Jrob78

You are absolutely right. My post reads a lot worse than it sounded in my head, my apologies to the board. However, the baits the OP listed aren't really that expensive for baits in those categories. To call the prices "silly" isn't very accurate. People should fish whatever gear they can afford and whatever makes them happy. That's what it's all about anyway, right?

Nobody is forcing anyone to buy expensive gear. Fish what makes you happy and keep your thoughts on what other people use to yourself.

If you want an 11" glide bait or a 6" rat bait, your going to have to pay up for one. Most of these baits are hand made and hand painted in small batches. Baits like that cost a lot of money. I don't know about the Rago baits specifically but you can't compare a big swimbait to your average crankbait.

I don't have experience with either rod but for the techniques you mention, I would go with graphite. Like smalljaw67 said, I wouldn't use glass for jerkbaits.

I agree. The Exceler isn't nearly as refined as Daiwa's higher end reels but it is a very capable reel. I had one I used on a "truck rod" for years. It was used and abused but held up great and caught me a lot of bass. You can find the older models for $35 nib right now, you will be hard pressed to find a better reel at twice that price.

The 2 braking systems are different and effect casting differently but you won't have any trouble going from one to the other. Set your cent brakes with 3 on and 3 off to start and you will be good to go.

A rod with a broken tip isn't the same rod it was before. The action and power of a rod change dramatically when you lose much length off the tip. Hopefully it didn't lose more than an inch or 2, if it did you might not be happy with what you get.

Check out the Kicker Fish High Tail Hole Shot Shaky Worm. It comes in a 4.75" and a 7" and has holes in the tail end of the worm that trap air and float it. The worms are priced right and come with JJ Magic scent infused into the baits. Other than that, I use Elaztech baits when I need a floating worm.

That's too funny, I wondered if I was the only one who noticed that. It didn't look as big as some of the 6lb smallies.

This is kind of how I am too. I don't have a specific rod for swimming jigs and the jigs I swim are generally lighter and less bulky than the "regular" jigs I fish. I've got several MH F rods that I might fish a swim jig on.

I know you don't have them in Ohio but Academy's house brand (H20 Xpress) crankbaits are really, really nice. They are $3-$6 with most being on the $3 side of things. You can order them online.

That Chronarch/Dobyn's combo looks awesome!

I use a Revo Toro Winch 50 mounted on the same Okuma rod with 20-25 lb mono. It's a really good all purpose swimbait rod for not a lot of money. The build quality is really good and the rod can handle 6" and 8" Hudds.

I suppose they could but they're in the business of making money. I'm not sure what the B series originally cost but Curado's haven't been $150 reels in at least 10 years, maybe longer. Things don't normally go down in price, especially after they have been improved upon. Most people don't want a cheaper, watered down Curado. The Citica has always been a quality reel at the sub $150 price point.

Agreed, it seems like a bad time to be coming out with a new line of reels if your name isn't Shimano or Daiwa.

I don't imagine the Chronarch E will be around for much longer. It will be directly competing with the new Curado, the Ch CI4 puts the Chronarch back at the price point it belongs and the E series reels have been around since '09. That is purely speculation on my part though.

That's something we'll all have to decide for ourselves. That's the fun part

They don't normally release the 50 size reels, previously the 100 size reels, at the same time as the 100/200 size reels. If there is going to be a smaller version it will come later. They only did it with the Chronarch E because they already had the tooling and were already making the Curado 50E.

You can't have a better Curado with more technology and updated materials and expect the price to stay the same. If I remember correctly, the Curado D was a $199 reel, the E actually went down and the G went down again. I would much rather pay $200 for a better reel. They tried a budget friendly reel in the G, that didn't go over too well. You can't have it both ways.

I agree. 2's if regular length trebles and 1's if short shank trebles.

Me too. The rod I use for Flukes and Senkos is a 7'3" MH F. Those baits load up fine on it and cast a mile. Plus, I get better hook sets on long casts.

The St. Croix Avid Pearl are the only rods I know of that seem to be made with women in mind. Fisher Girl makes some womens rod and reel combos but they look pretty cheesy.

Take your reel into the store and put it on the rods you like. See which one's feel the best and pick one of those. That's about as close as you're going to get to knowing what a rod fishes like. You just have to buy different rods until you figure out what you really like.

I would use #1. A fluke is heavy and aerodynamic, you shouldn't have any issue casting it with casting gear. If you prefer spinning gear though, #3 would work fine too.

If you throw deep divers much, a rod meant for deep diving crankbaits is pretty important, IMO. You can throw all your cranks on one rod but it definitely isn't ideal.