Lowrance HDS-5 - keeps "losing bottom"

donberry

Petty Officer 3rd Class
Joined
Dec 27, 2010
Messages
94
mounted on a 'glass 19' fish and ski. Bought it Aug 16 - worked great for the first couple of weeks. Starting last week, the sonar loses the bottom - no bottom is displayed and the depth will bounce around from "---" to maybe 2' to 10' - but I will be in water anywhere from 30' to 120'.
I stop the sonar and then start it again - nothing. I turn the unit off and back on - nothing.
Then magically, after anywhere from 10-20 minutes, it will start working again.
I first start trying to check out the sonar when i am going maybe 2-5mph. I stop the boat completely. I turn off the engine. Nothing.
Magically it will just stop working again. No rhyme or reason. It may stop when I am going 30 mph or it may stop when i am sitting still. It may start when i am going 30mph, or it may start back up when i am sitting still.

There are no other electronics on my boat. I am fishing weekdays, late at night and am pretty much on the lake by myself, with just a boat every now and then speeding by so I don;t see any other boat interference problems.

Fish right now are hitting in around 15' of water or off points 20-40' - sometimes the sonar works and i can fish points, but then it will just stop working and I am fishing blind.

I checked transducer, still exactly where it was when 1st mounted. I was thinking maybe some how it got knocked up a little, but nope.

I ran the cable thru the hull and at the closest, it is about 12-14" from the starting battery with the other 2 batteries on the other side of the boat so I really don;t see any battery interference problems.

I actually don;t see any interference problems as the 1st 2 weeks it worked great, then just started doing this. I would guess an intermittent problem with the transducer ? Maybe the unit itself ? I really can't afford to just start buying another transducer hoping it fixes the problem.

It really sucks as this was a lot of money for me.
Oh, being an intermittent problem, I thought maybe the cables so double checked them to make sure they were still tight.
So now it is a 50-50 chance on if I will have sonar or not and it will stop working.
I am new to fishing this lake and it has 246 miles of shorline and is 160' deep (Tims Ford). I could be 10 feet from shore in 80' of water - so a sonar is a pretty important piece of gear, especially since the water temp is still around 87 and I am trying to fish points and find the inclines.
Last 2 times out I got tired of messing with it and just end up going back to one place I checked out well before this started happening.
Would be nice to explore the other 240 miles of the lake.....
any ideas.
 

donberry

Petty Officer 3rd Class
Joined
Dec 27, 2010
Messages
94
Re: Lowrance HDS-5 - keeps "losing bottom"

yep, it has the software updates. Actually, it came with it installed. Had a big sticker on the box saying it had 4.0 installed. Did not trust it so checked it anyway and it is 4.0 installed
 

chriscraft254

Commander
Joined
Jun 4, 2011
Messages
2,445
Re: Lowrance HDS-5 - keeps "losing bottom"

Check your connectors, while plugged in, try and push and pull them on the back of unit. It may be as simple as you not having the plug seated all the way. Also make sure no water has gotten in the cable connector end. If any corrosion is on the pins in the connector, clean them. Also may try and turn up your ping speed. Also check that your transducer hasn't hit something and flipped up at the transom. They are designed to flip up if they hit debris. I tighten mine down so it doesn't flip up at all. If it rips off, it rips off. It sounds to me like corrosion on one of the plug pins, your loosing connection because of it. Or its not seated fully. If you still have issues call lowrance and tell them about the problem. They will send you a new unit if it is within a certain amount of days of purchase while yours is being looked at for the problem. Good luck.
 

atlapp

Seaman
Joined
Sep 25, 2010
Messages
51
Re: Lowrance HDS-5 - keeps "losing bottom"

Try playing with the settings...senstivity
 
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