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04-03-2010, 05:29 AM | #1 |
Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 50
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transducer head-ache......
i am thinking the tranny has an issue since putting it directly in the water did not help. rrrrrrrrrr......spring break with a NON-working unit stinks! |
04-03-2010, 08:02 AM | #2 |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2009
Posts: 90
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Try to reset it. Contact Humminbird.
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04-03-2010, 08:02 AM | #3 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 116
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Double check your voltage. When my Garmin goes under 11.5v, I get sonar failure and it shuts down. I would have thought this was enough voltage, especially since it has a low battery alarm feature which goes down to 8 volts!
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04-03-2010, 12:17 PM | #4 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,921
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04-03-2010, 02:54 PM | #5 |
Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 50
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i checked the voltage of the battery, coming out of the battery box, and the power chord where it plugs into the unit. all gave the same readings of 13.2V. i cleaned out the wet well and the bottom of the tranny......both were very clean as i have only had it out 8 times. i wonder if there is something other than water that might help when i replace/swap it. someone posted on here once that some garmin products actually call for mineral oil. hmmmmmmmmmm.......any ideas?
fabulous......how do you reset them? like reset the defaults that the head unit comes with? tried that many times. after i checked everything i even added a new spacer to the bottom of the rubber cap the tranny is mounted to keep the tranny as close to the hull as possible. it is all but touching now. brought it out to a little fresh water lake to give it a try and got the same F**K up readings. hummingbird service center is closed till monday. i pulled everything out and prolly gonna ship it back for a new one. here is my question to all wet mount users out there. Can the constant pinging of the sonar through the water in the wet well harm the the tranny? i only have a small gap there and wonder as the thing would track a 1/4 jig down to 18ish feet the first time a ran the unit. would have checked deeper but that was all the depth of the lake. frustrated i am! i hope it was a sh**y unit and they treat the swap well. |
04-03-2010, 03:45 PM | #6 |
Senior Member
Join Date: Mar 2009
Posts: 2,384
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You don't have any other electronics near the FF that might be causing interference do you?
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04-03-2010, 05:26 PM | #7 |
Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 50
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none....i even shut my cell phone off when working on the unit today. no difference. but no other electronics on-board.
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04-03-2010, 05:49 PM | #8 |
Senior Member
Join Date: May 2008
Location: La Jolla
Posts: 189
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D town...
I have a 535 that has a bad transducer. The readings of the bottom I get are a lot like a bar graph, and the depth is totally off. If this is anything like what you've seen, it is likely you've got a bad 'ducer. I don't know why mine decided to go bad, it functioned for years for another user and for a few trips for me, maybe they just 'go bad'? I'm told H-bird has a good customer repair policy. I tried, and I'll just say... good luck with that. Sorry for the downer message, but I know your pain. Garmin for me next time. For what it's worth, Willy |
04-03-2010, 09:55 PM | #9 |
Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 50
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i am gonna try on monday..........i hope the fact that i am the original owner since only january and have my receipt they will help. if not i to am going in a different direction. lowrance or garmin i guess.
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04-04-2010, 01:55 PM | #10 |
Junior
Join Date: Aug 2008
Location: San Diego
Posts: 15
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99% sure it is the ducer. Had my Eagle Cuda acting the same way, had the ducer replaced under warranty. Did all the voltage trouble shooting and in water tests first, for a waste of time. I'm now doing the wet mount, no more gooping it. I get better performance with the wet mount and will quickly replace it if it goes bad again. Good luck.
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05-03-2010, 06:48 AM | #11 |
Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 50
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finally got out this weekend. the new tranny that hummingbird sent worked like a charm. fired it up and it worked all day (8 am to 6pm).
one modification i did make was to add a rubber stopper to the rubber mounting cap......lowered the tranny closer to the hull. |
05-03-2010, 07:08 AM | #12 |
Senior Member
Join Date: May 2008
Location: La Jolla
Posts: 189
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Congrats!
That's great. Just from curiosity, did you call in the repair request, and then send it in? Did they require the proof of purchase? Well done. Willy |
05-03-2010, 03:14 PM | #13 |
Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 50
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called and got a work number and shipped it in. they did ask for a proof of purchase. it was back to me in a little over a week.
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05-03-2010, 05:13 PM | #14 |
Olivenhain Bob
Join Date: May 2008
Location: Olivenhain, CA
Posts: 1,121
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I have an H-Bird Matrix 12 that probably uses the same transducer. It is nearly new and works better then my first one... when it works. My problem is that on almost every trip, several times during the day, the unit starts giving strange depth readings ranging from showing no depth at all to showing 20 feet when I know I am in over 100 feet. Rebooting the unit usually fixes the problem.
I am virtually certain that this is a hardware problem but since it is intermittent and I cannot reproduce the problem on demand, I am at a loss about what to to. Sending it to H-Bird would be a waste of time since it is not a solid problem so it will probably not show up when they test it. This thing is really starting to piss me off. I will give this unit one more day on the water and if it acts up again, I will take it back to West Marine. Anyone have any suggestions. Bob |
05-03-2010, 06:40 PM | #15 |
Rum Pirate
Join Date: Mar 2010
Location: Wilds of Mira Mesa
Posts: 388
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My unit starts out working fine and the on the paddle out stops reading close to the first buoy. I have had this happen 3 times now. I re-adjusted the max depth reading to 290 ft and it works great now. You may need to set your max reading depth at the 300 ft mark.
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05-03-2010, 07:54 PM | #16 |
Member
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 50
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if it is under warrenty send it in. they want your business and will send you a new tranny.
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