Author Topic: Introducing myself - Hi I'm Geno  (Read 2563 times)

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Offline Geno

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Introducing myself - Hi I'm Geno
« on: March 22, 2014, 10:26:31 AM »
Hi everyone, I am Geno and I just registered. I never did get an email but the forum let me in so here I am.

I have lurked here for a short time and will be here for a while.

I am an older (think late forties) non-traditional student with a family who takes care of two households. I work full-time, attend school full-time and have enough time left over to sleep and not much more. My wife and I started back to school in 09 to get the education we never completed. I have just been accepted into a physical geography program at the largest university in my state. I will be doing masters work for the next two years and a lot of my work will be with sonar. The university has kindly agreed to provide me with funding to build a system that can remotely sense and map the bottom of the local river in such a way that it can be integrated with arcGIS with the understanding that I leave it behind when I move on to PhD work.

Fluvial geomorphology is my focus and our ideal situation will be the ability to record bedload (bottom sediment) movement in a semi-dynamic environment and the holy grail will be the ability to determine different types of bottom sediment in a short range freshwater  setting (our smallest environment will be a creek fifty to one hundred feet wide and five to thirty feet deep, our largest will be an impounded river several hundred yards wide and up to 150 feet deep).

My intention is to use an 800 series (smallest networkable) unit with an LSS2 transducer (much sharper image as far as I can tell) hull mounted for the small waters and towfish mounted for the larger waters, networked to a laptop with a huge hard drive running some sort of freeware or low cost mapping integration ware for the sonar, I have an older Trimble  differential GPS that I hope I can use for location.

I am currently rebuilding a 24' pontoon boat with a factory hard top to use as the platform for both water sampling and sonar. It is not in great condition but the main parts are solid. It has plenty of deck space, a massive weight carrying capacity, and a top to shade equipment as we work. It will also be easy to enclose and heat/cool if we need to work in inclement weather. I have removed all of the furniture and running gear so I can get the worn out flooring off and replace the deck. Once I get the floor sorted out I will be putting in a new console I found cheap, some used furniture that is in good rebuild-able shape, getting the aluminum rails and hard top welded up where repairs are needed, and mounting all the running gear back where it belongs.

I have already sorted out the trailer with new wheels and tires all around and bearings on one side. I need to install lights and some bumpers but it is legal and safe right now.

The engine (Tohatsu M90 A) needed very little and although it is somewhat less than attractive, it is in good running order and very solid. I have already installed a huge fuel cell for long range and new deep cycle batteries.

I am looking for suggestions on the system before I begin this oddesea (lol). I know from experience that doing research into building a finicky thing such as I propose can't be done with just twenty hours of lurking on forums and reading a few papers.

Also, I am very handy mechanically and have a decent understanding of networking technologies. I intend to build my own cables, a towfish or two and I will have time to play around with the new toys to work out the kinks.

Thank you in advance for all of your help.
"Something which threatens your life is a problem, everything else in an inconvenience"

Paul "Home Run" Richert
21 January 1966 - 04 November 2005
Rest in peace Brother


Offline Bob B

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Re: Introducing myself - Hi I'm Geno
« Reply #1 on: March 22, 2014, 06:20:29 PM »
Welcome .....I don't have a clue what fluvial geomorphology is, but there are a lot of diverse users on this forum.
**Looking for the one that makes it all worthwhile**

Offline chuck41

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Re: Introducing myself - Hi I'm Geno
« Reply #2 on: March 22, 2014, 09:21:38 PM »
Geno,
I too am a newbie on the board and also working with the challenges of a party barge.  I just put an "experienced" 80 model Johnson 115 on my 26' barge.  Replaced a much newer 70 and am kicking myself that I didn't do this five years ago. That's what this old barge really needed. The speed the 70 achieved I can now do running only 4000 rpm.  Full throttle gave me an increase of almost 50% in speed.  I like cruising with the motor loafing along and you can carry on a normal conversation with folks on board.

My instillation on the left "toon" is pretty much blocked by the lower unit of the motor.  I still get usable (for my purposes) info on the right at low speeds, but that might not be sufficient for the info you need.  In the next week or two I will be adding a third "toon" to my boat and probably will move the si transducer to the rear of it just in front of the motor.  If your boat turns out like mine you will likely have to install two sidelooking transducers, one on the rear of each "toon".  I recently purchased a HB 798ci si HD, kinda the "poor boy's si", but that does not use the higher definition 800Khz transducer that would likely be a better choice for you.  I think that is standard with the 900 and above HB units and optional on the 800 series.  Not available with my unit. You might also think of mounting a transducer in front of the barge using a folding support that you can deploy when you need it and fold it up safely out of the water otherwise. 

I am a bit your senior.  (Think lower 70s).  Taught computer programming in local college for a number of years and retired to operate a computer business then retired in '02 when wife had breast cancer.  She's fine now and I have time freed up for hunting, fishing and diving, and drooling over sonar pictures.

The wide availability of good sonar units with side imaging and high definition downlooking capability, even 360 coverage are out there in stock at your local marina today. Check with some of the guys on their posts about bottom composition to pick out what will be needed to work for your project.  You might also look at Reefmaster and Lakemaster Autochart to see if the bottom composition readouts available with their products might be helpful to you.  Autochart is not currently available and has obviously no user reports available, but Reefmaster has been out for several years with lots of experienced users and several updates to make it a well established product.  This discussion item on Reefmaster on this forum will likely be helpful to you: http://forums.sideimagingsoft.com/index.php?topic=6950.0   A post on that section will get you a response from Reefmaster as to the adaptability of their mapping process to the arcGIS system.

I hope you will keep us well appraised of the progress of your project.  It sounds like it would be a really interesting study.  Good luck to you.

Chuck

P.S. That Tohatsu 90 should do a really good job for you.  I have a good friend that runs a local marine repair shop.  That is his motor of choice.  Swears that it is more fuel efficient, easier to maintain, more trouble free and reliable than any of the 4 strokes.  He has been using them on his personal boat for quite a number of years.
« Last Edit: March 22, 2014, 09:34:20 PM by chuck41 »
A bad day on the lake is still better than a good day at work!

Offline Geno

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Re: Introducing myself - Hi I'm Geno
« Reply #3 on: March 25, 2014, 09:43:00 AM »
Thanks Bob and Chuck.

Glad to be here.

I have spoken with Matt and he thinks I can do what I plan with a little ingenuity.
"Something which threatens your life is a problem, everything else in an inconvenience"

Paul "Home Run" Richert
21 January 1966 - 04 November 2005
Rest in peace Brother


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