Mounting FF to personal water craft.

[hooknhunter]

Hello all. If I haven't offended too many and burnt my bridges with my negativity, I could use some opinions on how to mount my new FF to my personal pontoon.

Do you have one mounted on your toon? If so, I'd love to see pictures.

I have an Elite 4x ice machine, that I'd like to use on my toon without buying a new transducer or putting out a lot of money on mounting parts, etc. The electronics and battery should fit in the pocket on my toon, easily enough. It's attaching the transducer without damaging the cable that I'm mostly puzzling over.

I have been thinking that I could use a piece of PVC that is big enough to let the transducer fall through but small enough that the foam float won't fit through? Mount the pipe to the transom far to one side so it won't interfer with my anchor?

My pontoon is very much if not exactly like this one: [url "http://www.autoaccessoriesgarage.com/Boat-RV-Accessories/Classic-Accessories-Colorado-Pontoon-Boat"]http://www.autoaccessoriesgarage.com/...olorado-Pontoon-Boat[/url].
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[flygoddess]

You ain't burned nothing to me. Pretty cool sonar.

Now, I am going to bounce what I have done off you. I bought the RAM mount for Hummingbird which is my choice. They have sonar mounts for all of them.

http://www.cabelas.com/product/Boating/B...t104523480


I then took a piece of plywood the size of the inside of one of my bags and bolted the ball mount on it
http://www.cabelas.com/product/Boating/B...t104523480

Expensive initial cost, but I can use it on anything. Remember I have 6 pontoons and an Aluminum boat.




Then for the Transducer, I bought some Nylon strap 2" wide. Put quick clips on it. In the picture I am using square aluminum tubing, but have switched to PVC.



Hope this helps
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[hooknhunter]

Thanks for the reply FG.

I've made one for now. I may change it in the future depending on how I like it. It's nothing fancy, but here is what I came up with. It cost me a grand total of about 30 cents and took about 20 minutes. I think it is going to work out nicely.

Ready for use, see pic 211.

Stowed away for transport, see pic 212.
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[flygoddess]

KAAAAA LEAN! That is what I am talkin' about!
Is your transducer hanging freely? Will it give a good reading if it is swinging from you moving? I guess it should.
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[hooknhunter]

Time will tell, but I don't think that swinging would be any different than a boat moving up and down, and side to side, in the waves.
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[albinotrout]

This is what I have done for a humminbird 565. As you can see I used a lot of PVC. Hope this gives you some ideas.[cool]
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[idahoron]

Your assuming that it will hang straight. I am not sure if it will or not. When a toon goes over waves you will see the bottom as wavy if it is set on raw sonar. You might get that wavy in other directions with no support. I have set up Fish finder a several ways.
In this one I made a stand alone unit that will hook up to about any pontoon or flat tube. This unit is a stand alone unit with a battery box, transducer and the display all on one thing. Everyone that has seen this in person wants to kill me for it.







I set one up with a transducer and display on the foot pegs.




My big boat has the display mounted on a tube in front and the transducer in back. I am not super wild about this one because it is not quick to get it up and out of the way coming in to beach. Here is a picture of the back with the transducer.



This is a little hard to see how the display is mounted but I made a bracket that clamps to the pipe.



When mounted correctly you can get amazing images.
These are sturgeon in these next pictures. Ron








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[hooknhunter]

That looks like a pretty neat set up.

I'd really like to see Ron's but it appears he used a photo hosting site. I'm currently at work, and I won't be able to go online without a fire wall for almost a week.

[flygoddess]

Ron, I will let you live...[laugh] Well thought out though.
Yours to Albino.
Hunter, couldn't you just take One PVC pipe and slit it so you could run the cable in it then fix the Transducer so it is rigid?

The Transducer just need be in about 1 to 2 inches of water. I mounted mine so that with boat sitting on beach, or dock the Transducer is about an inch off the ground. No up and down required, no cracked transducer lens[]

Oh and if you are talking FRAME pontoons, don't get any more simple than this:
Transducer

Sonar


Wiener dog inspected the work all the way[]
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[hooknhunter]

Well, I used the FF quite a bit this weekend at the dangling didn't seem to affect the sonar much. Only seemed to have an effect if I kicked it with my flippers (which didn't happen that often), and then it was only minimal. Otherwise, it worked great. I was able to find plenty of fish with it, and more importantly, I was able to identify the correct type of weeds to fish over. I could see the weeds easily on my sonar, drop anchor, and then fish the perimeter of the weeds (which is where the fish were hanging out). I put a little over 100 perch in the freezer this week end, I'll post more on that in another thread.

Before I get flame sprayed for keeping so many, let me say that we have a fish fry coming up at my wife's family reunion, so it will all get consumed very shortly. She came from a family of 10 and most of her siblings along with their children will be there so we have a small army to feed.