We constantly see posts about what transducers to buy and there is so much misunderstanding of how transducers work in the real world compared to how people think they work compared to the specs and brochures. We have spent over 10,000 hours using various transducers for a huge range of fishing and understand the pro's and cons and how they can help or hinder you catching more fish.
1) I don't need a 1kw because I'm only fishing in less than 100m -
If you're regularly fishing in 30m plus than you will see huge benefits in using a 1kw transducer of the right type for your fishing style purely because of the size of the elements in addition to the extra power. This is especially true when marking fish close to the bottom, where bottom detail and target separation are especially important. This is again clearly evident at speed where 1kw transducers give a far superior picture compared to a 300 or 600w model.
2) Narrow beam transducers won't see fish in shallow water -
Narrow beam transducers are by far the best transducer if you are bottom fishing in nearly all depths, as can be seen in the screen shots. Even in shallow water they still mark fish extremely clearly and in deeper water the clarity far exceeds that of wider beam angle transducers.
3) I will see more with a wider cone angle -
In fact in the real world you will actually see less on your screen due to data averaging, as the transducer is looking at such a large 3D area it has to delete and flatten data at every instant to display it on a 2d screen. When you searching for isolated fish and structure at speed wide transducers actually almost completely delete the spots you are searching for, in fact in 18 months of using a 275 low high wide, our catch rate on red emperor reduced by close to 90% and the ability to find new spots at speed was basically non existent, that was 1000's of litres of wasted fuel, an expensive lesson to learn. Swapping back to a 265 Low high seen catch rates increase massively and multiple new spots found every trip at high speed.
All of the shots below are using narrow cone transducers and as you can see the definition is next level. Using a wide transducer for anything other than trolling is like trying to go hunting with a light bar instead of a spotlight. Fishing requires the same accuracy as any other type of hunting and as a result a spotlight aka narrow beam sonar is going to give you the best results in most situations.
If you want sounder images like these than feel free to get in touch and get yourself the best transducers available for your fishing style.
Large School of Nannygai, with estuary cod and coral trout close to the bottom. In this depth the sounder is only looking at approximately a 3m circle of bottom yet the screen is full of fish...
Clearly marking bait at close to 100kms an hour with perfect bottom picture. This is looking at less than a 1m circle of the water column.
Clearly marking the bottom and fish in 51m while travelling at 70kph. You can even see the areas of bottom where there is live growth and small bait.
Can see the bait and sinker dropping to the bottom in 50m, transducer is seeing about a 5m circle of bottom, notice the separation of all of the targets as well, it's not just a big red blob that you would see on a wider cone.
Super crisp clean target definition even in 11m of water, something that most think a narrow cone transducer will do.
Trolling for Spanish Mackerel, narrow cone transducers won't mark fish when trolling.... Or will they?
The crazy details in this shot would not be able to be seen without a narrow cone. Look at the fish marking up in the cave/overhang on the right of screen, solid red blobs that would be masked and not shown using a wide cone, even the overhang would have been hidden.
In this shot you can see the large red fish (red emperor) in amongst the bait school, super crisp clear detail that helps you see and catch more fish!
