Lowrance H2O question

[krappiekrazy]

Saturday while fishing my unit kept going from WAAS aquired to WAAS lost. What is happening? I was fishing out in the middle of the lake so there should not have been interference. The batteries were 7/8 charged when I started fishing. Could it have been the batteries? Need help.........

[Barnacle Bill]

Mine did that the last time out and I even have an external antenna. But I had forgot to tell it in programming that it was connected. Its my understanding that there are still not enough WAAS satellites up there. So I guess it depends on where you are and atmospheric conditions. That's my guess.

[Cousneddy]

Jeff,
I have an Ifinder pro. Early this spring a friend and myself made a hike up coffee slough from key cave back to Savannah hwy. I would only lose WAAS when under a bluff or heavy tree cover. I wouldn't think you should lose it at all out in the open river. I would suspect a satellite problem before I would a problem with the GPS. I'll take mine next time and see how it does.

Ed

[Crappie Reaper]

Mine did that the last time out and I even have an external antenna. But I had forgot to tell it in programming that it was connected. Its my understanding that there are still not enough WAAS satellites up there. So I guess it depends on where you are and atmospheric conditions. That's my guess.

I have a regular I Finder, mine does the same thing, but usually only when I am working close to a bluff, or tall trees.

[Cmac]

I agree with Ibfishing, might want to check & see what the unit is set on, But one of my buddies was having a similar problem & he just called Lowrance (he had to hold on the phone forever) but they finally had him do something to reset the unit over the phone & now it works fine.

Not sure if it is the same reset to fix everything but when I got the hotspots fishing map I had to call them as well cuz I could'nt get a satelite fix when I put the card in & the lady on the phone had me to turn the unit off & then hold the pages key & the power key while I turned it on & I havent had a problem since then, but like I said not sure if this reset will work for everything???

Be prepared to hold for a while

Hope this helps

[Moose1am]

This is correct. Last time I read about this there were only TWO WAAS (Wide Area Augumentation Satellites in orbit) More were said to be in the planning stages.

If you are in an area of the country where you don't have a clear line of view to to the Southern Horizon it may be hard to get the WASS Satellite signals on your gps unit.

Airplanes are flying up high and they have much better view of the Southern Horizon. So they can more easily get the WAAS correction signals.

Actually the WAAS system was developed with airplane pilots in mind. We lowly earth bound fishermen are just barely able to reap the same benefits that the WAAS satellites provides to Private Air Plane Pilots.

We are lucky that Bill Clinton got the Federal Government to turn off the GPS's selective Availablity as with that back on we would never get the accuracy that we get these days. We would go from plus or minus 3 meters to plus or minu 30 ft or more.

Mine did that the last time out and I even have an external antenna. But I had forgot to tell it in programming that it was connected. Its my understanding that there are still not enough WAAS satellites up there. So I guess it depends on where you are and atmospheric conditions. That's my guess.

[Moose1am]

This site contains some useful information on what WAAS is and how it works etc.

http://gpsinformation.net/exe/waas.html

[FisherMike]

Go to your GPS set up and unselect 'Require WAAS'.
I'm sure your problem will be solved.

[krappiekrazy]

Thanks guys for all the help. I will have time to play with it tomorrow after work. Will let everyone know what works..

Thanks

[krappiekrazy]

Well it is working!!!!! Changed the batteries and pressed the page key with the power key. Now it works great. Not real sure what fixed it but who cares. It works... Thanks for all the help.