Fish finder question

Twistedlarch · Jun 3, 2015

I just bought a Hummingbird Piranhamax 197c for my pimped out raft. My question is: Will the fish finder tax my trolling motor battery much? Right now I run a 40 lb thrust Minnkota and can easily run all day on my Marine battery.

In case your wondering what a pimped out raft is

thanks!
Brian

Admin · Jun 3, 2015

Nice boat, captain! And a crue too. )

JeannaJigs · Jun 3, 2015

fish finders tax a battery only minimally, you'll be fine! 40 pounds on that thing must fly, I have a 45# on a 16 foot fiberlass drift boat and it hauls...

bass · Jun 4, 2015

I looked up your finder at the Humminbird site. The draw is 220mA. Thus, .22AH per hour. You will not be able to tell the difference in capacity. If your trolling motor is a Duramax model it will create a lot of noise for the finder. I have a separate battery for my depth finder for just this reason.

Good luck.

Twistedlarch · Jun 4, 2015

bass said:
I looked up your finder at the Humminbird site. The draw is 220mA. Thus, .22AH per hour. You will not be able to tell the difference in capacity. If your trolling motor is a Duramax model it will create a lot of noise for the finder. I have a separate battery for my depth finder for just this reason.

Good luck.

Thanks for the info! The Motor I have is a Minnkota C2 40

Twistedlarch · Jun 4, 2015

JeannaJigs said:
fish finders tax a battery only minimally, you'll be fine! 40 pounds on that thing must fly, I have a 45# on a 16 foot fiberlass drift boat and it hauls...

I think my top speed last time I was out was just under 4 mph, I think a raft has a lot more drag then a DB.

rogerdodger · Jun 4, 2015

bass said:
I looked up your finder at the Humminbird site. The draw is 220mA. Thus, .22AH per hour. You will not be able to tell the difference in capacity. If your trolling motor is a Duramax model it will create a lot of noise for the finder. I have a separate battery for my depth finder for just this reason.

Good luck.

however many new sonars have much higher draw, my Elite-7hdi draws 1.1amps, larger screen HDI units might draw closer to 2amps, so in some cases now, the sonar should not be ignored...on the good side, you can overlay battery voltage on the display...cheers, roger

bass · Jun 5, 2015

rogerdodger said:
however many new sonars have much higher draw, my Elite-7hdi draws 1.1amps, larger screen HDI units might draw closer to 2amps, so in some cases now, the sonar should not be ignored...on the good side, you can overlay battery voltage on the display...cheers, roger

That is a good point. If you were out on the water for a full day 2A draw could eat a good portion of your batteries capacity. I think most 24 series batteries are around 85AH. In a 10 hour day a 2A draw would use up almost a quarter of that capacity. In reality it is worse than that since you will not be able to get every AH out of the battery for which it is rated.

rogerdodger · Jun 5, 2015

bass said:
That is a good point. If you were out on the water for a full day 2A draw could eat a good portion of your batteries capacity. I think most 24 series batteries are around 85AH. In a 10 hour day a 2A draw would use up almost a quarter of that capacity. In reality it is worse than that since you will not be able to get every AH out of the battery for which it is rated.

yes, the deeper you draw a battery down, the more damage done.

here is an example for a battery that is designed to tolerate deep cycles..

DrTheopolis · Jun 5, 2015

As mentioned (sort of), if the transducer is mounted near the electric motor, when you get into the throttle, the FF won't read right. Creates too much RF, and you'll see the bottom depth go from 1 foot to 350 feet quite frequently.

rogerdodger · Jun 5, 2015

DrTheopolis said:
As mentioned (sort of), if the transducer is mounted near the electric motor, when you get into the throttle, the FF won't read right. Creates too much RF, and you'll see the bottom depth go from 1 foot to 350 feet quite frequently.

yes and no. It depends on unit/brand and shielding/power...transducers for my Lowrance HDS-8 were very close to my 45# MinnKota RipTide with Digital Maximizer top end, never had any significant interference issues, never lost bottom depth...so I think it depends...if you have interference issues, improve grounding of everything, make sure the sonar and motor are drawing from separate batteries, add distance between motor and transducer....that would be my order of experiments...cheers, roger

DrTheopolis · Jun 5, 2015

I based that OFF my (somewhat limited) experience on my buddy's driftboat with an 80# Riptide. The FF is a portable unit (uses AA batteries). On the DB, the only place it will mount is on the transom, right next to the motor. At higher throttle, it doesn't work particularly well. At low throttle, it works just fine and dandy.

LuisFisher · Feb 18, 2016

So cute image!

Fish finder question

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