# Garmin preloaded Lake Vu HD maps



## thill (Aug 23, 2006)

I'm so close to finally buying a new graph for my boat and I am settled on the Garmin echomap chirp unit. Does anyone have this graph with the 17,000 preloaded maps?

I'm curious of the coverage for MI lakes. I fish many small lakes from Traverse City to South Haven and spend a fair amount of time on the Detroit river. Does anyone have 1st hand experience with these unites and can speak of the lake coverage?

Thanks!


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## MichiganMan67 (Mar 29, 2015)

Last year I bought the Garmin53DV with preloaded lake-vu maps. The sonar part is outstanding. I've never been to any of the small lakes in your area, But everywhere I've been on lake Michigan from the bay of green bay, to little and big bay de noc, to Fairport to Manistique, the lake vu-map is off by about a quarter mile. Sometimes near shore or in a river it shows my boat is on land. I called Garmin and just got a lot of double talk. I can't trust the Garmin GPS so I use my Humming bird 597 for following contours.


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## Timberdoodle2 (Jan 6, 2015)

can you just use the finder for for following the contours and use the gps to mark way points or plotting routes?


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## MichiganMan67 (Mar 29, 2015)

Yes you can use it to mark way points. It will take you back to your way point very well. It's difficult to plot a route when the contours on the map are so inacurate. Your plotted route may say your in 20 feet of water as your lower unit plows into rocks in 20 inches of water. It's also difficult to follow a break or conture when the mapping is way off both on conture shape and depth. The big issue is that the maps contours are groosely innacurate compared to all the other backround mapping systems Iv'e used on both Lorance and Humingbird units. I guess that's way the Garmin pre-loaded maps are free.


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## thill (Aug 23, 2006)

MichiganMan67 said:


> Yes you can use it to mark way points. It will take you back to your way point very well. It's difficult to plot a route when the contours on the map are so inacurate. Your plotted route may say your in 20 feet of water as your lower unit plows into rocks in 20 inches of water. It's also difficult to follow a break or conture when the mapping is way off both on conture shape and depth. The big issue is that the maps contours are groosely innacurate compared to all the other backround mapping systems Iv'e used on both Lorance and Humingbird units. I guess that's way the Garmin pre-loaded maps are free.



This is pretty interesting! I just bought a Garmin echomap 93sv and so far the mapping is spot on. I'm going fishing Wednesday to a different lake and I'll be sure to check out the accuracy. I wonder if you just got a bad GPS in your unit? I'll report back after Wednesday's trip.

My buddy has the same unit but with the coastal maps and he brags about how great they are. Weird!


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## MichiganMan67 (Mar 29, 2015)

thill said:


> This is pretty interesting! I just bought a Garmin echomap 93sv and so far the mapping is spot on. I'm going fishing Wednesday to a different lake and I'll be sure to check out the accuracy. I wonder if you just got a bad GPS in your unit? I'll report back after Wednesday's trip.
> 
> My buddy has the same unit but with the coastal maps and he brags about how great they are. Weird!


Just my luck,,,


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## Dslomo (Sep 28, 2012)

I have 2 93sv's and they are great. Haven't used the quickdraw contours yet but heard it's a great feature


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