[outfishin_]

I've been ice fishing for years but never have used a flasher or fish finder of any sort......whats the difference between the two....I know that both show fish in different ways....why use one or the other......Sorry for sounding dumb ....I'm trying to figure out way my portable fish finder would'nt work for ice fishing...

thanks Ben

 

[Big Al]

I like my flasher because it tells me exactly what is down there and where it is in relation to my jig, in real time. I've never been able to figure how to get that information from a fish finder.

 

[SuperHunter18]

I have an old flasher that I cant get to work while ice fishing. I have used it in the summer and it works but not in the winter. Is the water too cold for it to work? Or does that have nothing to do with it. Maybe I can tray and insulate the transduce some how and see if I can get it to read then.

 

[live2fishdjs]

Your fish finder will work, but not as well as a flasher (go ahead LCD guys flame away ). It will show you fish and your bait, but not in real time as a flasher will. Another drawback (at least for my portable) is battery life...not near the life I get w/ my Vexilar. If it gets really cold it could freeze up or work very slow as well. But, it's better than fishing blind (I used to use one before my Vexilar and many others use them) IMO.

 

[double trouble]

like we have seen before, the guys at lowrance swear that their ice machines will work better than a flasher because they are not using an lcd. they are using a thin film transistor or tft. i have not talked to anyone that has one so it is a guess for us whether these new ice fishing finders can cut the mustard on the ice. i'd bet that in a few years we will all change over to them. like all new advances in technology , it will get more accepted ,just as lcd's first did , and now color screens.just a matter of time. as for lcd's on the ice. i use a heated shanty and they were fine for depth ,but even my humminbird real time sonar on my legend 1000 portable was not as clear as my vex.good for depth and marking fish ,but not as good marking a lure or a fish entering the hole. thats as much as i can share , my own 2 cents from the products i have used.

 

[martin1950]

Mr. Hunter, Here is a few possible solutions for your OLD Flasher. The unit just need some WD-40 sprayed in the flasher unit, Yes it will make a big mess but you might have boat-gunk in the head. If you are using OLD Lowrances' the cone angle is 22degrees, if the transducors not in the bottom of the hole you could be picking up the hole. Last but not least, I keep my unit and rechargable batteries inside the house until I go fishing. Cold batts will make a machine run slow. As far as flasher/LCD, depends on how cold it is. Always did like to watch that little fishie on the LCD swim to the left, never could catch up with him though.


Martin

P.S. See Darrin, I can post without dropping Preferance names:lol:

 

[LXHunter]

I purchased a Vexilar FL-8SE a couple years ago and I have been nothing but happy with it. Me and my buddy's have improved our ice fishing success rate 100% or more by using it. With regard to the fish finders (i.e., non-flasher type), we could never get one to work all that great through the ice.

 

[Still Wait'n]

It's hard to beat the vex. The Dave Genz website has good info. Of couse he endorses it but it's still good info.:fish:

 

[jigworm]

I use an Eagle Optima (LCD) and have not had any of the problems described above. I have no problem picking up a teardrop/spike combo in 20' of water. And the right hand side of the screen is about as "realtime" as it gets. The zoom feature is great and split screen mode allows you to watch the entire water column and the zoomed in area. Flashers are nice and probably do handle the extreme cold better, but I can't see spending $300 when I have something that works

 

[SuperHunter18]

Mr. Hunter, Here is a few possible solutions for your OLD Flasher. The unit just need some WD-40 sprayed in the flasher unit, Yes it will make a big mess but you might have boat-gunk in the head. If you are using OLD Lowrances' the cone angle is 22degrees, if the transducors not in the bottom of the hole you could be picking up the hole. Last but not least, I keep my unit and rechargable batteries inside the house until I go fishing. Cold batts will make a machine run slow. As far as flasher/LCD, depends on how cold it is. Always did like to watch that little fishie on the LCD swim to the left, never could catch up with him though.


Martin

P.S. See Darrin, I can post without dropping Preferance names:lol:

Thanks for the tips Martin!

I will give it a try again this year. Maybe I need to have the transducer below the ice. I don't think the head is the problem because it spins fine. It works correctly in my fish tanks When I try and use it in my shanty the flashing line just stays at zero. I have tried to adjust the gain but it never moves and I was only in about 20 feet of water at the most.

Can't wait for the hard water!

 

[martin1950]

Welcome to the site Still Wait'n. That lake in your backyard has some good fishing in it, now that all the weekenders are gone back out of state! A local high school student is going to show me his hotspots for ''''eyes" and other toothy critters and if he is lying to me, well, I guess my wife will just have to fail him in his class work:lol: :lol: :lol: Catch ya on the ice or sooner.


Martin

P.S. Fill out your profile.

 

[Ed Michrina]

I think a flasher is the best unit but I use a fishing buddy. One feature I like with the the fishing buddy, is it's side scanning beam. I have found more fish with that function. All you do is scan a circle around the hole your fishing from. If you mark fish, lets say 150 feet away, mark the direction and pace it off. I was surprised how many times it puts me over a small weed bed.

 

[THE BAIT SHOP GUY]

LCR's are excellent for icefishing. Problem is, most people don't know how to set them up properly. For the most part, you can't just drop the transducer in the water, turn the unit on, and start fishing. First you have to put the unit into manual mode and disable the automatic features (especially fish ID.) Turn the chart speed all the way up. With it turned up, the lag between what your bait does and what you see it do on the screen is well under a second (close enough to "real time" for me.) Next, adjust its sensitivity. Set it so that you can just make out your lure on the screen (around 85 to 90 %.) This will give you the best target seperation between a fish and your bait or a fish swimming close to the bottom.

Another good thing about LCR's is that they run on a different frequency than the flashers do. Ever try fishing in a group of guys all running the same model flasher? The units interfear with each other so much that nobody can make out what's happening under the water. I can fish just a few feet away from my body with a flasher with little to no interfearance at all.

Either way you decide to go (LCR or Flasher,) it'll GREATLY improve the number of fish you catch and you'll wonder how you ever got along without one.