MarCum or Vex flasher!

[team walleye]

I am still pretty new to ice fishing but I have decided it's time to get a flasher. Any opinions on one or the other? Also, are there ever any used ones for sale on here?

Thanks!

[Baseline]

I've had both. Either one is a good unit. Personally I don't think you need to buy the high priced do everything flasher for ice fishing. I currently use the Marcum Tci3 which has plenty of power and does the job I want it too. My Vex Fl-8 was good enough as well. After all its just vertical fishing. Not much to see other than the bottom, your bait and the occasional fish that swims into the cone.

[thump55]

I currently have an LX-3 and an LX-5 and have had Vex's in the past.The Marcum LX-3 is what I would recommend. The Vex is a fine unit, but I prefer the Marcum mainly because it has the transducer arm, a better carrying case, and is quieter.

The actual function of a Vex, Marcum, or Humminbird will be nearly identical.

Get one with zoom (LX-3 has zoom)...you don't need anything fancier than that.

Most importantly, if you don't have one now, just get something.

[CI_Guy]

If you fish with friends often, you may want to see what brand they use. Marcum and Vexilar don't always play well together. The Marcum puts out a higher wattage and Vex can't always filter out the interference.
Marcum can filter out the interference from either brand.
If you are fishing with all Vexilar users in a small area with a Marcum you might not be real popular.
The couple times I've seen newer Vexilars with Marcums they were able to filter out the interference.

Both work good, two friend I fish with have them, I just take my HDS5 Gen2 and put it in a ice pack for winter, nice to have the GPS map for finding WPTs I've marked in the summer to check out.

[team walleye]

Thanks for the info guys. I was looking at the vex FL-8se just because it's the best deal I have found on one at $279. Not looking to spend big bucks just need something that works. My father in law and his buddies have Marcums and they seems like nice units, but I think they are ok the nicer end of models.

[AllenW]

I have both a Humminbird ice 45 and 55 and really like them, but a buddy just got the Helix 5 ice and it gives several depth screens and GPS also, might be an option?

Al

[thump55]

Originally Posted by team walleye

Thanks for the info guys. I was looking at the vex FL-8se just because it's the best deal I have found on one at $279. Not looking to spend big bucks just need something that works. My father in law and his buddies have Marcums and they seems like nice units, but I think they are ok the nicer end of models.

The FL-8 doesn't have zoom. Zoom isn't life or death, but I do use it 90% of the time I am fishing. Like I said before- anything is better than nothing, but if you can stretch for the next level up, I would try to do that.

I would buy a used FL-18, H'bird 45 or LX-3 before buying a new entry level flasher without zoom.

[team walleye]

What exactly does the zoom show me on a flasher?

[thump55]

Originally Posted by team walleye

What exactly does the zoom show me on a flasher?

The zoom spreads out the area on your flasher dial where the fish are.

For example, if you are fishing in 6 FOW (from transducer at bottom of ice to the lake bottom), in normal mode, the six feet is shown on your flasher dial from 12 o'clock to 4 o'clock. (There is 20' on the entire dial, so 5' down is at 3, 10' is at 6 o'clock, 15 at 9.

In zoom mode, that six feet is spread out to half of the dial, almost doubling the area on your graph making it easier to see individual fish, weeds, etc. So if you are fishing a pocket in the weeds for gills, and there are a bunch of fish on the screen, you can focus on the larger fish.

If you are in 8 FOW, you can zoom in on the bottom 5' and it will spread that 5' from 12 o'clock to 6' o'clock, doubling the area from normal mode.

Video here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TZ5QaA2z7Q

He gets into zoom about 5 minutes in.