Humminbird Ice 55 Review
Before I get on with my review of the ICE 55 flasher I’d like to point out that I’ll not try and hide the fact that I’m a big MarCum fan. In my opinion MarCum has done a lot to advance the flasher market over the past 10 years to the benefit of all ice anglers that spend time out on the ice hovered over their flasher unit of choice. And that’s how I view the introduction of the ICE 55 from Humminbird. This is just one more player in the market that will bring new ideas and technologies to the market place and in the end the competition will continue to push each of the major manufacturers forward seeking fresh technology and improved performance.
As I walked out onto the ice at the MarCum High Power Challenge event held on White Bear Lake on Saturday, December 20 I was actually quite excited to have the opportunity to put flashers from different manufacturers side by side in ice holes separated by a couple of feet and finally get to see the strengths and weaknesses of each respective unit. It is one thing to listen to the double talk on the chat forums about what a unit can and cannot do. It is a whole different experience to set aside 30 minutes or an hour of your time and compare the units with a critical eye where it counts… out on the ice in a real world situation.
This review will focus on the strengths and weakness of the ICE 55 from Humminbird as it is a new unit for 2008 and little is know about the unit’s capabilities.
I did not take the time to see if an ICE 35 or 45 was available at this event as I wanted to test the “top dog” in the Humminbird lineup to get a feel for the best their product line had to offer. If I get a chance to hit another one of these events I’ll be sure to seek out some ice time with their other units.
Ice 55 Soft Pack
A top of the line flasher unit should come in a soft pack standard from the factory. If I’m going to drop $500 on a flasher I want it to stay safe and protected while in transit from one fishing spot to the next. The ICE 55 comes in a black and grey soft pack that appeared to be well made and without any noticeable flaws in the stitching. The soft pack material felt durable. I did not care for the way the soft pack opened or closed. Instead of velcro a pair of zippers, one on each side of the opening flap, is used to open and close the face cover. Getting a grip on the little zipper tabs with gloved hands was a difficult task and I feel the opening cover to the unit would be best secured with velcro. In watching the way others opened the case it was apparent to me that the zippers on the cover will take a beating over time as everyone I watched as they opened the cover simply reached to the bottom of the flap and yanked the cover upwards forcing the zippers to retreat backwards under force. If you have the discipline to take off your gloves and work the zippers by hand this arrangement will not be an issue. If you fish like the masses you’ll be a “grip and rip” guy and those zippers won’t be long for this world.
Initial Impressions
My initial impressions of the unit’s look and layout was fairly positive. The flat panel face of the unit was easy to read (conditions were overcast with visibilities of about 1/4 mile due to blowing snow) so it was impossible to determine on this day how well this unit would do in bright sunlight. Control knobs were large and easy to manipulate with gloved hands. The unit I was using was fairly quiet and the standard color readout of red, yellow, green appeared to be on par with other units reagrding brightness. The ICE 55 did not have the crisp bright colors and color separation you see on a MarCum unit but I would give the ICE 55 decent marks in this area.
I did not like the way the unit sat on its mount and the overall size and height. This is a big, tall unit. Obviously if you design a unit around a larger flat screen display the unit is going to be bigger than other flashers offering a smaller display area. That’s not my beef here. What I didn’t like was how high the unit sat on the mount… the head unit needs to be lowered considerably and there appears to be room to do so by moving the head unit forward and down in front of the battery. I could see no reason why the ICE 55 couldn’t be tweaked slightly to reduce the overall height of this unit substantially. The mount and plastic shuttle on which the unit is mounted seemed up to the task.
Getting Set Up
Here’s where I started having serious issues with the unit. The knobs for adjustment on the face of the unit are large enough to be easily adjusted. However it would be nice if they were actually attached in a manner that would keep them attached securely. The “on/off” knob on the ICE 55 that I demoed pulled off under a light amount of pressure. Upon inspection I found that the plastic knob used friction alone to hold the knob in place. In comparison the MarCum units I’m familiar with use a metal allen head screw to “pin” the adjustment knobs in place securely. In fairness I was able to push the knob back in place and get back in action and the knob only came off one other time during the course of the event. However, this lack of attention to detail is going to bite someone out there and you’ll find that guy adjusting his Ice 55 with a pliers for the remainder of his trip until a replacement can be secured.
The function buttons are fairly large but the labels next to the respective buttons are silk screened or printed on the face of the unit in a “dirty” white that is very hard to read when fishing out on the ice in blowing snow. I’m sure this can be addressed in the future as the product is refined. I would highly suggest bolder print or decals using contrasting colors to indicate the function of each control.
The ICE 55, and likely all other ICE series units, use a system to adjust settings where a user pushes the button for the desired control and then the user makes the adjustment using the large adjustment knob at the top of the head unit. It sounds workable, right? Here’s why it drove me nuts!
For example, the active function is set for “gain” but I want to adjust the noise filter. I press the “noise” button and I adjust the amount of noise suppression using the control knob. So far, so good. The issue is that after a few second the active function is re-set to the default function, which was gain. Now when you go back to further tweak your noise settings you’re now adjusting your gain. To correct the issue you need to re-adjust your gain, re-select your “noise” function and then make the needed adjustments within the allowed time before things reset back to the default function control. Are you kidding me?! Is there a way to turn that off? If there is that “reset to default control” should be set to “off” at the factory. Why wouldn’t the selected function stay selected until it is changed by the user? If I’m working on tweaking the noise settings I’ll tell the flasher when I’m done doing so. Every person I watched use the ICE 55 struggled with the way the controls functioned.
#12 Gill Pill in 24 foot of Water
To begin the actual performance comparison I headed for deeper water. I wanted to test the sensitivity and target separation in a scenario that is common to the way I fish. For me “common” would be 20+ foot of water and small jigs for crappies and bluegills. The jig I picked was a #12 gill pill from Custom Jigs and Spins (one of my favorites of late )and that jig would be used on the same rod and line in all tests going forward.
The test was started with the Humminbird ICE 55 in the wide beam transducer setting. Gain was turned up enough to return a bottom reading. That reading, if memory serves, was under 5 out of the possible 25 gain settings on the ICE 55. Once the bottom was established I slowly began to lower the jig. After the jig had been lowered approximately 7 – 8 feet below the ice the jig was given time to come in under the cone. After a wait of sufficient time with no mark for the jig showing on the ICE 55 display it was apparent that more gain would be needed.
The gain was turned up slowly with the jig held motionless. The jig did not appear as a steady return on the ICE 55 until the gain had been turned up past 15. Once the signal for the jig had been established at a gain setting past 15 the jig was again slowly lowered deeper. As soon as the jig started to move the ICE 55 unit lost the jig and would only display a very intermittent return on the display.
The gain was again increased to maintain a useable return signal from the jig. As we continued to lower the jig that gain had to be increased. At 20 feet the gain was at a setting of 25. Maxed out for this unit. As the jig was sent deeper to just above bottom in 24 foot of water the ICE 55 absolutely could not display a return for the jig. When the jig was raised back shallower than 20 feet the jig would again be displayed as a flickering return on the ICE 55 display. Clearly the unit has some incredible sensitivity issues in the wide beam setting. So much so that we opted to not attempt a target separation test in the wide beam as there was no way to substantiate performance if the unit was unable to display returns for the targets.
In narrow beam the ICE 55 did a better job. Once the narrow beam was selected the jig was immediately displayed and the gain setting could be turned down to a setting of 3 – 4 depending on depth. The ICE 55 did a acceptable job of tracking the jig as it fell, the signal was fairly consistent as the jig fell in the water column which allowed me to track the movement of the bait most of the time as it fell towards the bottom.
A target separation test was conducted using sinkers pegged to a line. I know, I know. Flashers aren’t designed to mark sinkers, they’re designed to mark the bottom and fish. I’ll give you that, no doubt about it. But how do you get a couple perch to maintain a consistent separation while we test various flashers? So the sinker test is as good as it will get coming from us ice heads. Do know that the test was applied uniformly to the units tested.
Two sinkers were pegged to a line and that line was lowered to a depth just about the bottom in 24′ of water. If the flasher being tested could not distinguish the two sinkers as unique target the line was reeled up and the distance was increased.
The distance between the sinkers was increased until the ICE 55 could distinguish the targets as “separate.” In this test, in 24 foot of water and in the narrow beam setting, the ICE 55 consistently returned target separation results at 5″. In comparison the MarCum LX5 was able to produce target separation results around 2 inches without the use of the Super Fine Line option on the MarCum LX5.
These target separation tests backed up what I thought I was seeing visually. The ICE 55 display did not seem to be very crisp and the sensitivity was very poor in comparison to some of the other units on the market.
After evaluating the ICE 55’s performance in the wide and narrow beam modes I think it is important to point out how I think Humminbird has engineered their transducers as I feel that is playing a significant role in the capabilities of their unit.
First we need to talk about transducer crystals. I’m not an engineer so stick with me if some of my terminology is off a bit. I think the point I’m going to make will be plainly evident once we get past my feeble attempt as explaining how a transducer crystal works.
Inside every transducer there’s a crystal. When power is applied to the crystal that crystal resonates at a known frequency. Cystals give off primary and secondary frequencies. Primary frequencies produce clean signals with minimal noise or distortion. Secondary frequencies lack in the sensitivity and noise department and are not often used by sonar engineers when the goal is to produce the most sensitive signal possible.
A MarCum LX5 has two crystals in the transducer, each responsible for producing a primary frequency. One primary frequency is used in the narrow beam setting. The other primary frequency generated by the second crystal is used in the wide beam setting. If primary frequencies result in clean signals with less noise it is only obvious to me that you’re going to need two crystals to get the best performance out of the narrow beam and wide beams settings.
Humminbird uses one crystal in their ICE Series of flashers. I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume that the secondary frequency is being used in the wide beam setting. And that’s why the wide beam setting proved to have such difficulty displaying a return for that #12 Gill Pill in 24 foot of water when the MarCum could do so with ease.
Overview
The Humminbird Ice 55 is the newest player in the hotly contested flasher niche and bring a larger flat panel display to the market that will almost certainly force MarCum and Vexilar to offer units with larger displays in the near future. The overall quality and durability of the unit seemed to be acceptable, with a few minor reservations regarding the closure of the soft pack and the control knobs. Owners of this unit will find they’re able to adapt the way they fish to accomodate the exclusive use of the narrow beam setting in deeper water and use the ICE 55 as a serviceable tool out on the ice.
What needs attention? In my opinion the user control interface needs to be improved. With that much space available for the placement of user controls shouldn’t there be controls dedicated for each function? But the user controls aren’t the heart of the problem. The real issue at this time is with the nuts and bolts performance of this unit. Sure, a big flat panel display is nice. But none of that matters if the sensitivity and target separation is compromised. And shouldn’t the top unit in a product line that advertises a dual beam transducer offer a dual crystal transducer so the wide beam setting is actually useable at depths where most of us fish, which is to say at depths deeper than 22 feet?
I for one am excited to see where this product goes over the next couple seasons. I’m sure Humminbird will take this year one product back into engineering over the coming summer and address some if not all of the issues anglers will report to them over the ice season. For ice anglers looking for a flasher for use THIS SEASON I can say, without reservation, there’s flashers on the market that bring to the table a better combination of performance and features than the Humminbird ICE Series of flashers offers at this time.
By the way I am still using a Humminbird Super Thirty II, from 1975, sounds like the Ice 55 works about the same!
I was just down the road fishing with my boy.
