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Thought this would help some of those who are new to fishing with meat. Its also shows the difference in different size meatheads and different styles of bait with underwater video. UaVVQJe8eYU

Calumet Marine is now selling the whole online. $5.95 per tray of red with free shipping (must buy 20 trays) Green and Blue also available You can also get several types of strips there too with no minimum qtys on those. Here is a link: http://calumetmarine.3dcartstores.com/Bait_c_9.html

The spx5 is a decent autopilot especially for those on a smaller budget. But the reason I didn't bring it up myself it is very unlikely it will be able to do what you asked in your original post. But for those who troll for salmon in good to fair weather it is a good option. It is on the calumet marine website at the $1800 price which is as low a I've seen it.

I have extensive experience with both of these unit. In my opinion I will have to give the edge to the Garmin for several reasons. The Garmins strongest feature is its gps. It has almost a zero redraw time, the gen 2 is a lot better, but the Garmin is just so blazing fast. The touchscreen gps is extremely easy to use also. It also has some very useful Garmin exclusive features. The easy to use nature of the Garmin does stop with the gps the unit itself is very easy and I love the touchscreen interface. I like Garmins radar better, where lowrance is focusing on its 4g broadband I have been less than impressed with its real world performance. The HD series equipment from Garmin has been really good. One thing that is as much of a negative for lowrance as a positive for Garmin. That is reliability and customer service. Now the customer service side of lowrance has gotten slightly better but I also feel like I've been seeing more failures in equipment then ever too. My dad has had the same Garmin on his boat for years and never an issue. One of the last point and probably the best is $500-$600 more left in your pocket. Now this isn't just going to be a lowrance bash, the hds does have some good points. I will have to give it credit for an excellent sonar, where the Garmins is good the lowrance is great and if you are a multi species fisherman the structure scan may be a positive for you. Also the lowrance will seemlessly network multiple displays without having to duplicate equipment. The Garmin 740 will network just not as well as the hds or it's Garmin big brothers. Now there isn't one perfect unit for everyone and others might have different opinions especially because everyone fishes differently but I intentionally kept each point short so this post didn't get to long if you would like me to elaborate on something let me know.

Roughly $1000 to convert and $2700 for the autopilot and $200-$300 for misc hydraulic hoses, fitting, and hardware. That's realistically about where it ends up but it's the only thing that will do what your trying to do.

Call frank at the store he will be happy to take you out, he's always looking for someone to go out and has the ghp10 on his boat. I think he sometimes goes out of Benton harbor I don't know how far that is for you but considering you may be spending about $4000 on conversion and autopilot it may be worth the trip especially since you get a day on the water out of it.

You need a very strong autopilot to do that. All a good autopilot does is maximize the potential of what your working with a lot of the time driving better then you or i could. IF you dont have enough hp or your rudder is not big enough its not the autopilots fault that it wont keep coarse because if you were driving you wouldnt be able to either. So basically if its possible for your boat with the way you have it set up in those conditions one of these top of the line autopilots will do just fine. Do you run a kicker? If you run a kicker the TR-1 Gold will probably do the trick for you. I dont run 1mph but i had a TR-1 Gold on a 24ft hewescraft on an 8hp power thrust kicker and ran it in about 4 footers at about 2.5 mph. If you dont run a kicker then converting to hydraulic is a must, then adding a GHP-10. I ran my dads 27ft hardtop boat with a GHP-10 trolling in 8fters during a fishing tournament and it did not miss a beat. (I dont normally run in 8fters but if the money is on the line you have to fish an luckily enough we had the right equipment and people to get the job done and win that tournament)

No problem i can help. First let me explain that the blue lowrance network is not true NMEA 2000 because it does not use the standard plugs although Lowrance mades a Blue to Red adapter where the red is a true NMEA 2000 connection An antenna is anywhere from $150-$200 depending on where you get it from. First what you need is a NMEA 2000 starter kit. Again does not need to be Lowrance because true NMEA 2000 is universal. A starter kit will have at least power lead, a NMEA T, a male terminator, and a female terminator. (about $50 online) To hook into the NMEA network you will need the blue to red adapter from Lowrance ($25 online) Then you will need a short NMEA 2000 cable to go from your adapter to your Ts. Although if you buy the Garmin starter kit it actually comes with a couple spare cables so you wont need to buy one seperately. ($60 for Garmin starter or $15 for short cable) So all together your looking at about $250 roughly. HEre is a picture of a proper NMEA 2000 Network. See where is says NMEA 2000 Bb, just below that are your NMEA Ts. You can see how they plug together and at each end it looks like a cap, those are called terminators. Where that one has 3 Ts you only will also have 3. One will be the same yellow wire supply power and two will go to your blue to red adapter, and three to your gps antenna. PS if your uncomfortable with it or arent following me i can get it for you and pre assemble it that way youll just have screw down the antenna and plug it into your lowrance.

I dont have one but if you cant find that specific cable you can just use a proper NMEA 2000 configuration which may be easier to find. To complete a proper NMEA 2000 network you will need 2 Ts, a male and female terminator, and a backbone or drop cable. Everything needs to have the blue connectors since the blue connectors are lowrance specific and when they went to the red it conforms to NMEA standars and is the same across the board. I know its to late for you but for others i tend to stay away from Lowrance GPS antennas when you need to replace one that goes out. They seem to be less reliable then the others and the special cables can be a pain. You can plug a garmin in there and not need any special cables or wiring and probably never have a problem again.

A picture of the back of your boat would help to see if there is anything you can do better with your transom mount

If i were buying a new cable steering system it would definately be a Uflex NFB system. Uflex has a better design for their helm then teleflex and the nfb i think is worth the extra money.

Blood run is great and I just went with 45 myself. I used Morgan's for a while too which is good to but he jacked up the price on me so I switched to blood run and haven't been dissappointed.

Big weenie makes good meat rigs but if you want to add some variety my favorite is capt John king. He was one of the original innovators on meat rig fishing and has been doing it a long time with a proven design. They are available on the calumet marine webstore

yes the same one will work for mercruiser for alignment, there are some great deals on these on ebay if you want to buy one. Thats where i got mine and am very happy with it.

Any chance we can get a picture?

The best thing to do is to return the battery switch and get a battery management cluster if you can afford it. It runs about $150 and what it does is it automatically distributes your charging power to first then starting battery and once that one is full it takes all the charging power and uses it to keep the house battery up. No switching required because its all automatic and does not allow one battery to drain the other. It comes with really good directions and is a breeze to install, also if you already have a perko style switch in most cases no rewiring is needed just take the wires off the perko switch and put them on the right post per the direstions and thats it. I just added it to the online store so you can easily find it, for more info click the link below. http://calumetmarine.3dcartstores.com/Battery-Distibution-Cluster--Single_p_445.html Here are some pictures of an install that i did with one of these: This is an overview The Cluster with leads Heres the connection for the house circuit Heres where the motors hook up (not yet connected)

$3200 to convert ?!?!? Thats about twice what it should be. You can do a Garmin GHP-12 or a Raymarine X-10 and an octopus pump and spend about $2500 in parts to get an excellent autopilot while not having to convert. The Sportpilot is ok when you get a working one does not handle strong winds or decent sized waves very well but i guess thas ok considering the price.

You will be fine. Do you already have a battery switch installed or just considering your options?

It's a broken depth raider antenna that someone has tried to rig to work.

You generally have your deepest lines toward the center as you go out you run lines higher. There is a lower chance of tangles that way. That's the way I ran it but it's just whatever works best for you.

Black lights work best for me, even installed 12v led black lights in my spoon box.

Any NMEA compatible gps will work, does not have to be lowrance. If you can find a Garmin, Raymarine, maretron, or any other NMEA 0183 or NMEA 2000 it will work.

Sounds like a worn impeller either old or damaged

you usually just need to pull the prop shaft carrier Make sure you pressure check when your done to make sure that is the only leak 4.3L only tells us the engine size, if you need any more help we will need to know what drive you have.

That outer wire wrap is your ground use the wrap on the nmea in side of the radio. Just twist it up so you can use it in your connector to your Humminbird ground