General Mayhem

Nice one!... where there is one, there is more!

So, I have decided to buy a Garrett Axiom detector, I like what I have seen so far. In Canada, Garrett dealers, much like their U.S. counterparts have been taking pre-orders. There are several dealers offering the Axiom at the MAP price equivalent to $3999 USD, once you factor in the exchange rate. There is a Garrett dealer in town, he sells detectors and prospecting gear, I have dealt with him in the past. To be honest, I never really got a good feeling when I bought something from him. I don't want to turn this into something that it isn't, lets just say, I haven't felt particularly 'welcome' in his store and leave it at that. Despite the vibe I get from the guy, I was willing to buy from him anyway, as this is a relatively big purchase and should there be any issues it would be nice to be able to deal with someone local. So, we had a back and forth email discussion last night, regarding the Axiom and ordering one. He said he could order me one, the price he quoted was $5990 CAD= $4560USD. So, I decided it was time to negotiate and told him that there are other dealers offering the Axiom pre-orders at MAP equivalent to $3999 USD and that was the end of the conversation, he is now ignoring my emails. Now granted, he is free to run his business anyway he wants to, he can charge whatever he wants... I get that. Now, if he just replied and said "I'm sorry, but that is the best I can do" I could understand that a bit better, but to just ignore a customer, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I'm not sure how the pricing from Garrett and dealers work, and it's a topic I don't really want to delve into, as far as I am concerned that's between Garrett and their dealer network. But, as other dealers in Canada are offering pre-orders at MAP and free shipping anywhere in Canada, it would imply that there is still a profit to be made selling at MAP. As I said before, my preference would be to buy locally, but as this guy is ignoring me now, it doesn't exactly inspire my confidence in his customer service, so that negates any benefit of buying locally. Anyway, I guess I will be placing an order with another dealer, that is selling at MAP and offering free shipping. I plan on getting the 7x11 mono with 13" DD package. With the difference in price, I can get a 16" mono ($375 USD, listed on Garrett's site) and still have enough left over for a couple tanks of gas, for trips out to my claims. So what do you 'Diligent Detector Prospector' forum reader think?

Beast huh? Well, beast of a price, that much will be certain...😆

Hi Goldseeker, Don't worry, I'm not creeping around anywhere near your neck of the woods, right now. To be truthful it's more NorthWest...Kelowna, British Columbia. Funny enough Kelowna, in the local native language means "place of the Grizzly bear" I live out in the woods a bit, and I do have one that turns up in my driveway...from time to time.

Hey Goldseeker5000, Thought I would say hi, from the country north of you. Nice thread, just read it all now, from the start. Hard digging, but you seem to be making a go of it. That heart nugget is a beauty of a lump. After reading about your camp bear, it reminded me of my own. Montana Grizzly country, spent a few weeks down there alone, backpacking around looking for Fenn's treasure a few years back. One late afternoon, I was in a bit of a pinch, steep terrain, sun starting to dip behind the mountain...storm starting to roll in and no place to set up camp. Steep, covered in rock or broken trees, I had to keep pushing on. Anyways, I finally found a rock shelf, with rock faces on two sides to guard against the wind, just big enough for the tent and a small fire up against one of the walls. As I was setting up camp, off to the east up the mountain, in the last bit of direct sunlight, about half a mile away... a perfect cave in the side of the mountain. I had never seen a cave like this before, it was natural, but it almost looked constructed. To either side of the opening, were what looked almost like pillars and across the top was a overhanging rock that made it look like it was balanced there...made it look unreal. So, as I'm finishing up with the tent and getting a small fire going in the lee of the rock faces, my thoughts were focused on that cave and I'm thinking to myself "well, if I was a critter living up here...thats where I would be living". I had already decided that I wasn't going to cook anything, I hung my food up an old broken tree and crouched by the fire feeding it. I didn't have a gun with me, what with being a foreigner. All that I had with me for defence was my camp machete and a can of what was purported to be "Grizzly strength bear spray" it said so on the side anyway, lol 😆. Dusk in the steep country lasts awhile, as you probably well know. I don't know if it was half an hour or an hour later and I hear this low growling, over the wind...coming from above me, from the rock wall that protected my campsite from the wind. Standing no more than 10 feet away and 8 feet up, on the edge of the rock wall was a big ass Grizzly bear. His lip was curling as he growled at me and he was kicking back dirt and debris with his front feet. I stood up, keeping my eyes locked on his as I did, careful to not break his gaze. At the same time I'm thinking to myself "this is bad...this is very,very bad" he had total height advantage over me, I never felt so small in my life. With my left foot I was kicking at the fire, getting it stirred up...sparks blowing around. In my left hand I had the bear spray "Jeez, I hope the guys that came up with that label weren't from marketing..." I raised up my right arm at a 45° angle away from me, with the machete in my hand, staring at the bear the whole time. The bear never broke gaze with me either, his lip still curled, letting out a low grunting growl with each breath. We stood there staring eachother down, for what felt like an eternity. I am thinking to myself "Well, I'm going to have to try something here..." and I shit thee not, this is what I did. I started yelling in a loud voice, excencuating my words by waving the machete around as I spoke "LOOK, I KNOW I DON'T BELONG HERE!" tapping the flat of the machete blade on my chest. "I KNOW, ALL OF THIS!" waving towards the forest "BELONGS TO YOU!" pointing the machete at the bear, who just kept staring at me...at least the growling stopped. I started again, "I'M ONLY HERE FOR THE NIGHT, IN THE MORNING ALL OF THIS WILL BE GONE!" gesturing towards the tent. I paused for a bit and then started again "I'M NOT LOOKING FOR ANY TROUBLE!..." Another pause, then in the loudest yelling voice I could muster, "BUT, IF YOU WANNA GET CRAZY!..." raising both the bear spray and the machete up "THEN WEE CAANN GEETT CRAAZZY!" The bear stood there, as though pondering my words, then made a half turn to it's left...paused and gave me the most wicked side eye look, ever...and finished his turn and walked back up the mountain, towards the cave. Now, I don't think the bear actually understood what I said, I think it had alot more to do with how I said it. I doubt whether I slept an hour that night, and it didn't help that the storm really kicked up, too. Rain, wind howling, lightning and a nearby tree got blown over, I thought the bear was back when that happened. True to my word I was gone first thing in the morning... I tell this story to friends I've had, my whole life and I can see the look in their eyes, that they think I'm bullshitting them...but this is exactly how it went down. Just thought it was worth sharing.

Bohemia Miner, Thanks for the input, nice to hear a perspective from the other side of the counter. It could be my fears of dealers raising prices are unfounded, it could be I feel this way simply because I wants one 😁 On the other hand, I have recent experience with tech related items, that prove popular, getting price bumps, such as GPU's from a couple years ago until just recently. Anyway, not my intention to hijack this thread, don't want to get too far off topic here. Have a good day.

Congratulations, That should go a ways towards the days gas and beer, nice. That lunker is a beauty.

Thanks for the welcome Swegin, I assume your handle comes from the show "Deadwood"... if it does, I cross my fingers and hold them up.

Hi Phrunt, Yeah, not much of a price difference in your neck of the woods, be a no brainer in that case to go with the 7000. For me the price difference is a bit over 3000 CAD. My fears on the price increase is not so much on Garrett's part, but dealers. As far as I know dealers can charge whatever they want for it, the MAP is just the lowest they can advertise it for and the MSRP is just that... a suggestion. Who knows really though, if I could predict the future, I'd be far wealthier 😂

Hi new member here, although I have been lurking on this forum for awhile. I am in the market for a new detector, primarily on my gold claims in my home Province of British Columbia. I thought I had made my mind up to get a GPX 6000, then I started hearing about some of the issues about bad coils/EMI, poor build quality, bad design of stem etc. This caused me to hold off on pulling the trigger on buying one. I just feel for what is a $7400 CAD + 7% Provincial tax and 5% GST, detector in my neck of the woods, I would expect a machine that runs the way it is supposed to right out of the box. Apparently, for what seems like to be too many people in my opinion, that has not been the case. To the people who bought a 6000 and have had no issues with it, thats great, I'm not looking to pick a fight over this detector brand or that one. In my mind, Minelab still builds the best detector out there. If I could afford/justify a 7000, I would buy one...but I was never really in the market for one. A 6000 was in my mind the most I could afford/justify for my purposes. By and large the majority of 6000's seem to function just as they were meant to, but given Minelabs reluctance to deal with or even acknowledge in some cases, the issues that are obviously present... it's just not for me at this time. Now, given this new offering from Garrett, I have to say, I am truly considering buying one. Steve Herschbach's opinion matters to me, even though he says he is a bit biased on this one, I think we can agree he is biased in a good way... because the Axiom checks off most of his wish list in a detector. Even though I would like to see this detector in the hands of "unbiased" i.e. regular consumers, I am finding it hard to resist the urge of signing up for pre-purchase on one of these. I think this is going to be a popular product on release, and once proven to be popular...despite what Garrett says about building up stock of the units, I fear the MAP pricing of $4000 USD we are seeing now on pre-orders is likely to become MSRP of $4700 USD in short order. It might even go higher than that if supply and demand takes over. So I ask you, the diligent forum reader, do I throw caution to the wind and pre-order now? Or wait to see what the average Jane/Joe has to say about the Axiom? I suspect I already know the answer... as my cursor hovers over the 'buy now' button... Wow, this is a much longer post than I intended, but there you go.