This mode will show five different indications
on the large display. One outstanding feature of the MXT
is the ability for you to read everything on the display
with ease. The large number is called the VDI or Visual
Discrimination Indication number. This is a reference number
to help you identify different targets. The numbers range
from -95 to + 94. Minus numbers from -95 up to zero are
indications of iron. Most of us in our hunting will be dealing
with the positive numbers. The higher the conductivity of
the target, the higher the VDI number. Notice in the picture
we have a quarter indicated at +83.
There are a series of 16 blocks that appear along the bottom
portion of the display screen. These blocks do two things.
They give you another indication of the identity of the
target in relation to how it lines up with the target labels
below the display. In addition, the block changes sizes
according to how confident the detector is about the target.
They could be called "confidence blocks". There are three
sizes to the block. If the block is large, then the detector
is telling you. "I am almost sure that I have the identity
of this target nailed." If the block is one half the size,
the detector is telling you, "It looks pretty good, but
I could be mistaken, but I would dig if I were you." If
the block is one-fourth the size, the detector is telling
you, "You can go ahead and dig if you want to, but I wouldn't
unless the target is deep."
On the screen there are numerical labels. These labels are
of the most common targets found with a particular indication.
In the picture, the label is 25 cents. The neat thing about
the labels is when you get two labels shown, the first label
is more than likely the target.
The other indication on the display is the depth. This will
occur when the trigger on the hand grip is squeezed and
held while the coil is moved over the target. It is important
to remember that the depth indication is only for coin-sized
objects. The depth indicator will begin with 12 inches and
work its way down as you get the coil closer to the target.
Always go with the smallest depth reading to get the correct
depth.
Also, when the trigger is squeezed and held on the handgrip,
some blocks will appear at the bottom of the display. These
blocks will aid you in pinpointing a target. When the search
coil is directly over the target you will have the longest
possible length of blocks showing.
As you can see, in the Coin and Jewelry Mode, you have many
ways to check and recheck the target before digging. The Relic Mode has a different display.
It contains the VDI numbers (same as Coin and Jewelry Mode)
that are actually reference numbers. The type of metal,
size and shape determines this number. Relic hunters will
normally be interested in all the plus VDI numbers rather
than minus numbers. The labels on the display have changed
to indicate the things relic hunters are most interested,
IRON, BUTTON, BULLET and BUCKLE. Of course there are many
more targets of interest to a relic hunter so it will be
important to compare the VDI number with the items found.
This way you will begin to accumulate your own list of VDI
numbers and good targets.
The depth indicator will measure the depth of coin-sized
objects when pinpointing. Using this feature along with
the size of the confidence block, you can decide whether
or not to dig a relic target.
An interesting feature of the Relic Mode is the Mixed Mode
Audio feature. This is the All Metal and Discriminate Mode
working at the same time. The high, low audio sounds can
take some getting use to, but is very effective in separating
good targets from trash. Hunting for gold nuggets is just a dream
for most of us detectorist and a reality for only a few.
It does not make a lot of sense to spend a small fortune
on a gold detector that you will only use once a year, if
that much. With the MXT you will always be ready to hit
the nugget fields with a very acceptable piece of quality
equipment.
The Prospecting display still has the VDI numbers but everything
else on the display has changed. Gold VDI numbers can range
from slightly negative up to +80. According to the MXT Owner's
Guide (which is excellent), VDI numbers over +80 and below
-20 are highly unlikely to be gold.
On the display is the word GND (called ground phase) and
is followed by a number. In the photo, the GND is 54. This
number is the measurement of the ground and it tells you
how mineralized the soil is you are working in. If the numbers
range from the high 70's to the 80's, you are working in
soil with high iron mineralization. If the numbers are low,
30's and 40's, you are in alkali or salt areas. Generally,
higher numbers mean black sand and lower numbers mean less
iron in the soil. The GND is useful for finding gold bearing
ground in a dry wash but that is beyond the scope of this
report.
Another phrase on the display is Iron Target? This is a
number expressed in percent. The detector is looking at
the target and saying "What are the odds of this being iron?"
It then gives you the answer in a percent. In the picture,
the percent is 20%. Any target registering over 60% is going
to be iron.
This is really a multi-functional trigger.
There are three trigger positions: Center Position, Forward
Position and the Squeeze and Hold Position. To make it more
interesting, the trigger positions have different functions
in the three modes.
In the Coin and Jewelry Mode the center position will be
silent on rejected targets in the discriminate mode. This
is the traditional way to use the trigger. The forward position
adds a new feature in the Coin and Jewelry Mode, pull tab
rejection. If you are accepting nickels then pull tabs above
the nickel setting will not respond with the audio. When
the trigger is squeezed and held the display will indicate
depth and help with pinpointing.
In the Relic Mode the center position of the trigger will
cause the MXT to give a high and low audio sound, which
is called the Mixed Mode Audio. The sound is based on the
discriminate control setting, a low sound below the setting
and a high sound above the setting. If the discriminate
control is set to accept nickels, then any target reading
below nickels will give a low sound and above the nickel
will produce a high sound. If the trigger is in the forward
position then low sounds are suppressed and only high sounds
are heard. When the trigger is squeezed and held, the display
will show the depth of coin-sized objects such as buttons
and bullets.
In the Prospecting Mode the center position will produce
a low grunt sound when the coil is over iron or the target
shows at least 80% iron on the display. In the forward position
the grunt is gone and the audio is a VCO sound for all metals.
Squeezing and holding the trigger will stop ground tracking.
This feature is important when a small target like a nugget
is indicated and you want to hover the coil over the target.
With auto ground tracking operating, the MXT will think
that the small target is ground and null it out. Squeezing
the trigger when pinpointing will eliminate this dilemma.
If you have trouble remembering these trigger positions,
don't worry. They can be found on the bottom of the control
box for easy reference.
Ground balancing with the MXT could
not be easier. Ground balancing is a procedure that many
people have difficulty learning. If you ground balance a
detector correctly, you may get a little more depth. However,
if the procedure is done wrong, the results can be horrendous.
The MXT eliminates that problem.
On the face of the control box there is a TRAC toggle switch.
There are three positions: SALT. LOCK. AND GROUND. For normal
soil, which makes up at least 90% of our searching, the
toggle should be set to GROUND. LOCK is used in soil that
contains a lot of iron or rusted iron. Before you use the
LOCK setting you must ground balance in either SALT or GROUND.
SALT is used to compensate for alkali or salt. If you are
on a salt water beach, just move the toggle to SALT and
ground balance the detector.
The actually ground balancing procedure is so simple. Set
the other knobs (which we will discuss later) to preset
settings and then just find a clean spot with no metal underneath,
set the TRAC toggle switch to Ground or Salt and then pump
the coil. The coil should be moved up and down (two to four
inches) a couple of times. A very neat feature called Fast
AutoTrac will eliminate the ground mineralization. It is
that easy!
A feature I really like is the LOCK feature. Once the ground
balance has been set in either the GROUND or SALT mode,
you can toggle to LOCK. What this does is lock in the ground
balance settings. This is very useful when you are in a
highly decomposed iron environment. Rusted iron can sometimes
trick the detector's ground balance because the detector
thinks it is dealing with a mineral not a metal. One way
to tell when to lock in the ground balance is if you are
experiencing false signals, popping or chirping and it is
not electrical interference.
One note, when you are air testing target with the MXT,
be sure to have the TRAC toggle set to LOCK. The coil must
see the ground when ground balancing.
This knob control turns the detector
on and off and sets the gain or signal strength. On some
detectors this control is called the Sensitivity Setting.
The settings on this control go from 1 to 10 and then go
upward with a + 1, +2 and a +3. The preset is at 9.5. I
noticed that there is really a big difference in depth if
you are able to use the plus numbers. I have also found
that there seems to be a noticeable boost in the audio announcing
a target when using the plus numbers. If you can run the
MXT at +3, there will be a dramatic increase in depth. However,
it has been my experience that when you run the detector
in highly mineralized soil at +3 there is a buzzing sound
in the threshold. It sounds like a bee. I don't mind, with
the depth I am getting on those targets. The gain control
can be set too high in mineralized ground. The MXT will
notify you of this fact by giving the OVERLOAD-REDUCE GAIN/LIFT
LOOP message on the display. This message can also occur
when a target is very large. If the problem is not a large
target, you will have to reduce the gain setting. Lifting
the coil will get a proper ID on a large target.
This knob has two different functions.
When in the Coin and Jewelry or Relic Modes, this control
acts as a traditional discrimination control with everything
above the setting being accepted. The preset is just below
the Nickel setting and this is where I normally set the
discriminate knob when coin and jewelry hunting. Remember,
if the pull-tabs get to be a problem, just push the trigger
forward to eliminate them. A nice feature! I did notice
one thing, however, that is different from most detectors.
When the discrimination control is set to zero, all metal
will be detected.
Now if you are operating in the Relic Mode and the trigger
is in the center position, there will be a two tone I.D.
which is the Mixed Mode. (All Metal and Discriminate working
at the same time). Any metal target that is accepted by
the Discriminate Control will give a high sound and any
target to be rejected will give a low sound. If you want
to eliminate the low sound, just push the trigger forward.
If you are operating in the Prospecting Mode, the Dual
Control is used to adjust the speed of the Self Adjusting
Threshold or SAT. The threshold is the slight hum you
hear when operating the MXT and is adjusted with the Threshold
Knob. It is important that the threshold remain steady
so you can catch all the small target sounds. However,
electrical interference or ground mineralization can cause
the threshold to make a scratchy chattering noise. If
you increase the SAT speed, the chattering will go away
and you can separate the target from the interference
noise. So the SAT control will compensate for any irregularity
of the ground mineralization.
The SAT control and the Gain control work together in
the Prospecting Mode. If you are having trouble stabilizing
the Threshold, you may have to increase the SAT or reduce
the Gain.
If you rotate the SAT to the maximum setting, you go into
HyperSAT. You will start experiencing different sounds
but small nuggets will have a sharper report. This setting
is to be used in very bad ground conditions.
This control sets the volume of
the background noise. Some people refer to the sound
as a "hum." The setting should always be at the lowest
audio level so you can hear any minute changes in sound
while going over a target.
This portion of the report will
deal with the field-testing of the MXT. I am retired
and have plenty of time on my hands to metal detect,
so I put a lot of hours on this detector. I have also
been detecting regularly since 1966, so I am very
familiar with how a metal detector is supposed to
perform. I am breaking down the experiences with the
MXT by weeks and reporting my feelings as if it were
a diary. This report covers Oklahoma and Southern
Colorado hunting sites.
I received the MXT at 5:00 p.m.
and was anxious to try it out before it got dark,
so I headed for the backyard with my 42 target sticks.
I wanted to check the VDI numbers against the actual
targets. I ground balanced the MXT and then placed
the target sticks on the ground. I checked the ground
with the Prospecting Mode and found the GND to be
58, very mild mineralization. I was using the standard
950 coil and discovered the VDI numbers were right
on the mark. Using this coil I could pick up targets
12 inches away with the target sticks on the ground.
In the Prospecting Mode I could pick up a 4-grain
nugget at a measured 4 inches. I, like most of you,
realize the proof of the pudding is how does it perform
with targets in the ground.
The next day I went to an old park and it was raining
intermittently. I set all knobs to preset, selected
the Coin and Jewelry Mode and ground balanced the
MXT. I did not lock in the ground balance. The discriminate
knob was set to preset and I was using the 950 coil.
After I started hunting, I found several zinc pennies,
nickels, several dimes and one quarter. Nothing was
old. The zinc pennies VDI numbers ranged from 62,
65. One corroded zinc penny lying on top of the ground
indicated a VDI reading of 58. I checked under the
penny and there were not any targets. Some square
tabs would come in with the same VDI numbers as zinc
pennies. I tried pushing the trigger forward to eliminate
the square tabs - but still picked some of them up.
The deepest coin I found was about 4+ inches deep.
The rains came and I headed for shelter.
Today the park was soaked from the rain and the part
of the park I was hunting in was very trashy. I am
still using the standard 950 coil and using the presets.
I wanted to focus in on the "Confidence Blocks" to
see if there were really an aid to the "dig or not
dig" decision. I dug a lot of trash today and found
if the "Confidence Block" was large and indicated
a good target, you could almost bet the farm that
it was a good target. If the one-half block appeared
and the target indication was good, I established
that there were normally pieces of trash near the
good target. I could double check this using the Relic
Mode with its Mixed Mode to locate the bad target.
These blocks proved very helpful in making the decision
to dig. I am starting to get impressed with this detector.
Visited a school playground and
began in the Coin and Jewelry Mode using all preset
settings and the 950 coil. The GND was 59. The first
area I worked was a sandy volleyball court and found
very little because they had just added sand. I began
testing to see how deep the MXT would go by turning
the Gain to a +3. It was too much - so I backed down
to a +2 setting. I discovered that there was a great
difference in detection depth from the preset to the
+2. Deep coins under the new sand were picked up by
the MXT and the deepest coin I found in the volleyball
court sand was 10 inches deep.
I was having trouble with a pair of headphones that
had a very long coiled cord. The cord kept catching
the Mode Toggle and was switching the Coin and Jewelry
Mode to the Relic Mode. Actually, this was a blessing
in disguise. In the process of messing around with
the headphone cord, I found myself hunting in the
Relic Mode. It worked great on coins, as it seemed
to pull them out a lot deeper than the Coin and Jewelry
Mode. I needed to check this out to see if this was
a fluke.
This morning I went with some friends to an old part
of town where they were removing houses and scraping
the soil with dozers. The ground is covered with a
lot of scrap metal from what is left of the houses.
It seems there is rusted iron in every square foot
of ground. I decided to hunt in the Relic Mode and
set the discriminate knob to just below nickels. I
ground balanced the MXT and then locked it in because
of the decomposing iron. I was using the 950 coil.
This way I would have a high tone for all metals above
nickels and a low tone below the nickel setting. The
gain was set to +2.
The results were better than I could have ever anticipated.
It seems that I was pulling a coin out every two or
three steps. Using the Mixed Mode, anytime I heard
that screeching high tone among the many low tones,
I would try to get a VDI reading on the target. If
I could lock on a good VDI number, I would dig. Many
times I found coins next to a rusted iron target.
The target separation in the Mixed Mode is excellent.
This detector is amazing! We found several silver
coins today plus a few artifacts.
One problem did arise while hunting around these houses.
In one area that had an abundance of metal in the
ground, I noticed that the target indications were
off. Quarters would read in the mid 70's and pennies
in the low 60's. I solved this problem by reducing
the Gain dramatically and it worked! Sometimes less
Gain is better.
In most areas the detection depth was excellent using
the +2 Gain setting. The deepest coin I dug was a
dime at a measured 9 inches. One of my friends used
the detector for a short time and dug a square pull-tab
at 12 inches. This Relic Mode proved to be an excellent
way to hunt in very trashy areas. The ability of the
MXT to pull out good metal lying next to bad metal
is remarkable. I saw the need for a smaller coil,
so I purchased the Eclipse 5.3 coil and lower shaft.
Today, I am visiting a youth camp
that dates back to the early 1920's. The GND reading
was 56. I decided to use the relic mode for coin hunting
while using the new Eclipse 5.3 coil. The campsites
are very trashy with fire pits everywhere - a perfect
place for the smaller coil. At this site I can use
the +3 Gain setting without a lot of interference.
Right off the bat I had a loud signal and a VDI number
indicating a dime. The depth measurement read 9 inches.
I could not believe it could be a dime at nine inches
with that much audio and picked up with the 5.3 coil.
This was a target I was going to measure. Sure enough,
at nine inches out comes a nice Mercury Dime. After
playing around with the Gain settings I came to the
conclusion that somehow the +1, +2 and +3 Gain settings
must be boosting the sound when reporting a target.
This proved true time and time again.
Today, I had a first. While hunting in a city park
with the MXT's Coin and Jewelry Mode and using the
950 coil I found a bunch of nickels in a 4' X 15'
area. A bunch in this case is 43 nickels. Strangely
enough they all indicated either 18 or 20 on the VDI
display. All the nickels were dated in the 60's and
70's. Because of the heat, I left early and returned
later that evening to the same spot. I found 10 more
nickels.
One thing I have noticed is the variable sweep speed
of the MXT. It seems to operate extremely well at
slow sweep speeds but it also seems to function just
as well at moderate to fast sweep speeds.
We are now in Southern Colorado
where the GND numbers are reading in the low and mid
80's. This is very tough mineralized soil. I have
found that using the smaller coil worked better in
the highly mineralized soil. I guess the smaller coil's
surface does not see as much of the bad ground per
sweep as a larger coil.
The water levels in the rivers in Southern Colorado
are at an all time low due to a drought. The South
Fork of the Rio Grande was barely flowing and revealing
much of the bottom of the river - a perfect setup
for a metal detector. I chose a site on the river
where tube floaters come out of the river, hoping
they dropped a few things while making their exit.
The GND at this site was 84. The round river rock
seemed like solid iron to almost all metal detectors
I have used here, so I was anxious to see how the
MXT would handle this rock.
I set up in the Coin and Jewelry Mode with the 5.3
coil and used all the preset settings. I ground balance
over the river rock and MXT quickly removed the annoying
interference of the rock. If I increased the Gain
setting to +3, I would get an OVERLOAD reading on
the display and raising the coil did not remove the
OVERLOAD reading. However, I could use the preset
Gain setting (9.5) or +1 and +2 setting with good
results.
I put a dime on one of the rocks and all three settings
(preset, +1, +2) would pick up the dime. When the
dime was put under a 5-inch diameter rock, there were
mixed reading in preset mode, and +1 and +2 settings.
The MXT would read correctly when the coil was swept
one way but incorrectly when swept back over the target.
All detectors I have tested here before have had a
very difficult time handling this river rock. The
MXT performed much better than any detector I have
used in this portion of the river. While testing on
the rocks, I did find some coins and a small key chain.
These results with the river rock were the same in
all three operating modes of the MXT, Coin and Jewelry,
Relic and Prospecting Modes. Hunting in the campground
(yes, I had permission) adjacent to the river provided
some nice targets. The ground reading was 80 and the
site had a lot of man-made trash. I set the MXT in
the Coin and Jewelry Mode, used the 5.3 coil, set
the Gain to +2 and ground balanced and did not lock
it in. This time I turned the Threshold knob to operate
in a silent search mode. This silent search hunting
in a trashy site really made a difference. It was
a lot more pleasant than hearing a lot of background
noise for hours at a time.
In the campground I found that in highly mineralized
soil, if the signal is mixed but shows indications
that it could be good and it is deep, then by all
means, DIG! Most of the time the target was good.
It seems that highly mineralized soil will affect
or distort the VDI numbers. Most good targets that
would normally read in the 80's will now read in the
70's. The solution is to reduce the Gain. Also, if
the Confidence Block is the middle size and the target
is deep, DIG! The secret is dig deep targets - and
the MXT goes deep!
I did not get to visit any salt-water
beaches or tramp through the nugget fields in Arizona
but from what I have heard from other sources, the
MXT also performs with equal gusto under these conditions.
The MXT is a magnificent multi-purpose detector! About
the only thing the MXT does not do is swim underwater.
This is obviously a well designed and thought out
piece of equipment that will give top quality results.
When you are in the countryside with this detector
in your hand, you feel confident that not many targets
are going to escape the detection field of the MXT.
It is obvious that this wonderful piece of equipment
is going to carve a big notch for itself in the metal
detector world.
If you are interested in depth, you've got it!
If you are interested in quality, you've got it!
If you are interested in versatility, you've got it!
If you like high tech equipment, you've got it!
If you want something that works like it is advertised,
you've got it!
I am impressed!
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