CZ 20 Battery pack problem

[ClamBob]

I bought my CZ 20 in January and used it about 15-20 hours, and put it away in June. I broke it out today to find it dead as a doornail. It had been left turned off and I couldn't understand why the batteries had drained. I bought new replacement batteries and installed them but it was still dead. I looked a little closer at the battery holder and noticed four of the leads were slightly darker than the others. Then I noticed that one side of the connector had burned completely off. I called the supplier where I bought the machine (I actually noticed the burn while on the phone) and was told that I should have taken the batteries out of the machine while I wasn't using it. I don't recall this in the manual, but that lifetime warrantee does me no good at all with this storm approaching the beach. I was offered a rental, out of my pocket of course. I declined, considering I had already given them over $1100 out of my pocket.
They seem to have some experience at cleaning the battery connections. Apparently an ongoing problem with this detector. But they wont do it with a broken lead. I'm an electrician. They tried to tell me that one of my batteries blew up. Bull. If the switch was off, there should have been no drain on the batteries, no heat to the terminals, and no melting of the wires. Blame it on ME? Bull. And I can't even replace the 9-volt connector without voiding the warranty
I strongly suspect (In my opinion only) poor workmanship on the terminals, and the damage was done while the detector was in use. The leads were most likely poorly soldered or made of material which was unable to handle the current. Otherwise, I must believe that I bought a product that breaks when you TURN IT OFF.

BTW: The old batteries seem to be fine, but I was told over the phone that they could blow up and still seem fine. They really want to teach this old electrician new tricks.

Time to get a new coil for my Dad's old Garret Sea Hunter. How much you want to bet it works the first time?

Got it off my chest for now,
BobJ

 

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[lonewolfe]

I've had a CZ20 for 6 yrs now, and have never had a problem with it...

To me, it sounds like one of the batteries 'leaked', and caused the connection wire to burn,,,

if you read the manual,

you'll find that it in fact does say to remove any/all batteries when storing for long periods...

As for having/getting it fixed,,

go over the retailers head, and directly to Fisher themselves,,

they should be more than happy to fix it for little to no cost...

 

[ClamBob]

Thanks for the reply, lonewolfe.
If by "leak" you mean acid, nope. I guess that is what I would have thought. In this picture you can see the obviuosly melted solder inside the battery connection on the lower left corner. Otherwise, the battery side of the connector looks pristine. Something got hot inside the connector...not in the battery. In my experience, as an electrician who has done my share of soldering, this indicates a poor connection was made somewhere inside the unit causing high resistance through a narrow path.
As far as removing the batteries for storage, would the months of non use constitute "storage"?
Sorry, just venting. I really wanted to go out detecting today.

Peace,
BobJ