Lowrance networking

[MUSKY18]

Forgive me if this has been covered previously, but I am hung over this morning (bowling league) and am not functioning at 100%.

I already have a 520C on my console, and am going to buy another 520C for my bow. I would like to network the two units together, as to share waypoints, chip, etc. Questions are:

1. Do I need to buy another cable to connect the two units together, or will it come with the new unit.

2. Will the units work off the same GPS puck that I already have mounted on the boat?

[Scoot]

Bret, you can find your answer in the equipment/expert info forum- it's been covered a number of times in there.

One thing to remember with networking is that you'll be working off of one transducer. I know you like LOW and I gotta tell you- one transducer (I assume from the back of the boat) is less than ideal, IMO. It's not uncommon for the front end of my boat to be in 6" of water and the back end to be in eight feet. On Whitefish bay, the front end can be in 2 feet of water while the back end can be in 35 feet! Probably something you're already aware of, but I thought I'd point it out just in case.

Also, it's easy to save waypoints, icons, tracks, etc. on an SD card and share them between graphs, so you could easily have all info on each graph. Because of this, I decided to not network my graphs.

Just something to think about...

[10,000 Casts]

depending how you have have your curent unit rigged up, you will need an extension cable, another T connector and a male and a female terminator.

keep in mind that I haven't done it in a while, it will run off of 1 puck

also, it might be tough to find a head for a 520, with the new units out, the stores don't want to be stuck with the pucks

[PerchJerker]

I already have a 520C on my console, and am going to buy another 520C for my bow. I would like to network the two units together, as to share waypoints, chip, etc. Questions are:

1. Do I need to buy another cable to connect the two units together, or will it come with the new unit.

2. Will the units work off the same GPS puck that I already have mounted on the boat?

When networked together you can share a gps puck, waypoints, and other digital info from the gps and the transducer. Those network components are backbone cables, t-connectors, terminators, etc. and it's not likely that they'll include what you need, you'll need to buy some more parts on your own.

You can't share map cards over the network, you need to have a map card in each unit where you want to see map data.

You can't share sonar displays over the network. Each unit will need to have its own transducer, or if you want to use 1 transducer you can by connecting the units with an ethernet cable.

As the others have mentioned you may have trouble finding another 520, they've been on clearance for quite a while and most of them are long gone.

Hope that helps. If you have other questions I'd be happy to try to answer them.

[MUSKY18]

Thanks guys. The whole reason that I am doing this now is Reeds has their 520's on sale for $460 bucks, which is a very good deal, so I thought I would jump on it. After reading your responses, I am thinking it might just be easier to get a 522C with internal antenna that I can run off my trolling motors universal sonar and run it independent of the other unit.

[Scoot]

Thanks guys. The whole reason that I am doing this now is Reeds has their 520's on sale for $460 bucks, which is a very good deal, so I thought I would jump on it. After reading your responses, I am thinking it might just be easier to get a 522C with internal antenna that I can run off my trolling motors universal sonar and run it independent of the other unit.

After looking closely at all of the networking options, that's what I ended up doing. I've got a gps/sonar on the dash that reads from the back transducer and a 522C on the bow that I run through my trolling motor. I've been very happy with it so far. I can get all e-info on both units in about two minutes, so I basically do my networking manually.

[10,000 Casts]

That is the easiest way to go, it used to ge that you could get a 520 head only for $350. It got to a point where the retailers that did that had tons of modules on hand and Lowrance wouldn't take them back. Now the new units hav a different set up so they definetly don't want to have to sit on a bunch of antennas.

The best time to buy is this week at the NW sport show in Msp or the muskie show in a few weeks. Bring cash, no tax and there are some smokin deals.

[propster]

John, Perch, or Scoot - remind me: even if I network my two units, when I punch an icon in on one unit, it doesn't automatically show on the other, right? I still need to punch it in on both units at the same time, otherwise I'd have to transfer the data to get the icons to show on both, right? I have a LCX27c and a LMS332c, and think I will just add a tm transducer for the front, since I likely won't be getting a new tm with univ sonar.

Bret, I have some extra parts from when I tried to do it last summer. I'll let you know what I have when I get it out of storage mid-April, but I'm pretty sure I have a 15' cable, at least one or two terminators, and at least one or two T connectors.

[propster]

Other thought I had Bret - if you buy the full unit but run it off the one puck, put the extra puck in your vehicle and rig it so you can remove one of the units from the boat and mount it in the truck. Never get lost again. That's what my buddy does and he loves it.