A new genre of detector that is inexpensive and easy to build.

The project was born of the intuition that not all had been thought of in terms of metal detector design. To the best of our knoledge, this project represents a new genre of metal detector, being a hybrid between beat frequency operation (b.f.o) and induction balance (i.b)

The author has dubbed it "beat balance", or b.b. for short, thereby giving a nod to each of the two principles which underlie it. The result is a very simple design that is capable of greater sensitivity then that of a b.f.o. detector whilst offering high levels of immunity to voltage and temperature variations and to ground mineralization, together with good discrimination.