screen for a while until I get the hang of it as that makes good sense too. Will hopefully get out with it tomorrow arvo for a couple of hours.

Thanks mate.

 

[Heatho]

Had my first go with the Etrac today, bit of an eye opener, reasonably difficult to use but I think I've got a basic setup that is working for me, 1st target was a whisky bottle lid, 4th tarhget was another whisky bottle lid, 2nd target was a $2 coin and 3rd target was a Florin!! This was the same area that I've smashed with the Aldi, these targets were a bit further than aldi's depth can reach, sooo pretty good first hunt, pretty sure I was onto another Florin but could not recover the target before the rain came down, will try to get it over the next day or so.

Got a few bits of junk, big Iron bolt, which I knew was iron before digging and a couple of pulltabs. It did slow me down compared to the Aldi but....... gave me a Florin after about 5 steps soooo I reckon there must be plenty more there.

Pretty impressed for a first run, thanks again GP for the setup info, it helped heaps.

After a quick cleanup.

 

[Sa_bogan]

it will soon become easy to use this machine - on the ctx i use 5 tones to make it easy to listen rather then look at the screen all the time

 

[Goldpick]

Results straight away, that's what I like to see, on ya Heatho. How was the weight of the Etrac, get a sore arm after a while?

 

[Heatho]

it will soon become easy to use this machine - on the ctx i use 5 tones to make it easy to listen rather then look at the screen all the time

Hey SA Bogan yeah I agree mate, I set it up on 4 tone and ferrous audio as GP suggested, though I will play with a few different combinations of settings and save them as user programs for Barney.

Cheers GP, was good to get Silver first hunt with it. Wasn't too heavy at all, quite comfortable to use, although I only had about and hour and a half before the rain ruined things. Will hopefully get a full day with it soon and see how the weight goes, should be ok I think.

 

[Kingsolomon]

Glad your having fun with it only good for a crutch for me at present . So you get a new toy feeling without a price tag! You should be pretty good with it in a month or so . Already getting results keep at it.

 

[Heatho]

Cheers Barney, really appreciate the loan of it mate, will help me decide which detector to get next also. It's going to be fun learning it that's for sure. Hopefully I have some nice programs set up that make it easier to use when I hand it back to you.

Thanks again mate.

 

[Ramjet]

FLORIN! Nice result for your first outing with the etrac.

 

[rocketaroo]

Dont they call the etrac, the silver magnet? So generous to lend it to heatho barney