Fishing Forum

I have a question for you guys. We purchased a second fish finder for out boat, The first one that we have was hooked up by someone else and is hooked into the main boat motor battery.

This second finder when hooked to the main boat battery works great until you start the big engine. Then it locks up and the only way you can get to work again is to unplug it from the stand and then plug it back in and then it will power up. So we have had to resort to shutting it off before the boat is started. Or we have to hook it up to its own dedicated battery.

My question to you guys is this. Do you have your finders hooked to your main boat battery if so how do you get it to not have the power surge on start up. I don't want to fry the finder.

Thanks for the help.
Jared.
[signature]

my finder is hooked up to it's own battery source. your motor might be creating too much noise.
[signature]

Mine is hooked up to the same battery as my main motor and I haven't had a problem. But my guess is that the amps are dropping when you crank the motor momentarily starving the finder of power. It will probably require another battery or a good deep cell battery that will maintain the amps for your finder and motor during starter cranking.
[signature]

Make sure that the connections are clean and tight. A loose wire will do that.
[signature]

I had a similar problem. When you start your motor the voltage in the battery can go down to as low as 10 volts. This will cause your fishfinder to shut down or have other problems. I just bought a new battery with more reserve power so that when you run your electronics in your boat for a while it doesn't put as much of a drain on your battery. This should fix the problem.
[signature]

Had a similar issue with the finder hooked up to the main battery. Found out the main battery was not holding a good charge due to age so when I got a new deep cycle battery that fixed it. Previous post is right about battery dropping down when the starter is engaged. There is a huge inrush current and that drops the battery voltage and kills the fish finder.
[signature]

All good advice. My buddies Nitro started doing that his bird on the console. He changed the battery that had more CCA and fixed the problem.
[signature]

Thanks you guys. That is kind of what we were thinking but we also didn't know if there was supposed to be some sort of a surge protector on the line between the finder and the bat.

I guess we will just keep the 2nd battery in the boat.

Appreciate all the advise.
[signature]