Garrett Scorpion Gold Stinger
Price: $550
Avg. Score: 
3.84
Based on 25 reviews
3.84Based on 25 reviews
Avg. Durability:
5.00
Avg. Ease of use:
4.00
Good little machine
November 29, 2017
I always wanted to try one..So I bought a used one in good shape. I played
with it for some time and really really like it. I find it to be quite
sensitive (not quite as sensitive as my GM2 on small Stuff) but that is a
50mhz machine. I find it Simple to ground balance now (took a little
practice)and to set up the Disc for for Motion. If its fairly clean ground
I use all Metal (non Motion) then flip to disc and re-check and decide
weather to dig. I find it to go pretty deep up to 8" on a Canadian Dime
10"+ on a quarter. Deeper in Non Motion all metal (Deeper than My
Explorer2) Anyway I like using them (bought another). I have 2 Gold
Stingers, 2 Minelab Sovereign GT's and a Whites GM2 I like using them all
of my detectors ... Especially the powerful little Scorpion.
Max Depth: 10 inches on US quarter
Overall Rating
Durability
Ease of Use
Would you recommend this to a new user?
No, not really.
Dean from
British Columbia
30
Great detector
June 18, 2012
A neighbor had some gold dust in with some sand. I went over to his place
and pass over the jar. it pick up the gold dust. I lift the scorpion and
still pick the gold dust up about 4 ft. the machine was humming the stop
then it came back. That because the gold was small.
Overall Rating
Bruce from
utah
1325
Excellent entry level Gold Machine
December 31, 2011
First of all, I own a few machines. Whites Pi Surfmaster dual field, the
Garrett ace 250 was my starter machine and, one of my favorites for its
simplicity, it's always with me, Whites V3i,Tesoro Stingray, White's MXT. Minelab Excal II and a few coils. Well, actually more than a few coils. But you get the picture.
I purchased the Garret Gold Stinger Used on Craigslist for a very good price. The condition of the machine was like it was never used at all. Plus I got it with two coils. I think the only two coils available for it.
At first I was confused with the operators manual and had a hard time with this machine...If you are used to fully automatic machines, as I was, then you may not like the Gold Stinger at first.
I tried it, did some bench testing with it, used a few times and I just got so frustrated with it that I put it away and went back to the auto simple to use machines. Now after having spent some time with it, I just love this machine.
If you study this machine and do some real comparisons with other full auto machines the Gold Stinger is a lot of machine for the price
when compared to other machines in it's price range. At first I did not think it could detect small gold as good as the other machines I was using. But I was wrong. It is a very capable machine and I was to blame for not fully understanding how to set it up for the type of searching that I wanted to do. As other reviewers have commented on here... It's like three machines in one...and the lowest priced entry level gold prospecting machine still available today.
Sure, its not the latest and the greatest, but in my opinion for the price, you are getting an excellent machine. I wish Garret would make this machine in a submersible model.
I recommend you watch the Youtube videos on the Scorpion, Do some bench testing, do some actual ground testing, play with it until you understand the controls and what settings are going to work for the type of searching you are doing.
There is also a video that compares this machine's sensitivity to small gold..against the ace 250 and one of the new Garret AT machines.
I hope this helps some of you decide if you are thinking of buying The Garret Gold Scorpion.
Overall Rating
Jose from
Philly
1013
All Types of Hunting!
November 23, 2011
This is my favorite detector for all types of hunting. It does it all,
coin, gold and cache (with larger coil). I always liked the VLF/TR
detectors of the 80's but I wanted the motion mode also. This baby has it!
A dream machine that is 3 detectors in one. Full all metal mode, all metal
trash out and motion trash out. In a small unit. If you want to look at a
meter I guess your out of luck here. My ears work just fine. Thanks Charles for your best one yet!
Overall Rating
Mojave Green from
Helendale, Ca
135
Finding gold
October 18, 2011
Well just got my gold stinger about two weeks ago and went gold hunting
with it like they all say study manual and your MD before you go out
looking for gold. Having success finding the ore line in the water and
tested it on different size gold just to hear the tone better you must use
headphones and do watch the video on You tube to understand it better, it
helps a lot but yes, it does take at least 100hr of learning your scorpion
gold stinger but it's not for the beginners but your not going to find
anything smaller then 1 gram and that is at 2in deep.I tested it on a 3 gram nugget and it picked right up at 4in but like I said use headphone and the depth turned all the way up past nine on your MD with disc.. Turn to zero, but its now all up to you to understand it on your own and it my be different in the area you may dig.
Overall Rating
Gold hunter from
So califorina
244
President
October 10, 2011
I have been very disappointed in the Scorpion. Living in New England, we
have tons of hot rocks in the creek beds. I bought this unit because it
claimed to find gold nuggets.Since it is recommended to run the unit in all metals mode, you get hits in nearly every pass. (hot rocks). Then turn it to precious metals and you get nothing. Just a waist of time. Slows you down as you have to re ground balance it constantly. I have found all kinds of junk on the beaches from gum wrappers to bobby pins.
This unit would be fine as a beach machine or perhaps around parks and cellar holes but not on the creeks.
I'm sure it does find gold if it is in the gram plus size. In New England, gram nuggets are very rare. Most of the placer gold is fine flakes and half gram nuggets are the biggest normally found.
The bottom line for finding gold flakes or small nuggets is in the Kilohertz Frequency. The stinger is only 15 kz. I have been told you need 25 plus kz to find small gold nuggets. So for the price,(a couple hundred bucks more), the Gold Bug 2 seems to be the best unit for the money. STRICTLY ON FINDING GOLD.
Happy Hunting.
Overall Rating
Yankee Gold Prospecting from
New England
2811
Scorpion
November 08, 2010
You guys that cant use this detector are the reason garrett stoped building
the xlt 500 vlf-tr water machine(best machine ever built) but to make money
they had to build a turn on and go machine for the inexperienced, the
scorpion ground balances like the vlf-tr(I know most have never heard of
this machine)some of the old timers will. I wish garrett would make the scorpion in a waterproof machine, hopefully they have done this with the AT Pro, and also simple enough for the ones that cant do any adjusting to there machine
Sorry about the spelling, but I do know how to adjust my machine. Thanks.
Overall Rating
Old timer from
Fl.
4837
Great machine
October 15, 2010
Love reading how people can't use it and read plain English. It simple to
use. Haven't been out gold detecting yet but been to schools, parks. find
rings, money, and trash. It is going out this weekend to a school yard.
I have the lobo from terso another good detector, but if you can't read English don't know how to use the scorpion don't buy it. Leave it to someone that can use it.
Overall Rating
Bruce from
Utah
1740
Great little detector....confusing manual
September 26, 2010
Bought the gold stinger to nugget shoot, haven't done that yet...had it for
a month. Many hours spent coin hunting, found many! I realize this is a
specialty detector and its great for the money, my only beef is the
confusing, poorly written instruction manual. Most of what I learned is
from hours of trial and error:for instance if I'm coin hunting in motion disc can I operate in "manual"? If so what is the added benefit? Also, The "auto/manual" switch doesn't make a difference in motion disc....and can I use "auto" tuning in all metal mode? If not then this switch{auto/manual} is pointless...if I'm nugget hunting and I'm in all metal mode does "auto" work?? If so, is it reliable enough and what is "auto "about it? Does it automatically ground balance?? Who knows. A great little machine! Penetrates fairly deeply finds coins, albeit a specialty detector but that manual HAS to be rewritten!!
Overall Rating
Dave from
Vancouver B.C
338
Update
August 20, 2010
I was still having problems with mine. I sent it back to Garrett. They did
replace some parts in it. Got it back and it still did not work correctly.
Took it to the place that I purchased it from and they agreed that it's got
a problem. They have a test area setup behind the shop and it still could
not be ground balanced.
I ended up returning the Garrett and buying another brand and I'm very happy with that brand so far.
Mine obviously had a problem and still had the problem after being repared.
Overall Rating
Chris from
Southern Calif
51