Trouble Sounding fish

Big Red's, Pinkies, Pagrus auratus, Melbourne Snapper, the Crimson Tide
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Trouble Sounding fish

Post by snapper hunter » Sun Dec 10, 2017 7:43 pm

Just wondering if anyone else out here is having this problem.

Today in the bay was a total crazy Snapper bag out session, one of those days you are glad to be a boat owner BUT, I sounded all morning and I marked 1 snapper only in that whole time!

I sounded for a good hour before finally dropping the pick, and the only reason I dropped anchor is cause the sun was rising and we were were about to miss daybreak. There was absolutely nothing on the sounder when I anchored, and no marks inbetween winching in fish.

Now, there had to be fish under our boat, this place was full of fish!

I have been fishing for over 20 years and I know how to use sounders but this is my first Furuno sounder and it has been perfect up until today. My old Lowrance sounder would get electrical interference and the screen would light up with arches at all depths, fish that were not there. It seems I am having the opposite problem with this Furuno

Specs are
Furuno FCV587
B60 tranny
using dual high and low frequency

I get excellent readings of the bottom at all speeds.

I hope someone can help.

frozenpod
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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by frozenpod » Sun Dec 10, 2017 8:06 pm

If the transducer the correct angle for your hull.

Is it installed correctly?

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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by Nude up » Sun Dec 10, 2017 11:18 pm

The b60 is a through hull tx as frozenpod said check it is the correct angle for your hull and the arrow on the tx points to the centre of your hull, if it is showing the bottom I think this may be ok what settings do you have it on I have a 585 and use pic advance 2/1 shift set to 5 m zoom mode bottom lock interference auto colour erase 10% clutter 0 white line 0 TVs medium tx power 100% tx rate 10 colours 16 zoom 5m bottom lock3mt background blue. This is what I used when I ran the p66 I now have a through hull 1 kw and the difference was awesome

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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by yepi'mon » Mon Dec 11, 2017 7:37 am

What settings are you running? Could it be something simple like your set to low?

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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by snapper hunter » Mon Dec 11, 2017 7:48 am

Yep, its 20 degrees, perfect match with my hull.

Don't forget, it has worked perfectly in the past, marked up christmas trees and everything on the factory settings, but after yesterday, I am freaking out!

The only thing I can think of is the following:

1/ It was running of battery and the battery switch was switched over to the the opposite battery so was not getting any charge/voltage from the alternator. I note, the low voltage alarm did not come on.

2/ I was moving too fast, I notice I was covering more ground than the charter in the area, he was sounding much slower than me.

3/ There may be a setting that does not return arches for small fish, but I don't remember messing with those settings. Fish caught were all in the range of 2 to 4kg

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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by snapper hunter » Mon Dec 11, 2017 7:50 am

Thanks for the advice

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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by frozenpod » Mon Dec 11, 2017 10:48 am

How fast where you moving, I have picked up schools of snapper at 20knts plus with a 585 and 1kw transom mount.

I doubt the battery was the issue.

Snapper have a swim bladder (one they stand out like dogs balls on a sounder) 4kg fish would be around 75cm that isn't small compared with the sounder picking up bait fish, gars, KGW ect.

We would need a full run down of your settings to provide more detailed advice but a few basics settings I typically use.

TVG Medium for most depths
Gain as much as you can before the screen fills up with crap. roughly 6-8 with a 600W transducer.
Colour erase 10%
Clutter up to 30% but try to keep this as low as possible as you will miss out on current/temp lines ect
Advance speed 1/1
For less than 20m I use Dual mode LF/HF.

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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by re-tyred » Mon Dec 11, 2017 1:46 pm

What sort of bottom were you on? For example was it low slabby sandstone or large rocks. The reason I ask is that back in the days when I worked for furuno I spent quite some time with the South Aus Commercial snapper hand liners. they have top of the range furuno sounders , searchlight sonars and under water cameras. It was an interesting experience and convinced me that on rocky bottom, often there are fish that will not show on the sounder.
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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by snapper hunter » Tue Dec 12, 2017 8:34 am

Thanks for the advice.

I'm not sure how fast I was moving, I never have this problem so I don't worry about moving too fast. Probably between 5 to 10 knots

It was just a combination of reefy broken ground but not too reefy because there were no snags.

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Re: Trouble Sounding fish

Post by frozenpod » Tue Dec 12, 2017 8:49 am

5-10 knots is slow and certainly wouldn't have been an issue.

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