Fish I'm curious how you ran the TM wiring to the unit. Do you have any pictures of that?

How many boats you got in the yard right now?

1 in the back. [emoji106] LoL

Which units is that that you have on your bow. Is that the hds 5. I'm trying to decide which hds I want to place on my bow. Hds5 r hds7. Gen 1 I'm looking around.

I have a 7 up front and it could be bigger !


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you will always wish you had gone bigger

I would think bigger screen on the bow would be more practical. It would be hard to see on a hds 5 that's at your feet.


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Unless you are W


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That is an Elite 5 GPS/Depth finder that I picked up in the classifieds on this site for a real good deal. My eyes aren't perfect and the 5" is good I can see the depth and the bottom contour.

Cool. I'm looking at either the hds5 or 7 gen 1. I see a few on ebay.

Pic #1 Notice how I ran the power wire down into the RAM base under the deck. I will install a few stick on clips to tighten up the wire going to TM.

Pic#2 I picked this bracket up online.

Pic#3 Coil your extra cable and neatly zip tie it inside your TM bracket

Pic #4 On most Tm mounts there is a channel between the shaft and the mount. Remove the door bracket, lift up your shaft and stick you wire in there. Once you tighten it down it stays loose. and notice the little loop if you will...leave slack in cable for turning so you don't pull cable and put it in a bind.

I am no professional but I am a WEB research freak and this is how it was done.

Alpha man I'm selling my elite 7 as I'm upgrading. Lol.

I need another hds unit so I can share info with my hds 7 touch.

Thanks for the extra pics!

great idea
 

I have an older Garmin that I might try to install on my bow if the thru-hull ducer wire will reach the front of the boat. I changed to an Elite HDI 7 about a year ago, but I left the Garmin 170C thru hull transducer in place. Thanks to this thread, I will try to hook it up on the bow.

Might have to ask for splicing advice Marty if the wire ain't long enuf.

You could probably buy an extention cable to make it longer

Good thought. BTW, from this thread, it appears that the power should go back to the start batt to prevent interference. Makes sense, but is that true for the negative lead also?

I ran my power leads for the old GPS to a hot wire that was for a light in my up front pole storage, just tapped off of it. I have my entire electrical system run through a main 1+2 battery switch, as well. I never use the storage box light, it still works if need be, but I never use it

DO NOT USE THE TROLLING MOTOR WIRING!! if you are running a 24 or 36v system you will SMOKE your unit, its only 12v

Ill try to get a pic of how I mounted it today

Got lucky
 

I worked on this yesterday and luckily, the cable was long enough to fish it all the way to the front of the boat. I also pulled another pair of wires with it to run power. Looks like it'll work, but I need a few items that I think West Marine may have to complete the install. Took a look at the Ballzout mount, pretty pricey so I will try a ram mount instead if WM has one for a reasonable price.

Alphaman, I took a look at drilling through the faceplate of the TM plug, but there was not enough room because the Garmin cable is so large. Looks like I will have to drill another hole in my boat. After looking at some of the pics posted here where others mounted their unit, I'm thinking that center front is the best place. If I put it to the left, it will interfere with my ipilot. If I put it to the right, it will interfere with both my bow rope and also my anchor rope so I'm going to center it to try to avoid both problems. Will post a pic after I finish.

You can buy a little chrome cover to place over the hole where your wires come out. It keeps it clean looking. you may have one already on your console. To see what I'm talking about. Someone may chim in with a picture of what in talking about. If not I'll send a pic this evening.

you can see one of those covers in my first picture on page 1 of this thread

Couldn't see the cover on your post. Looks like it's blocked by the mount in one and the other pic is too dark to see, but I'm pretty sure I know what you're talking about and I believe WM has those.

I'm going to go with a Ram mount and as far as not being able to tighten it enough, check this out:

http://www.rammount.com/part/RAM-KNOB9HU


I saw it on another forum. Click on the little video and it'll show you how it works. According to the Rammount peep who posted it, the Ram mount has a lifetime warranty and this device allows you to tighten the crap out of the handle. I think the Ballzout device would almost be too rigid and the Ram might allow a little play to keep from damaging the gps especially cuz it has rubber parts. Wonder if that would have worked for you Alphaman?

If you have a unit that has some weight to it, It will fall. I have an hds 7 touch and it kept falling. Slowly while running on the chop.

That totally depends on the size ram mount you use.

I've never had mine fall, even in 5' chop

6in ram. A screw was pulled out that was in the back on the base.

Lawrence, I think they were talking about the diameter of the ball. That was referenced on that post on another forum that I mentioned. The Ram guy gave three sizes and there third one was for up to a 20 lb. device and I think it was 3.5 inches in diameter. Here is the link, look for the post from a user named Ram Mount:

http://basscatowners.yuku.com/reply/...t#.VOn6uEImbzI

I was referring the ram arm lenght. It's 6in long.

That is because you have the correct size ram mount for the unit that is on it. Arm length does not matter if you have the right size mount for what your putting on it. Its not that complicated.

Idk. That's was was installed when I bought the boat.

It is common for boat dealers to use subpar parts for the job.

yes, I know, but I think the ball diameter is what makes the difference. I think you probably had the right mount, I'm guessing that you couldn't tighten it enuf to make it stay in place, but I could be wrong.

Okay, got everything hooked up. GPS fired up fine, but the sonar gave me a message that said "sonar turned off". Since the sonar is what I am most interested in, I hope I can figure this out. My first hope is that it is giving me that message cuz the boat is on the trailer, but I think that i"m being too optimistic. It probably has something to do with the cable which I kinda worked hard getting it pulled up to the bow. Planning on calling Garmin tech support tomorrow.

I think you are getting this message either because of a bad transducer or a bad connection. You need to check your connection to the unit first. I think this is sometimes caused by a bad temperature sensor in the transducer. There is a way to bypass that but requires some splicing of wires. Calling Garmin is your best option to start with however.

Garmin suggested that my problem was a continuity issue with the wire leading to the xducer so I pulled back on the ducer wire all the way back to the console. I then turned on the gps/sonar and the "sonar turned off" message was not present. So I very carefully pulled/bent and examined every inch of the cable all the way back to the console where it was originally run. While doing that, I lost the signal once, but not at a point that I could ID so I rebooted the sonar and everything good. Then I bent/pulled and examined the cable again and couldn't get it to fail again. Bottom line, I refished it back to the bow and it is now (emphasis on the "now") working. I'm guessing it will work until it won't, probably after I hit a big wave, but for now, I'm going to cross my fingers and hope it works. thanks for all the advice.

okay, here's how it looks
 

Nice

That looks good Bill. I have to mount the transducer on my TM, which is a MotorGuide xi5 and the way it deploys its difficult to find a good way of mounting the wiring.

Yes, that will be my backup plan if the xducer starts acting up, but from what I'm seen on the net, it looks like a TM mount might work with an iPilot by running the wire thru the groove on the shaft.