Favorite Fishfinder

[TenMile]

quote:Originally posted by eastpoint

Baz and others

What type of charting would you recommend, I just bought and installed a Raymarine A50D, is 3D worth the extra dough? Have you wired up the DSC signal to your VHF?

Navionics Gold or higher is recommended as you get much greater detail.

Yes, set up the DSC -- it is very simple to do -- just connect 2 wires and make sure that your sounder is sending at the proper bit rate to your radio (mine wants 4800 baud). You have to get your radio and boat registered with Industry Canada (free and can be done online) and they send you an MMSI number that you enter into your radio. Much easier to tell your guests to press the red emergency button on your radio.

I have 2 systems -- an older Lowrance LCX-104c (10 inch colour screen) and a Raymarine C-70 (6.5" colour screen). The Lowrance has much better resolution and the menu is much more intuitive to follow -- the Raymarine comes with a 2" thick user manual and it's needed!!!

If you are buying new, go with one that openly supports the NMEA-2000 standard (and uses that connectivity) -- no more crimping wires and mess making -- also lowers the cost of add-on components you want to buy (like an extra GPS or sounder, Sirius Weather Radio etc...). While Raymarine indicate they support NMEA-2000, all of their cabling is still proprietary (just ended up making my own cable last weekend to connect the Raymarine to my Lowrance NMEA-2000 GPS and fuel flow monitor).

PS: I've seen some pretty wild pictures from the Broadband sounder. They now have a side-looking Sonar -- one guy on another site posted pictures of a wreck about 100ft below and you could clearly see the detail of the hull in 3d -- it was very cool. Seemed to show fish is high detail as well rather than just a blip on the screen.

TenMile
<'((((><

 

[eastpoint]

Thanks Ten Mile

Would you go with 3D(platinum) or 2D(gold)? Platinum is about $100 more.

I will hook up my DSC as you recommended. Sometimes I go out to Switfsure in 20' boat, would be nice to have DSC just in case.

 

[Labman]

Lowrance HDS-7
Full meal deal, still figuring it out (-:, may have to get my teenage daughter trll me how to work it!

 

[baz]

the lowerance went with the boat,
when i got my glasply i wanted a bigger screen,
but if i didnt buy the a60 new, i would have sold it and purchased another lowerance instead.
i didnt get the 3d card, i got the gold one, but you have to zoom in to get detail.
still havent hooked it up to the vhf, that now gives me another project!!

quote:Originally posted by Gone Fishn

Curious why did you upgrade to that from a 525? Screen size?

 

[TheBigGuy]

quote:Originally posted by baz

ive just upgraded to the raymarine a60 from a lowerance 525,
ive only had a chance to use it twice so im no expert on it yet, but i goto say im missing the lowerance.
for some reason when ive got the balls down the unit thinks that the depth the balls are the sea bed?? when really its off by 100ft?
i might mess around with the sensitivity an see if that fixes it
anyhows theres ma 2 cents

You could turn the sensitivity down, but then you may miss a lot of detail. The best way IMO is to change the angle of your transducer. Point the transducer more towards the bow at maybe a 20 degree angle. This will usually keep you from picking up the balls on the sounder. It also helps get a good bottom reading when running at full throttle.

 

[IronNoggin]

HumminBird 917CX Combo
200/83 kHz dual transducer (60 & 20 Degree Beams)
7" Brilliant Color Extra Wide (480 V x 800 H) Display
50 Channel WASS GPS Chartplotting
4000 Watts Power Output

This unit plugs into the intuitive Canon/Humminbird Digitroll System, which remotely operates Canon 20DT/TS Stainless High Speed, High Power downriggers (up to six if you so desire).

In a word: AWESOME!!

Cheers,
Nog

 

[TheBigGuy]

I was in Steveston Marine yesterday and was thinking of getting a new GPS/sounder unit. I have been partial to the garmins, and was thinking of getting another one. They had no Garmins in stock (except one old 2008 model). They told me all 2009 models were on recall because of chip problems. I thought that was only a minor bug affecting a small number of units. I was a little surprised to find out everything was under recall. Is that why so few people are recommending the Garmin units. I have found their sounders and GPS units pretty good up till now.

 

[Copper Moon]

I was going to buy a Garmin until I discovered that their Vancouver Island chart card did not contain all the detailed charts that the Navionics cards did. It would be okay for cruising, but I needed the detailed charting for my area (Nanoose).

 

[Time]

I should know a better way to phrase this with you guys, but how important is size?
Gps or gps/sounder combo is on my wish list, but wondering about the minimum (I have a small boat) screen you would consider useful. An 11" would be wonderful, but wouldn't fit my dash area (and would break my toy bank account). The cheaper models - all makes - have screens that look awful small, and impossible to keep a casual eye on.

 

[profisher]

I bought a Furuno 585 this spring. Its a 1kw unit with a 8.5 screen. Its a stand alone sounder, no GPS/plotter. I have a Lowrance LCX-16 for that. The Lowrance is showing signs of crapping out soon so I decided to go with the Furuno as my main sounder and will replace the Lowrance when it dies. I will use for that for my GPS/plotter and as a spare sounder. The combo units are handy but when they die or act up you loose all your toys.
The Furuno is awesome, nice display and easy to use. I have it hooked up to a big (18 pound) bronze transducer, so it handles the 1kw of power well and detects pretty much everything. Not cheap $1750 for the sounder and another $750 for the transducer. I had a Furuno paper sounder years ago and it was the best sounder I've had for detecting individual salmon. Paper is still the best at that, wish they still made them and the paper. This new Furuno is a close 2nd.

 

[The Fish Assassin]

quote:Originally posted by Pablo2079

Probably not in the same ballpark, but I'm currently shopping for a portable for my tin can. I've been searching on ebay, but it seems like a large percentage of portables only go to 99 feet.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Paul

Try Wal-Mart or Candian Tire I've used portables from both stores.

Take only what you need.

 

[The Fish Assassin]

I will see you all of your fancy sounders and say that without a doubt the best sounder I have is a papergraph sounder. I have never seen a sounder actually work like the demo's on them , but with the paper graph you can pick out individual targets amongst a ball of bait. It draws a nice ARC for salmon. The paper replacement is an issue, but for detail I would choose no other.

quote:I should know a better way to phrase this with you guys, but how important is size?

The wife seems to like it big.

Take only what you need.

 

[profisher]

Paper is the best by far, nothing on the market now can compete for seeing individual fish. The resolution is just not high enough on the small screen. I wish they still made paper and the sounders, I would buy one tomorrow. Yes they are a bit messy and stink, but they work!

 

[Fishing Guide]

Cheers All,

I have been a fan of Lowrance for years ... from the first flasher graphs in the late 1970's to the fabulous colour plotter/sounders (currently have a X-113C).

I have several rolls of paper and stylus's for the Lowrance paper chart fish finder. An amazing unit for detail. Let me know if anyone wishes to purchase some rare supplies for this unit.

Sincerely,

Fishing Guide
www.invictuscharters.com
BC Outdoors Pro Staff

 

[Silver Lining]

I bought the 2008 Garmin 5000 8" touch screen.
4 Kw HD digital Radar. Through hull transducer.
NMEA 2000 connections and NMEA 180 connections,
DSC connection to VHF. Bluechart chip.
The unit has been awesome. The 3d fisheye view is great when navigating channels with the downriggers down. Chart definition is great, looks like Google earth with actual photos of most moorages.
NMEA 2000 allowed me to hook up the new Yamaha 250HP engine to the plotter for full gages and fuel etc. shown on the screen. I believe that Yamaha is the only one with NMEA 2000 output. The engine uses it's own triducer to get speed for fuel consuption. Hooking the engine to the screen allowed me to avoid the hassle of the speed wheel in the through hull transducer. Hooked it up myself and was pretty impressed when it all actually worked.