Carver Owners Forum

Hello all. New to the group. Just got a 1999 Carver 356 ACMY. Has the Bimini top up on the bridge but does not have the side window enclosures. I have searched in vans and can’t find anything from Carver. Does anyone know where I can get a full bridge enclosure and aft cockpit enclosure? Need to get one.

Also wanted to see if anyone has ever mounted a transducer without pulling the boat successfully? Don’t really want to haul it out right now for putting a new Raymarine transducer on. Was just out with new bottom job. Didn’t know if anyone had any secrets or if carver had anything on the inside of the hull for shooting through. Thanks.

I doubt if you will find any off the shelf enclosures. You will have to hire a local canvas guy to custom make them. Won't be cheap, but most likely, your only option.
There are "shoot through the hull" transducers you can use. My guess is they aren't as good as bottom mounted units

Welcome aboard.

If you bought a thru-hull ducer, you're out of luck. Needs to be installed out of the water. If it's an in-hull design as buster mentioned, all the work is done inside the bilge. I agree there is nothing better than having the ducer in the water but there are some pretty powerful high tech in-hull units out there now. Which ever you have, propper install procedures will depend on your hull design.

Did you already purchase the ducer? If so which one? That will make a big difference in installation time.

Not yet. Thinking of either going with The Raymarine Axiom system or the Simrad EVO. Both seem like pretty good transducers and chart plotters.

My last boat had a shoot through the hull transducer. I had no issues it seemed to read the depths well. If you don't want to pull the boat this is probably the best way to go with the installation.

I have a shoot-through-the-hull transducer now, as it came with my latest fishfinder/plotter. Pretty simple to install. You "glue" one bracket down to the hull, fill it with antifreeze and then clip in the transducer. I think they'd be fine as long as you don't have a cored hull, or are not trying to do something like side scan. I would have preferred a through-hull, but would have had to buy a new one ($$$$), pay to haul just to install ($$$) or wait till off-season. I figured I could always do those options if the through-the-hull thing didn't work, but it's worked just fine.