And yet another flooded Equinox..

[SanMan]

Where are you getting your figures for "thousands disappointed"?

Ask any User of Minelab machines that required service out of warranty.

Sovereign users alone constitute thousands world wide.

And that is just Sovereign users.

You have an older Minelab machine that requires service, "any" older Minelab machine,........

You're in for a disappointment. Ask anyone who has walked that path.


But, they offer to sell you a new machine, how nice of them.

"Its send to England, Ireland, or Germany"

"The True colors of a service department show when an out of warranty repair is sent in"

Minelab, in no way compares to the repair departments at Fisher, Garrett, or Whites.

In fact, Whites claims they will repair any machine they have ever made.

Now that's a service department.

 

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[Treasure_Hunter]

I worked for Minelab for 3 years, we saw no where near that failure rate. I own 13 Minelabs myself. I have many friends who own multiple Minelabs as well every one of them are very happy with Minelab detectors. I have also owned Whites, Fishers, Tesoro, Nokta and Troy detectors.

 

[Jason in Enid]

"Excuse me",..... but isn't it the X-Terra that has to be sent to Ireland when the blister switch control panel fails?

Manufactured in 2005

View attachment 1766551


Or is it another of their units with blister switches in the control panel?

\

What are you smoking? Nobody has ever had to send US bought detector to another country for repairs. Youre just making up excuses to validate your obvious hatred for a detector company.

I have sent several out of warranty Minelabs in for service over the last decade. I never had ANY experience you are describing. If you dont like Minlebs, go use something else, but stop the bashing and false accusations.

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

"Excuse me",..... but isn't it the X-Terra that has to be sent to Ireland when the blister switch control panel fails?

Manufactured in 2005

View attachment 1766551


Or is it another of their units with blister switches in the control panel?

Only people who were sending it to Ireland were customers in United Kingdom, Minelab has never told North American customers to send Xterra or any other detector to Ireland.

 

[Bayoutalker]

That is because only a few users have taken them into the water!

Most users search on dry land!

So, of the few that have been used in the water, a few of them have leaked.

I'm still not impressed in the least.

Then don't buy one! Nobody is forcing you. You apparently don't have a dog in this fight so why are wasting everyone's time with your tirades?

 

[SanMan]

I worked for Minelab for 3 years, we saw no where near that failure rate. I own 13 Minelabs myself. I have many friends who own multiple Minelabs as well every one of them are very happy with Minelab detectors. I have also owned Whites, Fishers, Tesoro, Nokta and Troy detectors.

I never mentioned anything about a failure rate?

And I am happy with the Minelab machines I own,......

The point I'm making is the well known fact that they will not service older machines, but repair centers over seas will.

That is something that needs to be considered when a person plans to purchase a machine from any maker.

"Will they service what they sell down the line"

That is the point I'm making, and the same point has been made many times before me making it now.

 

[Jason in Enid]

I never mentioned anything about a failure rate?

And I am happy with the Minelab machines I own,......

The point I'm making is the well known fact that they will not service older machines, but repair centers over seas will.

That is something that needs to be considered when a person plans to purchase a machine from any maker.

"Will they service what they sell down the line"

That is the point I'm making, and the same point has been made many times before me making it now.

Another false statement. You can factory repairs on out of warranty detectors. I've done it. Many others have done it. What are you talking about?

 

[sgoss66]

I was running an out-of-warranty Minelab Explorer SE Pro, that had a service issue about 2 years ago. Minelab's repair center here in the U.S. serviced my machine.

Steve

 

[vferrari]

I never mentioned anything about a failure rate?

And I am happy with the Minelab machines I own,......

The point I'm making is the well known fact that they will not service older machines, but repair centers over seas will.

That is something that needs to be considered when a person plans to purchase a machine from any maker.

"Will they service what they sell down the line"

That is the point I'm making, and the same point has been made many times before me making it now.

If you have had a bad experience with the new Pennsylvania repair center, let's hear it, otherwise your experiences are old news and irrelevant today.

 

[SanMan]

\

What are you smoking? Nobody has ever had to send US bought detector to another country for repairs. Youre just making up excuses to validate your obvious hatred for a detector company.

I have sent several out of warranty Minelabs in for service over the last decade. I never had ANY experience you are describing. If you dont like Minlebs, go use something else, but stop the bashing and false accusations.

I remember clearly that Minelab stopped servicing one of there units that had blister switches in the control panel.

A good number of users were besides themselves with the fact they had nowhere to turn for service.
A factory trained service guy in Ireland came up with a fix and a number of people sent him their machines.
He did a great job, reasonable price, good turn around time.

Service centers here wouldn't touch those machines.

And, I remember, he was not well liked by Minelab for the fact that he was doing those repairs.

This whole story was written up in one of the popular forums. I remember reading it, and I remember
passing the info on to the owner of one of those machines.
He was happy to say the least that his machine would be back in action,.
He, like so many others, thought the machine was a dead player.

Don't criticize me for having a good memory.
I don't remember the exact model machine, because I didn't own one.
But I remember clearly that the front panel had blister switches that at one point gave up the ghost.

 

[SanMan]

Only people who were sending it to Ireland were customers in United Kingdom, Minelab has never told North American customers to send Xterra or any other detector to Ireland.

I "NEVER" said that Minelab "Told" people to send machines to Ireland!!

Guys that were desperate got on the internet, beat the bushes, and found that guy.

I'm just someone that reads a lot, and remembers a lot, and helps people a lot.

A tricky repair, factory turns machines away, one guy figures out a good fix, "That kind of thing I remember"

If you read that info, and passed it on to someone, and others jumped in asking for the info, you would likely remember it too.

So why bash me for stating what I clearly remember?

 

[vferrari]

Well....it didnt take long for me to flood mine. Went to 8ft at the dock searching for a lost atocha coin in the bezel. After 30 min at 8ft. She died and showed FP.....then CD. Since I could not find the FP code, I made my own conclusion that it stands for flooded panel !!
I'll send it in and get it fixed, but that's the end of any significant underwater hunting with it. This machine is a child's toy compared to an excal underwater. I trust it for wading and it's a great beach machine. If your gonna put in any time at six to eight feet....then grab your excal. Glad I found 2 treasure coins and a bronze religous medal before it popped.....pretty sure these 3 pieces have it paid off in terms of there value. That being said I've only had it for a few months and only one time to 8 ft. And it failed. I cant rely on it to hold at depth.....and that's a bunch of BS !!

Out of the thousands of Equinoxs sold how many have failed and leaked, very few.

Bart - Truly disappointing and no doubt a hassle. Some thoughts

The Equinox is warranted to 10 ft and the Excal to 100+ ft. Although it should not have failed at 8ft, the fact is it is indeed not really even a shallow dive machine. The 10 ft rating is just supposed to give margin to the casual beach hunter who is perhaps working in shoulder deep water. The Excal is a true dive machine by design.

Regardless, I know a few avid water detectorists who have successfully used it repeatedly as a shallow dive machine after they received a new machine after having suffered an initial leak failure (e.g., Calabash) and many more who don't dive but repeatedly dunk their machines salt and fresh water hunting. So that tells me that perhaps ML had (or have) a quality control issue affecting a subset of machines. So your replacement unit may perform better. In any event, you have the peace of mind knowing you are covered under warranty should the issue rear its ugly head again.

Good luck with your replacement unit and let us know how it does.

 

[SanMan]

Another false statement. You can factory repairs on out of warranty detectors. I've done it. Many others have done it. What are you talking about?

Really?

When is the last time you sent in a Minelab Sovereign Original or XS for repair?

I remember "A Lot" of people complaining that Minelab was no longer servicing older machines.

And, were steering people to buy a current machine.

"We no longer have the needed parts"
"Those parts are obsolete"
etc.

 

[vferrari]

If mine get wet after warranty I will be done detecting , at my age and social security I wouldn’t be able to afford another.

Since you are regularly using it wading, I suspect you will be fine as the units with problems seem to have a problem with the first 1 to 3 dunkings. With the release of the Vanquish multi IQ machine and the fully waterproof and capable Nokta Simplex machines being released at about $250, I see a trend that if your Equinox does die 3 years hence (i.e., when the warranty expires) you should be able to pick up very capable detector for just a few hundred dollars as that is where Nokta and Minelab are driving the detector marketplace to generate volume sales. Almost an impulse buy.

 

[Bayoutalker]

Really?

When is the last time you sent in a Minelab Sovereign Original or XS for repair?

I remember "A Lot" of people complaining that Minelab was no longer servicing older machines.

And, were steering people to buy a current machine.

"We no longer have the needed parts"
"Those parts are obsolete"
etc.

How long do you think parts should be available for machines that are no longer made? It is not practical for a manufacturer to keep producing parts for just a couple machines a year. At some point the replacement part costs more to produce than the unit is worth if it is even possible to make it. That is true of most products.

 

[SanMan]

Then don't buy one! Nobody is forcing you. You apparently don't have a dog in this fight so why are wasting everyone's time with your tirades?

I Own three Minelab machines, so I have three dogs in this fight.

"And" I clearly stated that I would be unhappy with "any" maker that stopped servicing their older machines.

Felix, the head of the service department at Fisher is a good friend of mine for many years.
If Fisher pulled the same stunt, I would have the same beef with them.

I'm simply speaking up for the consumer, the user, the person who has a strong attachment to a machine,
and it winds up in the parts pile because the factory won't service it.

why are wasting everyone's time with your tirades?

Don't blame me for wasting your time.
You're wasting your own time, no one is forcing you to read any post in this forum.

It just like TV.
You don't like a certain program,......
Don't watch it.

It's just like music.
You don't like certain music,.....
Don't listen to it.

 

[SanMan]

How long do you think parts should be available for machines that are no longer made?

Fisher repaired my 1235X, a machine that was 28 years old when I sent it in.

It came back perfect.

"How long do "YOU" think parts should be available for machines that are no longer made?"

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

I never mentioned anything about a failure rate?

And I am happy with the Minelab machines I own,......

The point I'm making is the well known fact that they will not service older machines, but repair centers over seas will.

That is something that needs to be considered when a person plans to purchase a machine from any maker.

"Will they service what they sell down the line"

That is the point I'm making, and the same point has been made many times before me making it now.

Failure rate was you saying there are thousands of dissatisfied Minelab customers.

When a detector is discontinued Minelab support it for 7 years, after the 7 years they continue to support it till they ran out of parts. Yes if you have a detector that is out of production and out of available repair parts they are going to advise customer to buy a new detector.

Your talking about 3rd party repair centers in Europe, not Minelab repair centers.

Minelab is a supporting vendor here, what your doing amounts to bashing a supporting vendor since your talking about something that happen many years ago and was not a detector you even owned and that violates our rules.

Since thread was opened by Calabash about his buddy's Nox and problem has been taken care of this thread is now closed.

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

Fisher repaired my 1235X, a machine that was 28 years old when I sent it in.

It came back perfect.

"How long do "YOU" think parts should be available for machines that are no longer made?"

When Minelab discontinues a detector they support it for 7 years at which point they will make one last production run of parts before they dismantle the production line. Once those parts run out they are out of parts. On average they support a detector for approx 10 years after production ends. Seems more than reasonable to me.