Side scan sonar

[Nick Clayton]

I have side scan on my new sound boat. Played around with it a bit, but thus far haven't found any use for it.

From what I've seen, until you get into the super high end stuff it's not going to be of much use for our salt fisheries.

I know a couple of the big charters in Westport have serious side scan systems and use them a lot, but those systems are thousands and thousands of dollars and not the type of thing that is typically installed on most sport boats.

 

[headduck]

We have side scan too... I imagined it would be great fishing shallow kelp beds... like out near neah... catch the suspended black and blue schools... but fish are everywhere there anyway...

Tried it trolling to see if I could see a school I was missing off port or stbd... nothin...just too much water and takes display space that is better used for other features.

Seems best for shallow rivers and lakes...which the boat would never be in.

We did throw some cash at a 1kw ducer the size of a swim step... it does its job in the standard archway but super wide beam. That was a useful upgrade.

 

[cdnred]

Late to the game. How much use is there to have side scan if all I plan to fish is fresh water lakes and rivers with no more then 30-40ft depth max..? From what I understand, it's not that easy setting up for using side scan. For the type of water that I'm looking to fish, should I even consider looking at getting a fishfinder that offers side scanning..? I want something simple to use and not have to spend needless money for features that I'll never need. I read somewhere that when people buy these fancy fishfinders, they end up only using about 10% of the functions featured..

I was planning on using it on my Colorado XT pontoon with a Minn Kota motor running on a LifePO4 12v 40ah battery. From what I've heard, I should consider running the fishfinder off a separate battery with about a 20ah rating to avoid interferences from the motor..

@Billy How did you like the 9 inch Garmin that you got after using it for a while..? I was looking at something in that 9" screen size and Garmin had some good reviews..