need to know if anyone can tell me if this detector is good for California Beaches?
Paul, please offer your knowlegable opinion if you would. A guy back east wants to trade
me for my Excalibur. I'm not sure if that a fair trade or not??? Help please
HH
Big I

Hello Big I,

That's one of Eric Foster's beach pi's he came out with several years ago, It's a good Pi with good depth somewhere in the ranks of the HH pi. I have an 11" Beachscan pi coil laying here somewhere. Planed to use this coil on one of my HH Pi's in the future, The beachscan coils are better made for California wet sand over the HH Pi coils.

It's not waterproof, maybe splash proof but it's a very good pi depending if the price is right. As for trading your Excalibur for his Beachscan Pi, I would not make the trade as your Excalibur is worth so much more. Keep the Excalibur since it's waterproof and does a good job finding treasure, Who's the seller of the Beachscan?

The beachscan operates at 15uS and does well with both gold jewelry and fair with clad coins and silver jewelry, The unit will detect gold jewelry a little deeper than clad coins or silver jewelry. Depending on the size of the gold ring and karat, It'll get a large mans gold ring between 10" to 13" inches in the wet sand. Clad coins and silver jewelry "coin size" will be less in the range of 7" to 9" inches deep. These type of Pi's are designed for gold jewelry, not clad coins and unfortunately silver jewelry falls in the same category as clad coins "except nickels" with conductivity..Your Excalibur will surpass the Beachscan on depth with clad coins and silver jewelry and fare about the same with gold jewelry.

Now, If you were buying a Beachscan Pi,...As long as you're getting the unit between $375.00 to $425.00 tops then I would say that's a fair deal, Keep me posted.

Maybe Terry in Hawaii can jump in here with his two cents, Terry knows allot about Pi's and maybe be able to share his thoughts too.

HH, Paul (Ca)

Thanks Paul, you're the local expert on those and I figured it about the same as not being a fair
swap for my Excal. I'm gonna see what the guy wants for it and if its priced like what you say I
might get it.
I'll let you know what happens. Thanks for the expert input

Big I

Hello Big I,

Forgot to mention the Beachscan pi has a fixed SAT speed, It may not be enough to operate with maximum performance here in California's wet sand. I know Mr. Bill adds on an adjustable sat speed control pot which should enhance the unit to operate better when the wet sand gets tough.

You should pass on the unit, Your Excalibur in the all metal mode hunting wet sand will excel over disc mode by at least an inch or two. Both the Sovereign and Excalibur can operate with higher sensitivity in the all metal mode when hunting the wet sand, You can even avoid hair pins and paper clips when using the all metal mode on both the Sov and Excalibur...........These targets will give a soft double signal when near the surface or a weak long signal when these pesky hair pins and paper clips are deep.

I hunted Santa Monica today, Fair results with clad coins but no gold jewelry.

All the best, Paul (Ca)

Yeah Paul, it has the variable Sat speed control, I saw pics of it except now since I told him no deal on the swap but I might consider buying outright, he said he'll think about it but is keeping it for now. If I can get it for $350-375 I'll get it. He's thinking it over. Thanks for the advice
I appreciate it.
Yeah the beaches this season didn't produce as much gold as in the past. I did find
2 diamond rings this summer but my total ring count was way lower than the last two summers
Its like they just did'nt go into the water and lose like they have in the past. I found both those diamond rings in the dry sand not two feet apart, which was real bizarre. Must of come
off the same towel is my guess. One is a cocktail ring with 27 stones the other has 8 channel set
in 14kt.

Guess its time to put on my 5" coil and head inland.

Thanks again

Big I

Hello Big I,

Yeah! I agree with the gold finds not so good the past year, Maybe the coming weeks ahead will be better :)

Here's a home-made Pi I put together a couple of years ago, Using a HH Pi circuit board, Pi miniature probe, 11" Beachscan coil and an optional 10" DD coil, Fisher 1225-X housing and other pi components, The unit is an all-purpose pi detector for beach detecting or hip mounted inland probe.

The miniature housing detaches and when used as a hip mounted Pi, the unit can then be used as a powerful probe when hunting inland. The circuit board have been modified and with special modified connectors to accept both a DD and mono coil, This Pi gets great depth and operates very smooth in California's harsh mineralized soil.

This unit would be similar to the Beachscan you may be looking into, Same performance and both operate at 15uS. The only difference between my HH pi project and the Beachscan you mentioned, Both SAT speeds are different as the one you may get has an adjustable SAT while mine has an extra resister running parallel to the 1 meg SAT resister to increase the SAT speed for California's harsh wet and and surf.

These are fun pi's to use, Allot of horsepower for little detectors.
HH, Paul

Here's the unit detached from the beach shaft and now setup as a hip mounted probe setup, Using this setup will allow the user to use with any detector as an inland probe. The probe will detect a buried nickel at 5" inches and other coins such as pennies/dimes and quarters about 3.5 " to 4" inches.

Maybe someday I'll sell this neat setup,
Paul