We
anglers can never say too much about the products we use and have faith
in.
If
you are strongly
confident in a specific brand, use it. But if you are looking at other
options, maybe you will find some helpful information here. Or maybe
you are looking for something to meet a specific need. I hope these
pages help you with whatever your need.
My
boat holds 3 Deka MARINE MASTER deep cycle
batteries – size 31 wet cell. I just finished 4 full seasons
on Great
Lakes fishing on my last set.
Deka
batteries, manufactured by East Penn, come in a large variety of
battery types and sizes, including wet cell dual purpose (heavy dutey
starting and moderate deep cycle), the heavy duty deep cycle batteries
like I have, starting batteries, SEAMATE AGM (electrolyte absorbed by
micro-porous AGM separators) and DOMINATOR gel cell batteries along
with more specialized models.
The East Penn website contains a wealth of detailed information. You
can register to download informative pdf
documents. I’ve learned a lot already especially from the
technical manuals, selector guide (real helpful for picking the size
and type of battery right for you) and the battery care guide.
Even
if
you aren’t looking for a new battery right now,
you’ll get useful information from these Adobe Reader
documents. Most of the documents are reasonably sized for quick
downloads, but packed with great facts just as the batteries are packed
with power! Knowledge is power and power is what Deka Batteries is all
about!!
D & R Sports Center
– Kalamazoo, MI on M-43 a few miles
west of US-131 - The home of Randy and Kevin VanDam, D & R has
a huge selection of hunting, fishing and outdoor equipment including
one of the best selections and variety of bass tackle in the Midwest.
Whether you need live bait, guns, clothing, ice fishing
tackle, or fly-fishing, D & R has it all.
If you have any questions, call D & R Sports Center at (800)
992-1520 or (616) 372-2277
locally. Friendly staff will be more than happy to help you find the
right tackle or supplies. D
& R Sports also provides mail order service.
Deka Batteries are manufactured by
East Penn Manufacturing Co. Inc. with world-wide
headquartes in a massive 490+ acre plant site in
Lyon Station, Pennsylvania. I like knowing the source since many
batteries are actually made by other companies.
I always like to know who is
actually making the products I count on and if you love your fishing
like I do, you count on your batteries as much as any other tool to get
the most out of your fishing. I’ve been trying lots of
battery ‘brands’ over the years since I fish 100
– 130+ days per year and tend to wear them out –
thanks quite a bit to the Great Lakes – in about a year and a
half on average. I just
bought my second set after getting 4 full seasons from the first.
After
thoroughly researching the various battery manufacturers and talking to
technicians from some of the companies, I’ve finally
found the best battery for me.
Deka batteries come in a wide
variety of sizes
and styles. After getting detailed attention from Wonch Battery techs
at the spring fishing shows, they recommended the wet cell Deka Marine Master batteries
– 3 of them in the size 31 – since I run a
24/36 V Motorguide and need one battery to be my start battery too.
And I need long-lasting power to fight the winds and currents on the
Great Lakes. They weigh 59 pounds each and are very well priced.
East Penn has very detailed
information to compare their various batteries you can download from
their website, so you can do quite a bit of homework before you even
talk to a tech. You may not even need to thanks to the detail.
Deka Batteries
are available in Michigan from Wonch Battery in Lansing (800-444-4148)
and other locations, and from D
& R Sports Center in Kalamazoo.
Flint
Sign & Design – A company I worked
with to create decals for my
new web site logo – GreatLakesBass.com. Michael
at Flint Sign & Design, did a great job building decals
that easily meet my expectations. Flint Sign can create custom decals
and signs for you too, and has many existing logos and patterns. Tell Flint Sign you saw them on
GreatLakesBass.com
and get a discount on your purchase.
Flint
Sign & Design
is a full service shop with all the equipment for signs of any size,
big or small. Flint
Sign & Design
is located in their completely new building at 3905 Fenton
Rd., Flint MI 48507. Call 810-232-8800; FAX: 810-232-8565.
One of the newest and coolest toolsfor the computer-age angler,
Lakemaster software, a division of Waypoint
Technologies, includes great products to improve
anyone’s fishing success. These are not just a rehash of
existing lake maps. Lakemaster experts are constantly using their
software linked to sounding equipment and GPS to improve the accuracy
of the maps they sell.
As we all know, many maps no longer
accurately match what we see out on the lake. Another exciting feature
is the improvement to real accurate 3-foot contours.
The first such map in Michigan is
Saginaw Bay included on the Saginaw Bay/Michigan combo, which
includes 176 inland lakes, GPS-linked fishing log, and a GPS interface
among other features. As they add new inland lakes, they provide
downloads to add to your registered software.
Click here to signup for
LAKEMASTER’s
latest news.
Another
map
most Great Lakes bass anglers (and walleye too) will want is the Lake Erie model.
The newest versions
have 3-foot contours for much of St. Clair, the Detroit River and some
of Erie.
Other features of these maps
include: GPS Interface, Fishing Log, Waypoint Storage, Routes, Contour
Options, Real-time Tracking with a PC connected to sonar, Distance
Measurement and adding Symbols and Labels.
Additional products include:
Electronic charts with high definition contours for use with Navionics
or C-MAP adaptive products, and Accurate paper maps with high
definition contours only gathered by on-water surveys. The hottest
product is the ProMap Series of hi-def GPS map
chips for Lowrance and Garmin units so far.
