FCV-627 Newb here

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

I am Onur from Turkey. I recently purchased an FCV627 + 525STID-PWD Combo. I'll use that without any auxillary equipment. This is the first time that I'll use a Furuno and I am completely unfamiliar with TVG, TX, Clutter, Color Erase, Calib etc.

I do trolling within the depth interval of 15 to 80 feet, max. speed of 3 knots. And for jigging, the maximum depth is 250 feet. I catch fish like barracuda, dolphinfish, bonito etc. which are closer to the surface and also grouper, porgy or leerfish (I hope the translations of the names of the fish are correct) which live at the bottom rocks. By the way, I fish at Mediterranian Sea.

Now, as a beginner, I'd be so glad if you could give me some basic tips and hints for the settings. I know I have to try different settings to find out the most convenient ones by myself but some small hints are always welcome.

Especially I need more clear explanation for the uses of TVG, TX, Clutter, Color Erase, Calib, than the explanation in the user's manual.

Thank you for your interest in advance.

 

[Snips]

Onur,
While you can adjust all those settings I would keep things simple for now. Start off with a screen advance rate of 1/1, TX Power setting of 10 and the TX Rate at 10 also. From this point I would adjust the range, gain and clutter in that order. Most folks don't use enough gain, they will turn the gain up until they start seeing blue speckles then they will turn it back down, thus losing fish targets. I perfer to turn the gain up to start seeing the speckles and then go a touch higher. I will leave the sounder like this until I am over fish targets then at this point I will use the Clutter control to remove the speckles from the screen but leave the fish targets. Since you are just getting started I would spend some time using the 627 in the DEMO mode. This will allow you to adjust the settings to see how they affect the picture without leaving the dock.

Snips

 

[Anonymous]

Thx Snips,

I made some trials last weekend. Found some bottom fish and hooked them in. The bottom observation (it itwas rock or mud or sand) was quite succesful, because I know how the bottom is and what I saw on the screen was 100% correct.
But I realized that I did not see any fish in the middle water (15-20 meters down from the surface) or close to te surface. I am sure there should have been some of them swimming around. Do you have any idea why they do not appear?

 

[Snips]

Onur,
Try using the sounder without the Bottom Discrimination mode on. When you turn on the sounders BD mode it changes the sounder internal settings for that purpose. I normally don't use the BD mode when looking for fish.

Snips

 

[Anonymous]

Worth trying.

Thx again Snips.