Reports on GPX5000

"HAPPY NEW YEAR"

HI ALL,
Haven't seen any reports on the gpx5000 lately. Was hoping for some feed back from you Eastern States People. Most of us out West are too far away from the GOLD FIELDS to do short trips in the summer months.
Would appreciate some reports.

CHEERS

From the looks of things the gents in the east
are having much more to do with water than gold these days.
There is some amazing footage coming out of NE Oz.
Hope everyone is doing ok.


Flak

Hi Charliec, I went out yesterday at Heathcote here in Vic. and thought I'd try my luck on one of my patches and found a Tiny .13 gram nugget about 2 to 3 inches down, on fine gold settings. Nothing to brag about but shows what the GPX 5000 is capable of.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v_uZeY856o

Regards Johnny

nice vid HOBO'S Gold and a nice little bit. it's unreal how much it takes to find a bit that small.
cheers
stoppsy

Hobo,

Thanks for posting the vid, the 5000 is really sensitive to small gold which is great. I just want to ask one question and that is How do you find the 5000 on hot rocks???? do they chime in at all when your detecting, Thanks....

HueyDuck....

Thanks Hobo - Sneaky little bugger that 0.13 grammer sure didn't want to end up the hand

Regards
Ararat

Hi Charliec
Have detected about 28/30 days in the triangle with the 5000 for 37.7 Gms
This was on the most hammered ground around

Hi HueyDuck
I get lots of hot rocks but if you can put up with them you will pick up a bit
of gold too

Cheers Ruffles

Scored these little suckers with my 5000 the last day of last year!!!
Not bad considering how saturated the ground was and all the thunderstorm activity around the place, seems crumbing between the grass clumps is the only way of getting a few colours these days.
Anyway there's no catch and release program with gold that I know of, so will just add these little fly chits to my growing pile of 5000 gold.

JP

Hi Hueyduck, I find that works fine on hot rocks no probs, if hot rocks play up with your detector in Fine gold settings, then might have to run your detector in Sensitive smooth settings. I find you can tune the GPX 5000 to just about every condition, there are so many settings at your disposal, its not like when I was running a Extreme where you were so very limited.
Regards Johnny

HI HOBO'S GOLD ,
Thanks for the video , it's good to see . The GPX5000 has a nice crisp-clear sound on the small gold . Is the coil a 12" or 14" N/F EM .
The video is nice and clear , what camera are you using .

CHEERS

Hi Charliec, It is 12" Nugget finder ad. The handy cam i'm using is a JVC Everio nice and light and easy to use, I've got a Bicycle handle bar camera mount, I keep the handy cam in my pocket until I get a signal and then mount the cam, that way I protect the cam. from getting scratched from bushes.

Regards Johnny

Thanks Hobo, really appreciate that feedback...it will be very helpful in the future.

HueyDuck....

I think its about time you got a flatter scoop. You should have got that bit in your hand ages ago and then went and found its sister.
I find kids beach sand spaded work the best.

Cheers.

My 4500 picked up a .11 grammer that was about 2 to 3 " down on the weekend so I cant see the value in upgrading but each to their own.

Hi,

I am sure a lot of people will do well with the 5000 and I am not knocking it, I just thought I would post my experience hiring a 4500 and 5000 on separate days and going to the same spot.
I am in the market for a new detector and decided to hire first before parting with a lot of money. I have previously owned a 2100 for a number of years and have found over 200 nuggets with it, biggest was only 16 grams but they all add up as you know.
The first day was with the 4500 to one of my patches in Vic's golden triangle, a gully that is not so well known, north of Moliagul. Ground was highly mineralised. I didn't have the 4500 running at optimum conditions as I am a beginner with it, but it was running quite smoothly and what noise there was I was able to put up with it as the target response was outstanding. I found 6 nuggets for the day between 1 and 12" on the old diggings, biggest was 1 gram at 12". I was very impressed at the depth on the one grammer. Overall I found the 4500 to be a quiet robust machine and I felt it had a lot of power for going deep.
The next time taking out the 5000 to the same area I used the settings recommended to me by the hirees. I noticed immediately it was a bit smoother than the 4500 and within 30 minutes of arriving I had a very small nugget maybe 0.1 grams in a part of the gully I hadn't found any before. I was impressed by this. As I continued detecting I noticed that I had to decipher ground noises and hot rocks a lot more than the 4500 and the detector started to get a bit more EMI than the 4500. I could make the changes to even out the noises, without a problem and continued. For the rest of the day I dug a further 3 of the tiniest nuggets you will ever find basically just under the surface. At the end of the day I couldn't help feeling that the 5000 was a machine designed just for detecing small or very small nuggets and I felt as if the depth capability of the machine had gone down a notch compared with the 4500. I felt as if the 4500 had more all round capability. Look each to their own and I know this was only comparing both machines once, but that is the honest impression I got and I will be looking for a good second hand 4500 to purchase rather than the 5000.

Hi Adrock

did exactly what you did hiring both machines over 3 weekends.
Ended up buying a 2nd hand GPX4500 and haven't regretted it.

G'day Adrock, & TheGoldenChild, I've also talked to a few who have done the same as you and they came to a similar conclusion. I had the oppertunity to use a 5000 for a few days, but decided to stay with my 4500.

I think if you were coming up from say the GP3000 or SD model machines you would notice a much more significant improvement, than from say a 4500 to the 5000, this is just my opinion and what I thought about the lattest machine.

We all know that each and every Minelab machine has been improved upon in each new model and the 5000 is no different, as it has features that the previous machine does not have. Are these new features a benfit to you as a user, thats what each has to decide for themselves, and thats why hiring for a few trips before buying which ever model your interested in has an advantage.

cheers dave

Ok, so I decided to hire a 5000 again. This was going to be a bit of an experiment. The scene was a little known gully near Tarnagulla in Vic. About 10 years ago I found my biggest nugget there (16g) with a SD2100. More recently I have flogged a small section of the gully with a 4500 finding 4 more bits for about 2g.
Fired up the 5000, it was nice and quiet, proceeded to find 3 lead shot at good depth whereas the 4500 hadn't heard them.
I then got a good signal over someone else's abandoned detector hole and pulled out a 1 grammer at 12" below their hole. Couldn't believe it.
An hour or so later, I found 3 more small nuggets amongst other people's detector holes.
My final nugget came from below one of my own 4500 holes. About 6" underneath out popped a lovely 1 grammer. The 4500 hadn't heard it at all, but it was an obvious signal to the 5000.
My verdict now is I love the 5000 over the 4500. Would I buy one? I don't know, for the capital outlay and the number of times I manage to get out in the bush, hiring is cheaper and you can always hire and test the new technology when a new detector comes out.
I will post my next hire experience with the 5000 next month.
Good luck everyone

If you dont get out much then it may not pay to buy one. You could always just sell what you find until you have enough to buy one later.

Ok, this was last weekend. I couldn't get an 11" mono with the detector this time so had to settle for the 14" mono. Wasn't really happy with this so it wasn't a fair comparison to the other two tests, but anyway it was going to be interesting.
I initially went to a well known area north of Dunolly which had been kind to me over the years although I knew the nuggets were small. I spent the morning here, I found the 14" mono more difficult to use, especially pinpointing and more noisy than the 11". Maybe I just wasn't used to a larger coil since it's been a while since I have used one. Dropped the gain back a bit and it was ok. Didn't find any gold and only got a couple of junk targets. I wasn't impressed, I think the cold weather and coil was annoying me too much. But also, if the gold isn't there you won't find it. I decided to try another area in the afternoon in Moliagul that I had thrashed with 2100 and 4500. By now I was getting some good deep targets, I dug 3 deep holes but they were all rubbish. Was almost about to give up for the day but got a very faint signal on the old digs which turned out to be a nice chunky 1 grammer at about 6". I had hardly heard the target but the 14" inch had redeemed itself. This was followed up about 5 minutes later by a 0.5 grammer at about 4". In conclusion, I still like the 5000, I think for my next trip, which is tomorrow incidently, I will make sure I have the 11" mono back on. Something about the response of this coil and ergonomics that makes it a winner for me. Until next time, happy hunting.

Was up at Wedderburn on the weekend. Had the 11" mono on the 5000 this time.
The site was a well known gully which I hadn't spent much time in. The ground looked really good, was getting lots of junk targets as the whole area was strewn with old cans and the like. I eventually found an area with less rubbish and just before lunch got a 0.5 grammer at about 6". Not a bad start to the day, I didn't have any pre-conceived ideas of what I was going to find, the area wasn't really an old patch.
After lunch I got another 0.5 grammer at about 1" deep in loamy topsoil. And a few minutes later swung the coil over someone else's abandoned hole and got a nice target. It turned out to be another 0.5 grammer at 6" below this person's old hole. The number of nuggets I've found with the 5000 below other people's holes is really amazing. So far haven't missed with this detector and am really enjoying it. cheers.

Had a day out at Talbot to a very well known gully. It was like Bourke St. the number of prospectors looking for a spot, lucky I got there first.
I had the 5000 with 11" mono and found 6 small nuggets, total weight was only 1 gram but I was still impressed with the 5000.
Some of the prettiest gold I've found actually.

Still just getting used to it,but the results so far is that I am turning up gold in places I didn,t expect and over ground I,ve been over many times.I,ll see how the gold count goes in the next few months for a better idea.It was hard letting the 4500 go never missed a beat.I must say that the 4500 was also excellent at reworking patches and definitely paid for itself with about 5 ounces all up(Not including 4 gold rings and other stuff of the beaches).
The 5000 is a real pleasure to use with a bit more flexibility now with the new timings to suit more ground conditions.The harness I feel is very poor and for the money they could supplied something better.It is very cheaply made and like the last one required continuous repair.
I,ve seen a few 5000's at work over the last few months and the results are very encouraging.Like always the operator and technique still play a very important role.Add to that the time it takes to understand the capabilities of a new machine.I was just starting to extract the best out of the 4500 after 19 months.Anyway I get to test it on the beach over xmas I believe the new salt timing is much better so see what happens.
Steve