I was out fishing yesterday and a very concerning thing happened with my flasher. It wouldn't work. For those that have read this blog, it is quite evident that I have a mad love affair with my flasher. I won't ice fish without it. In the list of ice fishing gear that everyone should own, it is #1 with a bullet (ok, so you need an auger of some sort to make a hole in the ice, but you get my point). For those that don't want to read my entire story, suffice it to say it was a bad vexilar battery, but I didn't realize that until 8 hours later after I was completely done fishing and worrying about sending it in to be repaired.
US $34.95
So back to my story. To say I was disheartened would be an understatement. The unit would spin up, but no colors, no depth readout, nothing. Used my buddies unit to test out my transducer, it worked great on his flasher. The problem wasn't the transducer. Used his transducer which also worked fine on his unit, nothing on mine. Again, flasher would spin, no readout. Very upset I placed the unit back in my vehicle and went to fish that day without one. Which was painful for me as it is one of the main ways I ensure catching fish on the ice. My spring bobber was good that day and I managed a decent number of crappies, but not anywhere near what I normally catch. At this point I was resigned to the fact that I was going to have to call customer service and prepare to ship it in to be fixed. I didn't even want to know what it was going to cost at that point....
It wasn't until well after getting home, cleaning fish, relaxing on the couch with the family watching television that it hit me. In fact, I had even gone as far as laying down to fall asleep when something occurred to me. When I went to grab the flasher that morning to head out ice fishing I remembered noticing that the battery wasn't charging quite right the last time I charged it after fishing all day. Up from bed I got, ran downstairs and grabbed the unit. Luckily I have a ice fishing camera also which uses the exact same type of battery, so I simply swapped the battery to my Vexilar. Turned the power on and woolahh unit worked perfectly. This had me intrigued at this point, so I took my vexilar battery and used it to power the camera. It would kind of power up, but only display about half of the screen. It truly was a bad vexilar battery.
Where can you buy vexilar batteries online?
This question was the first one that came to mind. Sure I knew I could go to the local sporting goods store and pick up a new battery, but I remembered the price being upwards of $50 last time I was there. My brain started thinking that if I'm able to find a flash drive for half to one quarter the price of what I can find at Best Buy online, why would a Vexilar battery be any different? Luckily it wasn't. Going to the usual suspects was quite rewarding. If you go to Ebay you can find a wide range of vexilar batteries, just understand they won't call them "vexilar batteries". They will simply be called by their generic name, which is a 7 amp hour 12 volt sealed lead acid battery. The beauty is they will ship right to your door for less than $15. That is crazy cheap. It made the fact that my battery was toast much easier to swallow. It should be mentioned that these are the same batteries that are used in Marcum flashers (VX-1, LX3, LX5), Vexilar flashers (FL-8, FL-18, FL-20), as well as Humminbird flashers (Ice-35, Ice-45, and Ice-55).
No need to break the bank when buying that new Vexilar battery, simply go online and find a great deal!
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