Troubleshooting Cabelas Treasure Hunter

[PowerSeed]

Hi!


I wade into this post with a little trepidation since I?m an electronically-challenged tinkerer whose only electro-accomplishment was building a Heathkit AR-3 for SWL use some 50 years ago. You folks are way above my pay grade


So here?s my problem: A friend gave me a ?non-functioning? ca. 2013 Cabelas Treasure Hunter with ?Seclusion 3D?. Somewhere I read that these units were private labeled for Cabelas by BH. The unit was bought for a single use to find a lost necklace, and not used thereafter.


This unit has a sealed coil cabled to its box via 5 pin mini DIN plug. When I fired it up with new batteries it executed the four startup beeps and screen flash described in the manual. All the buttons (Power - Sensitivity Up/Down - Disc/All Metal - Notch on/off - Notch Selector) and displays (Sensitivity - Battery Life - Coin Depth - Notch Metal Selection) worked as designed.


The unit started beeping sporadically when turned on, even on zero sensitivity, and I thought it was some indoor EMF source so I took it outside, well away from the house. It was still doing the sporadic beeping no matter where I positioned the coil, regardless of sensitivity setting. I attempted to test it with various coins, a bottle cap and pull tab. Waving these objects in front of the coil or scanning them on the ground created zero feedback beeps. Then, I noticed the sporadic beeps consistently increased in number and type when I wiggled the cable plug?even with zero sensitivity. When I unplugged the cable the unit continued to sporadically beep as before.


Thinking there might be a loose cable connection or short, I took the box apart to examine the cable plug receptacle and board attachments. All appeared to be in order visually with sound solder joints on the cable plug and board. The radially arranged pinouts with the registration slot a 6:00 o?clock were?


2:00 - White
4:00. - Black
7:00 - Black - shunted to the 4:00 pin
10:00 - Red
12:00 - Green


The densely spaced PCB components convinced me that I?d never be able to find or repair an issue in that area.


As I was ready to toss the unit in the trash, I thought why not run it past this forum to see if there is anything else I can do or try. Any suggestions out there?


Thanks,


Bill Curry

[dbanner]

Simply replace the coil/search head. Only then will you know if it's a coil problem or a problem within the main circuit. If you've got an oscilloscope, you can check the tx waveform to see what it's doing. If you've got a meter, you can make some rudimentary checks of power supply voltages etc, etc. Scope the output of the Rx preamp, then you could see the possible beeps, if not, the issue is further down the circuit. Knock the coil against something, if it beeps, then it could be the coil. However, if you've got repetitive cycling of beeps. Then it could be a capacitor that's gone beyond its age.

[sinclairuser]

as db said do the basic checks, but if it is a BH you are in luck replacement coils for those are easy to find and relatively cheap new and used, just check the manual for the operating frequency 7.69khz(like modern BH's), as long as its the right plug wiring(which you can check and alter if need be using your coil), you are good to go.
carl may be able to give you a heads up as well.

[Skippy]

One of these, presumably?
https://www.cabelas.ca/product/1525/...-bounty-hunter

Make sure you have a decent battery (batteries?) in it, a symptom of weak/flat batteries is false signals. Try running it on headphones, that will reduce the power draw when it beeps, which will be easier on the battery.

If it truly doesn't want to work, try selling it on eBay / Craigslist / whatever you have in your locality, people do buy broken stuff.