SE going for repairs.

[para7452]

Hi all. I am (was, and soon will be again!) the proud owner of an Explorer SE. When I got the machine last Thursday, 9/28, I noticed that after turning it on and doing some programming, the images on the LCD screen would appear to "fracture" on a vertical line right in the middle of the screen and then half of the image would wander down the screen up to a quarter of an inch! The two halves wouldn't line up any more, and the stuff that should appear at the bottom of the screen (Iron Mask on/off icon, and part of the Smartfind field) would wrap around and appear at the top! Strange, huh? Anyone heard of anything like this? I figured it was a little bug that would work itself out, but it never did. Never got any worse, and would clear itself after an off/on cycle, but you know, it shouldn't do that!

Minelab, when consulted about the problem by Kellyco Detectors, said that they had heard of it happening once on an older explorer, but not on the SE, and said, "Send it to us." Kellyco said they'd just go ahead and send me a new one when they got the old one from me in the mail. Thanks Kellyco! (They just got fifty of these machines in last night (10/3) by the way!)

You guys that say these explorers are tough to run are exaggerating a bit, methinks. This is my first Minelab, heck, my first detector in twenty-five years, and within two hours of opening the box and leafing through the manual I had set up a custom program that allowed me to hunt up some expensive aluminum arrows in the tall grown grass behind my target area, with no falsing, though I did find an old Dr. Pepper screwcap at about six inches in our very clay-like soil (I knew it wasn't an arrow, but I had to know what was giving the signal! Depth gauge was pretty spot-on, by the way) . Novel idea (arrows) for one of these machines, huh?
James

 

[WessThompson]

I too think the learning curve of the explorer is greatly exaggerated. Most people who complain are just people not willing to put any time in on the machine. Sure, you will always be learning with the Explorer...but you should be able to know the machine well enough in a couple weeks to start finding the goodies!

That being said...it's pretty easy to find arrows buried in the grass/ground. Heck, you could do that with any detector on the market. You don't need to learn much about the explorer to find targets like that.

Sorry to hear you machine had problems though. IT happens with any electronic equipment though.

 

[para7452]

Hi Wess,
I know you can find metal with any detector on the market, but do most of them allow you to program just THAT ARROW as a target and reject everything else? I mean there was no response, nada, from the Explorer, unless I found an arrow, until I got over that screw cap. I guess that the aluminum used in the cap was similar to that used in the arrow. Now THAT'S a cool machine!

Yep, you're right, electronics are subject to strange little bugs. You never know what's gonna happen! It's all part of the experience. As long as you don't get a flashing message on your dash in an accident that shows, "Are you sure you want airbag deployed?"

James

 

[KING OF ACE]

The fault you have had is a known fault with the explorer 2. It looks like it may have been carried over to the se . I guess minelab may still not have solved this gremlin in the design of the explorer se.

 

[para7452]

Bah, it's been a couple o' days more than a week that it's been gone now, and it's killin me! Another weekend with no machine swingin'. A new one is on its way though, this has been confirmed. Oh, yes.