Re: Fishfinder output power
No, it won't scare the fish away. You don't need anywhere near 500 Watts RMS in that sort of water. In fact you could get away with 50 watts quite nicely. More is better of course.<br /><br />You should know that the Gain on the fish finder doesn't decrease the power output, it decreases the receive sensitivity. I think a lot of folks aren't clear on that.<br /><br />As to the power, in a sense its sort of meaningless in water that shallow. We've all heard the argument that says its just like a flash light and that the brighter it is the better you can see. Well, that's true but in this case we're talking about looking though an empty room and trying to espy a cow. Once you've got enough light to recognize it as a cow you really don't need any more, let alone a floodlight.<br /><br />However I can tell you, I have a 600 watt fish finder (Furuno 582L) connected to a high performance 1-kW transducer (Airmar M260), and when we are in 35' of water absolutly no fish could pass under our boat without being detected. It simply could not happen. This would remain true in depths up to about 150 feet.<br /><br />Thom