Garrett Sea Hunter MKII Metal Detector

Great Machine - I would give 5 stars but the shaft is pretty cheesy! It wiggles and rattles enough that one of the nylon nuts loosened and fell off on my first outing! Fortunately it came with a few extras... probably because I'm sure it happens a lot!I do beach salt water detecting, and it's amazing. When you consider price vs it's competition, I'll take the Sea Hunter every day.Hunting in, or near salt water is a little different (especially in Florida) -- there is no discrimination on this machine, but if you really want to find the good stuff, you dig everything, and this machine finds everything, and at great depth. So if you're impatient, you'll be frustrated with the Sea Hunter, but it's far better than anything I've used at the beach so far. It's probably not the machine for local parks, that would drive anyone crazy.

This is my first metal detector so I only have experience with one that a friend had twice before. I chose this one over less expensive models because I am an active scuba diver with over 700 dives. I travel quite extensively (Only home 3 months last year) and I needed something that was collapsible. I saw this as something to add to my dive gear or just to use on the beaches. I spend a lot of time in Guam, japan, Singapore & the Philippine Islands. This looked like it would be a fun thing to try. So far I haven't had a chance to dive with it. Just got it a month ago. I have had fun on the beaches at home. Still learning. Probably my favorite feature is putting the controller on my hip. It makes swinging the coil back and forth less strenuous on my arm.

The Garrett Sea Hunter Mark II was something that I was so looking forward to using as reviews indicated that it is great in sea water and has little to no chatter. The box it came is quite plain (no issue), but the inside of the box which contained the pieces in separate compartments was not well made. I took out items that had been rolling around in transport and had to cut a hole bigger than the piece it was squeezed into, in order to get the piece out. The small manual has NO instructions on how to piece it all together. In the end I had to watch the Garret video online. The plastic screws seem flimsy, and the mounting brackets for the detector box were impossible to piece together with plastic screws as the screws were too short (despite trying to squeeze the brackets as best I could). The worst part when I managed to put it together, is that the two stem rods do not piece together properly and jiggle and wobble so much that it becomes useless to detect with. The rods are made very cheaply, are thin metal and are a substandard product. If you fix the detector box to the stem rod, the metal brackets that hold it to the stem cover up the instructions displayed on the box. An altogether very frustrating and disappointing experience over what I originally thought was a great detector. I have returned it.

Have edited since a new one shipped from the factory--- LOVE IT!I use this as part of a veteran diving program. Its important to get our divers in the water and finding stuff as part of their therapy. This unit has been incredible and we are ordering more this week.This last weekend I did a 1hr 20 min dive and a 2hr 10 min dive in 43 degree water with 1-3 foot vis. I found several relics, about $4 in change, and a nice pendant. I was uncovering items as much as 8-10 inches beneath the mud and muck. Highly recommend!

So far this has been a great product. Takes a little time to get the hang of it for pinpointing finds. I suggest the purchase of a sand scoop for retrieving hits underwater. I don't use it on shore because it doesn't allow to much discrimination compared to my other detector. However it would do fine for shore hunting. Five stars to METALDETECTINGSTUFF.COM for the great support after the sale..