Expidia
Commander
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2006
- Messages
- 2,368
Re: Navionics . . . I'd look elsewhere . . .
Nice looking rig. I was thinking of putting on some bow rails myself mainly for the safety of the front seat so if a jerk flew by us the person up front would be able to quickly grab ahold of the rail before the wave it. Also good for jocking the boat around at the dock.
Does anyone have trouble having their castings get wrapped around it?
I thought it would interfere too much with the person in the front like as they are cranking in and their line wraps around it as the lure comes out of the water.
I see your Humminbird quick release up there. Yep, that's the reason I went with Humminbird. I have a windshield and not much room to get fingers in between to release the unit from the boat so the Humminbird setup is the best I've found.
I've had a Humminbird Piranna portable years. When I bought this new boat all I had to do was call Humminbird and for a few bucks they sent me the base holder you have on the Starcraft. Worked great. All I had to do was wire in the transducer and the power and I was good to go. Worked great. But when I bought the 797 it was quite a difference. I can be doing 32 mph (my top end) and the 797 continues to read the bottom where the older one wouldn't work much over 10-15 mph if at all. I'll hold on to the portable for the times I'm on vacation and rent a boat or if my main unit breaks.
One nice feature that the combo GPS has is when you're trolling around a lake and you spot fish or structure on the finder you can just push one button to mark the spot. A few simply taps on the cursor and you can name it too as to what the spot is. You can also pick from many icons to show whats under that spot without having to name it.
You can still use one of your Humminbirds up front since the front fisherman can't see your screen.
By the way, the 797's base swivels sideways and up and down so you could swing it around to face forward if you wanted to while fishing. Nice feature when the suns hitting the screen.
The GPS is what is all about for my needs. With the mapping card (Cabelas 2006 Hotmaps Premium on special at $59) I'd purchase that right away before they run out. You could always resell it on Ebay if you didn't get a GPS model (it's half the price for sidescan without GPS I think). Once inserted it shows bottom structure, Fish locations and fish species and what's coming up beneath your boat BEFORE you get there.
GPS also plots a bread crumb trail too, so you could return to the dock in a totally fog or darkness without hitting an island, rock or obstruction.
The sidescan technology is just an additional bonus for me because I'm more concerned with the GPS feature first.
I amazed when I'm on a lake now as to how shallow many areas are and how few are actually marked with warnings. I see boats flying over these areas pulling skiers and not even knowing they are in 2 feet of water. Many launches are very shallow when leaving the dock and not marked either.
And on a river like the Hudson with a 6 foot tide one direction you're ok, on the way back a few hours later you see huge pilings sticking out of the area you already went over.
I was in a large bay last week in the morning on the Hudson. Going back to same bay 3 hours later I ran aground because I took my eyes off the screen as I was switching screens while cruising by buoys as I was trying to see if I could adjust the satellites set the GPS was locked on to and suddenly BAM! I ran aground. Luckily it was a muddy sandbar and no damage to the prop other than having to repaint it. Could have been a tree or rock. I was lucky and STUPID too!
Nice looking rig. I was thinking of putting on some bow rails myself mainly for the safety of the front seat so if a jerk flew by us the person up front would be able to quickly grab ahold of the rail before the wave it. Also good for jocking the boat around at the dock.
Does anyone have trouble having their castings get wrapped around it?
I thought it would interfere too much with the person in the front like as they are cranking in and their line wraps around it as the lure comes out of the water.
I see your Humminbird quick release up there. Yep, that's the reason I went with Humminbird. I have a windshield and not much room to get fingers in between to release the unit from the boat so the Humminbird setup is the best I've found.
I've had a Humminbird Piranna portable years. When I bought this new boat all I had to do was call Humminbird and for a few bucks they sent me the base holder you have on the Starcraft. Worked great. All I had to do was wire in the transducer and the power and I was good to go. Worked great. But when I bought the 797 it was quite a difference. I can be doing 32 mph (my top end) and the 797 continues to read the bottom where the older one wouldn't work much over 10-15 mph if at all. I'll hold on to the portable for the times I'm on vacation and rent a boat or if my main unit breaks.
One nice feature that the combo GPS has is when you're trolling around a lake and you spot fish or structure on the finder you can just push one button to mark the spot. A few simply taps on the cursor and you can name it too as to what the spot is. You can also pick from many icons to show whats under that spot without having to name it.
You can still use one of your Humminbirds up front since the front fisherman can't see your screen.
By the way, the 797's base swivels sideways and up and down so you could swing it around to face forward if you wanted to while fishing. Nice feature when the suns hitting the screen.
The GPS is what is all about for my needs. With the mapping card (Cabelas 2006 Hotmaps Premium on special at $59) I'd purchase that right away before they run out. You could always resell it on Ebay if you didn't get a GPS model (it's half the price for sidescan without GPS I think). Once inserted it shows bottom structure, Fish locations and fish species and what's coming up beneath your boat BEFORE you get there.
GPS also plots a bread crumb trail too, so you could return to the dock in a totally fog or darkness without hitting an island, rock or obstruction.
The sidescan technology is just an additional bonus for me because I'm more concerned with the GPS feature first.
I amazed when I'm on a lake now as to how shallow many areas are and how few are actually marked with warnings. I see boats flying over these areas pulling skiers and not even knowing they are in 2 feet of water. Many launches are very shallow when leaving the dock and not marked either.
And on a river like the Hudson with a 6 foot tide one direction you're ok, on the way back a few hours later you see huge pilings sticking out of the area you already went over.
I was in a large bay last week in the morning on the Hudson. Going back to same bay 3 hours later I ran aground because I took my eyes off the screen as I was switching screens while cruising by buoys as I was trying to see if I could adjust the satellites set the GPS was locked on to and suddenly BAM! I ran aground. Luckily it was a muddy sandbar and no damage to the prop other than having to repaint it. Could have been a tree or rock. I was lucky and STUPID too!
Underhand casting to get under docks is limited by the rails, and to some point by being an alum V with casting deck is much different than a bass boat. Landing of any decent size fish requires stepping off the platform. The rail may be modified or removed in near future to accomidate a front mount trolling motor. 
