hi guys, i fish on lake erie and am a first time boat owner. i wish i had a grady but maybe next year after i get the hang of boating. my guestion is i have a two year old humminbird 937c that came with the boat that i have checked the wiring and settings and does not have any fish arches at all, never. everything else works fine. i have talked to h.b. and they want 249.00 to look at it. i dont know how many people use this brand but any help would be great. i did have i set up by a charter captain and he thinks somethings not right. thanks dan
fish finders
- Thread starter little d
- Start date
yes it does mark bottom. it has either a fish sign or arches or both for fish finding but never had arches. the fish symbol doesnt work that well either. many people have told me that the transducer should be ok then? thanks again dan
Although I do have a Hummingbird I'm not famaliar with your model. Most will have an on/off somewhere in the menu for the fish symbol. Turn off and you will get only arches. Turn on and you will only get fish symbols.
Second, check the bottom of your transducer to see if it is basically level with the water surface when you are on plane. Technically the front of the transuducer should be about 1/4 inch below the hull and the back just a bit lower so their is a slight angle.
Third, have you tried the 'gain' feature. Turning it up is like turning up the voumn on a radio. Turning up the gain should show more detail on your screen. Turn it up until you get 'snow' on the screen and down just a bit and it is adjusted properly. Gain adjustment is sometimes a automatic feature and you have to turn it off automatic to manually adjust it.
Hope that helps. (love those walleyes)
Second, check the bottom of your transducer to see if it is basically level with the water surface when you are on plane. Technically the front of the transuducer should be about 1/4 inch below the hull and the back just a bit lower so their is a slight angle.
Third, have you tried the 'gain' feature. Turning it up is like turning up the voumn on a radio. Turning up the gain should show more detail on your screen. Turn it up until you get 'snow' on the screen and down just a bit and it is adjusted properly. Gain adjustment is sometimes a automatic feature and you have to turn it off automatic to manually adjust it.
Hope that helps. (love those walleyes)
Dan, If all else fails. Keep it for the mapping qualities and buy a Lowrance for a fish finder !!!!! That $265 that HB wants to check it out will go a ways buying a new unit!!!! Does the unit have a simulator mode, may be that will show you something!!! Keep me posted.
thats what i was thinking too! 249.00 to look at it? i told hb it was only in the water once and no dice 249.00 i remounted the tranducer and went through the wiring ran a pair of 10 gauge from the batterys away from other wiring in the boat but dont now how to check it in the garage? i also told them it never had arches so i dont now? i hate to put it in the water and find out it doesnt work again. thanks for the help dan
Fish Finder Arches....
Has the unit ever displayed anything suspended in the water? I can't recall the last time I saw fish arches that the unit wasn't in simulator mode....Just had this discussion with another charter Capt. a few days ago and we were joking about what a fish must look like in order to make a "Fish Arch" on a sounder screen. If a unit is displaying suspended "things" in the water I've found that those "things" will end up in my fish box.
Has the unit ever displayed anything suspended in the water? I can't recall the last time I saw fish arches that the unit wasn't in simulator mode....Just had this discussion with another charter Capt. a few days ago and we were joking about what a fish must look like in order to make a "Fish Arch" on a sounder screen. If a unit is displaying suspended "things" in the water I've found that those "things" will end up in my fish box.
Trolling for salmon on Lake Michigan we see "hooks" all the time. Arches are fish. Fish are hooks.
The fishfinder measures distance from the transducer. Arches are formed on the screen because when the fish first comes into the transducer cone it is further away from the transducer than when it is directly under the boat.
The fishfinder measures distance from the transducer. Arches are formed on the screen because when the fish first comes into the transducer cone it is further away from the transducer than when it is directly under the boat.
If it’s any consolation my $2K setup doesn’t show arches either. Come to think of it, I don’t believe I’ve ever seen arches on any machine other than a Lowrance. Could it be……….
Not be a smart-a@@ but maybe limited or no fish around.
I salmon fish and rarely mark fish when on the troll - plenty caught but almost never marked. Will mark bait balls, big arches and schools, small to big arches. In deeper water, 100ft or greater, auto gain will not always help your arch occurance on lower end units. Try manual gain, increasing until screen clutter near surface appears...even a little mid-water column clutter is good thing. Where I do mark a lot of fish is saltwater bottom fishing, and kokanee trout fishing due in part to their abundance, and their large air blatters.
I would save my money for new boat if you are planning on upgrade to grady and then I would invest is a "quality" fish finder. 95% of the finders you read about are consumer grade units and not worth spending hard cash on IMHO. Raymarine, Garmin, Lowrance, hummingbird would not be on the quality units list. Fine equipment yes, but not the quality, top notch filtering, powerful tranducer, super adjustable, sounders that give accurate, detailed picture of the water below.
Quality untils would be anything from Furuno and the higher end Sy-Tex units. Budget about $800-1,500.00 for good unit with 1kw tranducer. Even older Color CRT units from Furuno and Si-Tex put modern consumer grade sounders to shame. Color is a must
I like the Furuno FCV 585 or the Si-Tex CVS-833c. Both of these units support 1000watts 50/200 kHz Transducers. If budget forces 600w 50/200 kHz transducer then go with Si-Tex CVS-833 or Furuno FCV-620.
I salmon fish and rarely mark fish when on the troll - plenty caught but almost never marked. Will mark bait balls, big arches and schools, small to big arches. In deeper water, 100ft or greater, auto gain will not always help your arch occurance on lower end units. Try manual gain, increasing until screen clutter near surface appears...even a little mid-water column clutter is good thing. Where I do mark a lot of fish is saltwater bottom fishing, and kokanee trout fishing due in part to their abundance, and their large air blatters.
I would save my money for new boat if you are planning on upgrade to grady and then I would invest is a "quality" fish finder. 95% of the finders you read about are consumer grade units and not worth spending hard cash on IMHO. Raymarine, Garmin, Lowrance, hummingbird would not be on the quality units list. Fine equipment yes, but not the quality, top notch filtering, powerful tranducer, super adjustable, sounders that give accurate, detailed picture of the water below.
Quality untils would be anything from Furuno and the higher end Sy-Tex units. Budget about $800-1,500.00 for good unit with 1kw tranducer. Even older Color CRT units from Furuno and Si-Tex put modern consumer grade sounders to shame. Color is a must
I like the Furuno FCV 585 or the Si-Tex CVS-833c. Both of these units support 1000watts 50/200 kHz Transducers. If budget forces 600w 50/200 kHz transducer then go with Si-Tex CVS-833 or Furuno FCV-620.
hey guys thanks for the help again, we were working on the boat last night again and i noticed that my hb is a 931c not a 937 sorry! the deepest water i fish in is 40 feet. also the machine i have is to do arches on sonar and fish sign on fish id. i have been in runs with buddys and there marking and im not right next to them. they both have lowrance units though. again thanks for the help. this unit cost 1495.00 two years ago so i think it should be a good one
hey guys, just a update on the fish finder! talked to someone at humminbird with a brain! the lady was great, she walked me threw the whole sonar settings, transducers,water depths,screens everthing then it happened_______ SHE SAID HAVE YOU DOWN LOADED ALL YOUR NEW UPDATES YET?????? and i said what updates. well it sounds like after the unit came out there were some problems. they had a program to down load the new info in the unit. well we decided to send it back for the updates and look it over for FREE!!!! thats what im talking about. h.b. looks a little better right now but she did say that the warranty is only good for 90 days so maybe wait till you need it and i said if it dont mark fish a wont need the 90 days any more! ill let you guys know! thanks for the help dan
Just my 2 cents; Very seldom do I see fish arches. everything has to be perfect for this to happen. Boat speed, fish speed and directon of travel, sonar settings, number of vertical pixels at a given depth, if you are in shallow water or deep water, using zoom, zoom helps because you are reducing the pixels in a larger cone. It takes alot of time and experince on YOUR machine to to get arches consistently. I have lost interest and many hours trying to get these arches to appear as they do on the simulator mode. Most returns are flat lines or a mass of differant shapes and colors. I have a color unit and can usually tell what type of fish I am over by the size and color of the return. If you have B&W shade of gray will tell you. I have been on boats with experienced guys who spend most of thier time changing setting of their machine to get these "arch" symbols. My advice, don't bother trying to get arches! shut off the fish symbols and learn what your machine is telling you. Just my 2 cents :lol:
Good job Dan, you kept dogging the problem and now it sounds like you have a answer. Hope it works for you !!!!