Nokta Simplex
Nokta Simplex Ultra Target ID Chart: Reading the 0 to 99 Scale
Quick answer
The Simplex Ultra places targets on a two digit scale of 0 to 99. Iron sits at the bottom below roughly 15, foil and small gold in the teens and twenties, nickels and lead through the middle, pull tabs around the 30s and 40s, and copper, clad and silver coins from the high 60s upward.
The Simplex family reports on the same kind of two digit conductivity scale as most modern machines, and the ordering along that scale is dependable: iron lowest, then thin aluminium and small gold, then the mid conductors, then copper and silver at the top. What is not dependable is the exact digit, which moves with your soil, the depth of the target, how it is lying and how corroded it is.
The Simplex Ultra is published as fully waterproof to 16 feet, 5 metres, on a carbon fibre shaft at 2.6 pounds, 1.2 kilograms, which tells you where it is meant to be used. A great deal of Simplex hunting happens in wet sand and shallow water, and that is precisely the environment that compresses a target ID scale hardest. Plan for numbers to read lower and less confidently in salt than they do on dry inland ground.
Top pick
Nokta Simplex Ultra
Fully waterproof to 16 feet on a carbon fibre shaft, which is what makes it the machine people take into the water in the first place.
Price was accurate when this page was compiled and changes often.
What does each target ID band mean on the Simplex Ultra?
Use these as bands. Where two rows overlap, the machine cannot separate them by number alone and no setting will change that, because the two objects genuinely look similar to a coil.
On the Simplex Ultra 0 to 99 scale, iron generally reads below about 15 while silver and copper coins read from the high 60s into the 90s, with gold scattered through the low and middle bands.
| Target | Typical band (0 to 99) | Shares the band with | Dig or leave |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nails and small iron | 0 to 15 | Wire, rusted fragments | Leave on a coin hunt |
| Large corroded iron | 0 to 20, unstable | Anything flat and rusted | Check from two directions |
| Foil and thin aluminium | 15 to 25 | Small gold, chains | Dig if you want jewellery |
| Small gold jewellery | 15 to 35 | Foil, small tabs | Dig, this is the jewellery band |
| US nickel | 25 to 35 | Small gold, lead | Dig, a useful gold proxy |
| Lead sinkers and shot | 25 to 55 | Tabs, mixed alloys | Common on beaches and riverbanks |
| Pull tabs | 33 to 50 | Mid size gold rings | The core beach hunting dilemma |
| Aluminium screw caps | 45 to 60 | Heavy gold, alloy scrap | Endemic on modern beaches |
| Zinc cent | 52 to 62 | Screw caps, scrap | Dig while learning the bands |
| Copper cent and clad dime | 68 to 78 | Silver dime, brass | Dig, coin band |
| Silver coins, dime to quarter | 70 to 88 | Clad coins, tokens | Dig every stable signal |
| Half dollar and larger silver | 86 to 95 | Large copper, big brass | Dig, very little modern rubbish reads here |
Owner-reported bands on the Simplex scale rather than a published Nokta lookup chart. Nokta documents the scale and the search modes in the Simplex Ultra user manual and does not publish a per-target ID table.
Why do the numbers change in wet sand?
Salt water conducts. When the ground itself is conductive, the machine is working against a background signal that it has to balance out, and the effect on target ID is to compress and destabilise the scale. A coin that reads a confident 78 on dry inland soil may read in the low 70s, jump about, or lose its number entirely at depth once you are into wet salt sand.
This is not a fault and it is not fixed by turning sensitivity up, which usually makes it worse. It is fixed by ground balancing in the conditions you are actually standing in, working at a stable sensitivity, and re-balancing as you move between the dry sand, the wet sand and the water line. The settings by site type page covers the sequence.
How do I calibrate this chart to my own ground?
- Gather known targets. A nail, foil, a pull tab, a nickel, a cent, a dime and a quarter. If you hunt beaches, add a lead sinker and a screw cap, because those are what you will actually be sorting.
- Bury them where you hunt. Inland soil and, if you can, the top of a beach as well. The two sets of numbers will differ and both are worth knowing.
- Test at two depths. Two inches and six. Note how far each number falls as the target gets deeper, because that drop is what tells you how much to trust a faint signal.
- Write the numbers on paper. Keep the card in the bag. A chart you measured beats a chart you read, every time.
- Repeat after a firmware update. Nokta publishes firmware updates for the Simplex over USB, and processing changes can move marginal readings.
What should I do about the pull tab problem?
Decide what you are hunting before you start, because you cannot have both on a heavily used beach. If you are after coins, work the bands above about 60 and accept that you are leaving rings behind. If you are after jewellery, dig the 15 to 50 range and accept that most of what you recover will be aluminium.
The honest middle path is to hunt tabs on sites where the density is low enough to make it bearable, and to hunt coins where it is not. The dig time budget calculator will tell you how many holes you can actually finish in the time you have, which is usually the real constraint. If you also run a Legend, compare the scales on the target ID comparison page before assuming a number carries over.
Sources
- Nokta Simplex Ultra user manual, target ID and search mode sections
- Nokta Simplex Ultra published product listing features
- Nokta The Legend user manual, target ID sections
Frequently asked questions
What number is gold on the Simplex Ultra?
There is no single gold number on any detector, because gold registers according to its mass and shape rather than simply being gold. A thin chain may read in the foil band around 15 to 25, while a heavy ring can land among the pull tabs in the 35 to 50 range. Hunting gold means working the low and middle bands and accepting the aluminium that comes with them.
Is the Simplex Ultra good for saltwater beaches?
It is built for wet work: Nokta publishes it as fully waterproof to 16 feet, 5 metres, with a fully carbon fibre shaft that retracts to 25 inches for transport and diving. Expect target ID to compress and become less certain in wet salt sand, which is true of any machine. Ground balance frequently as you move between dry sand, wet sand and the water, and run a stable sensitivity rather than a maximum one.
Why does my Simplex give a good number then nothing on the next sweep?
Usually one of three things. The target is at the edge of detection depth, so the machine has barely enough signal to report a number at all. The target is iron presenting a deceptive face on one pass. Or two objects are sitting close together and the machine averages them differently depending on your sweep angle. Check from two directions at ninety degrees before you commit to digging.
Do Simplex Ultra and Legend target IDs match?
Not reliably enough to transfer a written chart between them. Both use a two digit scale, but the processing differs and the Legend offers simultaneous multi frequency profiles and several selectable single frequencies that the Simplex line does not. Coin bands land in broadly similar territory, while the low and middle bands are where the two part company. Calibrate each machine on your own buried samples separately.
Does the Simplex Ultra come with headphones?
Nokta states plainly in the Simplex Ultra listing that Bluetooth headphones are not included in the package. Worth knowing before you order, and worth planning around if you intend to use the machine in water, because wireless audio does not work underwater at all. A wired submersible set is the only option once the control box is submerged, regardless of which machine you are running.
Researched, not professional advice. This page is compiled from published specifications, manuals and owner-review consensus, not hands-on testing. Target ID numbers, depth figures and settings vary with soil chemistry, moisture, target size, depth, orientation and firmware version, so treat every figure here as a starting point and verify it against your own machine's manual and your own ground. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.