DetectingWales.com

Hi Folks
Just purchased a s/h Safari with alkaline battery pod only.  So would like a rechargeable set up if possible.
Someone out there must have a spare NiMH rechargeable battery and charger for a Safari/Etrac/explorer.  One size fits all. If anyone has the above to sell, please pm me with cost etc.  (also looking for stem and screen covers)

                                  Sory, I can't help with the battery but will be greatly interested to hear how you get on with the Safari. Having just got my Safari in Decenber, I am still learning the strange language that it speaks. I call it R2D2 and it eats alkaline batteries like a donkey eating strawberies! Fortunately I do have a rechargable battery and am also contemplating buying a second one.

                                                       Chris  :)

Thanks Chris.  Now I want a rechargeable battery even more!!!  I'll certainly let you know how I get on with it after this weekend when I'm using it on a field below a medieval castle.  I'd best not wear earphones if it's as noisy as you say!
I will probably keep sensitivity down a little for the first practice day.
It's good to swap info and advice in my book, and so far everyone on the detecting forums has been very helpful.  Appreciate it all.  Cheers.  Tom

Well I also have a new safari and I run it on bog standard AA NON rechargeable batteries
I get about 2 days detecting out of a set of new  batteries, each session lasting between five to six hours of continued  detecting,personally, I consider that is very acceptable ,especially when you can purchase 36 x AA batteries for a fiver!!!!!!!!😁😁😁😁😁😁ha!ha!ha!ha!ha!ha!ha!!!!!!!

Ding! Dong!  That's not so bad is it?  Where are you getting your batteries from please?  I think I can manage a fiver now and again, though Mrs only gives me a tenner a week pocket money now I've retired LOL.  Will have to start selling my fishing tackle to cover detecting costs!
Great stuff!
Tom

hi mate there is a rechargeable battery and charger on ebay item no is 321659722893 dont know how old it is but you could always ask gesza

I use rechargeable batteries in my Safari pod that I bought from Poundland, 4 x £1. I've had them for 9 months, I always charge my batteries before going on a rally and they last no problem. I use them in my TDK headphones as well, I also have a hip mounted
battery  kit that Chef geoff  makes and that lasts me at least 4  long days,

Hi Tom,
            it's not the volume that is a problem for me; you can easily turn that down via the control box or the head phones. After using a EuroAce for
three years I have been finding the sound produced by the Safari a bit alien. Where the EuroAce hated wet beach sand and I have to turn the sensetivity
down and suffer cosiderable loss of depth; I can move from dry to wet and back again without ant major problems when using the Safari.  ;D

             

 Chris if it still sounds like r2dt, have you discrimmed -10 yet ??, my safari was quiet as a mouse after~!!, just picking up good signals easily :)

Some interesting information there fellas.  Thank you very much.  will see how the AA batteries last when I'm out with the Safari all day on Saturday. (must remember to discrim -10) Cheers.  Tom

                                Last time out I tried all metals in conductive and attempted to dig only the lower tones but the darned thing kept giving me good signals for can-slaw and bits of rusty iron. After a couple of hours I packed in and meandered back to the car with it set in coin mode; making some better finds as I progressed back to the car. To be fair, I have thoroughly detected the area with my EuroAce and Tornado coil combination and must have cleared most of the good finds from the area where I spent the first couple of hours.

                                The wee beastie seems to function better on the beach. I think that I may need to put the sensitivity on manual and set it about 16 for my next outing on the above area. Oh, and knock out -10 & 40!

                                 

Love your description Chris "donkey eating strawberries"  ;D ;)

Hi Richie,
                 as well as learning the Safari, I have been communicating with several marine archaeologists and the "Receiver of Wreck"
since January and will be following up on a recent beach trip this coming Sunday. Drop me a pm if you are free to come to out play on Sunday.  ;)

                 

When you guys say you're knocking out -10 & +40,  does that mean that you're only discriminating those two sets of numbers?
I discriminate -1 -2 -3  and so on to -10 and  the detectors not to chattery at all

No Dylan. I think they mean  UP TO -10  & ONLY +40

The idea being you knock out most of the iron and stop the wrap around effect large iron creates.

Val

What does a £2 coin in at on the safari?

Hi Chef
Used my Safari for the first time today.  Found an assortment of finds on a farm near medieval castle.  16 musket balls, lead weights, buttons, 1 hammered (photo tomorrow for ID.) 1929 florin, 1930 half crown, 1942 sixpence, a grotty George, 2 Vicky pennies, bag seal, loads of lead bits and pieces, 1 artefact (candle base perhaps) loads of other bits and pieces.  Signals everywhere but need to learn more about the Safari and settings before I start digging only decent signals.
No £2 coins but will try one tomorrow on test whilst out on a farm with old court house and castle.  Lots of great sites with loads of potential but don't seem to find anything special.  Perhaps expectations a too high.  Tom

Thats what I do Val, but I don't find the Safari noisy at all ?

I've not found a £2 Geoff. I don't think I've ever had that much money. If anybody would like to send me a handful of them,
then I'll give them a try. ???

That sounds like a great site roughneck and a good days detecting by any ones standards ;)
The reason I ask Dylan is that the £2 comes in in the same region on the Etrac/Explorers as would the signal from "wrap-around" also crowns are there too but granted there aren't too many of those in the soil to be found :-\

Ah I see Geoff, as you say you don't hear of  many crowns being found, do you reckon theres any reason for this, or is it not so many were lost due to their size or value?

I think in the same way as gold coins they weren't "normal" money they were only used for large purchases ie property, livestock etc and so weren't carried around that much but my point is if you disc out 40 are you in danger of missing £2 and big silver ???

When I bought my Safari it came with a rechargeable battery + charger and a battery pack you can fit Alkaline AA's in.

I quickly found out the rechargeable pack was a bit old and knackered because it wouldn't last for the duration of one of my typical detecting outings.

I bought 8 x Sanyo eneloops (rechargeable AA's with low self discharge) and fitted a charging socket to the alkaline battery pack. This modified pack is great, it lasts for 3 or 4 outings and I can charge it with the original Minelab charger. This solved the problem for me without any great expense.  ;)

I still have the original rechargeable pack and plan to replace the cells at some point to make another spare battery, this will probably be a bit more difficult than the last one because the cells are tabbed type and you don't have the sprung contacts present in the Alkaline pack so using standard AA rechargeables like eneloops isn't an option. 

If you wanted a really simple solution to fix your problem, you could buy one of the alkaline packs and just use 8 x rechargeable AA's in it. Although bear in mind if you don't fit a charging socket you'd have to take the 8 cells out and put them in a charger each time...

Hope that helps.

                                    Good point; I am presently planning on buying a set of rechargeable cells to use in the battery pack that came with my purchase. The Sanyo Enloop batteries are well spoken of.

                                     To get in a little more practice with the Safari; I spent yesterday morning on the beach just to see if I would be able to winkle out a few coins from in between all the WWII scrap.  Having set the detector on coin mode and sensitivity at 20, I started detecting at first light and continued through to lunch time. I got all the usual WWII projectiles and copper 50 cal shrapnel plus eight coins. Not going to get rich but managed a George IV halfpenny, an old decimal 5p, a new decimal 10p, two thruppeny bits, a 2p decimal coin, a £1 coin, and a halfpenny sized copper coin that I can't yet id.

                                    The Safari worked well on the dry sand and was very stable, with no false signals. I am guessing that I have been sweeping the coil to fast in the past and noticed an improvement as I slowed down my sweep speed and tried to keep the speed constant. The deepest target recovered was a thrupenny bit at approximately 14" in dry sand. 50 cal copper jacketed projectiles came up at 38/39 on readings scale and .303 cartridges gave a 37/38 reading.

                                     I reckon that this machine is going to sniff out a lot more older coins from my regular beach and it will continue to surprise me with it's performance on the beach.  ;)

£2 coins come in round 36 same for Vicky full crowns, silver bracelets 38 same as big copper coins. I always run flatout with no discrim so there is no nulling of the detector in between signals  :)

Thanks BM
Running wide open is always the best way with Minelab FBS so well done you and ironically the more iron you have on a site the less disc you can successfully use, yes that 38 sounds a bit to close for comfort to me to disc 40 :-\

did try a big pile of silvers and came in at 39 so defo would not discrim out 40 as a hoard of silver may well be that,

£2 coin comes in @ 38 in the'All Metal' mode with the only adjustment being 'Low Trash'.

Hi Detetski,
can you explain how you fitted a charger socket to the alkaline pod please?
I am also looking at those Eneloop rechargeable AA's, I notice there's a few types with differing amp hrs.  eg 1900, 2400 etc.  Any suggestions as to the most suitable?
Went out last Saturday and Sunday on a new set of Duracells and they ran out on me towards the end of the second day.  cheers.  Tom

Here you go Roughneck this is a video that one of the members, johnus maximus, made a while back that shows you how it's done ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bpd3w6o-2vo#noexternalembed&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bpd3w6o-2vo#noexternalembed&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL)

If you go for Eneloop then go for the highest.  They're all compatible but you should get longer from higher ones.

Val

Which Eneloop do you use Val?

Chris, mine are 2000mah  but that's because they were the highest at the time I bought them  ::)

Goes to show how long I've been using them  ;)

Val