K1500

That's what I thought but it doesn't seem to matter what frequency I run the HDS unit on. I'll play with it a bit more next time out on the water.

I am new to electronics and have an HDS live. How do you determine the best sonar frequency to use? I assume it is changeable because some conditions favor one frequency over the other. Any insight is appreciated.

I have an interference question and am new to electronics. I have a Hook 2 4x on the bow that runs off the trolling motor transducer (motor guide xi5) and an HDS Live in the stern that has a separate transducer. When they are both on the live unit interferes with the hook unit in water deeper than about 10 feet. It causes the hook unit to mark dozens of fish that are not there. Turning the HDS unit off obviously fixes the problem. Is there anything I can do to solve the problem or am I stuck with it? I have tried changing sonar frequencies in the HDS unit but it doesn't seem to help. Thanks.

Actually, that's what I did to finally hookup the other day.

Thanks again to all who responded I went out with the identical setup and caught several this weekend no problem. I will chalk it up to bluegills.

Thanks for all who took time to reply, I appreciate it. I am soaking it all in and learning a lot. I am new to fishing Senkos and in my very limited use of them with the same setup I have not had the hookup problems I had this past weekend. I may indeed have been setting too rapidly on short line and plucking the bait from their mouth. I will give some of the suggestions a try, but I am guessing it may be a combination of things, not the least of which are bluegills. I may have to get a bobber and some red worms to verify the bluegill content of the pond!

More info...there were two of us with identical 7' medium power/fast action Shimano Exage spinning rods. The hits were a fairly rapid Tap/Tap. Most were fairly close in, some near my feet. A couple of times the bass up was either turned or pulled/leapt out of the water. We were both having hook set issues. They were regular H2O express (academy brand) EWG's. I switched to wacky at the end and hooked up in the first strike. We probably missed 7-10 and landed only two when rigged weightless Texas style. I think I'll give the offset round hooks a try.

I'm having a bit of trouble lately making a hook stick with a weightless senko. Fishing a 4/0 EWG hook, point is not buried, but is lying flush with and parallel to the worm. They hit and some even feel as if they are on, but they spit the hook after a second. I am using a medium action spinning rod with 12 pound mono. It seems to have plenty of backbone for normal hook sets. I am wondering if they may have just been holding on to the tail of the worm and no hook set would work. Thoughts?

Since I can't read the meter right now I called Mercury. They said it will only count the hours the motor is actually running. Thus, leaving the key on in the run position will not run the hour meter.

No hour meter on the console. I have to either hook it to my HSD live or have them pull it. I haven't networked the boat motor and electronics yet.

I bought a new boat with a new Merc 115 pro xs. The dealer accidentally left the key in the on position for 4 days (I realized this when I picked up the boat from storage and the key was on). The battery is not dead. Will this run the hour meter or does it only run when the motor is actually running. I called Merc but they are closed and the boat is stored away from the dealer so I can't easily have them run an hour count right now. Dealer claims it won't run the hour meter up. I just want to make sure my new motor doesn't have 100 'extra' hours on it.

This sounds dumb, but on one of my lowrance units I had to push the connector in really hard or it wouldn't turn on. Make sure it is really plugged in.

You can also use the appropriately sized large socket to drive the races. Harbor freight sells a cheap giant sized socket set that works well. In a real pinch, you can sometimes use the old races to drive in the new races. Just make sure you can then get the old races back out. Usually, you can with a bit of fiddling. You just want to make sure the new races are seated firmly, and make sure you don't nick the surfaces.

If you replace the bearings, always replace the races.

More info...I will be fishing in southern impoundments like Table Rock, Bull Shoals, Ouachita, Tenkiller, etc. I would love to go to the salt some time, but not in the near future.

I just bought a 20 foot Lowe bay boat (basically a CC bass boat layout). I don't have a lot of motorized boat experience and am wondering what anchor and what length and type of anchor line I need. Thanks.

I'm new to this but I don't really understand why anyone (regardless of why they are on the water) feels they have the exclusive right to a spot. To me it seems first person there has the right to a spot until they vacate it, then it is free game to the next person. Just because you wear a jersey and have 25 different logos on your boat doesn't change anything in that regard. Common courtesy suggests that you don't encroach on someone who is already there, the same as with a hunting spot. Why a guy from out of town using public resources to earn big bucks feels more entitled to a spot than a local who fishes the lake every weekend is perplexing. I guess in some people's eyes the money is what makes the difference. i would think that we are all out there to catch fish. A pro ought to have enough spots that they shouldn't have to run a local off of a spot the local has likely fished for years.

I haven't used either but my local shop had the elite 7 for $820 and the HDS Live 7 for $999. At that price differential it was easy to chose the HDS live. I pick up the boat this week so I will have to learn the electronics on it. The ability to network with the TM and the engine is an added bonus. Also, building a map of an 'unknown' lake seems like it may be a nice feature.

Senko if they are instructed how to fish it. A dressed Mepps Aglia may be a better bet.

Pulled the trigger on the 20' bay boat. I can't really believe I went all in, so we will see how it goes. Since I don't have a bunch of bass boat experience I may not know what I am missing. I went with an Xi5 trolling motor and hds7 live electronics in the back, cheap hook 4 in the front. Merc 115 pro xs ct. I hope it is a good 'do it all' boat for me and my family.

Yes, spell check got me on Bimini. It is on the dealers lot right now. The boat has a $150 fish finder and a cheap $300 trolling motor that they have not installed yet. I can get credit if I want a different motor and electronics. As a ballpark, would $3,000 be an amount you would expect to get off of a $30,000 boat?

Looking at my first new boat, a Lowe 20 foot bay boat. The dealer quotes a price of $31,400 with the Lowe factory $1,500 rebate. This is the same price Lowe has when you 'build' the boat on their website. How much off of this price is it reasonable to expect? Also, I intend to add roughly $3,000 worth of upgrades (electronics, trolling motor, bikini, etc). Am I better off to negotiate price and then pay for the upgrades or should I try to get the upgrades 'thrown in' instead of trying to get them to come off the price? I've bought houses and trucks but never boats, so any help is appreciated. I am looking at making a deal on Monday, so time is short.

I have read that. Both the ranger and the Lowe have aluminum trailers. I would also spec saltwater trolling motor.

Thanks for the heads up. I looked at the Lunds and I really like them but I am wanting to stay around 30k and they are 10k north of that. I am still thinking hard about the bay boat. I am also intrigued by taking it to the gulf and going for reds. I don't have a Lund dealer in Arkansas but I do have local tracker, ranger, and Lowe dealers. The shop near my house has a lowe bay 20 and it looked awfully nice.

I looked at a lowe bay 20 and 22 today, along with some other Lowe aluminum bass boats. The bay 20 seemed like a really nice layout. Plenty of room for 4 passengers and big fishing decks. I really liked it but I don't really know what to look for. Their bass boats seemed very nice as well, but they don't have very good seating for a 4th person. I'm not sure how comfortable it would be to sit on the edge of the front platform facing backwards.