Depth Sounder Thoughts

[Max Simmons]

I would like to add a new stand alone depth sounder. I'd like an in-hull transducer with a head unit on fly-bridge and lower station. Searched a bit on line, but didn't come up with anything. Any suggestions?

 

[Conrad]

We have an all Simrad system on Blue Sky; plotter, autopilot, and Structurescan for shallow (max 350 feet) depths. The structurescan has high definition and is great for looking at wrecks etc., but because of its depth limitations for us it is more of an entertainment tool.

But for serious depth readings we went with a stand alone Furuno FCV 588 fish finder. We use it primarily for depth readings but it is also very useful for finding fish. For depths, for example, it can read, on a very good day, down to 1400 feet. On average days it will always read to at least 1000 feet. No CHIRP technology involved.

The same fishfinder in a smaller size is the FCV 688.

http://www.furuno.com/en/products/fishfinder/FCV-588

 

[Jetstream]

I like the Simrad gear as well. I installed a GO9 with an in hull P79 transducer. It was a great unit and gave me good readings of bottom down to 600 feet which was the deepest water we took her out in. The unit and transducer were an easy install and you can mirror the screen on an iPad wirelessly which is what I used for our second station.

 

[Simi 60]

Sitex do a comparable unit to furuno for considerable less money.
Cover says Koden, and peel off the sitex sticker and it says koden.
Or you could just buy the more expensive koden if branding is everything.

 

[psneeld]

If looking just for depth readout and no fishfinding.....Raymarine, as well as most of the manufactures have a head unit and a similar looking data display unit for a second station.

There are much more inexpensivd units...smaller circular ones....one was by Hummingbird. Not sure they are still around with the others as they had a pretty high fsilure rate for years, the displays were small (for runabouts), and not sure they could hook up a second station.

 

[ranger58sb]

I would like to add a new stand alone depth sounder. I'd like an in-hull transducer with a head unit on fly-bridge and lower station. Searched a bit on line, but didn't come up with anything. Any suggestions?

FWIW, our two Furuno-based sounder systems are an FI-503 depth/speed/temp display with a Maretron DST100 235 Hz transducer, and an FCV-585 (fishfinder) with an Airmar B744V 50/200 Hz DST transducer. Probably more recent models available...

I understand it's useful to separate frequencies to reduce interference.

I don't know of any issues that would prevent installing a second display, although perhaps that'd be a NMEA0183 or NMEA2000 relay instead of a direect feed.

-Chris

 

[Xsbank]

I have a Si-tex and it works just fine, temperature readout too. Good price.

 

[schrater]

The two things I want a depth sounder for are to know how much rode needed for anchor and to figure out how far I can go in shallow water. I got a simple Humminbird for this purpose, and although it does decent for the former, it totally fails in the latter, since it tends to null out at about 8-10ft. I’d also like two displays for my two helm stations, but no joy there either. I hear a lot of talk about the displays, but not much about the transducers, which to me seems like the more important part. Definitely interested in cost effective options that meet these criteria.