Eagle Seacharter 480

[No Mas]

I recently purchased the eagle seacharter 480 (50/200df) and really got to use it for the first time this past weekend. To say the least I was frustrated! The problem was I could not pick up my downrigger balls and was not marking any fish. Had no problem reading bottom, depth, counturs, etc...

Last year I had the 320 fishmark and had no problems at all picking them up or marking fish. Called the tech guy and explained my problem. He suggested running the unit at 50khz at all times when running downrigger's. I did this for about ten minutes and still nothing.

I had the sensitivity up, chart speed was up, noise rejection was off and low at times. Everything I was trying was not working!! Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Eastern Yooper]

Unless I'm mistaken, that unit has a cone angle that can be set at either 35' or 12'.

Your 320 had a 20' cone angle, which is pretty much the industry norm.

If your 480 is set on the 12' angle, in all likelihood it is too narrow a beam to pick-up your cannonballs due to ball swing... depending, of course, on what depth you're running.

Reset your cone angle to 35' and I bet you get what you want.

[No Mas]

Eastern Yooper,

I was not aware that if you change the unit to the 50khz that would be the 35' cone. I tried that over the weekend and I was not getting any indication of downrigger's.

Someone else said try angling the transducer down farther in the water, do you know if this would help? The lady from the tech support said that it would not make a difference and that the transducer should run level with the water.

I can pick up bottom, contours on the bottom, etc... I even picked up bait fish and fish in general while I was fishing in Manistee three weeks ago. However, the deepest depth I read was 40ft. Last weekend I was fishing in at least 80ft. Any help would be appreciated!

Tom

[Eastern Yooper]

If I'm reading your post correctly, you can see the bottom until you get over 40' of water.... and then it disappears?

OK, if the unit is set to manual mode, then it will not self-adjust for deeper water, and will only show on the screen what its reading to 40' and shallower.

So, use the "menu" buttom to reset your bottom depth.

I hope its this simple a fix; if not, I'm kinda stumped.

I wouldn't think it necessary to put the transducer farther in the water, providing it is already submerged when on plane.

[No Mas]

I guess what I was trying to say is that while fishing in Manistee I was only fishing in 40ft of water. I can always pick up bottom no matter what depth I am in. Just having trouble marking fish in deeper water, but more importantly, I cannot pick up my downrigger's!

I guess what I will try is putting the unit on 50 khz, turning up the sensitivity, and turning up the chart speed. I'll wait to see what happens, I just don't understand why I could pick them up on the Fishmark 320 and not the Seacharter??

[ESOX]

Perhaps the transducer needs to be tilted a bit more astern.

[No Mas]

Do you mean down? If so, I did that, but I have not used it since!

[Eastern Yooper]

Sensitivity should be set somewhere around 60%.

Chart speed at max.

The 35' cone angle should easily show the cannonballs.

[ESOX]

I mean so that the transducer points more behind the boat. With the way a lot of transoms are angled and with ball blowback, you might have to tilt the transducer so it's pointing mor back. (I guess you could call that up)

[ESOX]

I mean so that the transducer points more behind the boat. With the way a lot of transoms are angled and with ball blowback, you might have to tilt the transducer so it's pointing more back. (I guess you could call that up)

[MSUICEMAN]

you could say that again... sorry, couldn't help it. depending on ball weight and speed, the ball might be quite a ways out from your boat. I've even known people to run two graphs, one straight down, another to look at the riggers.

steve