Lowrance

GB87 · #1 02-03-2016, 02:07 PM

Had a great boating season but boat (1987 V20)has been tucked away and shrink wrapped for a couple of months. It was so warm in RI this fall that I hated to take the boat out of the water.
About mid-season, my Lowrance HDS7 started to act up. GPS worked fine but sonar would not work in shallow depths. Figured that I would send it back to Lowrance over the winter. Just called and I was told that that it was out or warranty and they don't do repairs only replacement and then only if the unit is still in warranty. Does anyone know of anywhere in RI or MA that I can get this unit checked out?
GB87

inaforty · #2 02-03-2016, 04:44 PM

No personal experience but I think this guy does a lot of the commercial boats in New Bedford.

http://www.yachtinsidersguide.com/li...is-electronics

THEFERMANATOR · #3 02-03-2016, 05:16 PM

Maybe check with boe marine. They sell and do installs on alot of units, and seem to be very knowledgeable everytime I've talked to them.

jamesbalog · #4 02-04-2016, 08:33 AM

when you say sonar wont work in shallow depths what exactly do you mean? are you losing bottom? is the screen just blank? what is happening. What settings are you running on the unit? What kind of transducer do you have and where is it mounted?

Could just be a transducer problem, that would be the first thing i looked at....

GB87 · #5 02-04-2016, 11:59 AM

The unit works fine at depths greater than 20 feet. As soon as I go to any depth 20 feet or less it loses the bottom. As soon as the depth increases it works fine again. I have a transom mounted 50/200 kHz transducer. No problems until this year.

SkunkBoat · #6 02-04-2016, 12:18 PM

Try doing the reset to defaults

DiverDux · #7 02-06-2016, 12:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GB87

Had a great boating season but boat (1987 V20)has been tucked away and shrink wrapped for a couple of months. It was so warm in RI this fall that I hated to take the boat out of the water.
About mid-season, my Lowrance HDS7 started to act up. GPS worked fine but sonar would not work in shallow depths. Figured that I would send it back to Lowrance over the winter. Just called and I was told that that it was out or warranty and they don't do repairs only replacement and then only if the unit is still in warranty. Does anyone know of anywhere in RI or MA that I can get this unit checked out?
GB87

My Brother and I were researching chartplotters this past spring as we were in the market for a new unit. One thing that was glaringly clear was that Lowrance was not very helpful with respect to helping us determine the differences between several units we were considering. Poor communication, poor attitudes and lack of knowledge from the several people we spoke to.

Spoke to Garmin, complete opposite. I have always purchased Lowrance units in the past. This time bought Garmin and won't look back.

Customer service is based in North America and is outstanding. We had no problems with the equioment, but needed some help with the install (specifically linking the unit to the autopilot). The CSR was friendly and knowlegeable, he even sent a replacement part that I damaged at no charge. They even covered shipping.

The unit is a touch screen and is simple to use, much easier than any other units I have used in the past including comparable units on boats owned by my friends.

Do yourself a favor and check out the Garmin units, I think you will be happy you did.

SkunkBoat · #8 02-06-2016, 02:08 PM

Since Lowrance was bought by Navico seems they just don't quite have their ship together...

THEFERMANATOR · #9 02-06-2016, 05:38 PM

My 1st experience with lowrance was back when navico 1st bought them. I had an lmf-200 with the ep-10 to monitor fuel usage on my hydra-sports. Had nothing but problems with the fuel flow senso, after the 3rd one went out in just a few months, they refused to warranty it anymore. Gave up on it, and boe swapped me out for a northstar unit. My new boat has a lowrance chartplotter on it that does nmea2000, but unfortunately it doesnt do the engine readouts, so I'm looking at an lmf-200 and an ep-20 engine interface, then I can hook the chartplotter into it and have a gauge to tell me oil pressure, engine temp, hour meter, voltage, fuel flow, instant econ, and some more. What a shock when I checked the prices. I bought the lmf WITH the ep-10 flow sensor for $200, they no longer sell it as a combo. The lmf200 is $170, the flow sensor is $200, and the nmea2000 starter kit is $63. So its now $433 for what I bought not that long ago for $200 because navico jacked the prices up. It's going to cost me around $330 to hook it up to the engine so I can monitor it. Thats not chump change by a long shot because navico jacked the prices up.

phatdaddy · #10 02-06-2016, 05:44 PM

My take is what do you want it to do best. With a combo unit you can't get both to be great. I think garmin has the best gps, easy to use, very intuitive to use, but hard to get it to "talk" to other machines. Furuno has the best bottom machine, but u need a masters degree to work the gps and the base maps are a joke.