Thanks Fishreed,
I wasn't sure if anyone would respond.
My main goal was to find out if anyone owned the fishn buddy max and had been using it under similar conditions and whether they had experienced the same issues since I was the first to report this to the retailer and the warranty department.
At the time it occurred I had not anticipated it would be any challenge to impress upon the retailer the same conclusion I had determined in my morning use (ie that this product was not suitable for this type of use and therefore a complete refund )
Bare in mind as well, I was on a small narrow lake troll fishing in a canoe under windy conditions with at least 50 yds of fishing line and a multi spoon lure behind me with an undercharged small 12 volt battery driving the trolling motor (I realized when I arrived back at home the batter was not low but more probably burnt out as I had unintentionally charged it overnight with the charger switch on the "car boost 65 amp? setting, doh)
So I had my hands full as it was without the sonar mounting issues. Let alone not thinking I needed more exact stats and video to prove my "case" to the retailers or authorised dealers.
So when I saw the sonar shaking wildly back and forth with the increased canoe speed, I was more concerned with keeping from running ashore and snagging my line in shallower water and or having my canoe get turned sideways and ruining my line and also requiring more effort to get back on course. Normall would not have been any issue had my trolling battery not dies as it has always been able to compensate even in stronger wind conditions.
But as that my batter was fried and I had to paddle instead. So a gps and video was not convenient to say the least
Add now that while I'm doing this work the sonar keeps popping off the mount and floating up on an angle in peril of falling off. Being an avid fisherman I really didn't want to give up using the sonar so I kept reinserting it. Plus it was valuable to be able to read the depth and know if I was being blown too shallow. (Eventually I did give up as it was only a matter of time before I lost the sonar to the bottom of the lake, so I decided to remove the sonar and place it in the canoe and paddle to my launch.
Even through all of this if I knew then what I know now in terms of the time and effort to get the retailer to plead my case to the supplier, I would have taken the time to record a video (ie stop fishing altogether) of the shaking sonar and it coming loose and record my gps speed as evidence and for Humminbird R&D.
In regard to my speed estimate. I think it is fairly educated but yes admittedly I could be off. I based it on thousands of hours time trolling in my canoe and my 17 foot fishing/pleasure boat between speeds of .5 and 3 mph on everything from streams and small lakes to the great lakes. never had a gps on my canoe to track speed but I can correlate to some extent. Could I have been going 4 mph? possible. I never clocked how fast I paddle in a canoe but I know Ive gotta be trolling normally at 1 mph or less (.5 to 1 ) ideally in this lake . Its been so ling since I caught a rainbow in this lake that I kind forgot now or am not as confident that I know what the best trolling speed is anymore lol.
I figure I was going almost twice as fast as I would ideally want to be going to troll in this lake based on previous catches.
In regard to the suction cup. My previous portable of 25 yrs has a suction cup and it has never fallen off when used on this lake. I place if at either the very front (if 2 people in the canoe to bring the leading tip down, or at the rear if fishing myself)
It is possible to position in so the suction cup is almost vertical as the canoe side wall is vertical at the very back. I tilt the transducer slightly at an angle to compensate for the fact the wall starts to curve around. So the bottom of the transducer is completely parallel to the water surface and submerged.
The only issue I may have had with my old sonar is I believe I was getting false fish markings Due to interference from my trolling motor. The fishin buddy was supposed to resolve that as I could incread the distance plus I felt I needed a newer more advance technology to help accurately mark fish. I had lost faith in my old one
Now that people are mounting transducers to their trolling motors or getting motors which have built in transducers, I dint know it this is now possible because of sonar advances or trolling motor advances but I am sure that my motor interfered with my old sonar when place close to each other. In particular when the motor powers is high
So if its my motor being the issue I will still have trouble with the new portable if I use the suctions cup and need to place them close which is the case whenever I fish alone.
So I will give serious consideration to that aluminum transducer mount which I had never considered before.
I do have a new portable sonar the helix 5 gps which I have not opened yet until I get a final result on my fishing buddy return. I has a suction cup and it sounds like I should be replacing it with that aluminum holder. I am wondering if its easy enough to convert the portable transducer to mount on this as its much more economical to get this portable helix 5 than the fixed one and converting the non portable . I got this portable Helix 5 GPS for only 379 CDN. It would cost much more than that to buy the permanent fixture and then the case and battery and connections separately