Hi Eric,
I have owned the higher end model (with a large base instead of a watch)smartcast for a couple of years. When I first got it, it worked pretty well. It would show depth and bottom structure with decent resolution. The fish locator seemed a bit over excited about the fish, it would show them everywhere, but I would never catch anything, which was probably my fault. After a month or so, I would not get a reading if the little green boat ( the transducer) was cast out too far. I thought that the transducer was losing its battery, so I bought another one. The same problem kept happening and gradually got worse, I don't and can't use it anymore.
I am aware of your situation, that you basically have you own lake. If you wanted to be able to check out the bottom structures and survey the depths, the smartcast would work well for that purpose. It would allow you to make your own topo map of your lake, which will help determine the best spots to fish.
If you want to use the smartcast for years and plan on fishing big water with it, I would not recommend buying it. For some reason, and maybe I bought a lemon, the reciever (which in your case would be the watch) loses its ability to gather the signal from the transducer. I must also say that my smartcast went through several rain storms, but I would think that a little rain should not harm something that has been engineered the correct way.
It was fun to find out how deep some of the lakes where that I have fished for years, and I must say that the info I got from the smartcast made me narrow down the best fishing spots. But, if I wanted to get that info again, I would have to go and buy another smartcast- something this expensive should not be disposable. Good Luck!
I have owned the higher end model (with a large base instead of a watch)smartcast for a couple of years. When I first got it, it worked pretty well. It would show depth and bottom structure with decent resolution. The fish locator seemed a bit over excited about the fish, it would show them everywhere, but I would never catch anything, which was probably my fault. After a month or so, I would not get a reading if the little green boat ( the transducer) was cast out too far. I thought that the transducer was losing its battery, so I bought another one. The same problem kept happening and gradually got worse, I don't and can't use it anymore.
I am aware of your situation, that you basically have you own lake. If you wanted to be able to check out the bottom structures and survey the depths, the smartcast would work well for that purpose. It would allow you to make your own topo map of your lake, which will help determine the best spots to fish.
If you want to use the smartcast for years and plan on fishing big water with it, I would not recommend buying it. For some reason, and maybe I bought a lemon, the reciever (which in your case would be the watch) loses its ability to gather the signal from the transducer. I must also say that my smartcast went through several rain storms, but I would think that a little rain should not harm something that has been engineered the correct way.
It was fun to find out how deep some of the lakes where that I have fished for years, and I must say that the info I got from the smartcast made me narrow down the best fishing spots. But, if I wanted to get that info again, I would have to go and buy another smartcast- something this expensive should not be disposable. Good Luck!
