using your graphs in the offseason

  • jwelch
    Iowa
    Posts: 48
    #1306761

    I was wondering if anybody has came up with anything so you can look at your graphs in the house? I know they make a 12 volt power cord but then I would have to sit out in my truck. I would like to hook them up so I can sit around play with them a little and maybe update them without going out in the cold. So far I’m thinking I might try to get in extra power cord, battery and hook them up. Anybody have any other ideas for this?

    Jeremy

    cade-laufenberg
    Winona,MN/La Crosse, WI
    Posts: 3667
    #932605

    you can use the same 12 volt batteries that you would use for a portable flasher/under water camera and connect the wires from your graph straight to it. This is actually how I used to power my gps/graph on my small boat as I did not want to drain any extra life from my already marginal trolling battery. I’ve actually even used this for taking the gps ice fishing and it worked great (minus the 30 ft of tangled wiring). It should only take you a matter of a minute or two to disconnect your wires from your boat and reconnect them to one of these batteries which you can pick up for between $19.99 and $25.00. hope this helps.

    James Holst
    Keymaster
    SE Minnesota
    Posts: 18926
    #932607

    Quote:


    I was wondering if anybody has came up with anything so you can look at your graphs in the house? I know they make a 12 volt power cord but then I would have to sit out in my truck. I would like to hook them up so I can sit around play with them a little and maybe update them without going out in the cold. So far I’m thinking I might try to get in extra power cord, battery and hook them up. Anybody have any other ideas for this?

    Jeremy


    I use this handy little bugger any time I want to run a 12 volt car plug in the house off of 110 power.

    $2.52 on Amazon.

    110 to 12v adapter

    huntfishhastings
    Hastings, MN
    Posts: 282
    #932613

    I take mine out of the boat and stick it on a old genz vexilar pack that I had. Like some one else said, I had an extra power cord for a boat. I cut it shorter and ran it to a 12v flasher battery. I use it in the truck while ice fishing. Its nice too if you fish a lake in the summer you can mark way points on all the structure you find open water and have them when it all freezes up. I find it alot nicer to look at a 7″ screen when looking for something specific than a little 3″ screen on the handheld. I have a HDS7 has any one tried the ice tranducer with one of these? I tried it in flasher mode with the boat one but I couldnt make heads from tails in what I was seeing. The Vexi is much better but I wouldnt mind having a extra flasher for other people. Although its a expensive piece of equipment to have bouncing around in a shack.

    phigs
    Twin Cities, MN
    Posts: 1046
    #932620

    Quote:


    I use this handy little bugger any time I want to run a 12 volt car plug in the house off of 110 power.

    $2.52 on Amazon.

    110 to 12v adapter


    have never seen one of those before. thanks! gonna order up a few of them.

    wallgeye
    Richfield, MN
    Posts: 157
    #933104

    That thing is sweet! Never seen one before. May buy one. When I had the same problem the OP has I was looking all over. I almost went this way Computer lighter adaptor

    Lets you install a cigarette lighter in an open drive bay on your computer.
    I then toyed with connecting directly to 12v molex plug from a computer power supply. I have a few laying around from upgrade projects. Decided I did not want to risk a $3000 sonar to me trying to do something that might not work. I guess I am still scarred from the car stereo I cooked while installing it in high school. I hooked the leads up backwards and the stereo was gone in a poof of smoke. Thought I would save money buy buying one roll of wire and use the same color for hot and ground.

    Mistake!

    Currently am waiting for a 500mb sonar record file to download onto a chip so I can run it through DrDepth. Hoping the battery lasts longer then the download takes!

    For now I have settled with the arrangement others have mentioned. 12v backup battery for vexilar/aqua-view/marcum connnected with a spare wiring harness I found. Still not sure where it came from.

    What I would do for a USB 3.0 port on these sonars!! To hell with the SD slot, record directly to a thumb drive or connect directly to a pc for updates and file transfers!

    Have also heard of people using lawn tractor/ motorcycle batteries in ice shacks to power several devices for longer periods. If you have one of those 12v booster packs for emergency jump starts it may have a 12 jack you could tie into, saw someone who ran his gear that way also. I use some spring clamps to hold the head unit down to my desk. I mount the sonar into the bracket and clamp the bracket down to the desk.

    joea
    Lakeville, MN
    Posts: 14
    #939031

    I’ve got my HDS-7 setup on a Genz Blue pack, Lowrance ice ducer, and battery.

    With a full charge, I can get roughly 6 hours out of a 7.5 mAh battery.

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