Lowrance sonar difficulties in shallow water?

[steve-hamilton]

my 510 did it bad.

then it was replaced w/ a 520.

it was doing it as well.

i have the 2.4.2 software update (was done by angling outfitters when i bought it).

i now turn the sensitivity down below 50%, and turn the depth to auto, and find it works....but still not perfect.

BUT FOLKS, for those fishing in less than 6' of water, have you listened to your finder? it gives off some serious noise....

my rule of thumb, if its less than 5' of water, it gets turned off.

[bigmac035]

Hi. I have the head unit, an HDS-5X, and would like to find out where to get one of the 83/200 transducers. Anyone know of the part number, or a place to find the right one?? Thanks.

[Méchant Malade]

The 83/200 is accomplish by the unit not the transducer, so if you have a old transducer it will work with you're HDS 5 if you don't have one just buy the regular Lowrance 200khz.

[mikemicropterus]

Hopefully you are not running these in the automatic mode thus the neeed to follow sheldons advive on settings...mine is never in auto mode ,I have 3 units on my boat, a humminbird 757 and a lowrance flasher on the dash and another lowrance at the bow......also is the tranduser at the right angle.....I have experinced that if the sensitivity is too high too much signal comes back and it can act as interfernce and thus loses the signal... Is the big motor running or a kicker also I have seen interference from trolling motors as well....What is considered shallow becasue alot of the time if I can see the bottom I will shut off the unit and just use my eyes..jump in the water sometime and listen to the transducer and you will hear an audible clicking sound that can put the fish off or even tell them you are coming. Through conditioning they can detect the noise and some fish will move away from it.....sneeky fish....

[eye-tracker]

Hopefully you are not running these in the automatic mode thus the neeed to follow sheldons advive on settings...mine is never in auto mode

The Lowrance auto settings are designed by top Lowrance anglers for different fishing situations and saved in the operating system for instant recall. I for one would rather select a setting and spend time fishing instead of playing around with the unit all day adjusting manual settings as the water temp, density and electric interference constantly changes. Let the high tech processors in todays electronics do the calculations for you while you spend time fishing.

-sheldon

[eye-tracker]

HDS Transducers

200 khz transducer
HST-WSBL Part #106-72 Transom-mount, skimmer with built-in temperature sensor. (20 ft cable)

PDRT-WBL Part #106-89 Shoot-thru-hull mount, 20 degree pod type with remote temperature (200 kHz). (20 ft cable)

PDT-WBL Part #106-74 Trolling motor-mount, pod type with built-in temperature sensor. (12 ft cable)

-s

[steve-hamilton]

The Lowrance auto settings are designed by top Lowrance anglers for different fishing situations and saved in the operating system for instant recall. I for one would rather select a setting and spend time fishing instead of playing around with the unit all day adjusting manual settings as the water temp, density and electric interference constantly changes. Let the high tech processors in todays electronics do the calculations for you while you spend time fishing.

-sheldon

That must be the case with the new HDS models.

Personally, I dont think that is the case with previous models and big open water angling.

If nothing else, folks should turn off the auto sensitivity, auto depth, put the finder on manual mode, and turn their ping speed up. keep increasing sensitivity until noise appears, then either keep there, or reduce a couple %.

its amazing what the auto mode misses while trolling big water. (again, i have not experienced the HDS auto mode)

[eye-tracker]

Steve here is how I have run all my LCX units in auto mode...

I think the misunderstanding here is auto vs manual and what that means to different users. I will try to explain what I use in auto and what small adjustments I make.

1. I set my Ping speed to 100% the first day I get the unit and leave it.
2. I leave my units set to auto sensitivity so the processor calculates the density of the water based on surface temp and returns.
3. I then use the sensitivity slider in auto mode and push it up to 95% so the auto mode stays in the 90 to 100% range.
4. Set my depth range to auto so the unit adjusts and basis it calculations on the current depth
5. I turn off all noise reduction when I first get the unit so I see everything in the water column with out noise reduction removing echos.

With Grey Scale sonars you had to set everything to your own settings as the screen would be full of black pixels or none at all, so it took lots of tweaking.
The colour units today work much better in mostly auto modes for Sensitivity and Depth. You do need to increase your ping from the factory settings, but in most fishing situations the auto settings work well. The built in shallow and deep water trolling settings work well for most anglers and I recommend them as a good starting point with a few of the above auto adjustments.

Here is a open water sonar image from last year with the above settings...



This is an sonar recording image with the Lowrance shallow water preset from Dryden last season.


-s

[mikemicropterus]

Sheldon, I don't spend all day changing settings in manual mode, so I think you misunderstood what I meant ...My advice was to follow your advice on settings you posted in your bog for the unit you are using, if that is your experince, mine is different obviously.

We don't all get new units each season and so once you get familiar running in manual mode there is actually less adjusting to do, I have found, as it has a memory and when it powers up it uses the settings that were used the last time it was shut off.

I obviously did not say I was using a HDS model and was going from the experince from a unit I have used for the last 3 seasons and have gotten very familiar with it... In fact my x-125 I use in flasher mode the majority of the time and this setting is actually better than any auto mode as the time the processor takes to change the signal to a picture means you will miss the actual edge or breakline. I specifically bought it because it had the flasher and will not buy a unit that does not have this feature because of the real time info it gives....anytime you want see what I mean give me a call and I will show you....

Now if the units have changed that much in the past few years then I will be re-educated but I still have a hard time understanding how you can get instantaeous readings of the bottom when the processor has to take time to change the information from an electircal signal to a picture....and from your blog it would mean that if I went from shallow water to deep I would have to adjust the auto settings.... then if I went to troll I would have to adjust the unit again. and then if I went to back to shallow water I would have to re-adjust....so I'm not following what you mean, obviously if you are in shallow water for three days you don't have to do any adjusting which is the same in my case.... in less than 3 ft I said I will shut it off completely and use my eyes and my very good polarized glasses. So I spend very little time adjusting the unit and as Steve said you do lose alot of info in auto mode of most units,.

Also going through the lowrance manual for my unit they recommend not staying in auto mode and using manual to get better definftion and more info..... I didn't know you could change the water temp setting and I don't think I can on mine, I don't adjust the interference setting once it's been set, and the only setting I adjust is surface clutter depending on the water clarity, the stuff floating around.....


I am surprised that you would not use a unit with flasher mode, I know it's harder to read but once you get used to it gives more instantaneous info thus you don't miss the weededge or the drop-off or the actual top off the hump..I have been using flashers for since I was 12 and most good anglers will have both flasher and a graph running just to get more info. In fact I know of many anglers who do tournaments that only use a flasher up front.
You should try it sometime and see the difference but that was not the question, he wanted to know about losing the bottom of some newer Lowarnce units...Flasher mode is not quite the same as fastrak but it is similar..

"""I've been following the recent threads on walleyecentral.com about the difficulties some Lowrance sonar owners (500 series, LCX27/28/37/38 and even some LCX 112s) are experiencing regarding no depth readings or digital depth flashing in shallow water or in shallow water with a lot of weeds. I've been contemplating upgrading from my 8 year old Lowrance X-85 to the newer technology. Any Fish-Hawkers experiencing such difficulties with their newer Lowrance units? Thanks in advance."""

Just to refresh your memory above is the question. I like Lowrance and have been using them for more than 20 years and have had few problems. their service and turn around time is very good also...

[eye-tracker]

Mike,
I guess I just have no experience with the Lowrance units that is worth sharing with anglers that have your knowledge. I was only trying to share simple settings for the regular user that was loosing their bottom signal.

To answer the original question...
If any hawk talkers would like to ask questions about Lowrance products they can find myself, Keith Kavajcez, Doc Samson and Gary Parsons over at The Next Bite in the Everything Lowrance forum. I am sure you will get most of your questions answered, if not we will talk to Lowrance to seek the correct answer.

Fish-on...

-s