Marcum LX5 and weeds

[eurolarva]

I am new to using a flasher. I got a Marcum LX5 for xmas and was fishing in 8 feet of water that had pretty heavy weed coverage about 18 inches from the bottom. I was fishing for Sunfish with an aquaview camera about 2 feet beside rigged for normal viewing (not downward). Seems no matter how I set the gain I could not distinguish from the fish and the weeds. I was using a very tiny teardrop with euro and a small sinker about 1 foot from the lure. I turned the gain up so I could see the lure and the sinker but when I saw fish in with the camera eating my lure I saw no indication on the LX5 this was happening. Any suggestions on the best way to tune the Marcum in to get rid of clutter from the weeds and give me a better view of the fish and the lure?

[PerchJerker]

Was your transducer hanging straight down, not touching the side of the hole? You won't get good results if it's not pointing straight down.

Another trick you can try in shallow water is to use the narrow beam transducer (NBT).

[Deitz Dittrich]

as perch said.. hit the NBT button.. this will shrink the cone angle to 9 degrees and you will get less clutter. This also works great when you are fishing heavy drop offs!

[iffwalleyes]

The narrow beam should cut down the amount of weeds greatly. Then turn the gain all the way down and start to turn it up till you can just make out you jig. I know this doesn't always work but start from there and see what you get. Generally even if you don't cut the weeds out entirly you will get them to at least be a different color so that when you are jigging there is a noticable color difference between the jig and weeds.

[eurolarva]

Thanks for the tips. My ducer may not have been centered in the hole but it was pointing straight down. I played a little with the NBT button and the SFL button as well and it did get better but in order to get a good read on my bait I had to turn the gain up so high that I was getting clutter on the whole display. Went to 12 feet of water and had much less problems. Could also be that there were a ton of people fishing where I was on South Center and it could have been noise from their flashers. I hope to get out tomorrow so I can play with it more.

[CNY Tim]

eurolarva - As you use it more you will gain on every trip and will be an expert at setting it up in minimal time. All tips here are great. One other tip trying a hozontal bait will help immensely in this situation as you will need a very minimal of amount of gain to see your jig while keeping the weeds at bay. I always fish the NBT 8 deg. transducer it's my favorite.

[mjhowe]

Also, sometimes you need to rub the bottom of the transducer to increase "connectivity" with the water. Especially a new transducer. Wet it, then rub the bottom of the transducer with your fingers, like you are trying to "scrub" the bottom of the 'ducer. Any ice build up, oily substances etc. can affect your readings.

Also,

Tim has a link to a LX-5 video he could post, dont remember if it has much in way of instruction, but you might pick up a thing or 2...

Tim?

[CNY Tim]

Mike it doesn't have anything to do with weeds but it does help feature wise.

http://www.fishfever.com/node/202

[BigJohnnyIce]

I agree with what everyone said so far, but I just wanted to add one more thing to try. Use the 5 foot zoom feature. I know that you said you were fishing in 8 FOW, but zooming in on the bottom 5 FOW might make a difference in seeing fish and your jig.

Also, if you can make out your jig above the weeds, follow it down and watch for any color chnages on the screen as it goes through the weeds. If there are changes, it is either a fish, your jig, or both.

[eurolarva]

Thanks for the video link. I tried to get out to South Center this morning and there was open water on shore so I had to hit an alternate area. Thanks for all the feedback on this thread. I used the LX5 on two lakes today and was more like a pro. With my rapala I was able to lure the fish above the weeds and watch them follow it up. Fishing today was bad however I managed to catch a few fish.

[redrocketangler]

fully charged battery helps too. when my battery goes low i need to start turning the gain up.