LX6 first use on ice and review…

I had a chance to use my new LX6 on Upper Red yesterday. The results were less then satisfactory. In part through half the day I got tired of fiddling with the settings and had to revert to the Ice-55. I think it may have been because we were fishing the for the most part outside in harsh cold & windy situation.

These were the tried settings:

Sensitivity 3

Target ID 1

Chart, flasher, vertical, vertical zoom displays

Auto & dynamic range

Zoom auto & fixed

Ping set 2

Target adjust 1

IR 2

The LX6 started out fine, but as the cold settled in it created issues. I could not get a read on sensitivity if set to 3 once the cold hit. Had to be 4 or higher. At times it would not read, had to adjust sensitivity to get it to kick in. Made sure there wasnt frozen ice on the transducer and set it to hang properly. In part I am very familar & confident fiddling with electronics and Marcums. But I could not get my LX6 to perform admirably in 13 fow.

The Auto depth constantly zoomed its windows way too often making it an eye sore to focus on fish and lure. I could not use dynamic depth, it appears the software becomes distorted or jagged on screen display during real time use. Set depth results was same as auto. I powercycled the unit several times to ensure it wasnt some random software error but the issues persisted.

My buddies LX7 running the 2.9 software did not have the same issues. He was running similar settings but on dynamic depth. He had sensitivity set to 3 all day will I had to be on 4.

This morning woke up and cleaned up the LX6 from yesterdays trip. Reseated the power and transducer cables on the head unit. Battery was good and showed plenty juice.

I hope to give it another test run soon maybe next week to make sure there isnt something wrong with my unit or transducer. Im a big Marcum fan, but the issues I had this past Sunday was enough from me to switch back to a mechanical flasher for the rest of the day.

Make sure the battery had a good charge, how long had you been using it before it started to have problems? Sounds like it might be a battery getting low condition.

Possible bad battery?

Quote:

---

Make sure the battery had a good charge, how long had you been using it before it started to have problems? Sounds like it might be a battery getting low condition.

Possible bad battery?

---

I am certain the battery is good. Was fully charged before I left for the trip. It lost little juice through out half day use. Powered the unit on this Morning without any issues showing 12.7 volts as I remember.

Thinking of swapping tranducers on the next trip if needed to ensure its not that. Have extra battery too just in case but again I doubt its that.

Good thought, you could swap transducers with your Bud.

Quote:

---

Quote:

---

Make sure the battery had a good charge, how long had you been using it before it started to have problems? Sounds like it might be a battery getting low condition.

Possible bad battery?

---

I am certain the battery is good. Was fully charged before I left for the trip. It lost little juice through out half day use. Powered the unit on this Morning without any issues showing 12.7 volts as I remember.

Thinking of swapping tranducers on the next trip if needed to ensure its not that. Have extra battery too just in case but again I doubt its that.

---

I’ve seen better luck with a manual range setting in shallow water (sub-15′) than when using Dynamic or Auto range settings. Give that a try next time out. In deeper water the Dynamic / Auto settings seem to work better.

As for you needing to run different sensitivity settings than your buddy, you’re running different software on your 6 that has a different gain curve. Your numbers will not match your buddy’s numbers and you will need to run a higher numerically sensitivity setting to “see” your jig.

For reference, on the Lx9’s the mid-point of the gain curve seems to be right around 11 – 13 whereas the midpoint on the LX7’s running V2.9 is 3. Long story short, the new gain curves have been “opened up” meaning there’s far more adjust-ability and options for tuning but to see that new found sensitivity and ability to tune you’re going to need to operate at a higher setting than in the past.

A likely reason why your unit was functioning so poorly in dynamic mode is that because you were “under gained” (I think I just made up a new phrase!) you weren’t returning a strong enough signal to the LX6 for it to properly set the dynamic range.

Of course everything I just shared should be considered nothing more than speculation since I was not there to work with the unit firsthand.

Quote:

---

I’ve seen better luck with a manual range setting in shallow water (sub-15′) than when using Dynamic or Auto range settings. Give that a try next time out. In deeper water the Dynamic / Auto settings seem to work better.

As for you needing to run different sensitivity settings than your buddy, you’re running different software on your 6 that has a different gain curve. Your numbers will not match your buddy’s numbers and you will need to run a higher numerically sensitivity setting to “see” your jig.

For reference, on the Lx9’s the mid-point of the gain curve seems to be right around 11 – 13 whereas the midpoint on the LX7’s running V2.9 is 3. Long story short, the new gain curves have been “opened up” meaning there’s far more adjust-ability and options for tuning but to see that new found sensitivity and ability to tune you’re going to need to operate at a higher setting than in the past.

A likely reason why your unit was functioning so poorly in dynamic mode is that because you were “under gained” (I think I just made up a new phrase!) you weren’t returning a strong enough signal to the LX6 for it to properly set the dynamic range.

Of course everything I just shared should be considered nothing more than speculation since I was not there to work with the unit firsthand.

---

Thanks for the feedback James. The unit did operate more cleanly on the set depth instead of auto/dynamic in 13 fow on Red. However when set on dynamic depth it causes the screen displays such as flasher and vertical to flicker and garble pixelated on screen of the LX6. Wonder if this is a bug with the 3.01 software? Did not have deeper water to test with on this further since we were on Red.

For about the first half hour + the LX6 did also pick up my buckshot spoon flawlessly on sensitivity 3 before subduing to 4. And occasionally not picking up anything after that without having to adjust the sensitivity back and forth between 3-5. It did settle on 4 most of the day. I will assume as you say the gain curve is likely higher and will need to be set to 4-6 in future for proper visual.

I will test the LX6 it on your recommended settings next time im out and tweak the settings more.

I’m not aware of any dynamic depth “bugs” related to the LX6 software. Keep me posted on your findings. I just fished a production LX6 in the latest show up on Red and it functioned very well fishing similar spoons at similar depths.

The manual says the dynamic range will not work @10ft….
13ft might be just close enough (considering the transducer depth)…
No ice here yet but in shallow water I would try manual…

Quote:

---

The manual says the dynamic range will not work @10ft….

13ft might be just close enough (considering the transducer depth)…

No ice here yet but in shallow water I would try manual…

---

Your right, manual does say no less than 10ft. We were borderline the whole day 11-13 fow. I think that may have played a part but to cause a pixelated screen? However my buddies LX7 on 2.09 didnt have any of the same issues. And he sets his sensitivity to 3, flasher dial and vertical screens on dynamic.

Aside the issues I was worried that the screen on the LX6 may have been too small to my likings but it turns out to be just fine. I love having the chart display feature with the vertical bar graph and will completely eliminate the flasher dial screen from now on. I think that’s the way to go.

Quote:

---

Aside the issues I was worried that the screen on the LX6 may have been too small to my likings but it turns out to be just fine. I love having the chart display feature with the vertical bar graph and will completely eliminate the flasher dial screen from now on. I think that’s the way to go.

---

10-4 on that. If I’m fishing outside hopping around the 6 is a great size.

The colors on the LX-6 seem to not be as vibrant as on the LX-7. Especially the green. That or maybe I am just half color blind. The other thing I noticed on the LX-6 is that on the graph chart display it almost sits too far to the left side of the screen and cuts off the depth numbers when looking straight at it – have to move to the right a little to see everything.