Possible problem with my E-Trac

[hoser]

To make a long story short my machine shut down on me the other day after several hours of hunting and the display said overvoltage. I tried turning it on twice with the same results. Went back to the car and installed the rechargable pack and it fired right up. Yes I was using AA alkaline. I buy mine at Sam's club with the Members Mark brand on them. I have gone through one 48 pack and I'm on the second and up till now have not had a lick of trouble. Anyone else had this happen? I just fired Minelab a letter asking just what overvoltage really meant on the screen. I could see this if I had just put fresh cells in the holder. But not after several hours into the hunt. :-\ With our trip to the scout camp this weekend I sure hope it's not gonna die on me. Better take the Beach Hunter just in case.

[coinnut]

This happened to me along with a lot of other problems (6 more) when I got the E Trac brand new. I sent it in under warranty and have never had an issue for two years now. Mine would shut down and say over voltage. It could be a short and when you jar the unit, something may short out and cause the over voltage signal. It probably does this to protect the delicate electronics from burning out. Some of the things the manual states for that condition is that, the machine may be too hot and you need to move to a cooler location for a bit. The other interesting one I found in the manual was a part that read that faulty batteries cause many detector problems Maybe you have a shorting battery that is causing the pack to get hot or something. I would check each battery on a voltage tester just to see if there is a bad or odd one. If not you may try to get an answer from Minelab, but I'm not sure if they improved customer service yet?? keep us posted on it.

[hoser]

Thanks coinnut. Based on what you just said that would explain why after installing the rechargable pack it worked fine. I'll replace or check the AA's and make sure they are good. In any case I will put new batteries in just in case. And yes, this will be a good test as to Minelabs response.

[z118]

This happened to me recently... I was using the rechargable battery and the machine made an odd string of beeps, flashed voltage overload on the screen, and shut down. I turned it back on, and the same thing happened. I went back to my care, switched to the AA battery pack, turned the machine on, and same thing again. I removed the shaft, diconnected the coil, reconnected it, turned the machine on, and no problem. I shut the machine off, switched back to the rechargable battery, turned it on, and still no problem. It has not happened again since. Should I be worried?

[coinnut]

This happened to me recently... I was using the rechargable battery and the machine made an odd string of beeps, flashed voltage overload on the screen, and shut down. I turned it back on, and the same thing happened. I went back to my care, switched to the AA battery pack, turned the machine on, and same thing again. I removed the shaft, diconnected the coil, reconnected it, turned the machine on, and no problem. I shut the machine off, switched back to the rechargable battery, turned it on, and still no problem. It has not happened again since. Should I be worried?

I would try and wait until the hunting season is over before calling Minelab (unless your warrantee is about to expire). If you can just shut it down and restart or reconnect a couple of things, then I would do that for now. The only drawback is if you can't get it to stay on and you are far from home, you may have to end your hunt. I think if you turn on your machine and hold the power button down, it does a mini reset (not to be confused with the Master reset in the menu section) I don't believe you lose any patterns that way, but some of you settings may need to be adjusted again). It's somewhere in the manual and may be useful in the field sometime. Just out of curiosity, are the connections on the battery itself clean and is the connection in place. I noticed on mine that the metal piece on the battery terminals sometimes slides down a bit and exposes a bit of space where there would be no connection. I just usually tap my battery and it falls into place again.