Nexus "Understanding What Deep Targets Sound Like"

I'd like to make one thing clear before starting this post, pin pointer depth isn't deep, it's considered shallow by Nexus standards. Even going way back over 20 years when the Nexus Standard SE was still being manufactured, pin pointer depth wasn't an achievement, it was a feeble display of depth. Pretty much all the machines on the market nowadays are "high gain", this means you can bump your sensitivity up to make the deeper targets sound louder. The audio gain on the Nokta Legend is the prime example of this, the higher you set it, the louder the target response. Do I Think Having A Gain Setting Allows The Machine To Go Deeper? personally, no I don't, it just makes the quieter signals louder. 

Nowadays metal detectorists are being conditioned in a number of different ways, especially now that the new wave of digital machines have established themselves. The misconception I want to focus on is understanding what a "true threshold" is, I've written about it before, despite what Minelab, XP and Nokta might be pushing, a true threshold will rise and deviate when you pass your coil over a target, it's the true threshold on the Nexus that allows you to hear the signals at extreme depths. 

The threshold isn't a tone that nulls over non-ferrous, one of the biggest disappointments for me when I purchased my Equinox 800 was the fact the Threshold was fake and had no bearing on being able to hear deep targets. Having said that though, the Equinox didn't have the ability to find what I call deep targets. In my opinion none of the apparent 'high-end' machines on the market are deep seeking, they don't hold a candle to the depth capabilities of any Nexus machine. 

It's all to do with your reference point, if you've never used anything other than digital then "5 bars down" or pin pointer depth might appear super deep to you. It's only when you open your mind and explore other avenues you might come to realise that what you 'perceive' as deep isn't anything special. So Where Am I Going With This? To dig deep with the Nexus you need to understand what to listen for, on really deep signals you're not going to get a banging audio response and because of this if you're swinging too fast you could perceive the response to the target as ground noise. 

That's why it's recommended that when you're using low frequency coils you slow your swing speed down, hunt in all metal/standard audio and work with a raised threshold. What you're listening for is a rise within the threshold resonance, it can be anything from a nudge that just kicks the meter or a soft response that elevates the threshold slightly. At first these targets can be missed but if you slow down and apply your mind it won't take you long to understand what a deep target sounds like. If you're only going to be digging the banging responses then you will be walking over the deep stuff. 

When I'm talking about 'deep' I mean signals that are 13' inches or more, when swinging any Nexus machine, do not underestimate the depth capabilities of any of the coils. Through the years crazy depths have been achieved by Nexus users, I've shown some pretty good depths but the deeper stuff I've dug doesn't really demonstrate just how brutal Nexus is in regards to depth capabilities. But let us remember a very important point here, you can't find what isn't there so if there's no deep targets to be found it's common sense to realise you're not going to find them. But if there are targets hiding at extreme depths then Nexus has the ability to sniff them out. 

In the first part of the video below I'm using the Credo DDM with a small dual 4' coil, pay attention to the meter response and some of the depths I'm hitting. If you didn't know what to listen for it would've been easy to walk over these signals. The Credo fitted with a dual 4' coil is still very capable at hitting on medium to large coin sized targets at 14' inches, Most of the targets dug in the video were near pin pointer depth and above, it might of all been trash targets but that's not the point to me. The important point is that I heard the signals and recovered each item.

So to conclude, never underestimate the depth of Nexus and the importance of the threshold, this is the key to digging deep, it has to be understood that none of the digital machines contain a real threshold, this means that the purpose of a 'true' threshold can easily be misunderstood by people that don't know any better.