New One Man Boat

[yoderjac]

I did some more work on the MegaLive2 pole this morning. First, I took a piece of 3/4" schedule 40 PVC to the belt sander. The OD is just a bit to big to fit into the 1"EMT. About 4" of the inner EMT sticks out the bottom of the outer EMT where the transducer will attach. I want to make sure the trolling motor mount does not crush the EMT when I tighten it. I figure if I has as much of the 3/4 inch pipe above that seam as below it, there won't be a weak spot, so I measured about 8" of the 3/4" PVC. I then sanded that 8" with a belt sander so it fits pretty snugly into the inner EMT.

I then put cement as far into the inner EMT as I could reach with the applicator and covered the full 8" + of the 3/4" PVC. I inserted the PVC into the EMT.

Once dry, I will cut off the PVC at the end of the EMT.

Next I worked on the mount. I used woodscrews to attach the fish finder head mount base to the teak board. I had to take the washers and flatten one side on the grinder to make sure they would fit next to the base to support the thumbscrews.

The next picture shows a mockup of how the fish finder head mount will be used to hold the pole and attach to the boat rail:

 

[yoderjac]

Ever since I purchased the NRS Approach 100, even before putting it on the water, one of the chambers has had a slow leak. It would take week or more to evidence itself, so it was tiny. I've been working service and trying to find it. After the boat sits for a week or so, one of the chambers looks like this:

I have sprayed the seams with soapy water several times and could not find the leak. I am hoping to get back on the water today or tomorrow, so I decided to pump it up. The spec is 2.0-2.5 psi, so I pumped it up to 3.0 hoping this would help me find the leak. It did!

 

[yoderjac]

NRS contacted me and offered two possible solutions. One is for me to deflate it, apply Aquaseal to it and reinflate it. They would refund $200 and my warranty would stay intact. The second option is for them to send me a new raft. I then tear mine apart, deflate the boat, and return it in the same box. I understand boxing it can be challenging.

I think the first option would be easier for everyone if it is a permanent solution. If the issue returns in a few years after the warranty expires, it would be problematic.

I'm still debating it. I'm not worried about an immediate failure with the Aquaseal because I could then fall back on solution two returning the raft for a replacement.

I'm open to suggestions...

 

[yoderjac]

The 3M sealant/adhesive finally came in. I was able to apply it to the flattened portion of the outer EMT, and clamp the fish finder head bracket to it. It should be cured by tomorrow. I will add the hose clamps for extra security.

It is a good thing since the Megalive 2 came in today as well.

I checked the trolling motor bracket. It is about 3" so the 4" extension on the inner EMT seems about right. I plan to finish the pole tomorrow. Depending on timing, I may even get back on the water.

 

[yoderjac]

I did make it out to a lake today to test the Xplore 9. I did not catch any fish. My focus was on testing the electronics. I turned on the record function (or so I thought) and started a lap around the lake. The trolling motor in high speed gets me about 2 1/4 mph plus or minus 1/2 mph based on wind direction. I did throw out a lure to troll, but I was primarily learning the electronics.

The side imaging was pretty cool. I was able to identify fish in some cases but others were ambiguous. I think practice will improve this over time. On the way back up the lake, I did drop waypoints over some groups of fish and stopped to fish for them for a few minutes. I had no strikes, but I don't have a handle on size yet. Some of these groups may have been baitfish, or, perhaps they just didn't want to strike. With the side and down imaging, I could tell that I was in the right general spot, but of course I could not pinpoint fish in real-time.

At one point I decided to check the recording. It turns out, I had not properly turned it on. Live and learn. I figured out how to start it, and made another pass around the lake. As I was finishing up, I got checked by the game warden. This is a DWR lake, so I'm sure they check it regularly. I was the only boat on the lake. I presume the warden glassed the boat from the boat ramp and did not see a registration number. He just asked for my name and info to check me out and did not ask me to come ashore. I was about done anyway, so I pulled in and he helped me dock the boat. We had a nice conversation. He asked where I teach my Hunter Ed classes as he supports the classes in the county. I told him I retired recently and was still teaching up at Quantico for now.

After I got back home, I sat down with the Xplore 9 and reviewed the recording. This worked out great. Without having to control the boat or anything, I could focus on reading the sonar. I went through the entire recording and dropped and named waypoints on all the groups of fish I had encountered during the day. I also marked several groups of bluegill beds as well as some underwater structures.

If I get the Megalive2 installed and running tomorrow, I plan to go back and go to those same area and then see if I can use the Megalive 2 to understand what those are and how they are behaving. If I don't catch some fish with all this technology, I'll have very few excuses!

 

[yoderjac]

Well, getting the Megalive 2 setup was a bit more challenging than I expected. I first added four stainless steel hose clamps to the poles outer EMT to further hold the fish finder mounting bracket in place. I doubt they were necessary as the adhesive seemed plenty strong with the flattened side of the EMT. I put them on for added piece of mind.

I then installed the Megalive 2 transducer on the inner EMT. It took me more time to slog through the directions and make sure I understood all the positions and operating modes than it did to do the actually installation. The first issue I ran into was with the trolling motor mount. One of the hex screws would not screw into the insert. When I pulled it back apart and looked at it in detail, I saw that there was something in the threads. I used a pic to try to extract it. At it turns out, it was plastic that almost seem threaded in. I was able to spin it around the insert and sort of unscrew it. Once that was clear, I went back to installing the trolling motor mount on the bottom of the inner EMT.

Next, I tried to install the base on the boat. That was the second issue. I evidently did not measure correctly and it didn't fit. I ended up taking it to the circular saw and cutting one end off. Of course, I then had to put several coats of Danish teak oil on the new cut to seal it.

Once that dried, I was able to install it fine. Here is the base installed on the rail:

The next picture shows the pole installed on the base. It is as close to being in operational position as I can get with the boat on the trailer. The fish finder arm would normally be horizontal and the sensor below the boat.

Finally, here is a picture of the pole in the stowed position:

Next, I started working on power. The 50 ah battery I ordered has not arrived yet, but the box for it did. I had to plan out how I will deal with the new larger battery in the long run, and still be able to use the small 12 ah battery I have in the interim. I finally got that figured out. I still need to get the cables run and tie wrapped into place.

By the time I'm done with that, it will be too late to head out to test things today. I'm hoping to get out tomorrow.

 

[swat1018]

Not sure about Humminbird, but Garmin says not to zip-tie the transducer wire to the motor or pole, use electrical tape. Perhaps Humminbird protocol is different.

 

[yoderjac]

Not sure about Humminbird, but Garmin says not to zip-tie the transducer wire to the motor or pole, use electrical tape. Perhaps Humminbird protocol is different.

Yep, they have gromets and say to put zip ties around them. I think the zip tie issue is that if they are put on too tight you can physically effect the electrical characteristics of the cabling.

 

[yoderjac]

I think I am finally far enough long to do an in-water test tomorrow. Hopefully, I'll catch a fish! My plan is to go back to the waypoints I set in the recording I reviewed last time I was out and survey them with the Megalive 2. Presuming I find fish and one or more of those locations, I'll try fishing for them.

 

[catscratch]

You've sure put a lot of work into this. I suspect that catching a fish won't matter nearly as much as a perfect first float.

 

[yoderjac]

You've sure put a lot of work into this. I suspect that catching a fish won't matter nearly as much as a perfect first float.

I grew up on fishing well before hunting became a passion. I tend to dive in pretty deep, so during my working years I didn't have time for both. I'm now getting back into fishing for the first time, so it has been a labor of love. Lots has changed on the tech front since I fished. I've had the boat out 4 times now. I'm getting the hang of the boat, but each time I add something to it, things change.

 

[yoderjac]

I have a very interesting outing today with both good news and bad. I did not follow my plan, going to the waypoints and using the Megalive 2 to look for fish. Instead, as soon as I turned the Megalive 2, I saw fish. I spent the day just driving around with the Megalive 2 and casting at fish. I caught absolutely NOTHING! I think many of the fish I saw were panfish, not bass. It was really cool to be able to see my lure and watch fish react to it.

I learned today just how important having a trolling motor with spot-lock is, especially with my boat. With the remanents of the hurricane coming up the coast, we had some strange winds today. They kept shifting. I found it very hard to actually use the Megalive 2 the way you see it used in videos. By the time I would cast and begin the retrieve, the wind would push the boat and the transduce would be pointed in a different direction.

I'm glad I made the pole. It worked out really well. The trolling motor was fighting the wind and often pointed in a different direction than the fish. Most of the day was simply finding a group of fish and making a traditional cast and retrieve. There were a few periods when the winds stopped and I could actually watch my lure and the fish in real time. I was having a difficult time differentiating fish sizes and types. The larger fish seemed to have no interest in any of my lures. I only had them follow it a few times. I think many of the groups of fish were small pan fish. Either schools of bluegills or crappie. To verify this, I switched to a spinner that was small enough for pan fish but large enough to pick up on the Megalive 2. I finally got a fish to commit, but lost it on the way to the boat. It was definitely small and seemed like a pan fish to me before it jumped the hook.

That helped me calibrate fish sizes a bit.

So the good news is the pole worked great and I loved the Megalive 2. You can really learn a lot about fish behavior. I found the larger fish were kind of like gobblers and decoys. Some might react by coming in close, some would clearly swim away from the lure, and some would ignore it.

The bad news is that I down't have spot-lock on my troling motor...yet . The real bad news is that I'm out of commission until next week. After about 5 hours, the electronics died. I presume I ran the 12 ah LiFePo4 battery down. When I got back, I put everything on the cargers. The trolling motor battery was at 90%, but the 12ah battery would not take a charge. Fortunately, I bought it on Amazon, so I'm returning it and ordering another from a different vendor on Amazon. It doesn't arrive till Sunday.

 

[swat1018]

Run the live off your trolling motor battery, or are you 24V? You may experience interference, you may not, in my experience. The odds of interference is less since it's not on the motor.

 

[yoderjac]

Run the live off your trolling motor battery, or are you 24V? You may experience interference, you may not, in my experience. The odds of interference is less since it's not on the motor.

Yes, they suggest you use a separate battery because of the interference issue. Since I'm just learning all this stuff, I figured that would be one less possible issue, so I got another battery. Unfortunately, I got it and sized it to fit the Helix I first got so it was well undersized for the Xplore + Megalive2.

The replacement 12ah battery should be here Sunday. I need to work on my RM990 mower anyway and I've got some stuff to do at the farm. I typically avoid the weekends for fishing. I figure I'll leave the water to the folks who can only get out on weekends. Hopefully, I'll be good to go with the new battery. It ran about 5 hours. I plan to keep my use down to 3 hours until the 50 ah battery arrives.

Actually, while typing this reply, I decided to check on the 50 ah battery. UPS says it should arrive by tomorrow. Their tracking has been very optimistic lately for me. At the last minute they often change the expected date to the next day. So, we will see...

 

[yoderjac]

Well, as I sort of expected, UPS is now saying they will provide a new delivery date soon for the 50 ah battery.

 

[catscratch]

How severe is the interference problem? I have a fish finder that I run off the same bat as the trolling motor. Never tried it any other way. Wonder if I'm missing out on something.

 

[yoderjac]

How severe is the interference problem? I have a fish finder that I run off the same bat as the trolling motor. Never tried it any other way. Wonder if I'm missing out on something.

I don't really know. When I started planning for the new electronics, I did a little digging. I noticed that the power cords on the Xplore and higher end fish finders and the Megalive 2, all have a ground wire in addition to hot and cold. Humminbird recommends not using the trolling motor battery because of possible interference. I did read a few posts that said customer service was telling folks they could ignore the ground wires unless they were having interference problems. A ground wire indicates to me that the newer component cables are shielded. They are clearly thicker than the cables for my older Helix unit.

I'm guessing that with higher resolutions the newer components are more sensitive to interference. I'm also guessing that the more transducers and other electronics on the boat the more potential for interference.

I did not want to wire up everyting to the troling motor battery and find I had an interference issue and then have to get another battery and rewire everything, so I decided to design my layout with two batteries. So far, I have not used the ground wires. I extended them along side the SAE 2 wire power connectors I used. I figure it is easy enough to tie them together and ground them to the trolling motor frame if necessary. I'm not bothering with that for now.

I would say this. If you are seeing returns on the screen that don't seem to reflect reality you may want to look at interference reduction, but otherwise, I would not worry about it. For example, if I saw something that never changes on the screen as I move around, I'd call that problematic interference. If I saw something sweeping across the screen periodically, I'd call that interference. Otherwise, I would not sweat it.

 

[catscratch]

I'm guessing an easy way to test it is to just turn the motor off while watching the screen to see if there's any change.

 

[yoderjac]

I'm guessing an easy way to test it is to just turn the motor off while watching the screen to see if there's any change.

That will tell you specifically if the Trolling motor is causing interference. Which fish finder and transducers are you using?

 

[catscratch]

Lowrance Hook Reveal 5x Splitshot

https://www.lowrance.com/lowrance/type/fishfinders-chartplotters/hook-reveal-5x-splitshot/hook-reveal-7-splitshot-us-inland

It's a pretty low end unit. To be honest I haven't used it much to look for fish (I do pay attention to them though), I find myself mostly looking for depth changes and structure.

I grew up on creeks and rivers. Read the bottom and structures by watching the current. That's my true love, but having a big pond in the back yard finds me on still waters more often than not. Still getting use to watching a screen instead of swirls and eddies.