Chartplotter

[jeffstevens763@g]

Originally Posted by davej

Hi Jeff, Thank you and everyone else for the helpful comments; and the fact that you are happy with the Lowrance Elite 7, which I presume has a 7" screen?

What I think I need to do is go and see a few demo sets in various dealers before a final decision is made.

What about the detail on the Navionic charts, what is the practical difference between the various navionics charts?

We want the best underwater detail ( with wrecks) we can get and don't need various pictures of ports.

Many thanks David

hi dave yes mate 7 inch more oblong than square bigger the screen best IMO if you have budget.
charts & plotters wise have a look on force 4 chandlers site give them a ring i found them really helpfull i find fishing charts good with plenty of detail too [G2] mapping].
redcar fish company i delt with them & cactus bit of armchair research before you go off good to get to a show always plenty to play with.
i've not been for a long time SDSwatersports sheffield arther balderson i bought my first lowrance off him years ago big into diving he might point you in the direction of a good set up with the best charts
http://www.force4.co.uk/lowrance.html#.WJBVMBuLTIU
lowrance elite 9 chirp combo 83/200 455/800 KHZ transducer and navionics chart for the UK £699.95 saving £728.85

[jambo]

Lately I've found Catcus to be the best price wise for electronics

[jeffstevens763@g]

Originally Posted by Pikey Dave

Here're a couple of screen shots of Easdale, one is with sonar chart on & other off.Attachment 117874Attachment 117875

dave have you looked at the sonar charts [navionics] not looked into it in detail but more info and detail on the map

ha numpty didnt read last bit one is

[davej]

Hi Jeff,

This looks a suitable model, when it says UK charts I guess I just need to be sure its exactly what I want and does include the whole of the UK and Ireland.

thanks Dave

[jeffstevens763@g]

Originally Posted by davej

Hi Jeff,

This looks a suitable model, when it says UK charts I guess I just need to be sure its exactly what I want and does include the whole of the UK and Ireland.

thanks Dave

Yes mate it gives you an area that it covers with a line round it that's what I have if you go on navionics site more info selecting the right chart good price that I paid £600 then had to buy the charts well £90 for micro card I already had an SD. note you will need a cover & flush mount kit if sticking it in the console extra £50 ish.

Cheers

[Rib Martin]

Originally Posted by jeffstevens763@g

hi dave yes mate 7 inch more oblong than square bigger the screen best IMO if you have budget.
charts & plotters wise have a look on force 4 chandlers site give them a ring i found them really helpfull i find fishing charts good with plenty of detail too [G2] mapping].
redcar fish company i delt with them & cactus bit of armchair research before you go off good to get to a show always plenty to play with.
i've not been for a long time SDSwatersports sheffield arther balderson i bought my first lowrance off him years ago big into diving he might point you in the direction of a good set up with the best charts
http://www.force4.co.uk/lowrance.html#.WJBVMBuLTIU
lowrance elite 9 chirp combo 83/200 455/800 KHZ transducer and navionics chart for the UK £699.95 saving £728.85

Looks great...[emoji106]

[jeffstevens763@g]

as an idea of size this is my elite 7

if you look at pikey daves chart pics thats the level of detail with sonar charts for info

[Last Tango]

For comparison....this is a photo of the screen with Antares Charts loaded.
again, Easdale

[Pikey Dave]

Originally Posted by Last Tango

For comparison....this is a photo of the screen with Antares Charts loaded.

again, Easdale

Does it display on the plotter like that?

[jeffstevens763@g]

Originally Posted by Last Tango

For comparison....this is a photo of the screen with Antares Charts loaded.
again, Easdale

Do these come on an SD card for the plotter?

[jambo]

Originally Posted by jeffstevens763@g

Do these come on an SD card for the plotter?

No Jeff you get them on disc or flash drive but you superimpose onto Goole Earth

[Last Tango]

Originally Posted by Pikey Dave

Does it display on the plotter like that?

That's the problem. I'ts running on Open CPM (Free) and the World charts can also be had for free. The Antares overlay (Last count costs around £17 for all 370 charts like Easdale, all West coast of Scotland. they're for PC based systems. Chart formats: TIF, BSB, KMZ for Google Earth, QCT for Memory-Map.

As far as I know there's no way of getting them to run on fixed chartplotters.

[Xk59D]

curious on the garmin being a bit fisher price, what else do you want from a chart? this is a basic screenshot from garmin unit and if you add G2 you get more detail again.

next time i'm out i'll try to get some screenshots if i remember with G2 on.

[Pikey Dave]

Originally Posted by Xk59D

curious on the garmin being a bit fisher price, what else do you want from a chart? this is a basic screenshot from garmin unit and if you add G2 you get more detail again.

next time i'm out i'll try to get some screenshots if i remember with G2 on.

I did say "personally find" [emoji6] they just look a bit Telly Tubby to me, I find the colour scheme odd & the Garmin interface/ergonomics just not to my liking. I do own a couple of Garmin handhelds that I carry as backup, Garmin make the best handhelds (imo) but I just don't rate the fixed stuff, each to their own.

[Xk59D]

To each their own indeed. I've only had garmin and hummingbird so not much to compare with. The garmin interface is miles better than my old hummingbird, much easier to use but that was circa 2006 model so no doubt things have moved on.

Once you fire g2hd on though it basically looks like Google earth with sat pictures rather than basic colours. Also has a 3d mode similar to car gps view people are perhaps used to, few other things too so g2 is worth doing imo.

[jonp]

Ive owned most brands over the years but for the last 7 years stuck with Lowrance simply because they work extremely well and have very good customer service if ever you need to ask a question. Garmin lost me with two faulty units and poor service that took over 12 months to resolve.

Firstly I believe navionics to be the best charts and most regularly updated worldwide, to get an idea on how the gold charts look which contain less detail than platinum take a look on this site which you can see chart detail anywhere in the world for free (just zoom in anywhere) Navionics.

Back to the head units (lowrance). The only way to get more detail is by having the most resolution you can in the screen, this normally comes at a higher price for the more res.

I fish and dive so high down res is quite important as this gives more detail of structure and fish. Side res is also important if you decide to use a sidescan transducer or 3D.

With the above in mind the bigger the screen with the most res the more detail you are going to see which is why I opted for a 12inch Lowrance over the slightly lower res 12in simrad.

Some of my bottom fishing is in quite deep water 500m + and though Ive owned airmar tm 260 transducers I personally have found them to be a complete waste of money and quite finicky in deep water.

The standard 200/50khz lowrance transducer and the lowrance sidescan transducer will do everything I want. I can sound bottom bellow 500m and scan clearly 800m each side of my boat. The sidescan is also handy offshore as I scan out to the sides of my boat for bait fish, it even picks up krill.

Heres a few screen shots, some from an old hds gen 2 and some from my latest gen 3. Just to add you dont have to use them as a touch screen as theres an easy option to use the buttons instead, saying that I love the touch screen.

Jon

40kmh and still holding bottom with 200khz in 250m of water.



50htz heading deeper 500+



Shallow wreck



Krill



overlaying sidescan onto map + down sonar





As you can see sidescan is great for finding new dive sites and understanding the lay of the land before you get in.

[jeffstevens763@g]

thanks for the antares info
personnly ive always bought a paper chart of the area and had a good look of it before going out so the antares is well worth getting and i will.

agree with dave re garmin a bit telly tubby but i got use to it zoom in and easy to read from a distance with the plotter being oposite side of my helm didnt help.garmin UK were great when i had a problem

had humminbird combo & lowrance combo both with navionics gold both great for me beats the old days finding transite points to find dive sites.

[Phil M]

Navigation aside, if you are getting a new unit, really look at high def sonar, downVu, structurescan, whichever you go for. It makes finding a wreck or reef so much easier. I can track a shot going in om my Garmin EchoMap 50 DV. Its a good unit. bigger would have been nice but I ran out of console space (and cash).

Phil

[Pikey Dave]

Originally Posted by Phil M

Navigation aside, if you are getting a new unit, really look at high def sonar, downVu, structurescan, whichever you go for. It makes finding a wreck or reef so much easier. I can track a shot going in om my Garmin EchoMap 50 DV. Its a good unit. bigger would have been nice but I ran out of console space (and cash).

Phil

+1 we can see the weight on the mackerel feathers when we are fishing. I've dropped the shot on wrecks & watched it drop onto the wreck.

[jonp]

Even my old hds 5 would pick up soft plastic lures with 10g jig heads in 56 m of water, you can see the lures plus fish leaving the bottom to swim up to attack.

When deep dropping in 300-700m I use the upper and lower limits to select just a small amount of the water colum, this way I can still see my 10lb sinkers and fish. ( by the way I use a large ellectric reel with over 1 km of braid for deep work).

Jon