Fish Finder Battery Life

[Shellback]

How long does your FF battery last? Mine starts giving me the low voltage beep after 5 hours. I have a Humminbird 585c, with GPS and I've got a 5amp gel cell. The battery isn't 6 months old, does my color FF/GPS really suck it down that fast?!? Or is that average? How long does your guys battery last?

[porky]

for days, my ff is super basic, no color, no gps.

[krusty]

My 3 year old 7Ah battery runs my Humminbird 383c (color & GPS) a whole weekend. What is your battery voltage when fully charged? It should be well above 12V.

If the beeping is driving you crazy, you can always lower the voltage for your low battery alarm or turn it off all together.

[Christian]

I use a deer feeder batt. $20 at academy. I have a cheepo humminbird 150. Four times ive been out with it and never charged it yet. Avg time spent on the water is about 7 hrs. Total of 28 hrs so far and no plans to charge it before i go out today.

[polepole]

What level do you have your low voltage beep set to go off at.  I've seen a number of people have it too high.  FF's will run down to 10V or less.

Battery life varies a lot depending on the FF unit and what you have turned on.

A basic B&W 320x240 unit ... like a Humminbird 325 draws 270 mA with the lights off.  The even smaller units can be 1/2 that.
Step that up to color ... a Humminbird 345C draws 380 mA with the lights off.
Step up to a higher res screen, 640x480 ... Humminbird 586c is up over 600 mA.
Turn on your backlight and add 100 mA.
Turn your GPS on and add another 50-60 mA.

-Allen

[Tote]

I don't run mine all the time. If I am bouncing or trolling near the bottom then I will keep it on. If I am going to be well above the bottom I turn it off. So fo me I don't keep it on more than 3 hours total at a time.
I also use the 10AA set up and most of the time use rechargeables.

[atavuss]

When my 5 amp battery was new I could go 8 to 10 hours at least before the FF would show the battery at 8 volts and shut off.  Now that the battery is a few years old it won't go a day's fishing so I upgraded to a 10 amp battery and I get plenty of run time for one day's use.  I have not tried it multiple days without recharging it yet though.  My FF is a Humminbird 788ci, it has a color screen and GPS.  I keep the batteries in a Walmart waterproof box and charge them via a battery tender.  The wires are passed through a small hole with a grommet in the waterproof box

[G-Whiz]

5 1/2 hours for my Garmin GPSMap 188c. I have the voltage alarm turn down to 9.2; but my screen will flicker like crazy, then shut off before the alarm even goes off.....  during overcast days, I will turn the 'brightness' level down to save some power; but it's the GPS that sucks the life out of mine....

[polepole]

When my 5 amp battery was new I could go 8 to 10 hours at least before the FF would show the battery at 8 volts and shut off.  Now that the battery is a few years old it won't go a day's fishing so I upgraded to a 10 amp battery and I get plenty of run time for one day's use.  I have not tried it multiple days without recharging it yet though.  My FF is a Humminbird 788ci, it has a color screen and GPS.  I keep the batteries in a Walmart waterproof box and charge them via a battery tender.  The wires are passed through a small hole with a grommet in the waterproof box

The 718 draws 615 mA.  So the math ads up, at least when your battery was new.  5/0.615= ~8.13 hours.

-Allen

[atavuss]

When my 5 amp battery was new I could go 8 to 10 hours at least before the FF would show the battery at 8 volts and shut off.  Now that the battery is a few years old it won't go a day's fishing so I upgraded to a 10 amp battery and I get plenty of run time for one day's use.  I have not tried it multiple days without recharging it yet though.  My FF is a Humminbird 788ci, it has a color screen and GPS.  I keep the batteries in a Walmart waterproof box and charge them via a battery tender.  The wires are passed through a small hole with a grommet in the waterproof box

The 718 draws 615 mA.  So the math ads up, at least when your battery was new.  5/0.615= ~8.13 hours.

-Allen

actually it is a 788ci, is the amp draw the same for that unit?  only problem will be when I go camping and no access to a way of charging the battery during a multiple day trip. 

[polepole]

When my 5 amp battery was new I could go 8 to 10 hours at least before the FF would show the battery at 8 volts and shut off.  Now that the battery is a few years old it won't go a day's fishing so I upgraded to a 10 amp battery and I get plenty of run time for one day's use.  I have not tried it multiple days without recharging it yet though.  My FF is a Humminbird 788ci, it has a color screen and GPS.  I keep the batteries in a Walmart waterproof box and charge them via a battery tender.  The wires are passed through a small hole with a grommet in the waterproof box

The 718 draws 615 mA.  So the math ads up, at least when your battery was new.  5/0.615= ~8.13 hours.

-Allen

actually it is a 788ci, is the amp draw the same for that unit?  only problem will be when I go camping and no access to a way of charging the battery during a multiple day trip.

That was a typo on my part.  I was looking at the 788.

-Allen

[Chadrock]

Jeff, are you still using the same set up? Without doing any math, I would say try a new battery. Even the best SLA's don't do real well after discharging and recharging a bunch. A battery can measure 13 volts and have a low capacitance resulting in a shorter lifespan under load. Bring your battery to crabbyfest and I can check it with my fancy gizmo, and tell you if the batt is any good.

[polepole]

Fancy gizmo.  Do tell!

-Allen

[Chadrock]

Fancy gizmo.  Do tell!

-Allen

Well fancy may have been an exaggeration. It's a capacity meter that measures while simulating a load. The stuff I work on has to be @ atleast 80% capacity, or I replace it. That's where the boxes of batts I show up with once in a while come from.

[Shellback]

Its the same Battery model, just new.  I bought the new one in August or Sept.  And have only used it about 8 times.  I gotta bust out the Multimeter and take a look.  But for now, I gotta Vacuum...