Thread: Discussion on Lowrance Elite 5 DSI/Chartplotter ....

Originally Posted by Knot2Bad

If this unit is mounted on the TM then when you maneuver the TM on its axis you would be sending this vertical slice beam in a 180 arc left and right of the TM shaft. This would show you fish all around your boat wouldn't it? If so when you're moving your TM around you need to keep this in minds as to what direction you're looking at. Am I correct in this thinking? Has anyone considered this or tried it with their unit.

Yes, TM mounted tdx will send the fan shaped beam in accordance with & at right angles to the direction of the nose of the TM. The problem with any fast turning of the TM, is that it distorts the screen image, momentarily (as witnessed on the screenshot of the big cedar tree).
Yes, one does have to keep in mind what direction the trolling motor is pointing, especially when boat is moving/drifting but TM is not engaged. You want the fan shaped beam to be spread out across your forward motion, so that it sweeps the area you're heading into. If the TM is slightly angled off from dead straight ahead, and the boat is moving/drifting straight ahead, you're shortening the angle of the beam. (by "shortening" I mean instead of the beam being a _ it's a / ... and therefore the beam spread is not extending out to the R/L at the degree of angle associated with the 455 or 800kHz ping)

I don't think it would work very well, trying to make it act like a 360 HB unit, though. But, yeah ... you "could" turn the TM nose to the right or left & "sweep" the area in front of you ... you'd just have to keep changing your L/R direction, and have some other force pushing the boat forward (big motor/wind/waves/momentum from TM). You'd just have momentary "garbage" on your screen, during the direction change of the TM.

(from what I understand .... )
Lowrance DI units have a "dedicated DI crystal" ... which is probably why their HD units have such large transducers (to contain the DI, 2d, and their version of SI crystals). HB's use the SI crystal for the DI image, and the processor/software makes the image calculations. The dedicated DI crystal of the E5DSI is the reason it does not have 2d capabilities. (I think that's how it all works out, anyway.)

... cp