OnthePotomac

When I retired and got into bass fishing 20 years ago I had three baitcasters and each had 14lb BPS Excel mono to fish the tidal Potomac with everything. My spinning reel had 8lb BPS Excel mono and I caught lots and lots of bass and did not lose any. Amazing how we become victims of product development.

I am a Shimano baitcaster fan, but my two spinning reels are 2500 size Daiwas. One is a Capricorn and other is an Exceler. Basically the same reels. Excellent reels.

I am Carbonlite fan for the last six years or so and added two Carbonlite 2.0 on sale this year. Never a problem with any of them and they get a work out on the massive Tidal Potomac grass beds. Very light and easy on the old wrists for a long day of fishing.

Try plain old Dawn and a scrubby sponge on the handles and cork and rinse well. Makes your cork look new when it dries.

You fish the same murky water I do on the tidal Potomac and although I do not fish with braid from my boat (except for frogs) in your case I agree you should switch to at least 50lb braid on you baitcaster and forget the leader. Most of the braid fans on our river do not use a leader on their baitcast set ups..

I am with DVT. I have two 70's spooled with InvizX 15lb and hose the line regularly with KVD and clean my own reels and have never seen it find its way on to the drag washers or those on my other reels, one of which has 50lb braid for frogs. Just me perhaps, but I never tie line to the spool through the holes and although not necessary, I cover my spool holes with teflon tape before spooling on line. If not necessary why do I tape the spools..just me.

Not expert on olive oil except to eat it, but it would seem the viscosity could be an issue in slowing down high speed reel bearings, unlike machine bearings. I will stick with Yellow Rocket Fuel for my SS bearings and Aust Met oil for ceramics.

I am still using a jumbo spool of BPS 20 Excel which is now 15 years old, still in the box hanging on my fishing peg board in the basement.

My K does all plastics duty spooled with 15 lb InvizX flouro on a 7' MH Carbonlite fast tip. Sweet!

I can only comment on the Curado K and compare it to my Curado 100B, Curado 200E7, Citica 200E, Curado 200I, Chronarch CI4 and the Chronarch MGL and can verify that the K is one sweet reel. I cannot think of anything you could not do with that reel and the micro gears are really, really nice. I tend to buy all my reels the fastest there is in each model and at 8.5:1 on the K you get it back in a hurry.

Assume you tried Hawgtech.

I had a Citica 200D for years and it was mounted on a Carbonlite 7'MH the whole time and worked well for a variety of baits. That reel is a work horse. I had changed the gear set to a Curado faster ratio and installed ABEC 7 SS bearings on the spool and added Carbon Tec drags. I sold it to a guy in Texas who loves it.

You are going to love your MGL and you can fish anything with it. Really smooth. Keep a heavy grease on those micro gears like Shimano ACT 2, which is their drag grease. Mine is on a 7'MH Carbonlite spooled with InvizX 15lb flouro with a D Bomb tied on with a Gammie 4/0 EWG. This rig is a bass vacuum.

Recolor your faded braid with a Sharpie, choice of color.

Wow! A 96mm on a low profile reel is the longest I have seen.

Call the agency controlling your body of water and ask what type of aquacide they used and there two types: one is a bacteria based enzyme which depletes the nutrients the plants need and the other is an aquacide which destroys the plant. Neither will harm your equipment nor the fish.

I have that same reel on a 7' MH Carbonlite used for jigs, any jigs, and it works great spooled with 15lb InvizX. I throw into a lot of heavy junk on the Potomac River.

That is excellent line and I use it for small topwaters. For those who know, it will be easy to pass on by sale, or gift. Or keep for whenever. It will still be good 20 years from now if you store it in normal house temps out of the sun. I have a 20lb mono jumbo spool 20 years old and I am still using it for small swimbaits.

Boy, you are going to get answers all over the map for personal preferences. I use a medium rod and reel about the speed as yours for top waters and cranks. . I use MH rods for flipping , jigs and worms and I just like fast reels for frogs and plastics and even frogs.

Gotta say that none of my 17 Shimano reels from the Curado 100B to the Chronrch MGL have worm gear bearings and while have "customized" some of them over the years, I have never felt the need to put bearings on the worm gears. To each his own, but I saw getting them off and back on each cleaning a PITA.

Here is my take: flukes on a 7'2" Med Carbonlite spinning rod (3.8oz) and the set up is 8lb mono to a tiny swivel to 18" of mono to a 5/0 hook = no line twist and the hook serves as a keel for the fluke. Fat Ika on a 7' MH bait cast rod..

Or, if it has been taken down the drag springs may be back in like this ))or (( instead of like this ().

I will have to throw in my BPS Carbonlites and they are mentioned alright, but it seems to be all bad. I am up to ten now and started trying them in 2010, adding 2-3 each year to the present and all came on sale. With all the wailing about breaking in half, line guides falling off and line guide eyes falling out, I can honestly say I have never had a problem with mine and believe me I would not have tolerated it with all the other rods to choose from. The Potomac massive grass beds are not kind to rods.

Looks like cork filler, but on a brand new rod????

Except for my 8 year old KVD 7' MH I use for frogs, everything else I fish is either on a MH 7' Carbonlite, or a Medium 7' Carbonlite. Works for me.