Hi Gang, 

I just installed a bow mounted fish finder along with strapping a puck transducer to my trolling motor. I was browsing through the Humminbird docs when I noticed it said the transducer can only be powered on when in the water. My first reaction, well that is a pain in the butt to turn the unit on and off every time I move spots (I probably hit 25 spots in a day of fishing). 

 

Are you guys really turning your units on and off whenever you deploy the trolling motor? That seems crazy!

I turn mine on before the boat gets launched and turn it off when it is in the parking lot.

I leave mine on the whole time I’m on the lake. 

I also leave both my units on the whole time, although I do put whatever unit I’m not currently using in standby mode, but that’s just to help conserve power and has nothing to do with the transducer. In over 20 years of running boats with trolling motor transducers, I’ve never had an issue with one not working. 

I installed a micro switch on the TM bracket that turns the sonar power on when the TM is lifted to deploy and off when lifted back onto the bracket. I started doing this back when we had paper graphs  to save the TD.

Tom

Wow Mr.Tom you got a chuckle out of me with the paper graph I hated running out of paper how far technology has come

I have Humminbird units and a MinnKota trolling motor with built in transducer. I never turn off the unit when the trolling motor is lifted and in transit to another spot. I have travelled long distances in this manner, and after four full years of service, I have not had an issue. Will it shorten the life of transducer?  Maybe, but by that time we will want new electronics with all of the fun new options. ?

Some humminbird units have a shortcut to very quickly turn off the sonar pings. On my old unit, you hit the power button quickly once, it brings up a menu. Very quick and easy. Something to consider.