I lucked upon a really nice hot Compadre last winter for parts as the owner said it was working the year before. Wouldn't turn on when he put a new battery in. Took the gamble and bought it cheap.
Well, when you put a battery with the wrong contacts touching those in the detector, its not going to work. At home, popped in a new 9 volt---Bingo---it was alive and well.
Decided to give it a mod. Dual disc, external sensitivity, fixed and manual ground balance. What always made the Compadre a killer machine was the ED180 discrimination circuit.
The dual disc controls works great.

The Compadres are amazing. I have had my 5.75" one for 14 years now and it has found me so many amazing things and I have used it many hours. I recently purchased one with a 7" coil for $80, and it has found me a good amount of coins. I will not part with either one of them and if I find another Compadre at a decent price I would probably pick up a third one. I want to always have a working Compadre. They are my go to detectors especially since I have limited hours to go detecting right now. Thank you for sharing your post synthnut about your brother. It sounds like he enjoyed detecting and life very much. I enjoy every minute I get to to be out detecting. Your post is a reminder to enjoy every minute of life we have with family and the things we love doing.

I had all 4 of the big name 1 knob detectors; whites, Garrett, Tesoro and Fisher. My 2 Compadres had the 7” coils and were my 2nd favorite but I believe the Fisher 1212Xs are better based on my priorities. They all had pros and cons and I should of wrote them down as I cannot remember them.
I know what dirtdigger means when he’s thinking about getting a third one, I have 3 1212Xs..