'Masking Targets' Analog Discrimination

Those that watch my videos will know just how heavy the iron is on some of my river spots, I enjoy this terrain the most because it's a real challenge, anything I manage to find means a lot more to me, even if it's just a small piece of non-ferrous trash. Over the years I've experimented with discrimination levels and the conclusion is really very simple. For my machines to excel in dense iron, I have to run the disc as low as possible, this might initially sound obvious but let's take my Tesoro machines as an example, I run a large number of them at zero. If I run it any higher I will start masking targets - How Did I Come To This Conclusion? 

When iron was dense I went through a stage of running my disc setting from 2 upwards, the hunt would be quieter but I wasn't finding anything. As I began to lower the disc from 1 down to zero, targets started to come through. Yes..... more iron would come through as well but like I've explained hundreds of times before, if you understand what iron sounds like then it really isn't a problem. Unfortunately nowadays people are being conditioned into thinking that a metal detector has to be silent, only giving a clear defined signal if there's gold or silver under the coil, lets face it, most don't want to be digging trash and want maximum rewards for minimal effort, metal detecting just doesn't work that way. When I'm on the river I dig hundreds of targets with only a very small proportion being something interesting, but like I've stated before, because I love all my machines I don't ever get bored even if I end up finding nothing but trash. 

The most important point I want to make here is, with all my analog units, especially Tesoro's, if you're setting your disc level to the "IRON" mark on the dial then, in really heavy iron I can guarantee you'll be masking targets. Using a medium sized iron nail I'll slowly increase the disc until I get a double beep and then continue to slowly increase it more until the nail 'JUST' starts to break up. When this occurs I will reduce it a tiny fraction and that's where I'll leave it, this principle goes across the board with all my metal detectors, Nexus included. Many state you can't hunt with these 'settings', that's bullshit, you can but you have to learn every tiny nuance within the audio. This is something I pay very close attention to, my machines talk to me and I listen. I don't need multi-tones or a screen to tell me what's under my coil I just need my brain, ears and intuition. 

Intuition

Intuition is a natural gift we're born with, for me it's like a compass, I do my very best to live my life through it, I write, work with drums and metal detect with intuition being the primary force. In this modern age the mind and body connection is being incinerated by the technology that's taking over our lives, closely followed by the ego, intuition is killed by the ego. For me metal detecting is about communication and all my audio only units tell me everything I need to know. This is something that a lot of people still find hard to grasp, many out there take the language of analog as a literal thing. Simply put, a high tone is non ferrous, so with this thought in mind they go out and dig all the high tones. Obviously they start digging iron, quickly arriving at the conclusion that the machine/machines are rubbish because "they false in iron", when in reality they don't know what they're listening for. 

Metal Box Tesoro's

I favour Tesoro's with metal boxes because the tones resonate way more than the ones with the plastic modules. I genuinely find that the audio sings, especially the sweet non-ferrous tone, this is important to me because the sound of a masked target as opposed to a signal flicking off the iron is really obvious. My next video will be a river hunt with my Amigo 2 and there's a number of masked signals that come singing out the iron that I could only isolate from one direction. Due to the subtle audio and the tone resonating within the metal box, it's easy to decipher a potential treasure signal. Once again, it's hard to really explain what masked targets sound like, they can vary, it's just something I feel in my gut. 

Resonance 

To conclude, to get the best results in heavy iron with analog machines workout just how low you can set the discrimination, I think you'll find that it will be lower than the 'factory preset position', in combination with this, learn what iron sounds like and listen for the nuance between a high tone on iron and a sweet nonferrous response. Once you've mastered this I'm positive you'll start to hit on more nonferrous targets hidden in the iron, remember, be patient and apply your mind properly. 

A Silver 6 Pence Out The Iron With My Tesoro Amigo 2