Hey, all. New to this forum and my Sov Elite. Breaking it in, in my backyard, at the preset beginner mode, and after acquiring a target, the sounds peak and fall constantly along with wild meter readings ranging from +900 to -1000, even while not moving or over the target. I have to switch off then back on to reset the threshold. That gives me about 30 seconds before things go haywire again. The manual's troubleshooting guide is basic, no help. I tried noise canceling, sensitivity adjustments, the meters calibration knob, still no luck getting things to stabilize. Hopefully, it's something silly that I'm doing or overlooking. Any ideas? del
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Varying sounds and Wild Digital Readings
- Thread starter del
- Start date
hi del,
geez that doesnt sound good . are you running in all metal mode ?
im pretty much new with the sovereigns myself. i have the GT model and im not having any of the problems your having. im sure someones going to come along soon and really be able to help you out. your elite should be running smooth as silk.
stan pa. sjmdc
geez that doesnt sound good . are you running in all metal mode ?
im pretty much new with the sovereigns myself. i have the GT model and im not having any of the problems your having. im sure someones going to come along soon and really be able to help you out. your elite should be running smooth as silk.
stan pa. sjmdc
Art (NWOH)
New member
Replace the batteries to see if that will fix it.
HH
HH
Del,
You are new to the Sovereign series and something just don't make sense does it. Like Art says is to recharge the battery first as the Elite comes with a rechargeable battery. A low battery will trigger a low battery alert which will will be a very erratic threshold with a loud signal every 15-30 seconds and will get so bad the threshold will go loud and you will be unable to turn it down. If you turn it off for a little bit and back on it seems to work OK,but after 30 seconds or so it will start up again. When I first got my XS I had the same question as mine did this.
Now if it still does this after the battery is fully charged then make sure all your connections are tight. the coil wire goes to the meter and finger tight, the wire out of the meter will go to the control box and it too has to be finger tight.
Set the controls with the controls to the factory presets and make sure the sensitivity is set all the way counter clockwise until it click as this is auto which will give you the smoothest threshold and a good place to set it until you get more experience with it. If it don't click it is in max sensitivity and the threshold will be very erratic for most.
Now if you have used a different detector before you will see the Sovereigns are a different detector and it sees more and will let you know this by all the signals you will be hearing by the tones changing and the nulling of iron and meter readings. This does confuse some that are not use to it, but this is the Sovereign language we call it and with some practice and Patience you will learn to love these tones as you will see some coins and other good finds others have passed over for years.
Being you have the Elite they had a freq switch with band 1 and band 2, most find band 2 works better than band 1, so we only use band 1 when band 2 has too much interference and we need to switch or when hunting with another Sovereign close to you.
Give the battery a charge and get back to us if it made a difference, I think it may be your problem like Art says.
Rick
You are new to the Sovereign series and something just don't make sense does it. Like Art says is to recharge the battery first as the Elite comes with a rechargeable battery. A low battery will trigger a low battery alert which will will be a very erratic threshold with a loud signal every 15-30 seconds and will get so bad the threshold will go loud and you will be unable to turn it down. If you turn it off for a little bit and back on it seems to work OK,but after 30 seconds or so it will start up again. When I first got my XS I had the same question as mine did this.
Now if it still does this after the battery is fully charged then make sure all your connections are tight. the coil wire goes to the meter and finger tight, the wire out of the meter will go to the control box and it too has to be finger tight.
Set the controls with the controls to the factory presets and make sure the sensitivity is set all the way counter clockwise until it click as this is auto which will give you the smoothest threshold and a good place to set it until you get more experience with it. If it don't click it is in max sensitivity and the threshold will be very erratic for most.
Now if you have used a different detector before you will see the Sovereigns are a different detector and it sees more and will let you know this by all the signals you will be hearing by the tones changing and the nulling of iron and meter readings. This does confuse some that are not use to it, but this is the Sovereign language we call it and with some practice and Patience you will learn to love these tones as you will see some coins and other good finds others have passed over for years.
Being you have the Elite they had a freq switch with band 1 and band 2, most find band 2 works better than band 1, so we only use band 1 when band 2 has too much interference and we need to switch or when hunting with another Sovereign close to you.
Give the battery a charge and get back to us if it made a difference, I think it may be your problem like Art says.
Rick
Art (NWOH)
New member
We have no idea what the temperature is .
Cold really knocks the stuffings out of battery performance.
Starting with weak batteries, then getting them cold will render them useless untill they warm back up.
Do we have a low batt/cold batt combo problem here???
HH
Cold really knocks the stuffings out of battery performance.
Starting with weak batteries, then getting them cold will render them useless untill they warm back up.
Do we have a low batt/cold batt combo problem here???
HH
Art (NWOH)
New member
I thought the Elite came with the Alkaline pack, and the rechargeable pack was an extra option. Perhaps Rick can straighten this out.
Any way.....
What you have sure sounds like a power problem. You don't have rechargeable AA's installed do you?? Verified that they are installed correctly??
This sounds like a heavy current drain problem. If you have a voltmeter, check the voltage on the pack....13-14 volts on new batts.
Install the pack and run the Elite until it goes bonkers for a minute, then quickly pull out the pack and measure the voltage before the pack can recover.
If the pack is being heavily loaded, you should see a lower than normal voltage that will climb as you watch the meter.
The way the Elite is made, it's difficult to measure "under load" current and voltage. If you have some jumper leads and a DVM let me know, and I can tell you how to check it out.
Have to say that this does not sound good if your batteries are OK.
HH
Any way.....
What you have sure sounds like a power problem. You don't have rechargeable AA's installed do you?? Verified that they are installed correctly??
This sounds like a heavy current drain problem. If you have a voltmeter, check the voltage on the pack....13-14 volts on new batts.
Install the pack and run the Elite until it goes bonkers for a minute, then quickly pull out the pack and measure the voltage before the pack can recover.
If the pack is being heavily loaded, you should see a lower than normal voltage that will climb as you watch the meter.
The way the Elite is made, it's difficult to measure "under load" current and voltage. If you have some jumper leads and a DVM let me know, and I can tell you how to check it out.
Have to say that this does not sound good if your batteries are OK.
HH
adam in cal
New member
Well,this could be a number of things ....First as was pointed out try the ""fresh batteries '' it almost sounds as if you're describing the ''low battery singnial'' and that would make it very noisy the tones wouldnt vary at this point though you would be overloaded with a constant"" buzzing bloop"" that wont go away,,,As also was pointed out be sure its not in the all metal mode, many of us have had it ''accidentendly clicked'' there and scratched our heads for a sec.....all that aside ,now you got fresh batteries you're in the disc mode with the switch toggled to band 2,and the sensitivity clicked to auto mode (all the way left until it clicks).....now is you back yard near any power lines or right in town or something that may have major electrical interference??? if so go some where away from the house a bit .....to calibrate the meter toss a us dime on the ground away from any other conductive source,now to see if you are running what I consider ""smooth'' you can click the audio to fixed for a minutie and calibrate the meter ,turn the machine on and rachet the volume to max,set the threshhold to the point where it's a consistant ""Humm"" not a loud crackly humm or a weak broken up humm a nice crisp "HUMM"" ......now its on and sounding smooth with the humm being a consistant and constant humm,pass the coil over the dime untill you hear the threshold disapear and its replaced with a nice solid tone at this point glance at the meter whlie keeping the coil over the dime and the tone constant ,turn the meter knob untill it reads 550 and just sits there ,it will flicker around a bit but should lock up at 550,after this is done pass the coil away from the dime slowly untill the threshold returns to the constant humm, now go slowly back toward the dime,repeat this over and over untill you see the point when the threshold disapers and the coin signal comes in ,,,,,you will have to work with the machine for a while to really understand it ....Many new Sovereign owners have gotten frustrated or felt the machine didnt work properly and eventually either gave up or moved on to something else....those that stuck with it and learned the sounds have been well rewarded for there paitence .....you need to work Slow and slower with the sovereign,and this drives some crazy....But i belive if you take the time you will see its not really broken its just tough to figure out.....to be honest I thought the friggin thing sounded like damn R2-D2 from star wars or something .....but it started to come together after some time and use ....the meter can be tricky as well and many people say it doesnt work right ....my suspicion is you may need to calibrate it ....although I dont think or recall the meter ever reaching 900 but anything is possible ............I hope it doesnt turn out you got a bunk unit,but sometimes that happens also,was it a brand new unit from a dealer??? if it was a used one it may pay to have it checked out by a pro .........any way hope you get it together and start making some solid finds ...........I can attest to the frustration I was in the same boat a while back ...I kept comin back here over and over with questions and problems and all the normal stuff..........I feel confident you will suceed just stick with it my friend and keep comin and let us know how you do ...........................
I do have a power line running up the alley, about 40' from where I was hunting. Would that be the culprit? I'll try going out to the school field, way out in the middle would put me 100 yds or so away from the nearest power line. Would that be far enough? Everything else I was doing right. I'll try it out tomorrow and let you know. del
This is all possible, but from what you explained it don't sound that way being after you turn it off and back on it is OK for a short time. A power line can give you a problem, but shouldn't be OK after you turn it off and then back on again. It will be more of a erratic threshold and numbers bouncing around all the time and switch freq or ruining auto sensitivity it should be OK, or not as bad.
It all sounds like a low voltage problem with bad batteries or using rechargeable in the alkaline pack. Make sure you are using a good quality batteries as I bought some cheaper AA and when I went to use them in my digital camera the camera just kept shutting down, but a set of Energizer in and now it is fine. Tested the cheapies and they show good, but under a load they must not be, so double check the batteries as this is what it sounds like if you shut it off and it is OK for around 30 seconds, then it starts getting erratic.
Good luck and I hope you find it is something simple.
Rick
It all sounds like a low voltage problem with bad batteries or using rechargeable in the alkaline pack. Make sure you are using a good quality batteries as I bought some cheaper AA and when I went to use them in my digital camera the camera just kept shutting down, but a set of Energizer in and now it is fine. Tested the cheapies and they show good, but under a load they must not be, so double check the batteries as this is what it sounds like if you shut it off and it is OK for around 30 seconds, then it starts getting erratic.
Good luck and I hope you find it is something simple.
Rick
I couldn't wait for daylight, so I took it out into the school field across the road, deep into the field about 100 yards from any power line, and it works beautifully! Found a balled up piece of wire and a candy wrapper. Whatever the interference was, it caused my unit to go crazy. I was hoping it wasn't an internal problem, even though the warranty would've covered it, I didn't want the down time. So, thanks for all your tips. I'll keep you posted on the treasure I find. del
hey del,
glad to read your up and working now. i remember a couple years ago detecting a small park with my explorer and it was pretty much under high tension wire from the penna. railroad. no matter what i did my explorer would just go crazy. went two blocks to another park and she ran smooth as silk.
stan pa. sjmdc
glad to read your up and working now. i remember a couple years ago detecting a small park with my explorer and it was pretty much under high tension wire from the penna. railroad. no matter what i did my explorer would just go crazy. went two blocks to another park and she ran smooth as silk.
stan pa. sjmdc
Art (NWOH)
New member
Glad to hear it.
I seen some gruesome interference, but not what you described. What you described sounded like power problems to such an extent that I never thought of interference.
Have seen interference make blouping, blubbing noises and sputtering stuff. Had to unplug the coil to stop it.
The thought of a bad coil crossed my mind, but the only one I had crap out did not act up quite like you described.
At least you know what hopeless interference sounds like now.
HH and go get 'em!!!
I seen some gruesome interference, but not what you described. What you described sounded like power problems to such an extent that I never thought of interference.
Have seen interference make blouping, blubbing noises and sputtering stuff. Had to unplug the coil to stop it.
The thought of a bad coil crossed my mind, but the only one I had crap out did not act up quite like you described.
At least you know what hopeless interference sounds like now.
HH and go get 'em!!!
adam in cal
New member
now go get em'''