triplehooked
Member
Finally able to post a few finds from the past couple of weeks with the Racer Pro pack.
First off I would like to commend the Makro/Notka companies for (imo) single handedly changing the customer/company relations concept in our hobby. It truly is a welcomed sight to actually incorporate consumer input so quickly into developing products.
I would also like to add that I'm not, nor have I ever been, compensated for any reviews. If I ever do, I'll post it with along my review of said product. This is not a dig towards any who are compensated for their time either with free products or monetarily. In fact, I think our product testers here and elsewhere do a great job in trying to be unbiased in their reviews and I commend them in their efforts. But I also think that some potential problem areas are often down played or slightly hinted at rather than pointed out. I'm referring to all brand detectors here. I prefer to not read between the lines, if there are issues, let's hear them.
That being said, I'll move on.
I'll be honest here. My initial observations with this detector were not good. I was expecting a Core with front facing controls and added iron volume. This is not that unit. That's not a bad thing, just different. I've given it more field time for a fair shake. Although I still prefer the Core, I think the Racer is a good detector for the park hunter and occasional relic hunter.
About the Racer 2:
The unit assembles easily and is well built. It has adjustments at the rod end and arm cuff to accommodate folks of varied heights and sizes. The rod collars are beefy and secure the rods well with no lateral movement. I have heard of a couple of Racers having loose collars, but I don't expect that to be the norm.
Coils... the coils are well built and perform as expected, but the coil covers are thin. Many do not use coil covers, but for those that do, use caution when removing for cleaning as it appears that they will crack easily. The coil ears are strong and more than adequate for their intended purpose, but I noticed coil ear flexing when attaching them to the rod end. This is attributed to excessive air gap at the coil end and can be remedied by using a thicker washer to compensate for said gap. I expect to see coil failures in the future if this isn't addressed.
Ergonomics... The Racer is nose heavy, no way around it. The mfg. did what they could by moving the coil attachment forward and changing the S rod angle. But, there is no real fix other than changing to a T rod design, or just using the 5" coil exclusively. Not a deal breaker, I'm just picky. But you will notice it after a few hours of continuous use.
Pro pack... A great option for those wanting multiple coils and rechargeable battery pack at a good price. The coil choices are spot on for both the park hunter and field/relic hunter. The Varta batteries are of good quality. I had over 20 hours use on my R2 and the meter still read full! I didn't receive the US charger adapter in my pro pack, but a quick call to Detector Electronics remedied the issue. Kudos to them for great service and quick shipping! The backpack style case is nice in that you can store the coils on the rod, but that's about it. The case itself is thin and the stitching poor. I wouldn't "back pack" anywhere with this case due to concern of its construction. I would prefer the Notka Core pro pack case, the best out there, imo. The hp are better than nothing, but I would suspect that most people who are purchasing a detector of this caliber and cost have a pair of killer b's or gray ghosts lying around. If not, a cheap pair of ear buds would fare better than these. I would recommend upgrading the hp or removing them altogether and putting the extra money towards a better quality case.
Features..... It's loaded with them. I'll be honest here. I don't use notch or much disc. in my style of detecting. But the adjustable iron audio and tone break are much welcomed editions for me. I also liked the adjustable audio in three tone. Not a necessity, but I definitely used it to better pick out non ferrous targets in iron laden sites.
Performance...... I can only report on MY style of detecting, which is in medium to heavy iron field sites, typically old home sites that have been gone for 50 to 100 years, therefore reducing the occurrence of modern trash. I cannot report how the R2 does in parks, or with aluminum bits and pieces, only relics and iron...sorry.
First thing I noticed was how much it overloaded on surface targets. I wouldn't think a shot gun head stamp would cause a surface overload, but it does, as did a 4" square nail. This was at 65 gain with the standard coil. The 5" coil behaved a little better. Again, this is not a deal killer for me. Merely an observation and an attribute of the Racer. You adjust to it rather quickly.
In what I call medium iron (think 10 to 20 iron targets in a single sweep) performance is excellent. Button and coin sized targets are hard to miss. Although large deep iron and bent nails do fool you.
In heavy, machine gun like iron, the audio tends to over saturate. The Racer tries to give you as much information as possible, which is a good thing, unless you are in the heavy stuff. Reducing the gain helps, but not entirely. My marginal targets averaged about 40% non ferrous, meaning 4 out of 10 "iffy" targets were non ferrous vs. 70% with the Deus or Core. Once again, subjective.....
One thing to keep in mind with this detector is not hesitate to throttle back on the gain. I found 60-75 worked very well for me at my sites.
Over all I think this is a great all around detector. Yes, it has its faults. But the perfect detector has yet to be made.
Oh yeah, here's a few finds from the Racer
Good huntin!
First off I would like to commend the Makro/Notka companies for (imo) single handedly changing the customer/company relations concept in our hobby. It truly is a welcomed sight to actually incorporate consumer input so quickly into developing products.
I would also like to add that I'm not, nor have I ever been, compensated for any reviews. If I ever do, I'll post it with along my review of said product. This is not a dig towards any who are compensated for their time either with free products or monetarily. In fact, I think our product testers here and elsewhere do a great job in trying to be unbiased in their reviews and I commend them in their efforts. But I also think that some potential problem areas are often down played or slightly hinted at rather than pointed out. I'm referring to all brand detectors here. I prefer to not read between the lines, if there are issues, let's hear them.
That being said, I'll move on.
I'll be honest here. My initial observations with this detector were not good. I was expecting a Core with front facing controls and added iron volume. This is not that unit. That's not a bad thing, just different. I've given it more field time for a fair shake. Although I still prefer the Core, I think the Racer is a good detector for the park hunter and occasional relic hunter.
About the Racer 2:
The unit assembles easily and is well built. It has adjustments at the rod end and arm cuff to accommodate folks of varied heights and sizes. The rod collars are beefy and secure the rods well with no lateral movement. I have heard of a couple of Racers having loose collars, but I don't expect that to be the norm.
Coils... the coils are well built and perform as expected, but the coil covers are thin. Many do not use coil covers, but for those that do, use caution when removing for cleaning as it appears that they will crack easily. The coil ears are strong and more than adequate for their intended purpose, but I noticed coil ear flexing when attaching them to the rod end. This is attributed to excessive air gap at the coil end and can be remedied by using a thicker washer to compensate for said gap. I expect to see coil failures in the future if this isn't addressed.
Ergonomics... The Racer is nose heavy, no way around it. The mfg. did what they could by moving the coil attachment forward and changing the S rod angle. But, there is no real fix other than changing to a T rod design, or just using the 5" coil exclusively. Not a deal breaker, I'm just picky. But you will notice it after a few hours of continuous use.
Pro pack... A great option for those wanting multiple coils and rechargeable battery pack at a good price. The coil choices are spot on for both the park hunter and field/relic hunter. The Varta batteries are of good quality. I had over 20 hours use on my R2 and the meter still read full! I didn't receive the US charger adapter in my pro pack, but a quick call to Detector Electronics remedied the issue. Kudos to them for great service and quick shipping! The backpack style case is nice in that you can store the coils on the rod, but that's about it. The case itself is thin and the stitching poor. I wouldn't "back pack" anywhere with this case due to concern of its construction. I would prefer the Notka Core pro pack case, the best out there, imo. The hp are better than nothing, but I would suspect that most people who are purchasing a detector of this caliber and cost have a pair of killer b's or gray ghosts lying around. If not, a cheap pair of ear buds would fare better than these. I would recommend upgrading the hp or removing them altogether and putting the extra money towards a better quality case.
Features..... It's loaded with them. I'll be honest here. I don't use notch or much disc. in my style of detecting. But the adjustable iron audio and tone break are much welcomed editions for me. I also liked the adjustable audio in three tone. Not a necessity, but I definitely used it to better pick out non ferrous targets in iron laden sites.
Performance...... I can only report on MY style of detecting, which is in medium to heavy iron field sites, typically old home sites that have been gone for 50 to 100 years, therefore reducing the occurrence of modern trash. I cannot report how the R2 does in parks, or with aluminum bits and pieces, only relics and iron...sorry.
First thing I noticed was how much it overloaded on surface targets. I wouldn't think a shot gun head stamp would cause a surface overload, but it does, as did a 4" square nail. This was at 65 gain with the standard coil. The 5" coil behaved a little better. Again, this is not a deal killer for me. Merely an observation and an attribute of the Racer. You adjust to it rather quickly.
In what I call medium iron (think 10 to 20 iron targets in a single sweep) performance is excellent. Button and coin sized targets are hard to miss. Although large deep iron and bent nails do fool you.
In heavy, machine gun like iron, the audio tends to over saturate. The Racer tries to give you as much information as possible, which is a good thing, unless you are in the heavy stuff. Reducing the gain helps, but not entirely. My marginal targets averaged about 40% non ferrous, meaning 4 out of 10 "iffy" targets were non ferrous vs. 70% with the Deus or Core. Once again, subjective.....
One thing to keep in mind with this detector is not hesitate to throttle back on the gain. I found 60-75 worked very well for me at my sites.
Over all I think this is a great all around detector. Yes, it has its faults. But the perfect detector has yet to be made.
Oh yeah, here's a few finds from the Racer
Good huntin!
