I want your NEGATIVE experiences with the Ultrex.

Somebody has got to have had some performance or accuracy issues with these. I'm just trying to do my research and make the best decision. Personally, I want one but not if it's something that still has several kinks that need to be worked out.

Do you find it spinning your boat around from time to time? Moving you off of your spot by a considerable distance?

Works as advertised. I wish I had bought one sooner.

I bought mine in February and I fish an average of 3-4 days most weeks. I honestly cannot say one thing negative as far as the performance of my Ultrex.

I did have an issue with slack in the steering about 3 months after I bought it , Minn Kota sent me a brand new Ultrex within 1 week of me reporting it to them.

Nothing negative...happy so far...friend had his pedal freeze up, but MK took care of it pronto!!

Had a frozen foot pedal on my first ultrex, had it swapped out and now working like a dream! One of my best investments I have bough!

Have had an ULTREX since they came out and have had ZERO problems.I have 2 boats and an ULTREX on both boats!

Same here... I love mine

I caught a fishing pole with mine last night. Took 30 minutes out of my tourney time last night. I had to go back to the ramp and get a 9/16 socket to remove the prop and 30lb big game [censored] that was wrapped around the motor shaft.

That's my only negative.

The only other negative ......was paying for it.

The only negative is that I wish I had one years ago. Best addition that you do to a bassboat hands down.

I don't have an Ultrex right now but have had the Terrova since 2009. The Terrova includes the auto pilot and anchor (spot lock) features that led to the Ultrex. After 8 years, these features both still work well and the only issues I have had with the Terrova are broken shafts.

If they got the technology right 8 years ago, I can only imagine that they have likely perfected the technology for the Ultrex. My experiences with the Ultrex have been really good as well. I will have one soon.

Like you, I wanted to wait for a later version. Not because I expected problems but because I wanted to benefit from the minor tweaks that most products get after year 1.

X3 but don't get one because they have a big advantage on windy days and would prefer my competition not to have one.

I was talking with a guide down at Falcon about his (I recently bought a Terrova) and he said it crapped out on him after 6 or 7 uses. He called Minn Kota and was told that the new Ultrexes are new enough where they don't have people to work on them, so they just sent him a brand new one.

I don't recall the exact problem he had, but I think it was with the updated technology (spot lock, iPilot, etc.) and that's why they just sent him a new one, rather than a problem with the motor itself.

Look at the Terrova and see if you still want an Ultrex after that. You might already know this, but if it's the technology you're after (spot lock, iPilot, advanced auto-pilot), that's all the same on the Terrova, Ulterra, and Ultrex. The deal with the Terrova is that it's an electric steer motor. The Ultrex is electric steer when it comes down to it (that little squiggly cord that goes to the control head...), but the foot pedal has a cable in it, so it's closer to what people are used to with a conventional cable steer motor.

And of course all of the pros have an Ultrex because it's the most expensive one out there.

the pros have the ultrex because it is a much better mounting system an the drive to steer it is cable with assist. the mounting bracket on the terrovas do not work well fishing around rocks an trees.

Yeah, my experience with my Terrova is that for that mount, you just have to remember that it hangs over the front. Same with pulling up to a doc.. bumped it once, thought, "Oh yeah..." and remember it from then on.

I'm certainly not going to knock the Ultrex; if someone wanted to give me one, I'd take it. I just don't see it being worth $500 more.

What shaft length are most of you going with? My old Maxxum went out again. I'll like to replace it on my BassCat Cougar.

The steering cables broke on my Ultrex while my son was fishing the college tournament on the Red River a couple of weeks ago, took it to warranty service center on Tuesday and picked it up Friday, installed it and the peddle didn't work. It would go full heel down and keep trying to turn the head of the motor, I'm sure that it happened on the River and that's what broke the cables. Took it back to the service center on Monday and picking it up today.

Up till then it's been flawless, won't own a boat without one till they come up with something better.

you want negative commentary on the ultrex, venture over to the bbc. I haven't been over there in a month or two but the TM section was littered with people b!tching about their ultrexes.

Zero complaints with mine, wish I had it sooner is all!

Got to use the ultrexx for the first time a couple weeks ago, and it made fishing super easy... after three full days of fishing, out of no where, I was no longer getting power or able to move the trolling motor at all with the foot pedal. From what I was told at fun n sun, the magnetic deal in the head of the trolling motor (part of the TM that turns the prop) was shot. Had to send it off to minn Kota and get a new one. Thank Gifford warranty.

I don’t mind hardware defects. Those can be fixed. I care about boat positioning and performance. Haven’t seen any remarks in regards to that yet, however.

Don't know what you mean by performance? It works like any trolling motor. If you want to go fast, it goes fast just like my Fortrex did. If you want to go slow you dial it back. It uses a pedal just like the Fortrex except it runs by motor so there is no resistance when the pedal moves. The Spot Lock is great. I lock it and it stays there. I've not used it in strong winds yet so I'm not sure if when locked with wind at your back, if the boat turns but I'd assume it would. I did have a problem with Spot Lock disengaging. I called Minn Kota and after being instructed to change the position of zip ties under the pedal, it worked fine. The majority of posts here indicate owners are happy with positioning and performance.

Yes, the reviews have been overwhelmingly positive but it is the performance in situations like wind, that you mentioned, and positioning that I’m interested in. If you caught a fish offshore or in a windy pocket, or were positioned off of a spot offshore fishing structure, did it keep your nose where it needed to be or was it inaccurate in holding position - did it spin your around to re-position....things like that...?

i-Fish,

Have had one since December last year. Had problems with initial unit in that it would not go momentary but had to go constant on and use wheel to control speed. Minn Kota sent a new unit and have had no problems since.

With both units was able to sit over a brush pile on Falcon in 20+ mph wind and slay crappie. Could watch my front HDS-12 and never move for hours on end.

Wife says it's 2nd best thing I have ever gotten in my life. You can guess what #1 is.....

Mine has held two skeeters over a ridge in 20mph winds.

It does spin around in the wind to face into the wind......I guess .,,,since it isn't mounted in the back. It's mounted onto the front and PULLS the boat against wind/current.

If you are trying to find a good reason not to buy one, then you don't want one. It's that easy.

Performance wise.....it is the best. There is nothing to fault. It is expensive. That is the only negative.

.......these Ultrex threads are something else. Lol

Just doing my due diligence. The truth is I want one. Badly. But someone that I respect, and many of you here on TFF are familiar with, doesn’t trust them. So i’m weighing his valued opinion against the opninon of those that are very familiar with them. I’m looking for the worst review I can find. So far I’ve found enough to tell me that I’ll be putting one on my boat. Just FYI, if I’m willing to put 2 PP’s on a boat then I’m not against saving a few grand by putting an ultrex on my boat instead.

Truth is I haven’t been around boats, or fishing for that matter, for very long at all and I’m just looking for the most honest information out there. That’s why I frequent this forum.

Yeah, I got nothing...LOL

Best thing I've ever had on a boat...after you get it you'll understand
Main thing with me is It's much easier after a few tournament days in a row on my back, etc...

Best thing I ever added to a bass boat.

I have an early model Terrova. The only complaint I have is the crappy mount. I want an Ultrex just don't fish enough these days to justify.

My partner put a Terrova on his boat when they first came out and he bitches about the mount every time we launch or put boat back on trailer because it sticks so far over the nose of the boat.
He's in the process of trading his in for Ultrex for 1.) Mount is much better 2.) he hates the steering on the Terrova

Both have great features but it depends on what you prefer

I put a 52" on my Cougar and it's perfect for both shallow and you can slide it down for fishing deeper, rougher water

I’m debating 45” or 52” myself on a z19.

52"Shaft on my CHAMPION 221 Elite.No problems when fishing windy conditions.

I have a 45/80 on my TZX190.

It hasn't surfaced on windy days yet.

It did use to cavitate and surface more often on my little 16ft Nitro....but that boat was like fishing from a bounce house.

Used a buddies the other day and I'd almost trade my ppoles for a ultrex im gunna haver to wait for the price to drop.

they are selling as fast as they are being delivered until they start stacking up at distributors I doubt that the price will go down have not seen buyers remorse from the ones I have sold an not many used ones for sale . looks like a better investment than poles or talons at this point.

Had a pedal seize up but Minn Kota sent me a new one within 3 days. Love my Ultrex!

Okay I got a negative, spot lock will not work under a bridge. Other than that, dang they are sweet.

I went with a 45 on my Phoenix.

The negative is the cost.

Best investment ever though.

the cost is not that bad for a product so well designed that they are selling as fast as they come in still cheaper than 2 talons or poles an a whole lot more advantages like holding on a point in 20 ft of water minnkota is way ahead of motorguide on trolling motors.

Yep. I got the 52 as well. Wouldn't want any shorter or longer

The circuit board in mine was dead straight from the factory. It wilould only run on 100 percent. The hardest thing is having to put the fortrexx back on the boat knowing how awesome the spotlock is on the ultrexx. They told me it might be several weeks to fix but warranty would cover all costs.

About a month ago, my pedal stopped responding in one direction. You could kind of stomp on it, and it would go back to working. I called Minn Kota, and they told me it was the steering sensor in the pedal and would need to be taken to a shop. Luckily, we were fishing the Big Bass Splash that weekend on Fork, and the Minn Kota trailer was there. They changed it out, and I've no problems since.

As a side note, I was also having issues with the spot lock either locking then disengaging or not engaging at all while I was having the pedal problem. Since replacing the steering sensor, I've had zero problems with the spot lock.

No negatives yet. I have had mine out 3 times. Complete game changer.

no kinks every feature on it is incredibly use full.

Not one negative in my opinion.. I would have paid 5000 for it. I am in love with the ultrex. Lol

I bought mine off Ebay. It came in a new box, but I ordered the 52" and they sent me the 60". I was so excited about the thing I did not notice until I had it installed. The seller paid for me to get it cut down at a certified dealer to keep the warranty intact. The guy who cut it down had never seen one before and didn't shorten the wires after cutting it down. The extra wire loop up top interfered with the GPS tracker and caused the unit to go crazy on spot lock. Anyway, I got all that fixed and the thing is awesome. The trouble I had with it had zero to do with any sort of quality defect for the manufacturer.

I love that you can save spots on the remote. I'll motor up to about a 100 yards from my spot then drop the trolling motor. I select the spot I want to go to and then futz with my gear while I get chauffeured up to the exact spot. Just awesome.

I don't own an Ultrex , but I have a question /comment . When I watch the commercial , it sure seems like the head is constantly moving to keep the " spot " lock in one position .
How much battery draw does this take , moving both the head and prop has to consume more power .
Does Minn Kota provide a battery draw comparison on using spot lock and prop versus just prop and no spot lock ?
It would seem like that might be the only negative .

A guy with an Ultrex blocking access to the dock, on his phone, unaware. Ultra dumb. That is my only negative experience.

Any amount it spends rotating the head is surely saved by the motor only applying the amount of thrust needed to hold the spot. On my remote, this speed setting is seldom more than 1/2 speed to 1-1/2 speed. On a 0-10 scale.

Compare it to my old Edge 70 and Maxxum 80.....I'd have them on 75% power, drift off my spot, blast back to the spot, over shoot it, over correct, then give up.....and drift away again....repeating this process throughout the day. My two gp 31 Optimas would be depleted severely by a day of fishing. On the new Ultrex, they aren't even close to depleted through a weekend.

The motor is far more efficient at holding a boat than an angler could ever be manually.

Not one negative, have had mine since January with no issues. I bought the 52" and wouldn't second guess that decision if I had to do it over again. Works great in rough deep water as well as shallow.

I have had one since February and love it. Early on it lost spot lock 3 different times so I recalibrated the unit through the remote and doing two 360;s with the boat to reset it and it hasn't lost spot lock since then. That is the only issue I have dad with it. It is awesome. It allows you more time to fish and less time on the t/m because it does a lot of the work for you. You can set it on spot lock and stand anywhere in the boat and fish. If you catch a fish and it is windy, put it on spot lock if it isn't already on and stay there while you take the fish off the hook and if it is big enough to take pictures. You will be in the same spot instead of 40 yards away because of wind drift with a standard trolling motor.


I don't know how many times I had to fish backwards in the past with a standard trolling motor because I had to have my foot on the pedal and face it into the wind but I wanted to fish an area behind the boat,,, a point with the wind blowing in on it. Now I can set it on spot lock and fish off the back deck or anywhere else in the boat. Also a great feature to have when you are getting a rod out of the box or changing baits and it is windy out.

So concerning battery draw, this past weekend after frontal passage I used spot lock to hold in place along rip rap for several hours. The batteries died before out four o'clock weigh in. My batteries are not quite one year old. So I do believe in windy conditions one should be aware that batteries will draw down. If it keeps happening I will consider battery upgrade.

Since you are asking for Negative experiences here is my experiences. Got the 112 with Ipilot link 45" in January 2016. No problems until about June when the monetary on/off switch quit working. Called Minn Kota and was told the reed switch was slipping down into holder. Had to spend some time adjusting the reed switch as it is very sensitive to correct position. happened again about a month later. Was fishing a tournament last month and the on/off quit again. I could not get it to adjust correctly while the motor was deployed. After stowing and putting the boat on the trailer I had it working again. Next day it stopped again while on spot lock. Stowed the unit and redeployed and it worked, Hit auto pilot and it would work for a few minutes and stop. Stow and redeployed it would start up again. Returned home and contacted Minn Kota and they informed me to take it to service dealer as it sounded like a problem with Armature. Boerne Marine in Boerne Tx was my dealer. Took it in at 0830 and got a call at 10:30 stating Fixed! Armature had a bad spot. When the prop was stopped at a certain spot it would quit. When stowing the prop would turn in the water to a good spot. Fixed now I hope!

+1 to this. Mine is awesome.

Mine just did this at the Red in the Bass Champs tourney this weekend. I talked to customer service today and they told me the same thing. Will look at it when I get to the lake house this weekend. Seems like a simple fix but we shall see.

Don't mean to hijack this thread, but I have been wondering about how well the Ultrex would hold up in real stumpy lakes like here at Lake Fork. Do you Ultrex owners go right on in to the stumpy areas or tend to avoid them? In other words, how tough are they?

I haven't had any problems with stumps with my Ultrex.Have bumped several stumps with no issues so far.

Anyone know if the steering is gear driven,if so are the gears plastic?

Steering is cable driven like most Trolling motors, it just has electric assist similar to power steering in your car.

Bought in Jan 2017, pedal froze in March 2017. MK shipped me a new one and a return label, replacement was mounted exactly 1 week later.

just traded a boat that had an ultrex, ordered another for the new one.

Does the battery drain on the Ultrex seem comparable to the Fortrex or does the "power steering" have a noticeable added drain on the batteries?

My partner clipped a stump on Palestine this morning and FaceTimed me to show me the aftermath. Lol


That’s the main problem with the ultrex. I know of 6 people that have broke the shaft or the mount. I don’t see why they couldn’t use the fortrex mount that has some give to it.

Ouch!!!

YIKES!

I worried about that today on Hubbard. I used mine as a rock grinder at least a dozen times. The prop is toast, but the shaft is like new.

Fished an 8 hour tourney in pretty rough winds today. Add on an hour and a half of spot locking before first cast, and the motor was used constantly for almost 9 hours. Batteries were 35% depleted. Could have run the rest of the day easily.

Ultrex uses less battery than my fortrex.

My ultrex last longer than my Maxxum did on the same batteries.

I have also been looking at an ultrex but have some questions. How well does it work in shallow water. I usually end up fishing between 1-7 feet and have concerns about the continual movement. It seems that a talon or power makes more since but like the fact of spot lock at any Depth. Unfortunately I can only afford one or the other. Any help would be appreciated.

Are they noisier than a Fortrex?

No. They probably use the same motor.

If you mostly fish 7ft and less and you like to sit in one spot for a long time then I would go with Talons or power poles. The Ultrex works just fine in shallow water and if you need to go real shallow you can raise the motor by adjusting the collar at the top of the T/M. The spot lock feature is awesome.

They could improve them with a break away mount or at least have some type of spring loaded mount so it haves some give to it when you bump a stump.

I’ve heard there is noise from turning. Wondering if it travels through the shaft? Guess you’d have to have an underwater mic to tell.

Ok......



......FINALLY!...... I have a negative experience to share.


Yesterday, on Richland Chambers, I was on a good pattern of fish. They were in 1-2ft of water, UNDER floating hay grass mats. I spot locked on a spot that was several miles from the ramp. Within a few minutes, my Ultrex had totally jammed up with hay grass. It slowly, and securely, totally wrapped itself into a ball of grass.

I left my 9/16 socket and wrench in the truck. And I couldn't get enough grass out of the prop to free it. It would simply trip the 50a breakers every time I tried to free it up.

It silently, sneakily, packed itself full of grass with the strength of 40lb braid.

Powerpoles would have been a better choice for that situation.



It did work great today in the gusty wind...allowing me to catch about 30 dinks on Waxahachie.

Those with the experience... When the shaft shatters, does it always happen at the mount, or have you seen it further down the shaft too?

One in our club shattered one on Pines yesterday, and it got me thinking that the mounting collar itself was the problem.