I'd be surprised if a transducer can be damaged by sticking it to the hull. If it's not working when you hold it the water, it's not working at all. Either a bad transducer, bad unit, bad wire or bad connection. I'd simply take it back and tell them it's not working and you want another one just like it. Howard On Jun 19, 2006, at 1:28 PM, Rick Langer wrote:
I'm having trouble getting my new Garmin Fishfinder 140 to work properly. It came with a transom mount transducer which I siliconed to the center of the lowest plank in the aft port cabin locker (a good place I thought). When I do get a reading, it seems to be accurate as measured against a handheld depth meter and other boats, but the problem is I don't always get a reading (just shows zero indefinitely) or I initially get a reading which doesn't change as the water depth changes. On the Chesapeake Bay Cruise I used it for more than a few hours and it either read zero for long periods or read accurately for only a short time. I finally gave up on it.
Today I popped it off. The silicone seal seemed tight with no air gaps. I went to the river and while using silly putty I couldn't get any reading (other than zero) from it, trying 6 or 7 different spots. I put it over the side with the silly putty still on the transducer and got no reading. I cleaned the putty off and put it over the side and got accurate readings once it started to register. Registering took from 10 seconds to sometimes minutes and a few times never showed anything but zero after being on many minutes.
Before I go to Garmin, who will probably tell me I ruined the transducer trying to silicone it to the floor, I thought I'd pass it by you smart folks.
Thanks,
Rick Langer M15 #337 Bluebird
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