Opinons please anchor, fishfinder

[mitch4570]

Hey guys WAS out today perching not much luck. Had trouble with anchor holding. I have a starcraft fishmaster 196 What size/ style anchor do I need? I fish lake erie, breast bay and port clinton. Also want to up grade my fiahfinder/ gps willing to spend 1000.00. Which ones work well for you.

Thanks in advance for your help

Mitch

[badboards]

I had the same problem couple weeks ago. For a soft bottom being sand or mud You need to invest in a fluke style anchor to fit the length of your boat with at least 4 feet of chain connected to anchor and the rule of thumb is 5 feet of anchor rope x the depth of water your in. I heard the waves was pretty bad today probably be hard for anything to hold. I don't go out in anything past 2 footers I only have an 18 foot boat. I'll be trying my new anchor out Wednesday for the first time. Get as much advise as you can. I find a lot of good research here and on YouTube. Good luck.

[DoubleG]

Chain on anchor line. The longer the chain the better. Chain helps anchor lay flat on bottom for a good set. No less then 150 ft. of anchor line ( called rode). You may not need it on a clam day but when waves increase you will need to play out more line. It is safest to anchor from bow!! A10 lb. fluke anchor is a good start. Chain & anchor will be heavy to lift. If you have room a windlass is great to have. Best type of anchor line is pillted cost more then stranded but easy to handle. Good fishing. Stay safe!!

[captainshotgun]

If your anchor is big enough, MORE chain!

[dunn782]

I'm a Lowrance guy on FF. Have an older HDS 7 works great. Side and down scan for other lakes rarely use those on Erie. May upgrade soon, I would go to a Simrad which is the Lowrance salt water unit. Definitely a chirp transducer. I for sure want a touch screen. If you only fish Erie you could probably skip the side and down scan and go with a larger screen unless you smallmouth fish a lot. On thing, you'll never wish you would have bought a smaller screen. Sort of like building a barn, no body ever wish they built smaller.

[captainshotgun]

I have several garmins, including dog collars. I also use 9” garmins at work on the headboats. I bought the 93sv echomap black fri last yr for about $600 at cabelas. We also have one lowrance at work. The garmins are the most user friendly by far imho. That being said; you might be ahead to buy two 7” for about the same money and network/ split them

[TonyC10]

Captainshotgun do you run head boats out? If so out of where?

[branhamautomotive]

I love the lowrance, simrad, bg , all basiclly very similar....same family. But the down scan is great in funding targets especially near bottom like perch........get a setup with a big enough transducer and get it set so it actually reads fish while running on plane.........nothing worse than driving over fish and not knowing

[captainshotgun]

Captainshotgun do you run head boats out? If so out of where?

I sent you a pm

[badboards]

Wanted to share this experience about my anchor Wednesday.

Fluke anchor works great. I'm gonna add another 3 feet of chain and 50 feet of rope Wich will give me 150 feet of rope and 5 feet of chain. Took a little to long to grab the bottom but when it did it held.