Bow depth finder

Please don’t hate me but I’m overwhelmed at the amount of information and misinformation out there.

I’m in the market for a new depth finder on the bow. Trolling motor mounted transducer, side and down imaging, probably a nine inch screen. I’ve got a small Lowrance on the dash and mostly use it for GPS and general depth readings. I fish solo so as soon as I get to where I’m going I generally don’t look at the dash mounted one until I move again. I typically fish relatively shallow but do venture deep when needed. Opinions please and thanks in advance.

Mike

Side imaging requires you to be moving around 3 to 7 mph. It can be done at the bow but is not optimal from my experience. I personally like the Hummingbird Helix series.The Hummingbird Helix 9 SI GPS gen 1 units are cheap right now. A Lowrance HDS 9 or Elite 9 Ti with totalscan is a nice unit as well. It really depends which one you like best. From my experience the birds have better SI and Lowrance has better sonar/di.

Side Imaging which is a Humminbird trademark will work great from near zero speed up to about 12 mph. The screen scroll speed is adjustable. It works exceptionally well at the bow with a SI transducer on the trolling motor. Just need some movement so the SI pulses can pass over subjects/bottom.

It's a search tool and a fishing tool.

Nice graph pics. Can the ‘Bird seam them together so it’s easier to read. I keep tilting my head like a dog.

You can have it take away the water column, the black center of the screen, but you'd miss a lot of stuff that was below you then. You pick it up pretty quick once you start using it.

This video shows you how to read it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xe6pLPdMKc

A good way to learn how to read SI is to have the screen horizontal instead of vertical. Put your nose close to the centerline and what you see with your left eye is on the left and what you see with your right eye is on the right. That is why it is called Side Imaging.

Thanks that was a big help.

Don't take the water column out, you will miss schools of fish, trees, or anything directly under the boat.
My $.02= Get an hds 9 gen 3 or carbon with a totalscan and put it at the dash with the transducer on the transom. Move your other lowrance up front and use Ethernet to link them to share waypoints. With that set up(depending on your current model lowrance) you can idle and look for stuff to fish and mark a waypoint when you find something. Then go up front and the waypoint will be there and you can cast to it. I know that seems like a lot more than you asked but it would be the easiest to find offshore stuff. I don't know where your located but if your close I would help with set up and installation.

You just made it super simple for me. Just clicked, makes much more sense now. Thank you!!! Headed out tomorrow to try it out

Sounds like an offer that’d be hard to refuse. I’m just north of Houston so that may make it very difficult for that to happen though.

I’m not quite sure my dash unit will support being linked. It’s an Elite 5 chirp gold or something like that. And I’m not sure I’ve got the funds for two so I was hoping to get the best bang for my buck and settle for the bow mount.
The more I think about it I’m leaning towards the hummingbird.

The elite won't network. You can do the bow mount. You will atleast like the down image up there and will be able to tell what's below you a lot better. Then later on you can get another unit to network

Side imaging played a huuuge part in me chasing schooling fish last week. I moved with them and i could see exactly which side would produce a better chance of catching fish. Limited out on sandies and hybrids in 1 hr

Really good deals available right now on Humminbird Helix in the non-mega models right now. Try to get a 10 up front. Let these guys shoot you a bid. Good prices, installs and even user lessons: http://www.shut-up-and-fish.com/contact_us.php