Opinions of Side Scan Sonar

[GaryF]

Greetings, this is my first registered post.

I just wanted to share my experience with a side scan sonar product that I first learned about from reading the pages of this forum. I am a somewhat reserved person by nature and I am not usually outspoken about anything, but my experience has been very positive and I thought others may find value in it.

Let me start by saying that I am not affiliated with this person or product in any way. I am simply a satisfied customer.

I decided to try a side scan transducer/towfish built by Garry Burton of Burton Electronics. He builds his own transducers and towfish and couples them with off-the-shelf recording fish finders from Lowrance Electronics. This idea appealed to me as I was already an owner of a Lowrance fish finder. I didn’t have a lot of money nor the desire to attempt to build my own transducer and towfish. I just want to go out on my boat and make images. I felt that this was the perfect way for me to get into side scanning for a relatively low cost. Garry agreed to build my towfish with an additional length of cable and I received my towfish with a couple of weeks. Since that time I have recorded nearly 200 scans and I am very happy with the results.

Attached are two recent scans off the coast of California. These were recorded on a Lowrance LCX-110C and the screen captures were taken using the Lowrance Sonar Viewer PC application. Sonar Viewer is a free download from the Lowrance website.

This first scan is a group of discarded sections of sewer pipe. These sections are 12 ft long and 8 ft in diameter. Note that two of the sections are standing upright. You can clearly see the upper ends of each pipe as well as their distinct acoustic shadow. One pipe section is badly broken and the target at lower right is one pipe laying atop another. This was recorded at 220 ft range at 2 knots. 85 ft water depth.

The second image is a large steel wreck that was intentionally sunk as an artificial reef. You can clearly see the collapsed deck and various openings in the hull. Sand waves are also clearly visible along with concrete rubble that was dumped later on the site. Just aft of the stern you can see the permanent surface buoy and directly beneath it is the mooring block on the bottom. This was recorded at 330 ft range at 2 knots. 130 ft water depth.

I feel that the quality of these images is comparable to commercial systems costing 10 times as much.

I’m including a link to Garry’s website for anyone that may be interested in further information.
http://www.burtonelectronics.com/

Respectfully,

GaryF
Huntington Beach, CA
USA

[corlay]

burtons electronics

Hi,

I've just read your description of Garry Burton's side scan sonar. I am very impressed and I'm planning to purchase the MC1. What do you think about it?I was hesitating between the MC1 and the Humminbird 987. I think the SSS is more useable in waters ranging from 35 to 55 meters deep. What is your opinion?
I haven't understood what he means when he talks about recording times! Could you explain it to me?
I thank you very much
[email protected]

GERARD

Greetings, this is my first registered post.

I just wanted to share my experience with a side scan sonar product that I first learned about from reading the pages of this forum. I am a somewhat reserved person by nature and I am not usually outspoken about anything, but my experience has been very positive and I thought others may find value in it.

Let me start by saying that I am not affiliated with this person or product in any way. I am simply a satisfied customer.

I decided to try a side scan transducer/towfish built by Garry Burton of Burton Electronics. He builds his own transducers and towfish and couples them with off-the-shelf recording fish finders from Lowrance Electronics. This idea appealed to me as I was already an owner of a Lowrance fish finder. I didn’t have a lot of money nor the desire to attempt to build my own transducer and towfish. I just want to go out on my boat and make images. I felt that this was the perfect way for me to get into side scanning for a relatively low cost. Garry agreed to build my towfish with an additional length of cable and I received my towfish with a couple of weeks. Since that time I have recorded nearly 200 scans and I am very happy with the results.

Attached are two recent scans off the coast of California. These were recorded on a Lowrance LCX-110C and the screen captures were taken using the Lowrance Sonar Viewer PC application. Sonar Viewer is a free download from the Lowrance website.

This first scan is a group of discarded sections of sewer pipe. These sections are 12 ft long and 8 ft in diameter. Note that two of the sections are standing upright. You can clearly see the upper ends of each pipe as well as their distinct acoustic shadow. One pipe section is badly broken and the target at lower right is one pipe laying atop another. This was recorded at 220 ft range at 2 knots. 85 ft water depth.

The second image is a large steel wreck that was intentionally sunk as an artificial reef. You can clearly see the collapsed deck and various openings in the hull. Sand waves are also clearly visible along with concrete rubble that was dumped later on the site. Just aft of the stern you can see the permanent surface buoy and directly beneath it is the mooring block on the bottom. This was recorded at 330 ft range at 2 knots. 130 ft water depth.

I feel that the quality of these images is comparable to commercial systems costing 10 times as much.

I’m including a link to Garry’s website for anyone that may be interested in further information.
http://www.burtonelectronics.com/

Respectfully,

GaryF
Huntington Beach, CA
USA

[GaryF]

Burton Electronics

Gerard,

I do not have any personal experience with the Humminbird 987. I did take a quick look at it on their website. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't appear as though the Humminbird continuously records side scan data for later review on a computer. The sample images on the Humminbird site appear to be only screen captures.

The Lowrance sounders continuously record raw sonar data to an internal SD/MMC card. The recording times are limited primarily by the capacity of the card. Sonar range also effects recording times. Longer ranges give longer recording times (due to fewer pings per second). I can routinely do a full day of scanning and not fill up a single 512MB SD card.

The recorded sonar files can be analyzed later on the PC with the Lowrance Sonar Viewer application. The program allows complete adjustment and control of the data file. You can replay the entire file just as if you were at sea. Replay can be forward or backwards. You can also zoom in or zoom out and make fine adjustments for sensitivity and color intensity. GPS data is imbedded in the file for every ping as well. You can also create your own custom color palettes to enhance analysis of the data. I find the program to be very good and it's free from Lowrance.

Regarding depth. It appears that the Humminbird's depth is limited by it's hull mounted transducer. The Burton side scan is deployed on a cable so depth is limited by cable length, tow speed, and towfish weight. I ordered my Burton side scan with 200 ft of cable and have gotten good results scanning to over 200 ft deep. However, my best results are obtained at 125 ft or less.

Keep in mind that the Lowrance sounders are only single channel, so likewise the Burton towfish is only single channel. It does not look in both directions. For me this is an acceptable limitation. The recording quality is very good at the 330 ft (100m) range scale. The attached image of the wreck was recorded at 330 ft range.

Gary

[Unregistered]

side scan sonar

Gerard,

I do not have any personal experience with the Humminbird 987. I did take a quick look at it on their website. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't appear as though the Humminbird continuously records side scan data for later review on a computer. The sample images on the Humminbird site appear to be only screen captures.

The Lowrance sounders continuously record raw sonar data to an internal SD/MMC card. The recording times are limited primarily by the capacity of the card. Sonar range also effects recording times. Longer ranges give longer recording times (due to fewer pings per second). I can routinely do a full day of scanning and not fill up a single 512MB SD card.

The recorded sonar files can be analyzed later on the PC with the Lowrance Sonar Viewer application. The program allows complete adjustment and control of the data file. You can replay the entire file just as if you were at sea. Replay can be forward or backwards. You can also zoom in or zoom out and make fine adjustments for sensitivity and color intensity. GPS data is imbedded in the file for every ping as well. You can also create your own custom color palettes to enhance analysis of the data. I find the program to be very good and it's free from Lowrance.

Regarding depth. It appears that the Humminbird's depth is limited by it's hull mounted transducer. The Burton side scan is deployed on a cable so depth is limited by cable length, tow speed, and towfish weight. I ordered my Burton side scan with 200 ft of cable and have gotten good results scanning to over 200 ft deep. However, my best results are obtained at 125 ft or less.

Keep in mind that the Lowrance sounders are only single channel, so likewise the Burton towfish is only single channel. It does not look in both directions. For me this is an acceptable limitation. The recording quality is very good at the 330 ft (100m) range scale. The attached image of the wreck was recorded at 330 ft range.

Gary

Thnak you very much Gary for your complete answer and explanation about Burton's side scan sonar. i'm impressed by its quality and reasonable price!
I am keeping in touch with Burton ZElectronics to buy one.
GERARD

[Unregistered]

One channel

Pity it does not cover both sides at the one time I would prefer to pay double rather than spend twice the time looking for something,it can be a big effort to get out searching for something so I llike to use my time as best possable.Good images but in practice you need to make the best use of your time on the water.

[GaryF]

Pity it does not cover both sides at the one time I would prefer to pay double rather than spend twice the time looking for something,it can be a big effort to get out searching for something so I llike to use my time as best possable.Good images but in practice you need to make the best use of your time on the water.

You have a valid point and I agree with you that a single channel side scan is not the perfect solution for conducting a serious sonar search. But I think it fills a void for someone like myself to get into side scanning that doesn't have a lot of money to purchase a commercial side scan sonar. Being single channel doesn't preclude someone from finding things. I've found a lot of new things that I didn't know about before. I've learned a lot with it and I'm having fun in the process. I think half the coverage for one tenth the cost of a commercial side scan is a reasonable compromise.

Cheers,

Gary

[Unregistered]

Cost

It is not much cheeper than a sportscan unit .

[GaryF]

Cost

It is not much cheeper than a sportscan unit .

True, but the Sportscan also requires a laptop computer. So for me it was a lot cheaper.

Gary

[Unregistered]

New Laptop

A new laptop from Dell is currently available for 399 euro (less than 400 dollars) and can be used for several other things. And makes the job some much more flexible

Is it possible to get some raw data for the M1 sidescan sonar (as you can from the Sportscan site) and replay it on your PC or laptop?
What program do u use to view the data ???

[GaryF]

I have no doubt that the Sportscan sonar is a good unit, I would just like to make a couple of additional observations regarding towfish depth and image quality.

The Sportscan is limited to a maximum depth of 100 ft. I don’t believe the Burton towfish has a specific depth limit as there are no electronics housed within the towfish, only a transducer. I have deployed my towfish well beyond 100 ft. My towfish has 200 ft of cable, but I think it would work just as well with 300 ft.

Image quality is also important to me and I think the Burton side scan produces a superior image. Attached are screen shots of a 60m Sportscan image of a wreck and a 67m Burton image of an upside down rock barge. Note the anchor chain draped over the barge. You be the judge.

One final note is to remember that the Lowrance recorder can still be used as a regular fish finder when not being used for side scanning. Attached is a sample recorded image.

I don’t know if you can download a side scan data file from Burton Electronics, but I would be happy to share a data file with you. You can download the data file and my user color file here:

You might have to right-click and choose 'Save Target As...' to download the files to your hard drive.

http://www.ub88.org/rockbarge.slg
http://www.ub88.org/yellow.lcf

You can download the Lowrance Sonar Viewer application directly from their website:

http://www.lowrance.com/Software/PCs...rViewer122.exe

In Sonar Viewer, be sure to use the ‘Open User Colors’ menu option to open the custom color file. Try setting sensitivity to 97 and colorline to 65.

Cheers,

Gary

[Unregistered]

Image quality

I would not use the sportscan image for any analysis or comparison of image quality. It is a very poor scan. If you look closely at the scan there are wedge(vee) shaped segments of very high detail displayed along the path of the scan. This is a common problem that occurs frequently with SportScan towfish. The towfish is extremely sensitive to weight and balance. If not properly adjusted, the towfish will wobble and zig-zag especially on a short length of cable. Any movement of the towfish is amplified in the signal returns because the transducers are located at the rear of the towfish. Also, it appears there are no target returns beyond 40m or so indicating a towfish alignment problem or more likely the unit is operating on high frequency which is limited to about 40m.

[sportscanuser]

Image Quality

From what I understand the sidescan sonar from Burton electronic is a very high quality transducer coupled to a good fishfinder with the limitations that go with this .

1 limited to one channel not practical to upgrade it to two channels ever! This is this units biggest problem.

2 Software is not designed for sidescan it is designed for a fish finder and seems to be good at this, it would need a complete new program for it to meet the basic industrial standards and be compatible with third party programs and to integrate fully in to a PC environment saying that I have only briefly looked at the software and it seem to have some nice features but I was unable to get GPS information on my laptop on the files you reference. The free software provided with the sportscan is ok and I understand it possible to upgrade it to other software to let it mosaic etc.

I use Oziexplorer software to track and map where I am going.

3 Single frequency unit, not flexible, many other units if you get a image you have the choice of rescanning at a higher frequency to get better definition. The high frequency images from he sportscan seem to be better than the images provided. See the image on my website of a 14 foot row boat in which the seats can be clearly seen. http://sidescansonar.bravehost.com/index.html

4 when you start to extend the cable to the 200 feet mark and longer signal loss becomes a problem as there is no active electronics at the transducer.



On the plus side

I like the image quality and wonder what is the spec of the transducer that was used to capture them.( could you upgrade a sportscan with a similar transducer)

I think the screen that comes with the fish finder while of lower resolution is more suited to out door use than a screen on a laptop I may be wrong on this ?, and is probably more suited to water splashes than a standard laptop.I am on the look out for a screen that works better in sunlight for my laptop.

The unit appears to be good value for money and is a good entry point in to sidescan sonar.

Feel free to mail me directly if anybody want any more information or files about the sportscan unit I am still learning about it.

[GaryF]

I don't disagree with you regarding the limitations of using a fishfinder as a side scan sonar, but I still find the system to be quite useful for my needs. For me it was a logical decision, as I already owned a Lowrance recorder. An ideal situation would be to have a commercial side scan with all of the features that you described, but until I can afford one, this system will work for me. It's my favorite piece of gear on my boat.

These are the only specs that I know about the transducer.

T6-200 Khz extra high resolution. Approx. 30 degrees by .9 degrees.
Physical size is approx: 16.5 in x 1.25 in (42 cm x 3 cm).

I believe these transducers are hand built by Garry Burton.

I'm quite impressed with the level of detail in my recordings. In the attached close up of the rock barge you can resolve individual fish in the school and you can also see the shadow of the anchor chain on the bottom.

Gary

[Unregistered]

Picture

Can you send a close picture up of the transducer.
Has any body got any experience of hand building them?

[GaryF]

A close-up of the transducer.

Gary