Hunting without headphones all year.

I hunted all this year without any headphones or electronic listening gear. Do they really make a difference in finding more coins :interesting:. It just seemed like a lot at the time to buy the headset considering I was buying my first detector ever (V3i) and I had no idea what I was doing anyway. Im interested in hearing your responses and thanks in advance,
Ricky (zrickkid).

I've been hunting for a long, long time now lol I never had headphones and I liked it that way! But after hunting with friends and the looks I got from them about my loud machine :eyebrow: :eyebrow: :eyebrow: and doing some group hunts with our club (phones required!!), I bought a pair. My advice to you is don't go cheap Get some nice ones. They block out so much external noise, that the good targets are easier to hear, faint ones are not missed and it also helps me concentrate and not space off. They focus my detecting mood. Since I hunt woods, I always put one cup off the ear a bit. They really shine when you do sidewalk strips (traffic :ticked and are a must if you do the beach. At first they are a little odd, but the grow on you :cheesysmile: I hate to be without them now. But hey, that's just me :shocked01:

I know I don't like not using headphones, but to each their own... My buddy Tim's headphones just took a poo on him and he had to do our last hunt without them.. he was complaining the whole time...Don't blame him!

In times of high background noise (kids, cars, wind) it can be hard enough to hear targets WITH phones. I can't imagine trying to hear signal without them. I think its important to keep from annoying others with constant beeping from our detectors too. On top of all that, a good set of phones with make your batteries last longer. A cheap set of phones will drain your batteries twice as fast as the stock speaker.

I have to admit that it was somewhat annoying to be listening to two machines at the same time while hunting... but at least I knew when Tim had a good signal. Usually I here a mumbling in the backgound and I see Tim with his camera out...

Headphones make ALL the difference. Get some good ones... Grey Ghost or Killer Bees... I have both and really like them.

You will hear the strong-sounding coin targets without headphones, usually... but most of those coins have already been dug. In order to get what's left you have to be able to hear the weaker signals, even the whispers. This would be a good question for Angel, but I would bet that without headphones, he would not have been able to hear and effectively discern at least half of his silver coin targets, if not more. He gets the coins that others miss, especially those mixed with trash, and careful listening to, and for, the tones is how.

It is also important to learn to distinguish quality of the tone (eg does it clip off abruptly, or end more evenly and sounding round like a coin? What are the sometimes subtle differences in tone between a deeply-buried silver coin and iron falsing?) The only way to do that is listen to the tones closely and dig a lot.

Couldn't imagine not using HP... Then again my hearing is going downhill each year.

Try planting a couple of coins 8 to 10 inches deep and then check them with and without hp's. Might answer your question. I remember many good coin finds that were nothing more than a whisper, and feel certain I would not have found them without headphones. Likewise as someone else already said, cars, kids, wind, weather, etc., all get in the way.

Just my two cents worth....

DS
www.stoutstandards.com

Absolutely a must for all the reasons already mentioned. Also when in a park you can pretend to not hear some of the annoying people you run into!

Yes... I definitely prefer headphones. I can't hear the threshold tone without them... and that is important to me. It is like night and day using them or not.

After reading this thread, I'm starting to wonder if getting a better pair than the Koss headphones that came with my Explorer would be a good decision.

It is a nice way to get in a pleasant zone while metal detecting... very peaceful. Unless EMI is high and then it's a whole different kind of zone. lol

Although I only have a year and a half of MD'ing under my belt... I would say headphones for sure!