PetSafe Stubborn Dog In-Ground Pet Fence System for Dogs & Cats - Waterproof Receiver Collar with Multiple Wire Gauge Options - Secure Yard Containment Solution for Pets - Perfect for Backyard, Garden & Outdoor Pet Safety

I purchased a PetSafe Stubborn Dog System plus extra collar to replace an in-ground fence by a different vendor. My 2-year old Beagles completely ignored the correction zaps from the other brand’s system and it didn’t offer any method to increase the level of correction. My dogs kept getting out and we’re fortunately rescued by consciousness individuals, as they tried to cross busy streets.I’m hoping that this system, with the adjustable intensity, will keep my dogs, safely at home, where they still have 2 acres of land to explore and an endless supply of squirrels to chase.My only gripe was that with such a high price tag, PetSafe should include a 9 Volt Battery. They include one with the full kit, but not the extra collar. It’s a pain, when you don’t have spare 9V batteries on hand.I've had this system installed for almost two years now. It has delivered on every promise and saved us from having to purchase a fence and gate to go between our home and detached garage.Installation: The install is easy and straightforward. The tip to use a drill to wind the wire (for areas that you do not want to be secured) works great. Me and my ten year old son knocked out the install in a couple of hours on a 1/4 acre backyard.Training: As many have mentioned, do not hurry the training. Take your time and follow the instructions to the letter.My experience using it for 22 months: It works perfectly. However, I quickly realized that part of the reason it works so well is that my dog is really a wimp. We have never had to move the collar setting past the lowest. She has only ever been zapped maybe 4-5 times, including during the training. She hears the buzz and she stops. She will not chase a ball past the line and trample our garden, and she will not escape into the street. If you have a dog that simply doesn't care about the pain and would rather deal with it to get out of your property, then this may not work for you. To illustrate how well this has worked for me, I changed the battery in the collar for the first time today. I expect the next battery may last three years or more.Notes: We hoped that our dog may stop needing the collar to go out. But this has proven false. She still doesn't run away but she is smart enough to test the boundaries and wander past them if she gets a chance. The collar has been great in rain, snow, heat etc. We don't have to worry about a tight fit because the sound it emits is enough to keep her in the yard.I was so pleased that I was able to place the wires so that it only protected two areas: The vegetable garden, and the opening where she could escape to the street (these areas are pretty far apart). All I had to do was wind the wires according to the instructions everywhere except where I wanted it to act as a fence. In the areas I wanted to it act as a fence, I made sure the single wire stayed at least 5 feet away from the other side of the loop.What needs improvement? Almost nothing. I do wish there were more accurate settings for how far your dog can be from the wire to make it give the warning ring. But it's close enough to not be a big issue.We took in a rescue dog a couple of months ago. He was let go by his former owner because he kept running away and getting picked up by the pound. We were asked by the rescue association to take him in because we have a large fenced in yard with a 6 foot high wood and wire fence. Right away "Freckles" found out a way to get out under the fence. We closed up the hole but he ran away again the next day. This went on for weeks. We would fix the holes and Freckles would find a new place to get out. Thankfully he had a tag with his name and the rescue association's phone number so we would get a phone call within a couple of hours from some friendly neighbor who had captured Freckles.We finally realized that we could not win. Our escape artist was smarter than us. So I started to do research on electronic fences. The best rated fence is the wireless kind, but you need to have a yard that is a perfect circle for that to work. Our yard is a rectangle. If Freckles was allowed to go to the back of the yard the correction area was outside of our fence on the sides. The dog would have been able to get out of the fence and not be "corrected" (shocked) until he was in the neighbor's yard.So I settled on an in-ground fence. Freckles is a Brittany. Brittanys, like beagles, are known for following their noses and running off. He is not being bad - just chasing birds, butterflies, squirrels or his favorite - a rabbit.In the front yard I used an electric edger to dig the shallow 1" trench. This is several inches above the utilities in the front yard - so no worries. In the back yard I ran the wire along the top rail of the wood fence and used plastic zip ties to tie the wire to the top of the wire fence. It took a day to install the fence.When I installed the battery in the collar I had the setting on the wired unit turned all the way up. So I got a shock. It wasn't that bad. It surprised me more than hurt me. I turned the setting down to half as much and now the correction area is within 10 feet of the wire.As Freckles approaches the fence he hears an audible tone to warn him to turn around. If that does not stop him, he gets a shock. Within an hour he learned to stop and turn around when the tone sounded. He learned quickly that he can not go out of the front door or garage door - even with the door wide open.As I showed Freckles his new boundaries I told him to "be careful" as he approached the correction area. It was funny that he was very in tune to my warning to "be careful". When I told him to be careful he would stop and look at me - way before he heard the tone. He is really a smart dog.Finally our escape artist can be free to run the yard and we don't have to worry about him finding a new place to get under the fence.It should be noted that the brains of the system must be inside the house. It can not be exposed to rain or freezing temperatures. I installed ours above the garage door. I ran the wire along the door jamb and then into the ground. It should also be noted that corners can not be run at 90 degrees. All angles must have a 3 foot arch to keep the corner from becoming a dead zone where the dog can get out. The 500 feet that came with the fence was not enough. Our friendly home depot sold us another 500 feet of wire for $25. The wire is not in the electronic section. It was with the ceiling fans.After a lot of research, I decided to purchase the fence from Amazon. They have always been great with their return policy. They also had the best price. I paid the extra $10 to have the fence sent to me in two days. You only save about $40 on a used unit from eBay with a good chance of getting a used unit that doesn't work.The lighting protection unit by this manufacturer is not very well rated. So I purchased a $20 surge protector to plug the extension cord into. I ran the extension cord from the light in the garage door opener to the fence system "brains" above the garage door. I attached the wires in the garage and on the wood fence with small 1 inch fence staples - being very careful not to puncture the wire. Where I had to coil up the extension cord I used a 16 penny nail to hang the wire on.So the bottom line is that this thing is great. Highly recommended.I’ve had this fencing system installed for 3 years now and it has only recently had issues with a broken loop. We have to re-install the boundary wire. If you leave any wire exposed to sun eventually that coating will get weak and crack as did ours that we left atop our patio instead of cutting into it. We thought maybe we could just splice new wire for that section but unfortunately it did not work. It kept my large beagle within our yard while operable. It may have been damaged by weed-eating, hopefully the parts underground are in tact, we’ll see.I love it! The company stands behind their product! The instructions are good. I highly recommend!Our Great Pyrenees would NOT stay home. Roaming around with all of the neighbourhood dogs and chasing cars. After we installed this fence and had her on the collar for 2 months, she wouldn’t even cross the boundary without the collar on! This has been the BEST purchase for our dog and our peace of mind.I was initially pretty happy with this product after setting up a 3 acre fence. My dog responded very well to the training and I could trust him outside. I did not love the idea of electric fences but living along a highway it felt like the best option to have my dog free and not worry about the highway traffic.Initially the fence worked pretty good. The warning zone range seemed very inconsistent, sometimes it would beep 15 feet from the fence and sometimes it wouldn’t beep until you were right on top of it.Then one day I found my dog cowered by the house being continually shocked by the collar about 200feet from the fence line. I took the collar off and it just kept shocking constantly until I took it apart and removed the battery.Now the collar is just completely dead and doesn’t work at all near the fence line. Not sure if my case is rare but the fact that it can malfunction in this way would make me recommend against using this product to any dog owner.I have a one year old Alaskan malamute and for the life of me could not keep her in our yard. I have a already fenced in yard but she would dig under everywhere and get out. After months of trying to fix the problem to no avail I purchased the wire fence. Let me start with first by saying it wasn’t the easiest to instal. There are multiple ways of installing this and because we have an existing fence we decided to go with the method it recommended and weave the wire through the chain link fence. Sounds easy enough but it would always get tangled and was quite the task of pulling hundreds of feet of wire (our yard is almost an acre). You also have to weave not onlyThrough the bottom but then comeBack around through the top and your fence must be at least 6 feet high. We had three breaks that were easy enough to splice back together. You then have to have the home base of the unit inside a warm place. We have a heated garage so we had to drill through the wall and connected the wires. After finally installing it all I could not believe that I now have a dog that no longer escapes!!!!!!!! My husband thought I was crazy and it would never work BUT it really did. She now doesn’t even go close to the outer fence and it was all soooo worth doing. I will say I have a friend who tried this without the existing fence and their dog would just run right through it.. that’s my story and I hope it all works out for anyone else who purchases this product. CheersBest deal on amazon, or anywhere else for that matter. Bought a cheap 90$ first and was immediately regretting it as soon as it was set up, what a piece of junk. Then I found this one. Amazing quality and a ton of great features. I set it up in a Thursday and my Sunday, my 9 month old golden doodle knew what to do. Very happy I didn’t spend 3k plus on an actual invisible fence brand system and there training. Sooooo easy!It worked really well in the beginning, but after a month I found that I had to keep turning it up because the collar wasn't as sensitive. This also happened with my previous pet safe fence/collar. You have to keep turning up the sensitivity over time as the dog was able to keep getting closer. The battery in the collar is still good. I like that it now uses 9 volt in the collar instead of button cells. I can use rechargeable batteries now and 9 volt seems to last longer. Over all it works well and beeps first giving the dog time to get away before getting shocked. I gave it 4 stars because it's pricey for what you get.