Airmar
Airmar is the OEM behind most of the world's marine transducers. Hudson Marine stocks Airmar depth, speed and CHIRP transducers in thru-hull, transom and in-hull fittings to suit every sounder.
Matching an Airmar transducer to the hull
Transducer choice starts with mounting type: thru-hull suits most fibreglass hulls with reasonable deadrise, transom mount is the simplest retrofit on smaller planing boats, and in-hull works where you cannot put a hole below the waterline, at some cost to sensitivity through the laminate. Deadrise angle at the mounting position needs matching to the transducer's designed tilt, since a mismatch shows up as a weak or unstable bottom signal at speed even with an otherwise correctly specified unit.
CHIRP transducers cover a frequency sweep rather than a single fixed frequency, giving better target separation and clearer detail than traditional single or dual-frequency units, but they need a sounder module capable of driving CHIRP to get the benefit; fitting one to older, non-CHIRP electronics gains little.
Connector and plug type is brand-specific between Garmin, Furuno, Simrad and others even where the transducer element itself is the same Airmar part, so check the connector matches your sounder before ordering rather than assuming a universal fit.
