Best Backup for a Gold Racer? Updated

As many know from previous, the Makro Gold Racer is in for repairs with only a week's use. Was returned to Detector Electronics but have heard nothing back from them yet, and uncertain about how long it will take. Still looks like pretty much top of the line for hunting micro jewelry, but need something to back it up, it proves unreliable so far. What do you all recommend as a high frequency back up good enough to be a main micro hunter? The Gold Bug 2 has been proven to work, is there anything else short of going to a Makro/Nokta product again?

Currently have only a mid and a low frequency to work with, but they are not first choice for really small gold. Need something else so that I can hunt micro and not be totally shut down if a detector does not work as it should. Any ideas?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/26/2016 03:18PM by Slag.

Well,
I would first see how your Racer when it gets worked out-- how it does.

Give it some more time,,,before you declare detector unreliable as far as model wise.

And when enough time lapses--- and you haven't heard anything concerning your detector issues,, by all means call them and see what is going on.

Slag, I bought a used Gold Racer from a dealer that turned out to be the one Keith Southern used in a video. I think he had it a month and must have used it 5 years worth, because after an hour of my using it, it totally crashed. It was at Detector Electronics for a few days when I first called. 2 days later I called back--customer service--( one of the owners handles many of these calls) and said that the board was bad and that I'd be getting a new control box and it would be shipped out in a couple days. So give them a call and they should update you. They ship back by UPS Ground, which takes forever. I'll be getting it Thurs.--a week from Mass. to NV. As someone said, they need better quality control. I was shown a very mineralized area out of Winnemucca that will be a good testing ground. Have the new small elliptical on order. The GB2 takes constant ground balancing. YJ

Thank you both.

Tnsharpshooter, you are quite right of course, but a working high frequency detector is desired for micro hunting virtually continuously without interruption, and with backup in case of failure to assure that. Many of us here have more than one detector for their chosen interest and so are never out of options if one goes down. Some have a number of them suited to slightly different aspects of the same thing, some have multiples of the same detector even.This is the same idea, just specialized differently. Moving from a selection of low/mid frequency, which is the more usual, to a selection of high frequency chosen for my interest which has a much smaller range of available choices.

Those choices apparently are Whites GMT, Fisher Gold Bug 2, Makro Gold Racer, Nokta AU Goldfinder. Two are well proven over a long period of time, two new from the same company showing great promise but have not stood the test of time. Just wondering if there are other choices not considered yet. Ground balance not so much an issue here in milder ground, and many years of detecting make it second nature. Manual ground balance is perfect, and tweaking it every so often not a problem, ground tracking if available is usually turned off. The very best back up for a Gold Racer is probably another Gold Racer, but given the experience so far, not sure about that yet. Any of the above choices will work, just wondering if there are others.

YubaJ, thank you especially. It will be interesting to see what your total time of loss is. That is the thing that is being worked around here, From the time the detector goes down to the time it is back in hand working as it should is lost time. Avoiding down time is what any smart business does, what we all do with cars and appliances of any other sort, that is the idea. Makro has an excellent reputation, but no one is perfect and contingencies must be planned for. This is not to bash Makro or anyone else for poor customer service. Lost time so far has been over week with poor performance a couple days before that. It is not known how long total down time will be, or whether similar problems will occur down the line, so just looking to avoid the same in future. Just need something to be working all the time. If it takes 5 detectors to do that then sign me up for the volume discount program.

There is a possibility a Deus version 4 with new smaller coil--- might just make your list of candidates.

Have to wait a while longer though for release.

Deus was one not considered for being too low in frequency. But just looking at the company website to see makes me wonder if that might not be an interesting choice in addition to another high frequency machine. Would certainly offer a broad range of possibilities. Thanks for the tip Tnsharpshooter!

Slag Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Deus was one not considered for being too low in
> frequency. But just looking at the company website
> to see makes me wonder if that might not be an
> interesting choice in addition to another high
> frequency machine. Would certainly offer a broad
> range of possibilities. Thanks for the tip
> Tnsharpshooter!


Nothing etched in stone,,but there has been talk,,the smaller coil coming in the future with Deus,,,may operate a substantially higher freqs than the current coils,,in the neighborhood of 20, 30 and 40 kHz,,maybe even higher.

Just speculation right now--- but something you might keep in the back of your mind for possible planning purposes.

If it hit 40kHz, a person would think it would be spectacular for small gold with that Deus feature set. Going to keep an eye on that one.

Deeptech Vista Gold runs at 25 kHz and I've found some major tiny flakes of metal with that.

Wait for the impact

LowBoy

TAKE A LITTLE TIME KICKBACK AND WATCH SOME OF MY DETECTING VIDEO'S BELOW ON YouTube

[www.youtube.com]

If you don’t dig it, then how are you going to know what you’re missing!
How can you have your pudding if you don’t eat your meat!

Slag Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> As many know from previous, the Makro Gold Racer
> is in for repairs with only a week's use. Was
> returned to Detector Electronics but have heard
> nothing back from them yet, and uncertain about
> how long it will take. Still looks like pretty
> much top of the line for hunting micro jewelry,
> but need something to back it up, it proves
> unreliable so far. What do you all recommend as a
> high frequency back up good enough to be a main
> micro hunter? The Gold Bug 2 has been proven to
> work, is there anything else short of going to a
> Makro/Nokta product again?
>
> Currently have only a mid and a low frequency to
> work with, but they are not first choice for
> really small gold. Need something else so that I
> can hunt micro and not be totally shut down if a
> detector does not work as it should. Any ideas?

Hello....Dilek here- Sales & Marketing Manager. We want all our customers to have the best experience with our products and we will stand behind our customers when they have an issue.
Can you send a short email to me at dilek@noktadetectors.com with details of the issues you had?
I will do my best to speed the process up for you to get your detector or your replacement to you.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2016 04:30PM by Nokta Detectors.

Nokta,

An email was sent to Dilek. Now at three or four such. Only one was returned. The issue was described and serial number given as requested, but no video was available. That email sent about a week ago and was not replied to. Detector Electronics has had the detector since last Friday, no word from them yet. Thanks for your interest.

To Others,

Thank you so much for the suggestions. Will look close at both.

S

Contacted Detector Electronics today to see how the gold Racer was coming along. They said it was on the bench and needs a new circuit board. One repair ahead of it, they will try to get it done yet this week he said. Used the chat box on their website which proved to be a good way to go about it. Should have it back in 7-10 days or maybe sooner they say.

I thought they were going to change out the entire control housing not just replace the PCB ->>>

Not what they told me, they said they were replacing the board and there was only one repair now ahead of it before they got to it.. Might be Goldbrick you are thinking of there, seems like that was what they did with his.