How do the X-Terra MDs change frequency with coil?

[DarkPrognosis]

I would love to build a few coils of my own (for better or for worse) and will be buying either the 505 or 705 but can't find out how they know what frequency to use. How does it know? Makes me think the coil is not simply a coil but a coil with the actual TX/RX circuitry in the housing with the coil.

[metal mania]

some do have a look at the schematic if u can

[Skippy]

Most of the tech stuff about these machines is available, search the forum. The coil has a microcontroller in it, which, among other duties (security) identifies the coil type to the brains in the control box. So you will be unable to homebrew a coil unless you can get a broken genuine one to hack.

[kt315]

ups... i only did put the coil pcb in dissolvent a time ago... a result will be told as soon as the pcb will be clean from epoxy...

[DarkPrognosis]

Man, they sure have ruined the best fun all for the sake of their profits.

[Carl-NC]

You can probably figure it out by monitoring the digital data coming out of the loop.

[kt315]

iyes. it is greedlab. you can not read programming code (HEX) of the chip because it is protected inside by a protect bit. greedlab calls that new superior tech proprietary "True Digital" VFLEX technology while there is nothing of digital tech. absoliutely nothing and not true. beside the protection of minelab coils from coping of secondary side. I have offered to take the pcb from coil and connect it inside a housing, meaning connection to the chip. then you do need in the vflex... then you can connect any coil, for example, a coil from Sov GT and Elite, e-track, explorer etc

[DarkPrognosis]

Yeah, I really wish we could make our own coils because I was looking at the third party NEF coils (not licensed) and saw the cost of them and at 200-300 US dollars they really want them more than I do.

[Carl-NC]

kt, is it also greedy of Minelab to put micros inside their detectors and then protect the code from copying? "Smart" loops like ML uses on the XT series are going to become the norm in the very near future and will likely do a lot more than ML did with the XT loops.

[DarkPrognosis]

kt, is it also greedy of Minelab to put micros inside their detectors and then protect the code from copying? "Smart" loops like ML uses on the XT series are going to become the norm in the very near future and will likely do a lot more than ML did with the XT loops.

I really feel that we may begin to see home made metal detectors on par with the big boys and the only reason we haven't yet is because the average MD'ist isn't also into computers and electronics.

I have seen PIC and ATMEL (Arduino) based PI metal detectors and even VLF ones. Basically, I feel, we need an Open Hardware MD and if that ever comes to be the big boys will stand up and take notice. I mean I know how much a F2 costs to make based on the parts count and it isn't all that much. Maybe 20 dollars tops unless they are buying in really large quantities which I doubt since this is still a niche market (the reason they can get away with charging so much for them).

[kt315]

kt, is it also greedy of Minelab to put micros inside their detectors and then protect the code from copying? "Smart" loops like ML uses on the XT series are going to become the norm in the very near future and will likely do a lot more than ML did with the XT loops.

Carl, where you find smart loops? you could be choice a frequency on LCD menu. but this way is intentionally excluded by ML. what did ML... you have to buy THREE coil because there are THREE frequencies while all coils are same inside - SIC!. all difference of the coils is only the difference of program code inside the coil's micros only saying to the housing brain on what frequency it has to be return. you have to pay three times MORE buying three coils than you could pay for one. GREEDY... the cash Predator!

[Qiaozhi]

I really feel that we may begin to see home made metal detectors on par with the big boys and the only reason we haven't yet is because the average MD'ist isn't also into computers and electronics.

I have seen PIC and ATMEL (Arduino) based PI metal detectors and even VLF ones. Basically, I feel, we need an Open Hardware MD and if that ever comes to be the big boys will stand up and take notice. I mean I know how much a F2 costs to make based on the parts count and it isn't all that much. Maybe 20 dollars tops unless they are buying in really large quantities which I doubt since this is still a niche market (the reason they can get away with charging so much for them).

You cannot simply base the final price of a product on the cost of its constituent parts. Mobile (cell) phones, for instance, have a much lower sale price than they should, mainly because the cost is recouped on the monthly tariff. The same goes for printers, where the money is made on the consumable products such as ink. Using your reasoning, all software and music (whatever it cost to develop) would be sold for only a few pennies, based on the cost of the plastic contained in the CD. Metal detectors take a lot of time and effort to develop and bring to market, and all the costs involved have to be recovered, plus the company has to make a profit, as without profit there would be no money to use for the development of new products. Also, as you correctly stated, metal detectors are not a high volume market.
If you start to factor in the mechanical issues as well, where either vacuum-forming and/or injection moulding is required, there are some high upfront costs involved there as well. In reality a lot of other factors need to be considered when determining the sale price.

[kt315]

Yeah, I really wish we could make our own coils because I was looking at the third party NEF coils (not licensed) and saw the cost of them and at 200-300 US dollars they really want them more than I do.

you mean may be ukrainian NEL coil seller. a manufacturer is located in US, he makes those coils, but may be he only orders them in china. he is INCOGNITO. yes, the coils are not licensed. ML did change the code a time ago... fighting against this pirate coping... and NEL coils (call oldie NEL) would be not work because un-consistency. then NEL again did something reading the new code and now their coils again work according their allegation. what must to say... you Dark and me are only pirates if we want to make the coil just for fun in ML opinion.

[Skippy]

At Qiaoshi: thank you for pointing out the naive error of thinking 'component cost' is all there is to a product, I was going to type just about the same reply earier on, but lost enthusiasm. Re. the Fisher F2, it has a custom-made LCD display, how do you put a price on that? Then there's the hundreds of hours development time for the microcontroller code. And the assembly costs of the search-coil. It would be interesting to see a FULL breakdown of the retail cost, for sure.
And Quote KT:"you have to buy THREE coil because there are THREE frequencies". It could be worse, until fairly recently, you would have also needed a plug-in electronics module for each frequency, too, with things like the amplifiers, and oscillator parts, maybe the demodulators, too.

[Skippy]

Here's one of the existing threads on ML's VFLEX system:http://www.geotech1.com/forums/showt...side-Schematic. I think there are others...