soft or hard bottom using the Vexilar FL12

[little fish]

Hi,
    I just bought a FL12 Vexilar, please can anyone tell me how to tell a hard bottom for a soft bottom using my Vex.
       Many thx

[chfishon]

i believe muck is more dense so it bounces the signal were as sand is not so the signal penetrates the ground more

[mushroom_capd_1]

I was just wathcing a video on that, it stated that hard bottem is more of a thinner solid red line, whereas soft bottom is a thicker red line with maybe green and orange mixed in. A very informative video on flasher usage! Check it out...   http://www.mattjohnsonoutdoors.com/TrapTalk3.html

[little fish]

Hi Mushroom capd1,
                            Watched the video, explaned everything.
 Many,many thanks,
                            Bert.

[slipperybob]

It takes a while to understand it.  It helps to double check it with a heavy sinker too.  As sometimes you may be on a slope and then you'll read it wrong on the Vex.  That's how dual beam can be useful.  It gives you an idea of the slope.

[ice dawg]

My vex gives me a thick red bottom when it is hard because it reflects more of the signal back. I get a thinner red line that sometimes will have some green with it with a soft bottom because the retuirning signal is weaker.

[bossman]

the thicker the line the softer the bottom

[eriksat1]

Hard bottom = thick wide strong return signal.
Soft muck bottom = thin weak return signal
you can figure it out by how much you have to turn the gain up for a certain depth, hard bottom you don't need much power/gain to get a good return signal, soft bottom you have to turn up the gain a lot more to get a good return signal.

[icejunky]

this is from the Vexilar site...

Deciphering Bottom Hardness With Your Flasher

When it comes to catching bass from structure, nothing is more important than the electronics mounted to the boat. One of the best tricks I've learned using a flasher is deciphering soft bottoms (muck, clay, fine sand) from hard bottoms (sand/gravel, chuck rock, boulders). Bass often show a preference for one or the other, but usually the harder bottoms. Therefore vast amounts of fishless water can be avoided simply by using your electronics to guide you to the appropriate bottom type.

Reading bottom types is done by observing the signal strength on the flasher. Soft bottoms tend to absorb a certain amount of the sonar's signal, while hard bottoms bounce back a greater percentage of the signal. Therefore the resulting signal of the flasher will reflect these differences. Hard bottoms will be displayed on the flasher as having a wider band of red, while soft bottoms will show as a narrower green band. The other tell-tale sign of a hard bottom is the appearance of a double-echo. This second echo occurs anytime the flasher passes over a hard bottom. It appears on the sonar simply as another bottom reading twice the depth as the true bottom reading. For example, if you're positioned over a ten foot gravel bar, a band will be displayed at ten feet on the sonar, while another slightly less intense band occurs at twenty feet. This band at twenty feet is the double echo.

Avoid changing the gain when trying to interpret bottom hardness, because the gain affects the intensity of the signal. Adjusting it high will result in a strong signal on the sonar, while a low setting will display a signal of less intensity. Continually adjusting the gain will leave you without a base signal from which to compare all other signals to. Find a setting for the gain when you first head out on the lake and then leave it alone. Thereafter, any changes to the flasher's signal as you travel across the water can be attributed to changes in bottom hardness.

Jim Moynagh

here is the link..

http://vexilar.com/pages/products/products_fl-12.php

[eriksat1]

Well moving around in a boat is much different from moving hole to hole on the ice. I find where I want to fish then turn the gain up until you get the 2nd echo then back it off until the 2nd echo just disappears that is usually your optimum signal strength for seeing weeds and fish on the flasher. If you are mainly fishing the same depths you can get a feel for it by how much you have to turn up the power to get the 2nd echo, it takes practice, like someone else said you can check it with a good string and a weight until you get the hang of it. And sometimes when deeper on really soft bottom it is hard to even get a 2nd echo at all.

[ice dawg]

the thicker the line the softer the bottom

[ice dawg]

Well moving around in a boat is much different from moving hole to hole on the ice. I find where I want to fish then turn the gain up until you get the 2nd echo then back it off until the 2nd echo just disappears that is usually your optimum signal strength for seeing weeds and fish on the flasher. If you are mainly fishing the same depths you can get a feel for it by how much you have to turn up the power to get the 2nd echo, it takes practice, like someone else said you can check it with a good string and a weight until you get the hang of it. And sometimes when deeper on really soft bottom it is hard to even get a 2nd echo at all.

I do the same thing when in a boat with a flasher. I like the double reading when using an LCD also.