Hervey Bay

[Ronald2boats]

Taking the missus and the dog out on the bay tomorrow for a spot of fishing and other leisure activities. Going to try sleeping on the boat for a couple of nights to see how that goes.

This will be the second time we will have put the Yalta in the water. It's too easy to let things get in the way.

I will let you know how the fishing goes, but be prepared to take everything with a grain of salt as a great fisherman I ain't.

... Ron via mobile

[Ronald2boats]

... Ron via mobile

[FisHard]

Great looking rig mate, have a good trip

[Ronald2boats]

Ok, not a perfect trip but it was good to try out the boat and see what it was like for sleeping on. A bit of a rambling report follows.

Weather was a bit ordinary and I can now see why people have told me to avoid northerlies in the bay. We did have some massive storms go through, but thankfully they went south of us as we holed up at Moon Point.

Fishing did not go too well as the sounder had problems even before we left the harbor. It lost bottom almost immediately and then eventually came 'good' but intermittently went to shite again. I checked the connector on the back of the sounder and it was seated ok. I did a factory reset and set the transducer but it still went bad at times. I noticed that the sounder made loud clicking sounds that seemed to get louder when the screen filled with crap. I understand that the clicking sounds might be normal, but I am not sure if the change in volume of the clicking might indicate a problem with the transducer. I might buy a new one unless anyone has a good suggestion about how to fault-find. The sounder is a Furuno 587 with a B60/20 through-hull transducer. Given the transducer mounting, it will be difficult to become fouled and there is no indication that it ever was.

Well, despite the sounder problems, we tried dropping a line on the artificial reef outside Woody but did not come up with anything.

We had anchored for a while, and used a large recovery float to retrieve. The anchor is a home-made mooloolaba pick and weighs a ton along with the decent amount of chain. The first attempt to retrieve saw the float sink under the water and not come up. I added a second smaller float and that did the trick. While having a big heavy anchor is great for keeping you in one spot, I think this anchor is overdone in the weight department and I will probably replace it with a much lighter one.

We cruised around looking for structure but did not find anything significant. The Roy Rufus must be sparsely populated or we missed everything, or the sounder was just not working properly. Rather than do nothing, we dropped a line and drifted over the reef a few times anyway. We then trolled some soft plastics while slowly cruising the inside of Fraser but did not get any hits.

We went north around MOON Point after lunch intent on checking out some of the creeks for a nice anchorage, but the bay was getting really uncomfortable at that stage and we decided to head back to Moon Point and relax with a beer instead. The storms and lightning that headed to the south of us were entertaining, but I heard that some boaties further south were less entertained.

We dropped some bait while anchored at Moon Point and lost tackle to large toads but did manage to catch a whiptail.

Sleeping in the cabin was ok for the two of us - which was good to now know, as it opens up some possibilities like overnight trip to the bunkers etc. The boat is actually a decent size and has a decent amount of storage and we were rarely tripping over our stuff. We had only ever previously slept on large boats such as 44ft cats and houseboats, so this was anew experience.

The dog was also a bit of a problem, as we had really house trained him well. He refused to do his business on a piece of artificial turf we had brought along. He kept looking at the back of the boat wanting to be let outside to do his business. Well, he really held on and in the end we beached on a sandbar the next morning to let him have a run and boy was he relieved. Not sure that he will be coming again. Overall, he was really well behaved.

The next morning, we trolled soft plastics back to a GPS mark I had for "Nimbi Ledge" but got nothing on the troll. Did a cruise around and really could not see anything resembling a ledge and only a few signs of small fish. We decided to drift for a while with some bait on the bottom but nothing biting. We drove back over the artificial reef to see if we could again find any structure but nothing stood out and nothing really biting when we drifted over it a few times.

The weather was starting to look a bit dark and the wind was coming up again though no rain on the radar. We decided to head in and call it a day. The sounder intermittently went stupid on the way back. I did get a pic of the screen while it was going off and I will add to this post. It still had lock at that stage though. From (fading) memory, when it loses lock, the screen shows a hard surface return and the depth shows as "---" which is not good in a shallow bay with shifting sandbars. Anyway, your thoughts on this would be appreciated.

Before the weather turned on the final day, I did push the throttle up just to see how she went. It was into a slight swell/chop and maybe 5-8 knots of wind (my guess). Yalta 2200 Fisherman with Suzuki DF150 running a 3 blade 15 x 21R prop., 190 litres fuel plus two adults, one dog and maybe 200kg of eskies, food, water, beer etc 'topped' out at 5800 RPM and a touch over 60kph. She may have had a bit more in her had I let her have her head a bit longer. I imagine it would also be better on smooth water and no wind. Anyway, just thought I would share as it seems to be a topic of interest.

I did notice that trimming the engine did not seem to make much difference to the Yalta's speed though it did to the handling. My previous Whittley 1750 got a significant boost by trimming up whilst on the plane. I guess each boat is different.

The trip was a good experience and some lessons learned.

1. I need a reliable sounder and fixing this is a high priority.
2. I do need to get some good GPS marks as fishing without catching isn't really that enjoyable, particularly as skipper where just drinking instead is not an option. So far few of the GPS marks I have found are much good. I suspect that wily fishos plant false GPS marks just for giggles.
3. I need to re-evaluate the anchor situation.
4. I need to reconsider taking the dog or coming up with some way that he would be happy to relive himself in a place of my choosing.

On the plus side:

1. The boat is a pleasure to drive and use. It has a large fishing cockpit that would be the envy of many.
2. Sleeping on the boat, while not exactly great, has proven that it would be ok for the two of us for a few days.

I thinks that's about all of interest.

[Any_Weather]

Hi Ronald, thanks for taking the time to write about your adventure. On the sounder front, did you try reducing the gain? A gain of 8.1 in less than 3m is extremely high and the reason you were hearing the clicking getting louder I suspect.

Cheers
Lee



Sent from my iPhone using Ausfish forums

[Ronald2boats]

Thanks, that makes sense re clicking. I did try auto modes, and manual with various gains when it was not working. It's was fully auto when it first lost the plot.

... Ron via mobile

[Crunchy]

You describe exact same issue I had with my old 627, I could never work it out so just lived with it, turning it off and on again fixed the issue for a while....it would happen again though....rapid changes in depth seem to freeze the unit as you describe.

[Ronald2boats]

An update on the sounder.

I decided to contact Furuno support which is done by JN Taylor in Brisbane. I spoke to a couple of guys (Luke and Haden) who were really helpful. I was pleasantly surprised that they took the time to walk through the problem and possible solutions. In the end, there was little that I could do other than to try transducer swaps or have the head-unit tested.

As I was dubious about how well an intermittent fault could be found by bench testing, I decided that I would be better off trying another transducer. I have thus ordered the Furuno P66 to stick on the transom to see if this resolves the issue. If it turns out that the transducer was not the issue, I might have a P66 for sale ;-)

Given that sending the head unit down for testing was more expensive than the P66, it was the better option in my mind. At worst, I have a fallback transducer that did not cost too much.

An update on the anchor.

I weighed the anchor today and it comes in at around 10kg. If you add the chain, it comes 17kg. Given that the 300mm styrofoam ball only displaces 14 litres of water the problem becomes obvious. I think I will tackle the anchoring on two fronts:

1. I will buy an inflatable float such as https://www.roadtechmarine.com.au/te...ia-mm/p/MAE242 which should give around 28kg of lift.
2. I will buy a 12/13mm reef anchor for temporary anchoring for reef fishing (rather than the mooloolaba pick).

I will also pick up a sand anchor for when tying up the stern to the beach (with the plough anchor on the bow).

[Dignity]

Ron, the float you have should be good for your anchoring, the inflatable ones will will collapse in any depth of water due to pressure. A 15 lb MBA pick is about the right size for your boat so I guess yours would be twice the size needed, also carry a good dan forth if anchoring in sand as those storms can play havoc and Fraser like Moreton has its own weather pattern due to having both sides surrounded with warm water.

Your sounder should only cost around $18 parcel post (i just sent a 3.2 kg package)so I'd be interested where your getting those cheap P66 from 😆

[Ronald2boats]

Thanks Dignity, I did not consider the pressure effect on volume. I will get a smaller anchor first and reassess the lift requirements.

The Furono guys quoted me an hour's work (inspect, reflash software and running in test tank all day) plus return shipping which would have been $158 plus my shipping costs - so maybe $180ish all-up. I ended up getting the P66 for $150 including shipping, but under $18 would have been nice!

At least by being able to swap the transducers as needed, I would be able to more definitive on whether the fault is in the head-unit or with the transducer. The only other way would have been to pull out the thru-hull B60 and send that down too; but pulling it out and refitting it would have been a pain.

[Sheik]

Not sure about the inflatable balls but I've heard good things about inflatable anchors Ron. Apparently they are quite easy to retrieve...

[Ronald2boats]

Great idea!

... Ron via mobile

[Crunchy]

Thanks Dignity, I did not consider the pressure effect on volume. I will get a smaller anchor first and reassess the lift requirements.

The Furono guys quoted me an hour's work (inspect, reflash software and running in test tank all day) plus return shipping which would have been $158 plus my shipping costs - so maybe $180ish all-up. I ended up getting the P66 for $150 including shipping, but under $18 would have been nice!

At least by being able to swap the transducers as needed, I would be able to more definitive on whether the fault is in the head-unit or with the transducer. The only other way would have been to pull out the thru-hull B60 and send that down too; but pulling it out and refitting it would have been a pain.

Damn, got a brand spanking new P66 for sale for $100 delivered - never been opened, came with my 588 the other day, next time ask heh!

[Dignity]

Dan, just bought a P66, I knew I should have waited.

[Dignity]

Not sure about the inflatable balls but I've heard good things about inflatable anchors Ron. Apparently they are quite easy to retrieve...

😂😂😂😂😂, I like the way you think.