F04 Underground Wire Locator Tracer Tone Generator Kit and Probe with Earphone, Buried Wire Tester for Locating Breakage Cables & Wires Dog Fence Cables

I suspect the poor reviews may have either had defective units or the wire was buried too deep. This unit helped me track irrigawire even under turf and cement. The audio signal was loud, had to turn it down unless tracking under cement. Make sure you ground well with a screwdriver or ver long nail/spike.

I was having an invisible fence put in for the dog, and the utility companies aren't going to locate buried speaker wire for you. So rather than pay an A/V installation company to come out and locate the wires I buried, I took a chance on this and I'm glad I did. This is extremely easy to use... Stake in the ground, clip on a wire, turn the transmitter on, turn on the receiver and adjust the volume.The receiver is pretty touchy, so you have to really play with the volume to find the sweet spot for your cable depth. The tone can be really loud and annoying so I'd recommend plugging in the headphones. If you get the volume dialed in right the light meter on the receiver is actually useful. However, I had to knock off a star because the meter's LEDs are not very bright at all and were difficult to see in sunlight. Overall though, I'm happy I bought this rather than pay for someone to come mark my yard for me.

This worked to help find the hidden valve that had a bad solenoid in my sprinkler system. Definitely cheaper than having an irrigation company come out! This is not a powerful, pro-grade unit, but it does the job I mentioned well. Excellent value.

I tested this with 14 gauge electrical wire for a distance of 5 feet. Connected red and black to each wire turned on high. Tested the tone over the 5 ft distance, with Probe about 1.5 feet above the wire. Sound/ dissipated immediately after getting a foot away from the transmitter. At two feet away it I could not hear the signal at all. It seem like this is not powerful enough to locate wires that are much more than a few inches below the surface.

I needed to find an invisible fence type buried wire that was cut. This wire is typically 1-3 inches below the ground, with sections of it almost at the surface in the mulched garden areas. I can’t tell you if this would work with deeper wires but the box claims that it would.This tool worked quite well in locating the break. Quick once I was setup. Starting with a known location, I swung it back and forth tracing the wire farther and farther out, listening. The signal was distinct, louder over the wire, faded away with distance, and stopped flat within a few inches of the actual break. Then I switched the end of the fence connected to the unit and traced the wire up to the break from the other direction. I was able to find the wire by scraping away at the dirt in about an 8 inch circle down about 3 inches (In this case this was made easier by being able to see the dig marks of the work that broke the cable.). Without knowing the likely cross point I probably would have been within 16 inches.Device comes with 2 x 9 volt batteries and a small screw driver to open the battery compartments- nice touch. However with this unit, as with some others, you need a ground stake and a wire to connect the ground stake to the sender device, neither a stake nor a wire were included. You might have a piece of bare metal that can be inserted a few inches deep lying around, or an actual metal spike, and almost any wire could then connect- I needed about 5 feet of wire to reach from my dog fence wire in the garage to the ground outside.It was helpful to practice with the receiver first at a location where I knew where it was. Be sure to both turn on and then press send on both the receiver and sender (2 steps each)Except for the missing stake and wire this was a great purchase at a very low price

My use was following buried wires outside.Wires were about 12+ inches deep, and the signal was lost at about 8 inches of depth.These are wires in buried conduit that were open on both ends, with dry, powdery, rocky soil, so this did not work for me.Did not test penetrating drywall.

I have a circuit breaker to outlet tracer, multistrand cable tracer, ethernet cable tracer and metal detector all of which proved useless tracing a cable break in an underground 120 volt line. I thought about building an RF tracer or renting one of the $3000 units but then saw this. I knew the conduit was about 3 feet down or should be by code. any way, disconnected line at either end, rammed an aluminum rod into ground and hooked this to L (line). I had tones all over the place for about 10 feet in any direction. Per the booklet this puts out a 550 Khz wave, my oscilloscope said 450 Khz but seemed to be working fine. turned transmit power to minimum and tried again. picked up conduit location right away and found approximate break point. it is going to be approximate as the wave transmits in a rough donut shape from your antenna - the broken wire. close enough for a hole in the ground, worked fine. saved $.Well built, rugged enough for home use Caveats: cloth case nice but too easy to accidentally push on button and they sewed instruction pouch on upside down. the units do clip together for storage though. you must "tune" your search by adjusting transmit and receive units so think: lower is better. Comes with alkaline batteries, units high drain, needs alkaline. the airline style earbuds you might want to replace with headphones. FWIW opened cases. circuit boards good quality but absolutely not waterproof. Swinging probe in arc also not he most accurate technique. Strapped my receiver and probe to a fiberglass rod, works better holding it like a cane.

loved it