Sov GT ?

[SurfPro]

I picked up a barely used Sov GT for my wife to use so she would stop wanting to use mine. The thing intermittently stops working, I mean totally quits. I checked the headphone connection, the coil connection, batteries and the on/off switch. After fiddling around with it I was finally able to revive it. One thing for sure is that my wife is heavy handed, she wears it around her waist, with the box right in front of her belly button. I wouldn't be at all surprised is she hit it with her scoop while shaking it out. If anyone has any suggestions for me to try, I'd be very grateful. I'm unfamiliar with the Mindlab repair dept. Do they turn things around quickly or is it like sending it to the abyss?

I carefully place the box in a zip lock bag and then in the blue Mindlab bag, I's sure that it hasn't gotten wet since we've owned it. The individual that I purchased it form only used it twice on dry sand.

Thanks,
SP

 

[crazyman]

I would almost bet the farm that it's the battery contacts. Check the outside contacts on the battery pack and in the battery compartment to make sure they aren't stuck depressed and for any corrosion. If it's the alkaline pack check the springs. This is really common especially with the alkaline battery pack. The little springs get depressed and don't get a good contact after time. You can carefully expand the springs back out but be careful.

 

[SurfPro]

Thanks a lot Crazyman, I'll check it out.

 

[w6pea]

I would have to agree with crazyman on checking the connections.

I would almost bet the farm that it's the battery contacts. Check the outside contacts on the battery pack and in the battery compartment to make sure they aren't stuck depressed and for any corrosion. If it's the alkaline pack check the springs. This is really common especially with the alkaline battery pack. The little springs get depressed and don't get a good contact after time. You can carefully expand the springs back out but be careful.

 

[SurfPro]

I checked, and slightly adjusted the prongs on both the rechargeable and the alkaline packs. Placed the alkaline pack in and everything seemed to work fine. I jostled, shaked, rocked and rolled the thing and couldn't get it to quite. Took it out for a test drive to my local beach yesterday. As soon as I hit the sand, turned it on with the coil cable and the headphones plugged in, NOTHING for about 10 seconds then it came on. For the 1st 15 minutes everything was ok, then the thing went all buggy, nulling for long periods, like 5 - 10 seconds. Giving off that low battery squeal and a really low buzz, much lower than the normal low tone threshold that we're all familiar with. I went back to the truck and replaced the alkaline pack with the rechargeable. From that point on it worked perfectly. Now here's the kicker. When I got home I checked the batteries knowing that this was only the 3rd trip out with them and they all tested well into the good. The only thing that I can think of now is to try the alkaline pack form my other Sov to see if it creates the same problem.

Has anyone ever had a battery pack cause this type of problem?

Best,
SP

 

[Critterhunter]

If a device suddenly goes dead but later works fine and randomly experiences the same problem then you can bet there is a bad connection somewhere. Like they said, check the battery terminals. They can get snagged on the GT when you slide the pack lid back together and get pressed in. Bend them out a bit, then do the same with the control box's terminals. My next guess would be a bad solder connection where the power wires come from the battery leads inside the machine. I think the positive wire has a white plug that plugs in on the face plate's control board. That might be loose.

After reading further I see you say the machine doesn't just go dead but acted strange the last time out. That still could be caused by a loose connection somewhere. Randomly turning off power for an instant and bringing it back on can lock up IC chips and such. Does the machine always come back on fine after it's turned off and then back on right away? Then I'd expect a short. If however it's still doing the same thing then there is a component on the edge of workability. Sometimes it powers up fine and others it wont.

When you get the machine apart the best thing to do is power it up and then start poking at various parts on the board with a wood ruler or something. Lightly tap things and see if you can cause it to fail to find the short. The rule is on most devices that a failure is due to a bad solder point or other connection. It can even be heat sensitivity. One day it works due to the expansion of the materials from heat, and another day it doesn't due to the ever so slight contraction of the material in colder conditions.

If you can't find any bad connection or solder joint then my next best guess is one of the POTs is dirty. They can do strange things, including seeming to cut out power, fading or jumpy audio, etc. Some pots can effect the functions of others in circuits, so it could be any of them. I'd suspect a dirty ON/OFF volume POT, though. That might explain it losing power and other things. Do a search in this forum and you'll find some info on how to clean pots. Worth a try before sending it in if it isn't under warranty.

 

[kered]

If the rechargable pack works perfect and the alkaline doesn't logic tells me the joints from the main board to the terminals are ok, and that something is wrong with the alkaline pack itself, be it conections or whatever.
Metering batteries directly is one thing and may give the required voltage and metering them under load is another, just one weak cell in the pack is enough to lower the voltage under load to cause problems.
I think it was fisher that warns against using duracells in the f75 because they are slightly longer than others and decompress the springs too far and weaken them, if the pack has had duracells in for any length of time could be the springs are weak or have been over compressed and puting in normal ones maybee the contacts aren't working 100%. Also cheap chinese alkalines meter well but under load don't perform, don't skimp on batteries

 

[Critterhunter]

Speaking of batteries...Kered, got my 750ma 3 cell Rhino lipos a little while back. Just checked one out and it fits fine inside the holder so long as you dremel off those little raised "teeth" that help hold AA batteries in place. If with them grinded off the holder will still hold AA batteries fine. That's just a little extra help to keep them in place while installing all of them and not really needed. Anyway, I'm cycling one of the packs right now. 1C would be .750ma so I'm cycling at .2 amps to be easy on them. Rather than drain them dead slow for the cycle I'm going to just use the pack in the GT until the low battery alarm is hit (around 10.5 volts) since the low amp draw of the GT is perfect for an easy conditioning cycle. I'll carry the other pack with me so when the first hits LVC (low voltage cutoff) I can just throw the other in. I'm figuring I'll get about 16 hours or more of run time on them, very close to the stock rechargable pack yet less than about 1/4th the weight. What did you figure out was the amp draw of the Sovereign? I can use that to get a more exact expected run time. My 500ma packs were fine but all I would get was about 7 to 8 hours out of them, meaning one good hunt. So long as I can get two "all day" hunts of about 8 hours out of the 750ma packs that's good enough for me. I just don't like switching batteries every hunt.

 

[w6pea]

Interesting thanks for the information. I have never really had any luck with any rechargeable battery's.