I got a call from Steve Howard asking me to check a coil out in my area that is in high mineralized ground and see how the new coil works in this soil.

Upon receiving the new Coil from Steve Howard the first thing I noticed was that this coil was not as heavy as some of the spider type coils that I have tested and been exposed to over the years. I weighted the coil and found that this 12" coil is only 0.7 of an ounce heaver the standard 950 coil that comes standard on the E-Series metal detectors. I was really impressed with the weight.

The day I received the coil the weather was getting bad and turning cold, so I knew my time to test it was going to be limited. I installed the coil on a DFX detector and headed for my test bed. The test bed is set up in highly mineralized ground. The mineralization readings in this area are from -88.0 to -93.5 and they change in a very short distance. The first thing I noticed that the detector ground balanced real well with this coil and walking around the unit was very stable and very little falsing.

The only thing I have buried in this test bed is coins, of all types, and all the coins are a least 4.5 inches because this seems to the depth that most detectors start having problems detecting the coins because of the mineralization. I started finding the coins and this combination did a really good job of finding the targets in an area that is normally hard to find them. The coil was finding the targets at a consistent rate and the pinpointing was really easy to pinpoint and right on target.

The next thing I noticed was that you had to sweep really slow to find the targets at a good rate. I made a few adjustments to the sweep speed, pre-amp gain, sensitivity and the overall performance really improved.

I wanted to compare this coil with the standard 950 coil using the standard coin & jewelry program and with some of the adjustments made to see if the detector remained stable with several settings to improve performance. I got another DFX Detector with standard 950 coil and compared them head to dead by changing the settings and looking for improved performance and to be some what stable in the process.

I am very impressed with this coil, the detector remained stable to all setting as long as they were not to drastic. The coil got an average of roughly 2 to 2.5 inches more depth over the 950 loop. Overall I was impressed with the loop; it's the best of the spider type loops that I have used so far.

My time was very limited to test this unit because of the weather, but with a change in the weather I will test it more. My conclusion, even with limited testing, is that I like the coil, and when they hit the market I will be using one of them.

Thanks,
Tom Copeland