Trolling with electric?

[skinny420]

Trolling with electric?

Looking to get a new trolling motor for my old bayliner. 1986 1710 fish and ski. Still original trolling motor on it. Id like to upgrade to a new ipilot motor and be able to troll on electric alone. Could i realistically troll 4-8 hours on a 24-36 volt motor and get good enough speed in the little wind and waves i would go out in? Its a pain trolling with a 125 2 stroke dragging buckets and all the rods and riggers its a tight fit. Netting, driving, and not tangling up in all the gear. How much thrust and voltage would i need? Rather keep to the 24v but would 2 batteries be enough? I couldnt even imagine the motor i have now even being a usefull guage as to how much more power i would need. Its just always worked and i mainly drift or jig and its fine for that. So. Does anybody troll a boat on only the electric motor and whata the specs. Speed, time, volts, battery type.....any help before i spend more on a trolling motor than i paid for the whole boat? Lol

[Skidplate]

My buddy does he pulls a lot of copper on the finger lakes so he's going slow he has a 24v but wants to get the 36v next time I think he gets about 4-5 hours out of two batteries

[FishingFool34]

I troll for walleye all the time with my trolling motor. Speed and conditions play a huge roll in how long you can troll for. On a normal day I'm trolling at 1.8-2.2 at 50-60% power on my motor and can do 6ish hours on my 24v Terrova with ipilot Link. I run 2 29 series batteries (I don't know the specifics off top of my head) but they are top of the line walmart batteries lol, roughly $90-100 each. You will prolly get more duration/power if you bumped up to 31 group AGM batteries, but you're talking almost triple the price of conventional batteries too. You would have a very tough time on Lake O trying to use a TM to get up to salmon speeds in any kind of wind/current imo. I can't comment on a 36v other than to say if you can afford it... get it, you can always turn down the power. You could prolly get away with a co-pilot motor but I would recommend iPilot, Link is great but you need specific electronics and map card to utilize everything.

Edited September 28, 2017 by FishingFool34

[Fishmaster 196]

I don't think a 24v system would work for what you want to do.  I have a 24v 80 lb terrova that I use only to steer my fishmaster.  At walleye speeds, around 2 mph, I can get a solid 6 hours or more of use with the motor on 3.5 or so to help steer the boat.  When I use it for salmon trolling at 2.5mph or more I have to bump up motor speed to 5 or 6 and am lucky to get 4 or 5 hours out of it.  There is no way  i could get 5 or 6 hours out of mine if I was using it to pull the boat without my 9.9 for propulsion in any kind of wind or waves.  Maybe if the lake was flat.  I have 2 30 series AGM batteries that power the terrova.  I have no experience with a 36v system.

Edited September 28, 2017 by Fishmaster 196

[Xxx]

I know of a guy that put those motor mounted type on his boat, they were 36 volt with group 31. I was still in buisness for myself and I sold a Canadian made battery, extremely high cranking amps, that they need for the cold season. He used it on our home lake and was rather surprised at its performance and longevity. Took it up to LakeO and wasn't 100% happy but it served its purpose. Like mentioned above it depended on what Mother Nature threw at the lake!! BUT what he has in that electric system you could of put a kicker on and not have to carry battery chargers and extension cords. Plus remember you have to remove your series wires to charge the batteries. Very expensive VS. productivity.

[justtracytrolling]

I use a 36v terrova ipilot and in flat conditions or down wind I can troll 6+ hrs easy on a charge at 2 to 2.2.  I seldom go this route though and use my main motor for most of the propulsion and my tm for steering, fine tuning speed, and auto pilot.  24v isn't adequate in my opinion after having both, but I have lots of gear and 3-4 people plus me.   BTW, if you fish a lot, batteries won't last more than a season at peak performance running them way down every trip.  Also if you fish mornings and evenings you will need a very fast on board charger.  I use the mk345 on my boat and the mk460 on my sons bass boat.   

[skinny420]

I have a humminbird with map cards. Ipilot is my main reason for wanting it. In a little wind and waves my main motor is great. Just on flat days or with the wind id use electric if i could. Either way i want auto pilot to steer. Cant fit my kicker on it and might just get the trolling plate instead of pulling buckets. I use walmarts best batteries too. Lol. So kind of what i figured. It could work but not best idea to use to troll except slow trolling flat water. Thanks.

[justtracytrolling]

If you use the tm to steer and auto pilot providing most of the propulsion with the big motor you will be very happy, but just electric alone you will be limited.

[dgfidler]

I use a Motorguide xi5 36v on a 20ft walk around that weighs about 5k with people on board. I added a kicker because I could only get 3-4 hours running at 2.0 to 2.5. With the kicker, I set the TM to 30% for steering and use the kicker for primary propulsion and it lasts all day. This dual motor setup works great.


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[WickedGood]

Im thinking of setting up 2 pairs of these electric motors bolted under my dive platform and using a joystick to control them. 4 motors in total.   would be able to run them all forward or reverse or even spin the boat around in circles with port fwd & stbd reverse.  etc..  figure that an extra pair of large deep cycle marine batteries would be needed for these ( as well as the deep cycle batt for the electric downriggers, fishfinder, GPS, VHF) and the two batterys for the Diesel Engine.   Could run the engine to recgarge everything or have it charge from the pickup truck when on the trailer or battery charger when parked at the house.

 

anyone try this type of trolling setup?   Was looking at getting some from China as they are less cost but shipping is a killer.  Maybe doing a group purchase and bringing in a bunch of them would lower cost?

Edited January 15, 2018 by WickedGood

[Char_Master]

On 1/15/2018 at 6:23 AM, WickedGood said:

Im thinking of setting up 2 pairs of these electric motors bolted under my dive platform and using a joystick to control them. 4 motors in total.   would be able to run them all forward or reverse or even spin the boat around in circles with port fwd & stbd reverse.  etc..  figure that an extra pair of large deep cycle marine batteries would be needed for these ( as well as the deep cycle batt for the electric downriggers, fishfinder, GPS, VHF) and the two batterys for the Diesel Engine.   Could run the engine to recgarge everything or have it charge from the pickup truck when on the trailer or battery charger when parked at the house.

 

anyone try this type of trolling setup?   Was looking at getting some from China as they are less cost but shipping is a killer.  Maybe doing a group purchase and bringing in a bunch of them would lower cost?

I use a set of these Minn Kotas on my 22’ boat, mounted right on the outdrive. Most* of the time they work very well, especially on calmer days. Pretty awesome experience to have six lines pulling behind the boat in dead silence! However, I get 4-7 hours of trolling out of them at a full charge from 1.5-2.2mph. Higher than 2.5 and they’ll be dead in a couple hours at the most. Works fine for me as most of the time I’m slow trolling for Lakers or speed trolling Steelhead at 3-5mph with the main engine, which is fast enough that it doesn’t smoke-out everyone on the boat. Also, as a warning, we’ve had our unit for the past two seasons and in that time the left motor broke three times and the right motor broke once. Not mishandled or abused, but somehow water was getting through the seals even after the Minn Kota mechanic fixed it multiple times. If I had to do it over again (which I might this year), I’d just buy a couple trolling bags and run the main.

Edited February 25, 2018 by Char_Master