Valentine 1 stealth mounitng/laser falsing

[Jean Welter <jfw2@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 11:39 10/12/98 -0400, you wrote:

>Hey Gang!
>
>Does anyone here on the BMW digest have a Valentine 1 radar/laser detector
>mounted on the rear deck inside the third brake light assembly?  I have just
>installed my V1 in such a way, and I'm getting an almost constant rear laser
>falsing.  It seems to me that the red plastic changes the wavelength of the
>sunlight and causes the detector to false.  (I can't wait to test that
>theory at night)  

Some of these units develop a fault (probably a flaky IC) that makes them
sensitive to heat. I suspect your unit is getting baked nicely on the rear
deck. (So doing your test at night will likely give you a false positive
result). Valentine Research seems to be aware of the problem and, at least
in my case, repaired the unit at N/C even though it was slightly out of
warranty. The symptoms were the same, persistent rearward laser falsing,
only during daytime. (Actually went away if the unit was cooled.) Give them
a call.
BTW, the red plastic will filter some wavelengths out of the sunlight, but
unless it fluoresces in the near-infrared, (possible, but rather unlikely)
it won't "change the wavelength".

Good luck,

Jean

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