sidescan

[stuck]

Im brand new on this forum,so i dont know if yall have beat this topic to death.Ive been psd for 10 years on westcoast of fle,citrus co. we finally got a side scan through hs grant.recovered a body with it last week in suwanne river got the divers 10 ft from the victim and located a shrimp boat that sunk last year off crystal river.we were even measuring jewfish laying on the wreck.We got the marine sonic splash proof and went to the school with tampa pd.I really think the thing is really going to save us a llot of bottomtime on recoverys.Im curious to see what situations anyone else has had using this tech stuff.

 

[DSAR592]

We have been using the Hummingbird side scan for about three years and just recently bought two more. We were the first ones in the area to have them. Now at least three agencies have them in this area. They are awesome. A while back a guy fell off of a ship. the divers were in the water searching for him and could not find him. We arrived with our side scan and he was exactly where he fell at. The side scan showed him perfectly. Told the divers where he was and they went straight to him. This is definately a must have piece of equipment. I know that we have found several bodies with the help of the sidescan. Ken

 

[nadwidny]

Gene Ralston is the king of sidescan

Side Scan Sonar - underwater searching

 

[stuck]

Ken,one of my friends has that unit on a 27 see vee and it is great.Local fwc officer is trying to get one for his boat and im hoping once my dept see how it works ill get mine.I can use that one on our 24 when working solo.for what they cost im really impressed with them.

 

[The Chad]

I'm a little green on this stuff too. I have the reg. sonar which shows bttm contour. I was wondering if your draging this thing under the boat at 2mph and the bttm is all hilly how well does it work then. I mean I've seen places in the lake where my bttm contour looks like a heartbeat on a monitor. Do you have a guy rasing and lowing it to prevent it from becoming a dirt dart?

 

[Tassie_Rohan]

I'm a little green on this stuff too. I have the reg. sonar which shows bttm contour. I was wondering if your draging this thing under the boat at 2mph and the bttm is all hilly how well does it work then. I mean I've seen places in the lake where my bttm contour looks like a heartbeat on a monitor. Do you have a guy rasing and lowing it to prevent it from becoming a dirt dart?

I got to look at a new humminbird sidescan that doesn't have a towfish - the transmitter mounts on the hull. Prob. not at good as what you're used to but we were getting good images of everything from car and boat wreaks down to small rocks, branches and bottom surface details. It was fairly cheap for a sidescan as well - around 2300.

Cheers,
Rohan.

 

[The Chad]

Wow thats pretty cool, not crazy about the price but BOAT stands for "bust out another thousand" right? Thanks for the info...if I could mount it off the back next to my other transducer or on the other side might be fun to play with.

 

[DennisS]

You can get the Hummingbird 997 for around $1800, if you shop around. The transducer has to have a clear view to the side, it can't be next to another transducer. I found out that the transom mount doesn't work with inboards and had to go to a thru-hull.

It's a pretty slick unit, there are a bunch of programmers that are working on a program that will read back the .SON files that are created when you are on record. You can only view them on your unit right now, this will enable playback on a PC if they get it working.

 

[stuck]

I wish i had it today,we have a missing fisherman off the coast,the best part is we really have no idea where to start diving.Were looking in a few areas were he likes to wade,we had a pretty strong s wind and flood tide and the area is about 25 square miles of about one foot vis.About 6 mixed patrol boats and 3 birds flew from around 1100 until dark,i didnt get the team on the boat and the fish into the water until around 4.We towed it till around 9,i could have knocked out a lot of area by myself with the hummingbird.It is shollow flat with spoilbanks with a lot of deep cuts and drops. We At places its so shallow that the fish was at times at the surface.when you drop it down and the depths change it does bounce off the bottom and you can see it in the screen.It was rough in the cuts and it made the bottom very wavy,you just have to adjust your course and run at different angles.We used it in a flats boat today it will be used out of a larger boat tomorrow so the weather wont be as much a factor.Weve got hhe marine sonic splash proof they have got a bunch of pictures of different targets on there website.