Mega 360... Yes, It Works For Striper Trolling

[SLYDoggie]

While I was never able to find anybody who had used the Mega 360 for fresh water trolling for Stripers in the 3MPH range, I decided to take the plunge and give it a try. I spent my first full day on the lake with it today and I can already tell that it is going to be a great addition. I was worried that the movement of the boat would be an issues but it really isn't for what I'm trying to zero in on.

It's going to take me a while to dial everything in using the various settings... Sweep Speed, Range, Sensitivity, Contrast, and frequency. In my case, I don't care about structure or bottom contours and am only interested in spotting schools of fish, small clusters of fish, and bait fish in the water column so I have the Mega 360 water column sensitivity set to +3, which is the same setting I use on DI and SI as well. The water depth I fish is typically in the 25' to 120' range but the fish aren't typically any deeper than about 60'.

I've attached some screen captures. Again, this is my very first day with the Mega 360 and I have a lot to learn on optimal settings but I was impressed by what I was able to find on the first day out.

I have a lot of data on the screen so you can tell most of the depth, range, speed, and etc but here is a description of the attached pictures:

1. snp1211204853 - Shows multiple large schools of shad (the primary forage for Stripers on Tims Ford Lake)
2. snp1211202658 - Shows 2 small schools of fish in the water column at 8:00 and 11:00 with shadows projected on the bottom
3. snp1211200757 - This is a forward "Sweep" view and shows a school of fish in front of the boat in the water column... I had already passed over most of the school before I thought to do a screen capture. This one isn't dialed in very well at all.
4. snp1211205758 - I zoomed in on this on to just see the water column. At first I thought all this "stuff" was just artifacts until I figured out that the 2 dots with trails were my downrigger balls with trails, the dot to the lower left of the boat icon is the motor with a cavitation trail behind it, the dot to the lower right is my right planer board with wake, and the line in the middle is my middle pontoon. I have the Mega 360 mounted with a Fishing Specialties rail mount on the right side of the pontoon just behind the captains chair and I think the pontoons blocked the view of the left planer board. I may experiment with lowering the pod a bit.

Again, I realize that I have work to do on adjusting the sensitivity and contrast to get the best out of the Mega 360 but I was definitely impressed with what I was able to do with it on the first day out. Typically with SI, when I see a school I've passed off to the right or left and make my slow turn to circle around (to keep my 5 lines from tangling... 2 on Downriggers, 2 on Planer Boards, and 1 Freeline off the back), they are gone by the time I get back to the waypoint I created. My hope is that I can see them to the left or right as I approach and make course corrections to troll through them without having to circle around. Ideally, I would love to be able to use the full 150' range but school is still out on that. I mostly did 100' range today but will play with higher ranges going forward.

As a side note, the color depth charts in the pictures are from AutoChart Live. There wasn't a HD map of Tims Ford Lake so I've pretty much mapped the entire 10,000 acres of the lake over the last couple of years and have uploaded it all to the Humminbird ChartSelect AutoChart LiveShare site.

Consider me a happy camper with my Mega 360 purchase!

[Bob B]

[Chief Brody]

[SLYDoggie]

Still experimenting with fine tuning the settings but I have found that color palates 9 and 12 seem to be the best for watching for things in the water column. In looking at the various palates for SI and DI, I would have never thought I would have a use for these two. As it turns out, they are very good for trolling because they minimize the impact of the bottom. In other words, the very dark "normal" color doesn't overpower the things appearing in the water column. In addition, things in the water column appear in a totally different color.

By the way, when I say "water column" I'm talking about the full range you have set on the 360 sweep and not just the normal "blank" area in the middle that represents the water column depth. My intent is to identify schools of Stripers at the edge of the range so I can alter course to troll through them.

I'm still switching back & forth between 100' and 120' range but haven't yet determined the best range... Still more fishing/testing/tweaking to be done.

My hope is to plow through a large school with Sonar Recording turned on so I can use the recording to play back over and over to determine the best settings... That hasn't happened yet.

[SLYDoggie]

I've now owned and used the Mega 360 for a few months and I wanted to provide this update! Although it takes constant tweaking of sensitivity as you change bottom depths and bottom hardness, I have definitely improved my ability to identify schools of striper and change direction to troll through them. The key is to use a color pallet that minimizes the bottom but shows the fish in the water columns and then tweak the sensitivity to keep the proper balance.

I also have mine set up so that I can use the Solix SI at the same time I use the Mega 360 (no Y Cable). The Solix SI+ transducer is connected to my Solix G2 15 and the Mega 360 is connected to my Solix G2 12. I usually keep my SI and DI on Mega frequency and the Mega 360 on 455. The 455 is better at highlighting fish in the water column and having them different also reduces crosstalk.

I wanted to show an example so I have attached a pair of synchronized screen captures from my 15 (Chart, SI+, and DI+) and 12 (Mega 360) of a school I trolled through yesterday... I pressed the screen capture button on both units at the same time. In fact, they had the exact same file name, since they were on two separate networked units but captured with the exact same timestamp, which caused problems trying to upload them.

I had been going along the shoreline but was headed out to the middle of the cove and, on the prior sweep of the Mega 360, I saw the first returns of the school at about 10:00 on the very edge of the 80' range I had it set at and changed direction to go right through the middle of them.

This is just one example of how the Mega 360 has helped me while trolling for Stripers. I also sometimes run a 4 way split on the 15 and have the 2D image in one of the quadrants but I much prefer this setup which has the SI at full screen width. With the quality of the fish returns I get on the DI, I don't really need the 2D imaging.

There is one thing that would make the Mega 360 absolutely outstanding for this purpose and that is if there was a "Trolling Mode" setting where the bottom return wasn't displayed. I don't really think this would be something very difficult for Humminbird to do as they already do this while in "Contour" mode. they remove the bottom return for the water column depth. If they had this "Trolling Mode" setting, it would greatly reduce the amount of sensitivity tweaking I have to do and only show fish. I can definitely identify schools of bait fish and Stripers at 150' out if I'm over a really deep bottom. If I have a bottom return, about 80' is the furthest I've been able to identify fish on top of the bottom return.

[Bob B]

[OK_BassBum]

Those are great shots.
Any word on the big screen and the AC?

[SLYDoggie]

I've been trolling with the Mega 360 for several months now and thought I would share what I've learned about tuning the Mega 360 for trolling rather than the traditional structure and fish on structure searching. I don't think there are many people who troll for Stripers on this forum but I'm providing this for those who do as well as others who might do searches at a later date.

I posted a couple of images in this post of a large school of Stripers a while back but am posting a few more images with a cookbook of the settings I typically use. All of the images have a combination of bait and schools of Stripers.

Here are the settings I've found to work best for me when trolling (I troll at 2.5 MPH in the daytime and 2.2 MPH at night):

Mega 360 Settings:

- Frequency = 455 Khz... I don't care about the bottom detail and the added range of the 455 Khz helps find fish at greater distances.
- Color Palette = 12... Green, since it minimizes the "blowout" of the bottom at higher sensitivity settings.
- Sweep Speed = 6... Again, I don't care about bottom detail and am only interested in the fastest refresh rate to spot upcoming schools so I can make course adjustments.
- Sensitivity = 8 to 12... Lower on shallower depths to minimize the brightness of the bottom return. Higher on deeper water to maximize fish and bait returns.
- Contrast = Mid range... If there is a thermocline, I bump it up a bit to minimize the thermocline return.
- Water Column Sensitivity = +3... You want to show everything in the water column. Humminbird has an image processing issue with Water Column Sensitivity and this will cause a blown out band to show on hard bottom surfaces.
- Dynamic Contrast = On... I find that this does a good job of maximizing the fish returns in a high contrast fashion as well as cutting out some of the clutter.
- Range = 80 to 120... For bottom depths up to 60', I use the 80' range setting. For bottom depths from 60 to 80 I use the 100' range setting. For bottom depths from 80 to 150 (the max depth on my lake), I use 120' range. Yes, I can spot schools of stripers at 120' out using the 455 Khz setting but only in deep water. If I'm in 40 to 60' of water and keep the range at 120', the bottom return will drown out any returns of fish out that far. I haven't thought to capture a good image at the 120' range but I have attached one where you can faintly pick out a small group of fish just outside the 90' range ring at about 10:00. the key to this is having the contrast set so that the bottom doesn't overpower the fish return. the lake I fish has very fast depth changes so I'm constantly tweaking the sensitivity on the Mega 360. Unfortunately, the Mega 360 adjusts the range rather than the sensitivity with the dial. I have my Humminbird remote set up to change the sensitivity on the +/- buttons so I don't have to constantly go into the menus to change the sensitivity.

Solix Settings:

- Frequency = 455 Khz... Same reason as Mega 360 above.
- Color Palette = 12... Same reason as Mega 360 above.
- Chart Speed = 10... I don't care about structure or image quality and find that the 10 chart speed setting elongates the fish returns making them easier to see.
- Sensitivity = 14 to 17... I run what most would consider "hot" in order to pick up as much in the water column as possible. I'm constantly tweaking this to keep a good balance of bottom return at varying depths
- Contrast = 10 to 12... I typically run 10 but will bump to 11 or 12 if there is a thermocline or clutter in the water
- Water Column Sensitivity = +3... Same reason as Mega 360 above.
- Dynamic Contrast = On... Same reason as Mega 360 above.
- Range = 120 or 200... If I'm fishing shallower water like a shoreline, I typically have the range set to 120. If I'm fishing over deeper water, I will typically run with my range set to 200.
- SI Sensitivity Offset = +4 or -4... I run SI from my Solix Transducer and not the Mega 360 so that I can have both Mega 360 and SI at the same time. When I'm trolling a shoreline, I always use the SI Sensitivity Offset to keep the bottom returns equal so that the bottom doesn't overpower the fish returns on either side. I use +4 when the shoreline is to my right (to make the left side stronger) and -4 when the shoreline is to my left (to make the left side weaker).

Hope this helps those who troll out there. Let me know if you have any tips I should try.

[Bob B]