<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>FishBlood&RiverMud wrote:</div>
Did it die at 80 holes?
How often do you need to drill 80 holes to catch a fish? 
I was simply trying to understand the amount of ice a 24V can do.
When i used to ice fish, i’d go home after 150 holes. Yup, i was that guy never found in a crowd and searching for the “Hottest Bite” (IDO THEME LOL). That also means eliminating a lot of unproductive water and while doing so increasing your knowledge of the individual fishery.
I have limited experience with electric augers. In my experience the deeper the ice the more you need to “Clear the hole” by lifting the auger flighting out of the hole to clear the hole of the ice chips. The effort to do this IMO outweighs the negatives of gas auger weight (Which 26 LBS never seemed too hard to manage IMO) Clearing the holes would likely extend the battery life as it isn’t trying to pull all the material from the hole…You are.
These augers don’t have the torque to drill deep ice without clearing the hole. Clearing the hole i found to be a lot of effort in comparison to gripping an auger with more torque and powering through the ice. No lifting necessary except pulling it out of the hole when complete, and when the flighting aren’t full of ice shavings, they’re just wet.
Therefore, 80 holes in 8″ of ice is likely not 40 holes in 24″ of ice and also likely not 26 holes in 36″ of ice either due to the increased resistance of the ice chips at those ice depths. I think of this like running the same gauge of wire, but longer lenghts…There’s efficiency loss (increased resistance means loss of voltage).
I’d expect after 24″ of ice you’d see a 20%+ power loss due to increased resistance of flighting full of chips/snow, even when clearing the hole a few times.
I wasn’t going to point this out, but the info was short in supplying the battery charge remaining after 80 holes in 8″ ice.
When i ice fished, i did strings of 15 holes. It would be disappointing to me to go home after 80 holes. That doesn’t cover a lot of ground frankly, and that is just early ice.
Andy, sure not many people need to drill 80 holes in 8″ of ice probably more accurate to say many people wouldn’t want to.
This auger will easily suit the needs of 90%+ of ice fisherman.
I agree. I also don’t understand why so many found gasoline augers difficult. Don’t recall spilling gas on anything or having starting issues.
I’m an outlier to the curve, i get that.
Example:
I did clear 42 acres of ice yesterday with the boat in 1.75 Hrs. Ice was 2.75″ average thickness. I’d say that was a record breaking ice day for me. There are 4,000,000+ people living nearby, and i’ve never seen another person try to break that ice up. To each their own. I appreciate being the only one enjoying the outdoors in this case. Respect the differences. Point fingers at the outlier if you want, but he might look at ya like a sheep.
So, in conclusion, my question wasn’t in regards to 80 holes in 8″, but i was trying to understand how many holes in more ice, and what the “Average” fisherman drills per day. I never could sit comfortably over a hole without the fish activity I wanted.
I won’t make fun of (Point out their shortcomings to the gas auger) electric augers anymore this year, but I cannot help but doing it once.
Maybe put a tally mark on the battery each time you charge it so you know when to buy a new one. 
