3 GPZ's in the field for a week- review

Sorry for my outburst.

Congrats on the finds and thank you for the no bullsh!t report Tributer, very informative and refreshing.
You have moved me one step closer to the Zed, thanks, Harry

No apologies required colour.It's understanding,that I'm after.For it's management that gets their ears rung,not so much the members.

Cheers Kon.

Hay tributer Its BILDA here just thought I'd let you know minelab replace my coil and they said it WAS faulty. No apologies or anything and of course we had to pay for the return.

Bilda wrote:  they said it WAS faulty. No apologies or anything and of course we had to pay for the return.

That is f***ing outrageous! The $10700 wasn't enough for them, the greedy b*stards!
Grasping commercialism at it's worse!

That's disappointing Slimpickens

Bilda wrote:Hay tributer Its BILDA here just thought I'd let you know minelab replace my coil and they said it WAS faulty. No apologies or anything and of course we had to pay for the return.

Good to hear you got a coil replacement. That was good of Minelab to say it was faulty, an apology and free postage would be the decent thing for them to do. But as we and others know, Minelab is not a top shelf company.

Looking forward to our next outing and you topping the tally count, cheers Tributer

Thanks Tributer for a great insight of your experience with 7000.

Great gold too.
Wishing you lot of success with this new toy and looking forward for some really nice finds.

GoldEN

Bilda wrote:Hay tributer Its BILDA here just thought I'd let you know minelab replace my coil and they said it WAS faulty. No apologies or anything and of course we had to pay for the return.

G'day Bilda,

Did you take it back to the Dealer and get them to send it back, as I think if they had sent it to Minelab then Minelab would have sent the new one back to them freight free. IMHO. As when we have returned something back under Warranty through our Dealers I have never paid for the freight. Just wondering that's all.

Cheers.

Mike.

When I sent my 5000 down on warranty I paid postage only because I sent it myself - not through a dealer. They sent it back direct to me at no charge? If I had gone through a dealer it wouldn't have cost me anything.

Hi there Tributer, Mate....your report is gold in its self. Well done on your finds & thanks for taking the time to do such a detailed account.

Best of luck out there

JW

Thanks Bilda, for your reply.

Cheers.

Mike.

Hi Folks,
Trib has covered off most of the high-lights from our week away with the three ZED'S; Bilda is happier now with his new coil and tentative tests indicate it is as it should be in terms of performance.
There have been a few comments about signals and or targets being located in close proximity to trees.
The 5gram specie Trib mentioned, I dug from under a tree root and gave a turkey warble type signal response as did the other two species that I unearthed, very interesting.
During the first few days of the trip while we had our L plates on we did dig pretty much every target, we soon came to the conclusion that most targets were shallow rubbish that gave a double blip and from that point only dug double blippers that were over shallow bedrock.
Next trip we figure we can dump the L plates and advance to Red P,s, Bilda will unfortunately have a bit of catching-up to do before he can advance from L plates; knowing him that won't take long.
Having spent many hours both day and night detecting, it has become fairly obvious to us that the ZED will certainly be a great piece of equipment once we are fully up to speed with its various setting combinations and over differing ground types and depths.
As for the $$$$ cost of one of these machines, a few more trips similar to our first serious effort and i'm sure the gains will far outweigh any misgivings we may have had prior to purchasing our machines.
Cheers,AUoptimist.

Thats interesting about the double blippers. I would still be inclined to dig all targets as you never know 100% until it is in your hand. I wouldnt be able to sleep at night wondering....what if.....By investigating all signals then you know for sure. But then I dont have a 7000 & maybe the signals from it are more reliable re gold/rubbish than the previous model detectors. Sounds like you are getting a good handle on it & finding some nice gold. Well done & thanks for sharing your learning curve.

Good luck out there

JW

The coil gives a double beep for a good reason, it has two windings in it.

Narrawa wrote:The coil gives a double beep for a good reason, it has two windings in it.

...very slight correction, 2x receive windings and 1x transmit winding

Steve, as usual, your verbiage is par excellence.
An excellent report from you and your teammates.

Robert

Hi Kiwijw et al,
The area we were working on this trip is liberally laced with varying sized shot pellets and after a day or two scratching/digging them out we found we were wasting too much time, time better spent covering more ground and saving some energy for more worthwhile deeper targets.
Another aspect much talked about the Zed is its weight; during the first couple of days we found it necessary to make minor adjustments to the harness and trying different positions for the bungee attachment on the detector shaft.
All three of us have vastly different body shapes so it was a case of no one size fitted each of us as ML seem to think, that said, in my case with the bungee attachment located at the top of the lower coil shaft and the bungee at my end attached to the middle of the small cord slung under the breast strut it worked rather well.
Towards the end of the week we both commented that the earlier weight issues had largely been overcome and the Zed was much more comfortable to swing, probably due to the harness snugging into our body shapes and our muscles taking some time to adjust to the new format.
My dual amp/speaker system, once the stereo jack was rewired, worked very well particularly on the windy days and being able to plug it into the WM12 speaker maintained separation between detector and self once the bungee cord was unhooked, a huge advantage when digging deep holes.
At this point in time the only mods I have done or will do is to somehow wrap some cord through the loop in the end of the bungee cord , after just this trip the outer sheath has worn through and some of the strands of rubber have begun to break.
Before Using the Zed for the first time I cut a thin sheet of plastic the shape of the front upper surface of the coil, that part of the coil that you pass the hand/ scoop full of dirt over, this will prevent damage to that section of the coil and it's held in place with velcro tabs.
It's still very early days with the Zed but at this point in time, given the experience gained thus far, future prospects with it look very good indeed.
Cheers, AUoptimist.

CostasDee wrote:

Narrawa wrote:The coil gives a double beep for a good reason, it has two windings in it.

...very slight correction, 2x receive windings and 1x transmit winding

I was in a hurry....i should have said two fields.....but you are indeed correct.

Theses blokes who refuse to dig all the pellets shots should be strung up by their heels. How on earth are we going to make it easier for the younger generation.

Hey Narrawa,
I figure we old fellas have dug more than enough shot pellets over the years; the young folk you refer to have to have some targets to serve their apprenticeship on; who knows, future generations of detectors may even tell you what sized shot, the year it was discharged and what type and make of firearm it was fired from; just to make it more interesting for the new chums.
Cheers, AUoptimist.

Im totally done with shotty pellets, those shallow loud double blips can stay where they are. You get to know whether or not they are within mm's of the coil. Id dig them if they were in visible clay or hard ground and didn't move with a boot scrape. But if there's any topsoil at all or they move with the scrape they stay where they are, on the ground.
Iv ditched the harness the 7 came with too. Damn things not made for broad shoulders and rides too high on the back, almost on my neck. Was actually causing neck pain to be honest. I got a hold of a good little backpack that has two plastic rings stitched into the padded shoulder straps, put there for carrying a small water bottle I guess. Perfect position for the bungy cord. Real comfortable to use. For my size that harness is horrid and clumsy.

G'day All,

Well I was thinking the same as what you have been saying, but after seeing a .32 gram bit come from just under the leaf litter I'm going to persist with the rotten little Bird shot/pellets as you just don't know until it comes out of the ground, especially in the areas where you have found gold previously. I said right from the start of this particular find that it is defiantly a Bird shot/pellet. Like I always say they all add up.

Cheers.

Mike.

Ignoring double blip and shallow signals that the Zed audio seems to clearly elucidate has a lot of merit IMHO only if you are confident the gold is consistently below a certain depth and the surface has a moderate to high amount of iron trash. Digging only the deep broader signals the Zed gives can work.

Loamy soils in virgin ground in some locations (eg some of NSW tablelands and western slopes and plains) are very good at consistently keeping gold at least 5 inches or more below the surface. In the right gold situation, not digging the shallow double signal targets ( mainly shallow bullets, small pieces of wire, boot tacks and shotgun pellets where I am) can effectively quadruple your chance of finding gold by saving maybe an hour or more for every four you detect by not digging shallow targets that are unlikely to be gold.

Disclaimer: Discriminating out double blips and shallow signals may result in you not digging a nugget the size of the Hand of Faith.....on the other hand by digging many shallow target signals in a trashy area your detecting day is done before you even had a chance to swing over the big nugget. If you are not confident in reading ground depth and ground changes or gold is at variable depths.....dig everything.
Tributer

Tributer wrote:
Disclaimer: Discriminating out double blips and shallow signals may result in you not digging a nugget the size of the Hand of Faith.....

Hey Steve, just a wild guess but I don't think the "Hand of Faith" size nugget is ever going to give a double blip, not at any depth.

cheers dave

Hey Tributer
What you are saying makes perfect sense to me, I guess it helps to have heard & seen the different signals the GPZ give to understand what it is telling you.
I did ask a question on Narra's forum in the Ask _ _ section about the different responses that the GPZ gives as I have heard a few different signals & wanted to get the good oil!!!

I have only had my GPZ 2 weeks & have'nt had an opportunity to use it yet....... other than in the back-yard to make sure it worked. I hope to detect in Vic after Easter in areas I have found gold with the 4500 & 5000. Will let you know how I go.

GOFORIT

rc62burke wrote:Hey Tributer
What you are saying makes perfect sense to me, I guess it helps to have heard & seen the different signals the GPZ give to understand what it is telling you.
I did ask a question on Narra's forum in the Ask _ _ section about the different responses that the GPZ gives as I have heard a few different signals & wanted to get the good oil!!!

I read your post on the AGP forum Lee and I agree with you that the Zed does seem to have a host of target responses that with experience will allow the user to get a better picture of target depth and type when compared to info you get from 4500/5000 signal responses. Its early days for me but obviously the shallow double blip signals help you disregard targets in certain situations and the broadness and strength of the deeper signals does seem to be a good indicator of depth. I hope down the track after many hours swinging and digging targets my brain will get better at interpreting them. The deep warbly signals we got on our trip were nearly all specimens or bent bits of nail/wire at reasonable depth. This reply may hopefully sound very naïve after a few more months of using the Zed (and it may help if I read the Candy paper and other info, which I havn't yet).
Tributer