FishFinder on a "JetSki"?? (pic)

[JiggaMan512]

ok. so this is my fishing vessel. if your laughing, dont worry, i cant hear you. :-[

I want to know if it is possible for a depth/fish finder on this.

I dont know much about the mechanics of fishfinders except that a transducer must be placed some where on the hull of the boat, right? My other concern is this: Since this thing is way shorter and lighter than a boat, the nose tends to drift from left to right easily with slight gust of wind. How fast does a fishfinder catch up and "refresh" itself to a slight shift of the boat??

Fishing solo, this thing is ridiculously awesome to fish off, being that you can get to places a bass boat or even jon boat/canoe cant go.

[Muddpuppy]

I'm not sure I would rather drag one of those over logs or sandbars over a Jon or canoe, but to each there own.

It looks to me like you could mount one on it, especially if you can split the hull and install a thru the hull transducers. I wonder if you might not get too much disturbance that close to the jet useing a transducer that mounts to the back of the hull. Most of the riders I see don't keep one in the water jumping around enough to use one. Ever thought about getting a portable finder and just takeing it when fishing?

[Way2slow]

No different than mounting one on a boat. Most of the newer good depth finder will read pretty close to real time for almost as fast as that thing will run (unless you've done like a guy in Jesup GA did and put a Mercury 300X powerhead in it) so keeping up with wnd drift is no problem.

You can mount your bracket a little down the top of the console and a skimmer X-ducer on the rear but it will have to be to one side some so it's out of the turbulance of the jet drive. This might create a problem when running wide open. If that section of the hull is lifted out of the water when fully on the pad, it will not work until you slow back down enough for the X-ducer to make contact with the water again. The X-ducer has to maintain contact with the water to work properly.

I might suggest for a mount to use the Ram Micro mount. That way you only have a small 1" ball mounted on the console of your jet ski when you don't want to use the depth finder and it only takes about a minute to connect and disconnect. You can get little square covers to cover the hole the cables go through.

If you get a Hummingbird model, they come with a quick disconnect mount and the cables are concealed in the mount so all you have to do is pop it on and off.

Installation and operation would be no different than a boat, after all, it's just a mini boat that has a bench seat and handle bars.

Keep in mind though, that thing has to stay water tight and you will have to make holes to run cables amd installing the mount, be sure to use plenty of silicon to seal any holes and openings created mounthing the thing.

[JiggaMan512]

Awesome, thanks for the info!

[Raul]

Another option can be a portable one, they operate with batteries and the transducer is mounted to the back of the hull with a suction cup.

[Gatorbassman]

That thing is cute. I sure hope it's not Pink. It doesn't matter so long as it floats. There's a guy on my home lake that fishes for Striper in one of those things. You should see him fighting a big striper. He's like a big bobber.

PS. My first fishing vessel was a large piece of styrofoam and a paddle.

[JiggaMan512]

The guy on your lake has that exact same kind of watercraft? thats cool. ive never seen anyone else with one. maybe i should start a club. or maybe a water-like-bikergang. and no, mines not pink, but it might as well be. my cousin that it would look cool to put these wierd decals on it (without my permission, no less) but atleast its not pink.