How many coils should you take with you?

Gday


I was just wondering if there are other members who carry more coils than they use?, I used to do that and found that in the end I would seem to use only a few of them all the time, and the rest just went along for the ride and took up precious space.

Using these on the 4500

I take about 5 coils, 3 of which I use the most, 4 of them are on stems for easy change over.

1 x minelab 8" mono--(early sd model one) absolutely amazing little coil, great for creeks, mullock heaps, scrubby and spinifex areas, around rocks and reef outcrops, better than any other small mono I have used.

1 x 11" minelab commander mono--This would be my most used coil and while being really sensitive it is stable and capable of amazing depth on the 4500, this coil is clearly made for this machine, if you dont have one I would recommend that you get one, it will pay for itself over and over again, my most used coil.

1 x 11" minelab standard gp series dd coil--They are a grossly underated coil, and most people dont use them in favour of an aftermarket alternative, I generally only use this in high trash spots, running in speudo mono, or when the ground is too bad for using mono coils.

1 x 14" nuggetfinder advantage mono coil, Excellent general use coil, its lightweight and gives good ground coverage, super sensitive to small pieces and has proven to have an excellent depth capability, this is my second most used coil.

1 x 18" nuggetfinder advantage mono coil, I break this out when I suspect there may be some depth to the ground or want some good ground coverage, lightweight and even capable with the small pieces, I believe this is the optimum sized coil for the 4500, others may disagree, I use this in conjuntion with the hipstick anyway so you barely know you have it on.


I narrowed my coils down to these ones by trial and error, I have tried quite a few coils out on the 4500 and I have found these to be the best for the areas in WA that I detect, I would possibly only consider one more coil and that would be a salt coil ( anti interference ) but that would be it..


So what do you take and use?


cheers

stayyerAU

stayyerAU, I would guess your 1 x 14" nuggetfinder advantage mono coil is elliptical and not round?

1 x 11" minelab commander mono is your most used. NF now makes a round 12" Advantage that might be good too.

I like the 17x11" NF Advantage size. But I tend to use bigger coils and I suppose I am missing some smaller gold by doing so.

Gday Beer Beeper

I use the 14" round nuggetfinder, but I have tried the eliptical one and it is well suited to the 4500, I have never been a big fan of eliptical coils and find that they tend to kick back if you touch anything while swinging which causes you to have to continually push it back to level with your foot, which I find very distracting, this may just be me though.

The 14" round seems to be a tad less touchy than the 14" eliptical and less prone to odd noises, and better suits my detecting style, but if you like the eliptical coils you will like the 14x9" advantage, its a good coil but will take a little getting used to, it also seems to be good for specimen nuggets as well.

I have not tried the 12" nuggetfinder advantage coil, but have heard its pretty good too, but having the 11" minelab commander mono I think that it would be really hard to beat, 11" to 12" I dont think there is enough advantage in there for me to worry about,(pardon the pun) maybe when my commander starts playing up I will try the 12" nf out.


cheers

stayyerAU

BP & StayyerAU,
We proved last year that the Minelab Commander 11" Round Mono was an absolute gem on the 4500, finding many small nuggets ranging 0.03g - 6.3g.
We were using a borrowed coil and on our return immediately swapped our supplied DD's for the mono.
Other coils we carry are the mentioned Minelab 8" round mono, 16" & 20" SL/NF Round mono's one of which is the Advantage.
We do not have a DD in our collection, very rarely did I ever use one going back to the SD days, monoman through and through.
Also never been a fan of eliptical coils, personally they are P in the A poking them into tight corners rather than stepping to the side and swinging as normal.
Anyway we all have our choices, keeps the manufacturers/suppliers in business.

Be out there soon.
Peter

I use a gpx4000 and mostly use a 16' NF mono, then a 11' minelab mono. My wife uses only the 8'' mine lab mono on her Extreme.
I also take along a 14'' coilteck salt coil for around Cue.
Cheers Greg.

Gday


Thanks for the replies, I see that the 11" minelab commander mono has other fans as well, personally I think its the best coil I have used on the 4500, and I have considered getting a second one just in case the one I have throws in the towel. (but I should get the nf 12")

The 8" minelab mono is a little gem too, I have had mine for many many years, and I think I got it with my first green box sd2100 , I also used it a lot on my gp extreme and found quite a few patches using it in rough country where bigger coils were too hard to use, its lethal on the 4500 and I am still amazed at the depth that it can achieve.

I also note that the nuggetfinders are popular, and I have found that the advantage coils are the best that I have used to date, thats why I decided on the 14" round and the 18" round monos, they are more sensitive than the earlier sl monos, that seemed a bit dull at times where the advantage coils seem to have a bit more life to them, this is one of the things that I found with the 14x9 eliptical nf advantage coil it was a bit too touchy for my liking in some situations so then I moved to the 14" round nf advantage which I found to be a bit more tolerant and a little less prone to ground noise and hotrocks ect.

Dont let this put you off the nf 14x9 elipt as it is a sensitive and capable coil, and seems to be really good on specimen nuggets, its a good general purpose coil if you like eliptical coils these match well with the 4500, and maybe the 4000 but I dont know how they will go on earlier models, maybe someone else may have tried one out and can make some comment about it.

It seems that most people seem to favour and use maybe two coils over the rest, I know I do but then the others I have are more for a purpose, like the 8" mono as soon as I start getting small nuggets about a quatrz blow, in a creek bed or where the ground is rocky or rubbly then on goes the 8" its easy to manouver and wont miss much, if I am following a run down a hill or it seems to go into deeper ground near the edge of a creek or something then on goes the 18" to see if there is anything a bit deeper down.

I think one of the biggest mistakes that some detectorist make is that they think that the bigger the coil the bigger the nugget, not so, I have found my best pieces with smaller coils and there are a couple of good reasons for that, the first is that you can get a smaller coil into spots that the big ones dont fit, under shrubs and branches and closer to the bases of trees where often pieces are hiding having been missed by bigger coils, and the other reason is the bigger coils simply dont have the sensitivity of the smaller coil and will miss the little pieces and some specimen nuggets, I know this because there has been plenty of times where I have happened apon someone elses dig holes and retrieved nugget after nugget from their old holes, I think that they have heard something but once they have started to dig and dislodged the piece from its resting place they have not been able to locate it due to lack of sensitivity of the big coil and just walked away thinking it was ground noise or something.

Use of a big coil should be slow and purposeful, its no good swinging it too fast and trying to cover as much ground as you can as quick as you can, if you tend to detect like that then go down to a smaller coil and your finds will increase, chances are that if you are detecting that spot then others have been there before you so the chances of finding the big easy pieces are remote, but in most cases there are still many ozs of small bits still left behind so it makes sense to concentrate your effort in that direction instead.


cheers

stayyerAU

Hi Stayyer AU
I guess I'm stuck with the same problem , which coils to buy, when to stop and how many to take on a trip.
I have far too many coils but now take away only three ie , nuggetfinder 12" Elipt mono , 16" XP DD and a 24" elipt mono.
These coils cover what I do well and work great on the GP 3500.
Opps I forgot, the ML 11" mono and DD are usually chucked in for good measure as back up
Mark

Hi there Stayer;


From personal experience,regardless of machine,a minimum of 3 coils that your comfortable with, regardless of shape,making sure they can handle the type of ground that your searching on,which can cover small nuggets at shallow depths and larger nuggets at greater depths should be more than adequate.[Small,Medium,Large].Now some people might disagree with my way of thinking,but how often does one use 6 different coils,in a days prospecting,apart from,it's good to know there there, just for the sake of things.


Happy Prospecting.

Hi all,
Here in Dunolly, my weapon of choice on my gpx4000 is a 12inch Advantage N/F round mono. Other coils I use are a 14x9 Colitek mono goldstalker which is a great coil for working in heavily timbered areas and a 16inch N/F round mono.. great for working deep areas. I would say the 12inch N/F would be abit more sensitive and quieter then the 14x9 coiltek.

Also have a 14inch coiltek DD which I hardly use and am considering relegation to ebay and the standard 11inch DD which is never used.

I take about 10 !
Bearing in mind though the wife also detects with a 4500 , so as not to cause any out in the field arguments over who has the better coil, and thats the only reason they found anything........ I just double up on everything
My Favourite coil so far is the NF Advantage 14" Elliptical , its a real pleasure to use.

Harb

Travelling to WA each winter we used to take a dozen or more coils. Nowadays we take only two 11" monos, one Coiltek and one Minelab. Two 14x9" Coiltel eliptical Nugget Stalker monoloops and a 14" salty in case we find something on salty soil.

Last season we kept the 11" monos for backup. The 11" Minelab I find very heavy so avoid it if possible. Throughtout the entire season last year we used only our Coiltek 14" eliptical monos. They are so darned good on the 4500s we we only tried the 11" monos long enough to convince ourselves the 14" were as sensitive as the 11" on small stuff and went very deep on anything over a couple of grams. The salty hasn't been used for years.

We expect that they were so good last season we will be using the same coils again this season in WA. That is of course unless nothing better in the way of coil or detector comes out before then.

Cheers, Jim

G'day Stayyer,

Me. 4500 with 16" and 12" NF Advantage monos

Wife. 4000 12" NF Advantage mono and 11" Commander DD (rarely used)

Tried and sold many coils. It will take some good coils to beat the NF's in our opinion.

Robert

PS Hey Jim have you found a way to marry a Coiltek with an NF?

"Two 14x9" Coiltel eliptical Nugget Stalker monoloops

Bugger! That was a slip of the finger.

Gday


For many years I used the coiltek coils as I preferred them over the standard minelab ones, but after having some serious issues with a couple of them and then the nuggetfinders starting to filter onto the market I slowly started to experiment with those.

As I said before when I buy a new detector model I always use the first two or three trips out with it to test various coils that are available, and then narrow it down to a few that I then use on a regular basis, I like the minelab coils as they have a high degree of quality but the weight factor of some puts me off using them, my absolute favourite coil from minelab is the 11" commander mono coil and I would say without any hesitation that it is the perfect coil in that size range for the 4500.

The only other minelab coil I use is the 8" round mono, which was my original from my first sd 2100 and its awesome on the 4500, all the other coils I have and use are Nuggetfinders, I have chosen all of these carefully and think that the advantage coils are the best that nuggetfinder have produced, the build quality of the coils and the weight factor were major considerations,the performance has been improved noticeably over the earlier sl nuggetfinder coils, so they have all the features that I wanted.

I use the round coils exclusively, but I still think that the 14" nuggetfinder eliptical advantage mono coil is one that should be considered if you like eliptical coils, the only other coil I am interested in getting is a salt coil, hopefully some time in the future nuggetfinder will produce one of those as well.


cheers


stayyerAU

I take every coil I own.
Generally I mainly use one or two, but when an area I'm working starts to peter out or atmospherics start to play up I'll try something different.
Just like changing a setting, changing down or up a coil size could be the key to reducing EMI or finding one you missed.

Must have coils for me though, are the commander mono 8" 11" and NF 16" round.

I also like to have a few so mates can try different ones they may not have.
Different coils suit different people differently... sweep styles, hearing ie: broader or sharper tones. What suits me may not suit you and visa versa

Gday StayyerAU;

Coils that i actually bring with me,when out prospecting,Not less than 4,not more than 8.
12",16"& 20"round mono Nuggetfinder,Advantage series,17x11"& 24X12"elliptical mono Nuggetfinder "Advantage.11&15x12"commander DD. 8"Commander round mono.

Cheers kon61

Gday


Sometimes it can be hard to know what to take in the way of coils as you dont always know where you are going to end up, and what the ground conditions are going to be until you get there, one thing I have also found is it that unless you are careful how you store your coils for travel they can deteriorate from rubbing or being stored in say rooftop boxes where the heat can be extreme, they are better stored inside the vehicle and in a spot where thay dont get other stuff piled on top of them.

If you are not careful a big coil that you dont use much, and is just carried in case you need it, can get a little beaten up and looking well used in no time with rough bush travel, I hang my big coil inside the car on plasic door hooks (the ones that have the square hook at top for going over the back of a door) I tape the hanger part of the hook with cloth tape so that it does not rub the coil, in the back of the troopies these fit well into the inside gutter just under where the roof lining ends, on the other side I can hang my detector on similar hooks so it keeps everything up and out of harms way.


cheers

stayyerAU

Whatever works for you I reckon. Ive got with me on my current trip 1x 14x9" goldstalker eliptical mono 1x 16" round goldstalker mono 1x 6" coiltek mono 1x 11" round salt coil 1x 14" coiltek DD and the standard minelab 11" DD but still havent had the need to take the 14x9 goldstalker off yet as its finding me Gold. Another chap detecting with us only uses a 17" eliptical nuggetfinder and an 18" ufo coil but yet still finds bits down to 0.2g which is quite impressive! My uncle also got to use a nuggetfinder 12" round advantage mono which he reckons was a beauty.

8

What coils would you use for a season in Western australia? I think the 4000 and 4500 has seta technology but the 3500 does not. So should the coils used for the 3500 be different as it is a different and noiser machine??
thoughts appreciated from those that have learnt the hard way over the years.