Fish Finder for Skinny water

[mcollins]

It escapes me now but somemone recently emailed me about fishfinder readings in skinny water. At what point do fish finders become confused and inaccurate ? Are they all subject to the same problem or are some more accurate and reliable then others. I suppose it shouldn't matter and possible I'm creating a problem here where one doesn't exist. What's the collective wisdom out there say ? Thanks

[Redfisher]

Don't know how other brands perform, but my Lowrance X-85 works fine in two foot of water. I have the shallow alarm set for three feet and that also seems to work just fine.

[Ray G]

Hi Mark,

I have a Garmin 100 that I have on the auto setting. I get readings above 1 foot of water. I know beacuse I have drifted over a couple of bars that were 1.7'. I am still getting use to it, but so far the auto setting has worked well.

Ray

[DaleH]

Mark:

That was me, I believe, that forwarded you info on depthfinders. I've seen some problems in less than 3' of water with the lower priced Huminbirds. I have the Wide Vision, which is their best 2D model, and it reads accurately to less than 1' below the hull. Meaning it'll read 1' when it is one foot below the hull, but go to 10" or less and then it starts to blink. This is a very reliable unit.

One neat feature of their new high-end units is that you can calibrate the set to display the true water depth, versus depth below the keel or actually the transducer. I saw one installed on a boat with a 4' total draft, with the transducer placed about 2' above the keel -- and the owner had the set adjusted to it read 5' when it was truly 5', so he knew he had only 1' before he hit.

I have yet to see any Raytheon unit that would work in less than 3 to 4', including their top end units with Loran or GPS integrated -- and probably wouldn't trust it anyway, which shows you how little I think of their products.

Every Eagle I've seen or used worked in shallow water, only had to adjust the sensitivity to "-1" on one unit to get it to perform in shallow water.

If I was buying one now?? I'd go for a Lowrance unit without question, they are by far the most popular unit on the wmi-boating & bass boating forums. Or I'd waggle a trip with Ray to check out his Garmin unit. Their algorithm to identify fish as an arch, as opposed to the fish shape, looks pretty impressive [same type of feature Lowrance uses].

I'd go for another high-end Huminbird, but only after I checked it out on the water and called the company. I believe that Techsonic, who makes them, was bought out, then merged with ZerCom -- their parent compnay is TeleFlex, who has a trusted name in the marine field. But their Customer Servce has unfortunately questionable as of late -- at least by the complaints on the WMI forums.

Then again, when I worked @ Bliss/West Marine, I never saw a H'Bird or Lowrance unit returned for repair [we didn't sell Lowrance or Eagle then, but still serviced them] and saw every other brand come back.

Once I was assured that H'Bird is in business to stay, then I'd probably consider another. But compared to the bullet-proof performance of all of the Lowrance units and the newer Garmin models, it would still be a tough decision.

What price range are you considering??

[mcollins]

I'm in the $200 range, I may be better off waiting until my budget catches up with me. I like the easy detachable feature of the H'bird since I may try it on my canoe