Some of My Quick Notes on the I-Pilot

I have had a few chances to go out and try the I-Pilot in both wind and calm so I thought I would post some notes of mine. Keep in mind, I am not an expert yet but I am working on getting there. Any issues could well be user errors.

1) Spot-lock:

I really do like this option because it allows me to stop on a position if I have got a fish, need to re-rig, or have found some interesting structure such as timber or a weedpoint. It does work really well in calm water and I would say just okay to good in wind. In the wind, the spot lock will generally keep in anchored position but the boat will sway/zig back and forth quite a bit. This is kind of similar to using one anchor, imho. Once the motor moves 5ft away from the anchor spot, it will gradually turn the propellor on and when it still senses it is losing ground to the wind it will ramp up the propellor speed. So in the wind, for bobber fishing or many more than 2 people fishing I am not yet convinced the spot lock will work that great but I will keep experimenting. But I think it still works well for casting to structure especially with one person in the back of the boat. When you using spot recall to a anchor postion, the motor will try to do this very quickly. I can’t recall, but it definitely seemed faster than the propellor speed I had set. I didn’t try with cruise control set and pushing the spot recall. The anchor spot is stored when stowing the motor and shutting off the i-pilot remote.

2) Advanced Auto-pilot:

This definitely works better than the auto-pilot based on heading. Draw a line of GPS coordinates is a great solution for this and I have to say this works good most all of time. The other times so far is that during a windy day, I am quite certain I had set a course with the motor pointed between 2 stumps and the resulting course was definitely off. This was not the norm, but I did notice it a few times, but not many. On this, I still need to experiment and figure out if it was user error. Is the line of coordinates created off where the motor is pointing or the line the motor was moving (i.e. I point the motor West but wind is pushing the motor North at the time). I also think the motor recalculates the coordinates with every adjustment in the motor steering.

3) Cruise Control: I have had good luck with this feature also and I will definitely like this for trolling spinners or dialing in other presentations. On side note, if it is windy, this cruise control will more or less be a greater than or equal function. For example, if the wind is blowing you at 1.5mph and you try to set speed at 1.0mph the motor won’t really try to slow you down. At least that is what I found from my limited use so far but this doesn’t really surprise me.

More later I am sure…

Raap

I got to use my I-Pilot for the first time this past weekend too. I would say your analysis of Spot-Lock is just about dead on. I still think the ideal situation for me to use this feature will be while casting wing dams or something similar. This will best work when wind speed and direction, or current, is constant and consistant. In this test drive I was faced with a gusting and swirling wind situation along with some current. My boat was all over the place. In fact so much so that my cable on my Terrova became so twisted around the head from spinning that it wouldn’t move anymore. The guys in the back of the boat were disgusted while trying to keep their jigs and lines vertical since they were always swinging like a yo-yo. I finally took it off and ran the motor manually.
Auto Pilot, Advanced Auto Pilot and Cruise Control all worked as advertised. I wasn’t in a situation to try the Track Back feature. I would assume that gusty winds and waves might adversely affect this operation too, although you are actually moving and not trying to hold on one spot so maybe it will surprise me.

So far I’d rank my I-Pilot experience a 7.5 out of 10. I’m defintely glad I got it and think that I’ll like it more and more as I continue to use it.

I thought the I pilot was suppose to stop the motor from twisting around?

Good reviews though, I found pretty much the same thing.

Has anybody been able to get the bow to stay upstream while slowly drifting downstream with the current?

Was so windy Sat I couldn’t get it to work and not sure if wind or the unit was the problem?
Didn’t have any problems with the AP so maybe there was some problem with the GPS and the high hills last week.

Al

My advice for keeping the bow pointed up stream while “slipping the current backwards is to just use the standard Auto Pilot feature and adjust your speed to keep your jig vertical.