How to read a fish finder?

[dwco5051]

I'm thinking of using my phone since I have Navionics on it already to navigate the lake and the old fish finder on the console. This way I can see the lake and also check for changes in depth on my crappy fish finder. Put the nice CHIRP on the trolling motor that way when I'm ready to stop and work an area I can focus from the front of the boat.

That makes sense. In my case both fish finders are over 25 years old and of about the same quality and I also have a flasher depth sounder in the control panel to let me now how deep it is providing I am under about 35 mph. It goes nuts once I get the boat up on the pad which rarely happens anymore. At age 77 gas is to expensive to run at 50+ mph just to fish a different spot.

 

[rob123p]

I hear you DWCO5051 this is going to be the first year I run a boat and gas will definitely get up there fast since I know I will open her up quite a few time getting all giddy. But I've found an Indian reserve that shares a portion of the lake and the gas prices there are much cheaper. It all comes together as you learn the lake or lakes that you plan on fishing on including the dangers and best fishing spots

 

[Fed]

When I take into account signals bouncing down & up, cone angles, snapshots, scrolling & history etc, etc... I find it very hard to get my head around how these shots are even possible.





It strikes me you shouldn't be able to see the side of something when looking from above and at a ~2Kt drift shouldn't the whole thing be elongated right across the screen?
To my knowledge sounders ping at a reasonably high rate & I'd expect to see a splattered mess right across the screen.