fishfinder/sonar question

TNReb

TNReb

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I'm completely new to using fish finders. Before buying one last month, I had never used one in my life other than being on someone else's boat and looking at it.

I have a Pelican 10E (10ft plastic boat) with a 55lb trolling motor.

I bought a cheaper unit - a Lowrance Elite-4x. I've used it about 10 times so far. I run it at 200kHz and I'm typically in 5-20ft of water, but occasionally cross the river channel where its 50-70ft.

However, I've never seen a fish "arc" - not one single time. Not even anything that remotely resembles an arc. All I see are random blobs. I have no clue if they're fish, trees, etc.

Question 1: Is this normal for boats moving at slow speeds with only a trolling motor? I read somewhere that the "arc" is a result of passing over the fish at high speed. Is this true? If I should be seeing arcs, did I just buy a crappy unit or is mine defective? Or am I expecting too much from it?

----

I have my transducer mounted to the bottom of the trolling motor using the bracket & zip that came with it. However, when I turn the trolling motor on, my sonar display seems to display a lot of interference.

Question 2: Is the prop interfering with the ping? Do I have this mounted like an idiot?

ccbokYd.jpg
 
I have no clue but I'm thinking mounting the transducer where you did is probably not right. Someone here has to know.
 
Are you getting the same interference at all speeds on the trolling motor? Mounting looks correct to me.
 
Is your unit equipped with downscan imaging? If so I believe that is why you are not seeing the typical fish arcs. I have a dsi unit and it is difficult to retrain my eye what fish look like on it versus my older 2D? unit on the bow.
 
I mounted my transducer just a little further back (maybe 3/4") on my trolling motor housing also
 
Bullfrog said:
Are you getting the same interference at all speeds on the trolling motor? Mounting looks correct to me.
Click to expand...

When I'm trolling real slow at 10% or so, there doesn't appear to be much interference. When I'm going "fast", it is noticeable.

ADR said:
Is your unit equipped with downscan imaging? If so I believe that is why you are not seeing the typical fish arcs. I have a dsi unit and it is difficult to retrain my eye what fish look like on it versus my older 2D? unit on the bow.
Click to expand...

Nope. No downscan imaging on this one.


The screen looks similar to this - except no arc shapes anywhere. Just blobs of random shapes.

max-mode-switchfire-300x218.jpg
 
Everything on the screen you posted is something. For example, the blob in 17 ft of water above the temp is a school of bait fish. If you took a picture of your screen, I think we could get you a better idea of what's going on. Many lowrance units have a record feature where you can put a strip of imaging in the memory.
 
I'll try and snap some pictures when I go out this weekend.

It just seems odd to me that everything I read about sonar units talks about "arcs". I've probably ran my unit at least 30 hours and never noticed an arc.
 
Mount looks correct but you could mount it to the boat if you wanted to... just mount it where its in the water and where it will not get knocked off. If you can reset your unit... take it to default settings it may help just in case you've got something out of whack.

if I was going to mount it to the boat I would glue a piece of thick plastic to the boat and then screw the mount to it instead of screwing it to the boat and making holes. The best option for your boat may be some kind of fold down mount that will bring the transducer head out of the way when not in use. It should also eliminate interference... or at least decrease it since youre moving away from the trolling motor. They will work even when just dropped over the side of the boat into the water. Try youtube for videos on mounting to kayaks and other plastic boats... there are a lot of ideas there that may be useful.
 
Mounting is absolutely correct. I'm no expert at interpretting the images either, but the settings are important. I've learned to adjust sensitivity until I see what I want and get rid of the rest. For example, When I'm spider rigging for crappie I will lessen the sensitivity until I only see larger fish. I'm not interested in baitfish at that time. Just where the schools of crappie are holding.
 
monsterbuck07 said:
Nyper that's the unit I am looking at but now you have me worried haha. Hopefully it's not a big deal.
Click to expand...

Bass Pro just stopped selling this on their website, but it had excellent reviews (it is still available in the Nashville store). I bought it based on the other reviews. My dad has the same one and hasn't had any problems out of his. I'm sure I'm just doing something wrong. Probably need to adjust the sensitivity or something.
 
I see several "arcs" (fish) in that shot... Different fish will create different size and shape "arcs".
 
Get us some screen shots. It could be a number of things. It would help to take some on a place you know there are fish.
 

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