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Dropped $180 on a depth sounder upgrade for the dredge last week

Old one kept giving false readings in murky water. New one has a wider beam angle. Has anyone else had trouble with bottom detection in heavy silt?
3 comments

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3 Comments
nathanbennett
Wider beam angle is usually the fix for silty bottoms since it gives you a bigger footprint to work with. The narrower beams just punch through the muck and miss the real bottom completely. A lot of guys swap to a 20 degree or wider transducer and it solves the false reading problem right away.
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ruby_grant
ruby_grant1mo ago
Oh, I hate to nitpick but a wider beam actually gives you a smaller footprint in deeper water since it spreads out more. The narrower beam is what punches through silt and gives you a cleaner reading on the hard bottom below. You might want to try a 10 or 12 degree element instead of going wider.
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lisa_jones21
lisa_jones2126d agoMost Upvoted
Nah, I disagree, wider beam just blurs soft stuff too much for me.
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