Chinese clones

[Melbeta]

Higher prices on American metal detectors, gave an fantastic opportunity for Chinese hackers and manufacturers. They kicked out lower priced clones right and left. Thus today we have lost many of our American metal detector manufacturers. This is why junk things prevail in our stores today.

In fact Ken White Jr, remarked about those clones coming from China. He knew the handwriting was on the wall for the existence of Whites Electronics. Even employees back then used to tell me it was a matter of time and Whites Electronics would be forced to close their doors. It came true!

Now I merely made a factual statement, as witnessed by me, a dealer under Whites Electronics, and other metal detector manufacturers. It affected my business as well in the past. Also we had companies who could purchase more units then I could purchase, and they thus cut the prices way below what I could sell them for, and I tossed in the towel. We called them "price cutters" and the manufactures did nothing about it. So I knew it was only a matter of time and many makes of metal detectors would be out of business. I was not the only dealer who tossed in the towel. And now we have the metal detector economy of today. And it is the same economy of all kinds of businesses operating out there today. And there I end my statements. I will say no more.
Melbeta

[Carl-NC]

The only White's detector that got counterfeited was the GMT. It hurt sales in Africa but that's not what killed the company. The company was killed by marketing and management, and was exacerbated by distributors who wanted to maintain the 1980s status quo. I was there and saw it live.

[Melbeta]

Well, I used to have people come in, look the machines over, I showed them how they worked in my test beds in the fenced in area behind my store building. They said they would think it over. They ended up buying from the price cutter in Florida. Then they came in, wanted me to teach them how to use it. He sold it to them below what I could sell it for. So when a buyer wanted to expand, and made me an offer for my building, that I could not turn down, I sold the store front building to them. I bought a warehouse that was in foreclosure, and went into mail order sales. That is when I tossed in the towel. So I base my thoughts on what my experience was related to. I could not compete with the price cutters who bought in volume. I used to see small dealers all of the USA. I do not think they exist now. We used to have quite a few dealers here in my town. All are gone now. A manufacture needs to have one price for all of their dealers and not give volume buyers better prices. It drives the mom and dad shops out of business. Heck, here one used to go to Sears, Montgomery Wards, Target, and Kmart, and sold the machines for less then I could sell them. Then we had KellyCo to contend with. So I tossed the towel in and quit selling metal detectors. I would go to Fort Carson, buy military surplus things on auction, and sold and made money. I was making $10,000 to $20,000 a month selling surplus out of my warehouse. Yes, I agree with what you said above, marketing and management certainly contributed to running me out of the metal detector business and into the government surplus business. I am not sure what the 1980s status quo was, except I guess it was how they operated back then. So I guess that is true as far as I was concern as well. I stayed a dealer until 1996 and quit ordering detector stock by then. I really was doing well in metal detecctors when I was taking in used metal detectors, shipping them back to Whites Electronics, directly to Ken White Sr, he went through them for me, fixed them, updated them to the next highest series that he could, and I sold them right and left. None of the other manufactures did that for me I will have to admit. Now Fred from NTHL arrived, visited with me, told me that Fisher was closing out a bunch of older models, and I bought they right and left from Fisher, until they were all gone. But on the latest model detectors, price cutters were my major problems... I even wrote and printed all kinds of booklets, and printed out vintage maps, gave them free on sales of new detectors. It helped a bit, but price cutters were my major problem. I even took customers with me when I went metal detecting on Sundays. That gave me a lot of future sales to their friends. But there was not enough of it to keep me in the detector business. Selling surplus electronics gradually took over my business and I have to admit it was great for my business. I tried advertising nationally on various metal detector manufactures advertising, but it did not sustain my sales. Now I know it helped some of the dealers in Denver though, but most of my sales came from people who knew I was in the metal detector business and knew my reputation for being a good person. Price cutters were my major problem in metal detector sales. I just could not compete with them on metal detector sales...

Now I am one who believes in being able to obtain schematics and service material, to use on used detectors, but I do not believe in posting them into the internet. I think it does hurt the manufactures in America. I will help a guy who can do his own repair service on a machine he bought from me. And I understand the reluctance of manufactures giving out schematics and service material at random. I asked Ken White Sr for some, but he said I will repair yours for free and he did. But I took in used metal detectors from other makes and I had to figure out what was wrong in then or toss them away. I am speaking of Relcos. I took them in all the time, and sold people a machine which worked far better then Relco. Lots of Relcos were only good for the kids to use. I think there is a great need in someone who will open up a metal detector service business for repairs and updates myself. I only know of Keith Wills right now. And he is limited on what he can update and repair. Now I know Whites Electronics had some service centers out there, but probably should have had far more of them. That does help sales for dealers... I was really lucky I had Ken White Sr to take my used Whites and fix them for me. I took Whites Electronics machines in on trade for all kinds of makers and Ken fixed and updated them so I could sell them to buyers.
Melbeta

[Carl-NC]

What you describe is the result of two massive shifts in consumer shopping. First, in the 1980s, discount big box stores (esp Walmart) came on the scene a dealt a huge blow to mom&pop stores and even traditional department stores. Then, the last 20 years have seen another shift to online buying, namely eBay and Amazon.

White's had built up a large distributor/dealer network in the 80's with 10 regional distributors serving nothing but small-time dealers. Kellyco was a special case where they were serviced directly from the factory, which distributors didn't like. When big-box came on the scene White's shunned that venue and stuck with the dist/dealer model. Bounty Hunter did not. When on-line shopping took off White's shunned that venue and stuck with the dist/dealer model. Bounty Hunter, Garrett, and Minelab did not. White's dealer terms were so strict that a dealer could not sell anything over the telephone or advertise on the Internet, and could not sell outside their region.

Around 2010 (I was there) the writing was on the wall that the company was not going to survive with the dist/dealer model... a lot of those dealers sold out of their garages and that was no longer a viable outlet. So White's decided to start selling big-box and on-line. Problem is, big-box requires the ability to deliver large quantities on a minute's notice and the ability to take back large crates of return stock. White's didn't know how to deal with all that and the effort failed. Meanwhile, most of the distributors were "let go" and dealers were allowed to have an Internet site but only if it was hosted by White's and followed a fixed template, making them all look alike. Overall it was a disaster, and was coupled with a massive turnover in Engineering leading to new product problems.

Tesoro suffered the exact same fate: an extinct sales model and no Engineering. Garrett successfully navigated the consumer shifts and probably came out stronger than before. First Texas has been especially successful in the big-box stores and has also done well on-line. Minelab is in a unique position of having high-demand products where they can continue to support dealers (and where training is often necessary), yet they still do pretty well in the new sales channels.

Sorry your business was a victim of changing times but that's been happening throughout history. The sad truth is that White's waited way too long to scrap the dist/dealer model, and that (plus a few other bad decisions) is what ultimately killed the company.

[h9361]

Hello
Dear All
See attached, fake GPX but its performance is exactly like real GPX!





See the video, real test.

[Melbeta]

Yes, what you said is indeed true. At the time, I decided to quit fooling with the companies that cateried to buisinesses like KellyCo, and it proved to be a benefit for me. Now other mom and pop stores just vanished. I am speaking of experienced witnessing what happened in my town. The metal detector magazines back then catered to mom and pop store, but they are gone from history today. It is the same with department stores. Cheaper goods kills larger stores. I worked in larger department stores in the past. Today they are mostly gone. The discount stores survive right now, but eventually they will disappear as well. Quality products cannot compete with cheap goods. Customers are fickle and gravitate toward price cutters and inferior products just to save money. And you are right, thta has been happening throughout history. It is sad, but it happens. It is happening today in the auto industry. I am still driving a 1989 Buick Riviera and it has bumpers. Does not get as good gas mileage, but is safer to ride in. Todays vehicles protect by designed collapsing of the bodies. Crazy? Yes, but they make more money making and selling them.
Melbeta

[Melbeta]

One of the Laws of Economics is, that as a business is having a profit, it attracts competition, competition attracts more competition, finally so much competition is exists that it now attracts what they called ruinious competition, and then the competition collapses, and the cycle now starts all over again, with a business having a profit as the competion left the market. It is true. Any place where there is a profit, it attracts competition... Where there is no profit, they leave and go elsewhere.So I dwelled in my own place, made my own things, and had no competition and it was profitable for me. But a problem arose. I ran out of my supply and sales diminished.And then I decided, it is time to retire as I made sufficient profits.
Melbeta

[eclipse]

Hello
Dear All
See attached, fake GPX but its performance is exactly like real GPX!
[ATTACH]55917[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]55918[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]55919[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]55920[/ATTACH]

See the video, real test.

Thats not a clone, its fake looking at the board pictured there.

[kt315]

ok. i ask not on your matter but i did see a video. why your country in those squares? who did this huge job?
i am really shoked seen that. sure incredible job! who can give me clear answer?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9HYLTpXq0I

[Altra]

ok. i ask not on your matter but i did see a video. why your country in those squares? who did this huge job?
i am really shoked seen that. sure incredible job! who can give me clear answer?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9HYLTpXq0I

The squares are called "sections" they are 1 mile by 1 mile. The survey system in the USA from the 1800's known as "Township, Range and Section". Those are mostly corn and wheat farms. The brown areas have been plowed. The rest of the video I'm not sure?


http://www.jsu.edu/dept/geography/mh...ne/trprac.html

[Altra]

Thats not a clone, its fake looking at the board pictured there.

I agree! It's probably a VLF/TR? Notice how smooth sounding it is in the house around electricity.

[eclipse]

Yes its not even Pi. I have couple of GPX5000 and a real close clone, not going to advertise the clone so no names. The front end op amp of the clone is ne5534 instead of ad797 but everything else is top notch. Im going to compare these units this week or when i find the time. Im guessing close results of the original vs clone, less smooth threshold perhaps on the clone.

[ZED]

Yes the ones in the pics are fakes,the clone 5000 detectors are almost identical to the originals,they just use different components in a few places,the manufactures of the clones could never figure out how to calibrate the earth field
after the manufacturing was complete,and so the clones went to market with earth field issues,interestingly the calibration process is just an inbuilt procedure on the detector,but they never new how to enable it.

[Orbit]

Yes the ones in the pics are fakes,the clone 5000 detectors are almost identical to the originals,they just use different components in a few places,the manufactures of the clones could never figure out how to calibrate the earth field
after the manufacturing was complete,and so the clones went to market with earth field issues,interestingly the calibration process is just an inbuilt procedure on the detector,but they never new how to enable it.

My respects ZED , i don't believe they couldn't maybe they didn't want to?! Otherwise clone gpx 5000 not at all pi detector ! One man bought it and came to me had a problem with the button it was factory defective I replaced it with him when I opened it the tile had nothing to do with the original it is actually a VLF detector as Eclipse said i have them somewhere in some hard drive if i find a setup of them...

[ZED]

Orbit what you describe are fakes,the clones i mention are exact component for component replicas,track layout,component layout,even the trannys are the same,partys that i know have sent me pics of these clones that they bought,and asked if i can help them resolve the earth field issue,they even contacted the manufacturer about the problem and at the time they were interested in if we could fix this issue,that was a while ago and from what i understand the clone problem has been eliminated.