Depth Sounder Interference

[Brooksie]

I have two sounders aboard. My old "flasher" below interferes with the digital sounder readout on the bridge although the opposite is not true.
any ideas what might be done to prevent this? The transducers are quite close to each other Thanks

 

[FlyWright]

They're probably fixed on the same frequency. I bet the flasher is the more powerful of the two.

 

[Gbinterim]

I had the same problem, so I installed a toggle switch on my electrical panel. The solution was simple and inexpensive.

 

[aboatman]

That's pretty common if you have two depth sounders because they will read each other's signals. If you can change the frequency of one, that might solve your problem. Otherwise just use one and turn the other one off.

 

[JDCAVE]

The technical term is “cross talk” and a usual occurrence if they are both on the same frequency. However it can also occur with different frequencies. One sounder on at a time, I’m afraid.

 

[Brooksie]

Thanks for the feedback. The new digital one isn't very good anyway; it doesn't seem to want to "take responsibility" in shallow water and goes blank on me. I'll try another one and see if I can find one that uses a different frequency.

 

[High Wire]

It might be time to let the flasher go.

 

[Peter B]

Thanks for the feedback. The new digital one isn't very good anyway; it doesn't seem to want to "take responsibility" in shallow water and goes blank on me. I'll try another one and see if I can find one that uses a different frequency.

Brooksie, I'm surprised your new digital one does not have a dual frequency option. Most do. I have 3 sonars on my boat. One old flasher at the lower helm which came with the boat, but still works. It has a simple digital readout as well as the flasher, and is on about 190khz I think. However, for redundancy and convenience I also got a a couple of new (then) quite inexpensive Lowrances, (monochrome displays), but dual frequency as option 50 or 200khz. The one on the flybridge is set on 200khz, and the new one same model at the lower helm I set on 50khz, and all three can be used at the same time with no interference.

Check if your digital one has another frequency option, and try that if it does. it will probably solve the issue. If not, then turning off the least helpful one for the occasion is the only option - or get another better one as you say, but make sure it has the dual frequency option. They aren't that expensive unless you go for large colour screens.