UPDATE: My Latest with White's Electronics!

Howdy Folks!
My V3I is in Sweet Home right now, and I got an email from Carl today telling me that there are problems with the machine. It isn't working at all right. VDI numbers are off the mark, depth isn't there, and other issues as I have complained about before. On a couple of other forums, I was told that I should consider a less sophisticated machine because I just wasn't willing to make the investment of time and energy to learn the V3i. Meanwhile, I knew it had problems, though didn't know what those problems might be.

Now I have a sense of vindication. A top White's engineer has confirmed that the machine isn't working right. It wasn't that I wasn't putting out the effort, it wasn't that I didn't learn the settings and what they do, it wasn't that I didn't bother to read the manuals for the V3 and V3i, as some stated on other forums. The problem was the machine itself.

There was one individual in particular who offered to help get the problem straightened out. Andreak77 believed me when many others, folks with long background in detecting, wanted me to believe I was simply too ignorant or lazy to learn the machine. I thank her for that.

Now I am waiting to hear what the outcome will be. Carl said he wanted to explore what specifically was wrong with my machine, but indicated a new unit might soon be coming my way. He made clear I would receive satisfaction. And for those folks, I am deply appreciative. I am waiting to hear what the final outcome will be, but am confident that very soon now, I'll have a working V3i and be made happy with my investment.

Being fair, I should add that I originally voiced concerns back in about July. Not long after a particularly insulting thread entitled Woe is me! appeared on several forums, I busted up my knee and soon after discovered the blood clot that many doctors and nurses predicted could prove terminal if it moved. My daily life became a litany of woes of a medical nature that pushed any thoughts of the V3i to the back burner as my very mortality became an issue that ensconced itself front and center on the stage of personal affairs. I figured the V3i could wait until I got straightened out and surgeryfied. Now that I've been mended, I got the V3i to White's so they could investigate the V3i and see what was happening there. It has been a long and extremely strange journey getting to this particular point in my little life.

Now that the problems have been confirmed, I find solace in knowing it refutes the Woe is Me threads on various forums better than my own attempts to acquit myself as a detectorist. I now know for certain that it wasn't me being lazy or shiftless, but an actual problem on the machine. And I feel a certain sense of vindication after being marginalized on other forums. The facts are in, and it was the machine after all. I couldn't figure out what was wrong, but knew enough to discern that something was definately wrong. Now Carl is trying to figure out precisely what went wrong, specifically. But it wasn't because I failed to make the investment of time and energy to learn the unit, as was said elsewhere. Thanks Carl, I needed that!

Now I await the final outcome, and am assured I will be made whole and be satisfied by White's Electronics. They'll take care of things, and I will be a happy camper when it is all over. Now I feel a great confidence that White's is 'on the job' and will get me squared away real soon.

So, in essence, this is a public thank you to White's Electronics; to Carl of White's Electronics, and to Andreak77, for taking my concerns seriously and working to satisfy their customer. Many thanks, and much appreciation!

Blessings,
M-Taliesin
 
Howdy Again Folks!
I got word from Sweet Home that a replacement has been ordered for my defective V3i.
They are sending me a brand spanking new V3i to my home, scheduled to arrive on Friday
evening. Since the weather for the weekend is predicted to be excellent, I anticipate giving
that new V3i a real workout, and expect to be pleased.

By Sunday evening I expect to have good report on how that new V3i worked under hunt
conditions. And who knows, maybe I'll have some real nice finds to show off in the bargain!

Thanks to Carl at White's for his effort to satisfy this customer, thanks to Andrea who offered
her help if all else failed, and to everybody at White's who exercise considerable patience
while I fretted over my concerns with the V3i I had, and taking steps to resolve the issue.
They really are a terrific bunch of folks up there in Oregon, and I surely do appreciate their
concern for me as their customer.

Blessings,
M-Taliesin
 
Glad they treated you right. Good luck with the new V. My your health hold up and you make the find of a lifetime.
 
Howdy Folks!
The new Spectra V3i arrived yesterday right at 2:30 in the afternoon. Of course I'd been looking forward to
the arrival of my replacement unit all day and was ready to go when it got here.

It took about 30 minutes to assemble the machine, and a bit more to program the registration info, select
the 6x10 coil, turn on VCO, select Polar Plot analyze, made certain Tone I.D. was selected, and run through
a number of other settings. Oh, and of course, I had to turn on Wireless Headset and get it connected on
the V3i. I checked discrimination, gain, all metal, and decided I would leave those settings as they were
when the unit got here. Gain was set at 7, and I left it be. I believe discrimination was set at 65, but
don't quite recall. I wanted to see how it behaved without making changes to those settings.

Went to a local school and fired it up. Hunted for about 30 to 45 minutes and found the machine to
run fairly stable. My intention was to visit a number of locations but the wind came up and I hadn't
brought a jacket, and it got uncomfortable on my little Irish skin pretty quick. But the time I spent
was satisfying. Not because I was finding a whole plethora of targets, but because the machine
ran pretty darn quiet at the settings right out of the box. It wasn't falsing all over the place,
and I was getting good results. The obvious things I noticed was that it was running too hot for
the tot lot I was hunting. It picked up those U-shaped clamps that hold the fabric under the
chips down. Those were easily 6 inches down. I also was hitting on items that were beneath
the fabric, and I don't cut through fabric. Because the machine was hotter than necessary for
the location, I also got sound from metal upright posts at 8 to 12 inches distant. That will be
corrected by simply turning down the gain when hunting tot lots. And that means running with
a gain of 1 or 2. The difference being that I can run at low gain because I want to... not because
I have no other choice, as was the problem with my previous machine.

As it now stands, I believe this machine will do the job it was designed to do. It is clear from my
quick experimental hunt yesterday that I'll be able to run at a gain at or better than 7, which is
something I could never achieve with my previous unit. And I also saw that I could get good depth
with this machine that simply wasn't available to me on the other unit.

I hope to report that it has blown me away with terrific results in coming days. I also feel certain
it is going to perform as good or better than expected when I set up a tot lot program just for
hunting in that environment. There will be a great deal of experimentation with this machine to
learn how it behaves in the field, but now I have verified beyond doubt that my problems were
with the machine rather than the operator. I hope to visit with Jack up in Fort Collins to set up
his custom program in the next few weeks and spend a bit of time hunting with him.

My most heartfelt thanks go to White's Electronics and to Carl and Andrea in particular for
their willingness to help satisfy this customer. While I have only logged maybe 30 to 45 minutes
on the machine so far, my preliminary observations are really looking good. I will be starting
almost from scratch with a V3i now, particularly after such a long absence from using one.
With the exception of our Texas trip when I tried to work with the old V3i, I hadn't laid
hands on a v3i since around July when I got hurt.

Thank you Carl! You came through with flying colors and restored my faith in White's!
Thanks to White's Electronics for taking care of their customer in World Class fashion!
Thanks to Andrea who offered her help and advice.

Blessings,
M-Taliesin
 
Hey Mel! I am really interested in your follow up with the new machine. Will you be able to search in places other than the wood-chipped tot lots with your knee, to get a feel about how it sees and pinpoints coins down at say 7-10? I have always counted you as about the savy-est of detectorists, and I am really looking forward to your reports. It will be interesting to hear about your comparisons when getting tone and digging at depths beyond tot lot levels since you already have the MXT to maybe do a side-by-side comparison in real time. I am happy that you got the full, new replacement. It has been a long time coming. martin
 
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