Texadillo said:
[size=medium]I like the black also...it reminds me of my Tesoro/Troy unit ...[/size]
I was pleased, back then, to see the Troy Custom units get introduced in the foreign-type color scheme, but that was back then, almost two decades ago. By then. however, we had seen most major, and minor, detector brands switching to black rods and housings. It almost started in popular fashion in 1982 with the introduction of the old Fisher 1260-X, and to tell you the truth, I got tired of the "basic black" look long ago and have preferred some variety in color scheme in my detectors.
Having the control housing or armcup or battery box a contrasting color is fine for me, as long as the chosen color goes pleasantly with the black rod system. Some examples would be the gray with black rods of the Nokta FORS CoRe, the burgundy color to go with the black rods on the Makro Racer, White's gray w/black rods on the MX5 and maroon w/black rods on the recent Coinmaster series. We could even include the Garrett Ace 250 and 350 models with their yellow and black rods, although I felt that was going a bit too bold of a contrast.
There have been, and are, models with complementary color schemes where the plastic control housings are black but the rods a different color, such as the Teknetics T2 that is black with green rods, the newly released White's Treasure Master and Treasure Pro models with black housings and either silver or a funny gold color rod. And most definitely we can't overlook some of my favorite two-tone colors found on the Tesoro line, with the brown plastic and goldish rods of the "general use" models.
Texadillo said:
[size=medium]... but then again I'm also fond of camo. Ha![/size]
I had a couple of Fisher F19's and I have to admit that I did like the camo look [size=small](No, not the Pink camo
)[/size].
Texadillo said:
[size=medium]Color is really a "personal preference" and it's impossible to please all the masses. Call me old fashioned and this is just my opinion but I always thought the traditional Tesoro colors of brown and gold looked nice along with the professional looking decals back in the day. [/size]
I, too, am a bit "old fashioned" and I thought the gray rods and housings of the H.O.T. series looked okay. I also like the good old brown color of all the Tesoro's I currently own, but I will say I haven't been too excited about all the gold rods they used.
Many times through the thirty-two years I have owned and enjoyed my favorite Tesoro models I have had, or seen others who have, detectors with a 2-piece or 3-piece metal rod system where the hue of the gold applied differed quite noticeably between the rods. Maybe fortunate for me that I have often owned more than one Tesoro and I have been able to switch rod sections around on a few occasions in order to get a closer match between the rods on one detector. Not only that, I wish all the rods would have had a more subdued appearance rather than a very bright, shiny look to them.
Like I said, I find the all black-colored rod and housing/armcup design to be kind of 'OK,' but also coming at a time where we have had too many all-black detectors on the market and it seems a popular trend is to get away from that, at least partly. While I list 6 Tesoro's in my signature, I also have a 7th I recently acquired that has painted rods. I am going to take it with me on the Nevada ghost town trip next week and leave my pristine Eldorado in the zippered detector bag to keep it pristine. The other Eldorado has the upper 'S' and middle rods painted
brown.
I wish it would have been a more professional brown finish because where it has chipped through you see the gold rod under the paint, but the rod coloring is almost exactly what I wished to have seen years ago because it about matches the same brown color of the control housing and armcup. I had always hoped to see the rod pieces shift from gold to either a matching brown color, or to a tan color, similar to the control face.
Overall, however, the change to the all black housing and rod package is probably an okay move on Tesoro's part, possibly as a slight cost reduction in production, but I do wish the side decals were not the ugly shades they've been using. I also understand the general trend in the industry to cater to the folks who believe a bigger-size Double-D coil is the way to go, but I am not one of the people on that band wagon. All too often I have found newcomers to the hobby who buy one of these new models with a big DD coil, and they have a lot of difficulty pinpointing a target and, often, that results in a lot more digging which isn't a good thing in a manicured grassy area.
They can add to the nose-heavy weight and that can be fatiguing, and the lengthy, overlapping Tx and Rx windings also cause some problems when searching in a very target saturated site. The 8X9 spoked coil was OK, but the good old 8" round Concentric works just fine, and for the 'average' hobbyists who are generally Coin Hunters in urban settings, an 8" coil should be about the largest to use due to the often trashy conditions. Smaller-sized coils are actually a better choice to better deal with the trash.
Yes, I would like to see a new model or two be released by Tesoro, but I can accept the fact that the new black color scheme is a favorable move for them, at least from a marketing standpoint. And while I am partial to smaller-than-stock sized coils, and generally prefer a Concentric coil design, I do own and use some DD coils because due to their size and how the detector was designed to perform [size=small](site environment)[/size], they work and work well.
The market, as a whole, has shifted to models with Target ID displays and various forms of audio Tone ID, but Tesoro doesn't compete with them. We can also notice a trend for many manufacturers to shift to more featured, better performing modes, but offer them with a lower MSRP, which is also a general move for the bulk of the industry. Now we have three same-o models with a different search coil and black coloring with an MSRP of $435 for the preset GB Cibola, $535 for the manual GB Vaquero, and $709 for the more featured Tejón.
Since we are seeing the same internals and same old-fashioned features and packaging, I would think one move would have been to figure out how to package them with a lower, more competitive MSRP for today's market. Without something really new and creative/exciting, a more attractive price might help draw shoppers to the stark appearance of the Tesoro line.
Yes, I know what Tesoro's can do and that in many hunt site applications they are very tough to match or better. That is evident from a glance at my personal detector arsenal, but this is the latter half of 2015 and all my Tesoro models are some that work, work quite well in iron infested sites, but were first introduced in March of '90 [size=small](my 'original' Bandido)[/size] or March of 2001 [size=small](my Eldorado).[/size] That makes their into-dates over 14 years ago to over 25 years ago!
So, "Thank You" Tesoro for working on some changes, and "Thank You" Tesoro for providing us with detectors that work well afield for many applications, BUT .... PLEASE start working on a detector or two that will catch up with the current market trend, and in the mean-time, consider some price adjustments on some of your current model line-up. It's really needed, not only to compete with the other guys today, but set a mark for achievement for Tesoro.
Example, IF Tesoro had some engineering assistance and the financing to bring to market something new and creative, in a digitally-based electronic design, AND be competitive with the likes of the Makro Racer, Teknetics T2 and Omega 8000 [size=small](the 8500 should be out soon, I hope)[/size], White's MX5, and even the Garrett AT Pro, they would have to bring us something new, more featured, performance driven, and at a competitive market price. If they did that next month, and had an MSRP to challenge the other guys, the new offering would have to be priced lower then their current Tejón or Lobo SuperTRAQ and even compete with their other models in that ± $500 range.
Let's not give the AZ folks too much pat-on-the-back for a simple change in color without some corresponding encouragement to put more into R&D. Changing colors and coils, to a larger DD coil, and bumping the MSRP UP by $10, I feel, was a wrong direction to go ....
but I will keep using the older Tesoro models I have because they continue to work where I need them.
Monte