Sounder Advice

[quigley595]

Folks,
apologies if this post is not appropriate, but I would appreciate your advice.

I had a problem with my sounder (Lowrance LMS 337) and the Navico folks were fantastic!! My problem was the transducer not reading water temp, but I also had another minor problem in the head unit. They replaced both the transducer and the head unit (with an LMS339). Thanks Navico.. great service!

I have attached 4 pics...... All are of exactly the same area. The 'OLD' pics are the old unit (LMS337), and the 'NEW' pics are the LMS339 with the new transducer.

What are your thoughts on the differences between the OLD and the NEW? Considering all the yellow stuff going almost to the bottom on the 'NEW' pics, do I have a problem with the adjustment of the transducer?

The pics are screenshots from the Lowrance Sonar Viewer 1.2.2, OLD-1 and NEW-1 are set at 80% sensitivity, and OLD-2 & New-2 are the same pics set at 70% sensitivity.
Appreciate your thoughts.

Cheers
Mike

[Cruiser]

My guess is you have the sensitivity (or power level) set too high.

All that yellow stuff is surface clutter (air bubbles etc). Were you reversing at the time? You also have a very clear second echo. That means the signal has hit the bottom, bounced back to the boat, reflected off the boat back down, bounced off the bottom again back to the boat.

Too much signal for the depth of water.

Cruiser.

[quigley595]

My guess is you have the sensitivity (or power level) set too high.

All that yellow stuff is surface clutter (air bubbles etc). Were you reversing at the time? You also have a very clear second echo. That means the signal has hit the bottom, bounced back to the boat, reflected off the boat back down, bounced off the bottom again back to the boat.

Too much signal for the depth of water.

Cruiser.

Thanks for your reply Cruiser... that was what I was thinking, although the unit was set on auto sensivity. I wasn't reversing at the time... that would have explained the clutter, so as your said, I reckon it is just too much power.

I was in about 20 feet of water in the screenshots (I think the SonarViewer program reads in feet).
Its going to be a PITA to have to set the sensitivity manually every time I go out, but if thats what I have to do, then so be it.

I was hoping for a few more replies to give me some sort of consensus, since I haven't too much experience with these things.

cheers,
Mike

[mirage]

As Cruiser said, it looks like the sensitivity/gain is way too high. Were you travelling at speed? Engine electrical interference can creat a lot of clutter.
Anyway the auto function should work better than that at trolling type speeds. Sometimes it just takes a bit of playing around to sort it out. Not much help that comment, I know!
You can get into the menu and change the feet to metres if you want too.
Cheers, Scotty.

[roydsy]

I used to get this problem with my eagle seacharter 642igps..... and by turning down the gain it fixed the problem.

happy sounding

[quigley595]

Thanks for all your replies folks..... I really appreciate your thoughts on this.

Mike

[artesian]

hello Cruiser, that is the first explanation of the second echo that I have come across that made sense to me!! And I even read the manuals of important toys like sounders.

Thanks