Bosch Professional Wall Scanner D-tect 120 (4 x AA batteries, max. detection depth plastic pipes/wooden studs/live cable/magnetic metal/non-magnetic metal: 60/38/60/120/120 mm, in cardboard)

Detects, metal and wood studs, more reliable than previous ones purchased

A very useful peace of equipment to have I found it easy to use and located electric cables pipes and metal structures in walls and floors easily

This bosch detector is great quality and does exactly what it says on this tin. I used many others but this tick all the boxes for me.

I so wanted this Bosch scanner to work but it proved too inconsistent. I have a x2 other cheaper multi stud detectors and these perform far better than this unit,

Bosch 120 D-Tect is better than other detectors of Bosch or similar products. In case of electrical cables it's working fine even the cable are not nearby water pipes. Metal water pipes also is correctly detected, in case of plastic water pipes needs pacience and correct moving of detector. As in other detectors important is training and learning how has to be moved the detector and how to have to interpret the indications of the tool. Helpful is the indication of tool in which direction has to be move the tool to center the detection. Detection is going worser when different cable/pipes/metal objects are closed. for homeworkers is a good tool and better than the green line products of Bosch, for profesionals this tool is as good as they are. 100% perfect detection in any situation will not achieved by this tool. It is better than a normal detector, but not perfect. The perfect detector still has not been developed

I tested this with pieces of wood ie studs, copper pipe, electrical cable and I think plastic pipe behind, as far as I recollect, a sheet of 13mm ply and it did accurately detect objects. The problem for me as a plumber is it does not distinguish metal or plastic pipe from stud work so I though it wasn't really much use. On reflection however if you can identify studs and their 'width' and this differs from the standard stud width, you do at least have some idea that something else there! A local store did also extoll the virtues of the GSM 120 which can apparently distinguish the two and is nearly half the price so I recturned the above. The GSM 120 I notice comes with mixed reviews but I think I am going to give it a try!Tried also getting some help from the Bosch Tools forum but there seems to be some problem with my password and have been unable to have it reset after a number of attempts to have it done automatically, as well as couple of emails and phonecalls! Phone support responsive but not technically knowledgeable.

Quite frankly, apart from live electric wires, I have no idea if this actually works or not…. It detects stuff that don’t exist. So I end up not trusting it. Besides, having to slide it against the wall leaves marks. The plastic is not suited to be sliding against white walls.

I was expecting it to pick up live cables in the wall etc but it doesn't do any better than my black and decker etc (only picks up a couple of live cables and senses something is possibly in the wall at other points).I now have 4 scanners and the other 3 are just as good and when you add the cost you could probably buy 2 sets of them for the cost of this one item.