too touchy

By frederichb1349208 Ranked #261 - Avalanche Beacons March 23, 2010

I just received the pulse from Backcountry with software version 3.00. I got an opportunity to take it to Mt Baker beacon park for some trials. I was pretty stoked. We turned on 3 beacons buried at a respectable depth. As soon as I turned the pulse on it identified 3 beacons and I started off after the first signal. The secondary search went quick and the pulse switched into pinpoint at 2.8. While trying to work a grid the beacon would throw up the hand signal asking me to stop. It did this about six or seven times taking from 4 to 20 seconds to acquire the signal again. Twice the beacon returned from the stop sign and acquired a more distant signal showing the arrow and a reading of 20 or more, even though I was still in the 2.8 zone of the first signal. Both times it did this it took a while for the beacon to realize there was a much closer signal. All in all the beacons were found but it took a long time and considerable baby sitting.

I thought maybe its all the cell phone interference of a busy place like Mt Baker. So I took my 2 old trackers and placed them in my back yard. One laying flat and the other on its side. The pulse immediately switched from primary search to secondary and I went quickly to within a few meters of the first signal. The beacon then switched into pinpoint mode and I started working a grid. The stop sign comes up and I wait for a few seconds and it picks up where it left off. The stop sign comes up again and comes back with the further second signal on secondary search mode. But after about 10 seconds it returns to the pinpoint mode of the first signal. I mark the first and move on to the second and get the same behavior. So now I'm thinking I had my call phone on in my hip pocket. I turned it off and repeated the exercise with the exact same results.

Now here's where it gets really weird. I switched the beacon into basic mode and repeated the same search for both beacons. The first beacon was found with a couple of short stop signs and I marked it. I moved to the second and go pinpoint mode and up comes the stop sign. But this time when it comes back it fixates on the marked beacon and takes me there into a pinpoint search where I mark it found. The first beacon was marked twice and the second tracker never found!

In summary, in advanced mode, the pulse will find the targets with a lot of fuss and baby sitting. It is not fast but will eventually get you closer to the target than an old Tracker. In basic mode it could trick a searcher! This beacon takes considerable practice.

View Details: Mammut Pulse Barryvox Avalanche Beacon

Helpful Votes: 1 Yes