cart7t

I used to run my old 16 1/2' Champion SuperV with the 150 ProV on it with a 26P Yammie 3 blade prop that I used as a backup just for grins. While that boat had a USCG plate that said it was rated for a 150, there was no way, back when it was made and the biggest 150's were the old Merc Tower of Powers which were rated at the power head, that it was ever intended to be run with that much 150hp motor. Normally I ran a 23P prop which made the boat less beastly. That 26P prop made for a wild and scary ride.

Is that a nutrigrain bar in your pants or are you just happy to catch that fish? ;D Nice fish BTW.

Better than BPS rods. Much lighter. On par with Quantum Tours, the HMX54 style, maybe a little better. You'll like.

Ya know, Raleigh just came up on a list of best places to find a mate in the US. Oh, Glen G. Occupation - TV tech guy Arnold, Missouri

Catch and release is rather meaningless if you hoist the fish into the boat and allow it to bounce all over the carpet which rubs its slime coat off. I'll hoist fish up but grab them in the air for smaller fish under 2lbs, anything larger gets lipped.

Nice to see you guys carrying on with the old sponsoned V hull boats. Both in very nice condition.

May have bent the shaft causing the grinding. Usually the shear pin should protect from that but apparently your pin never sheared. Not good.

Check the number stamped into the reel foot. If it's a 70's model those were often 3.8:1, 4.7:1 or 5.1:1 as reel mech stated. We used to buy "Buzz gears" to step up the 3.8:1 models up to a whopping 4.7:1! If it's an 80's it's more than likely 5.1:1. Whoopie! ;D

way2slow can probably help here. I know my Yammie 150 ProV is merely a restricted 200 ProV and can be upgraded by adding on about $1200 worth of carbs, reeds and an exhaust tuner.

Not bad. Looks good. My second boat was a late 70's SS-7 skeeter with a 115 Evinrude. 17 1/2 foot little speed demon, unfortunately it didn't take rough water very well. d**n thing bounced all over the place. The thing had great storage though.

The PQ reels, whether the older version with the centrifugal brake system or the newer ones with the magnetic braking are pretty nice reels for that price along with the rod..

A pretty good boat. Avoid the Travis editions. They were poorly made with a lot of unsealed wood.

Tom, the reason both guys asked about your RPM's at WOT was that's the best way to make a determination on what pitch prop to steer you towards. While I'm sure your boat was running pretty fast, a 125hp motor doesn't quite have the grunt to turn a 26p prop to anywhere near it's potential. If you were doing 55-60 I'd be surprised, boat speedometers have a tendency to be VERY inaccurate at high speeds. That said, I hope the 23 helps you out. If you're not interested in finding the exact prop that will work best on your boat, then stick with what your dealer told you. It should put you in the ballpark.

I've got a 3600 box full like burley. They're great for slinging off piers or jetties for Macks or bluefish. They'll cast a mile. I've never tried them on FW fish. I'm betting they'd probably work pretty good with schooling whites, hybrids or stripers.

They certainly have their time and place. Most of the time their best place is in my tacklebox, not on my rod.

All Avid has to do is claim he was trying to catch it in the mouth. It would seem as though the CA game warden who witnessed this deal is being extremely lax in his duties. The fish was foul hooked, then stuck on a stringer, then drug around the lake while the particulars called their lawyer, then hauled to the dock for a weighing before being released. I won't even get into the stupidity of someone attempting to fish for the WR bass and not having a sufficient livewell on-board to maintain the catch but if you can't see from anyone else's perspective how this fish shouldn't be considered I doubt you'll ever change your mind. But I will give you an example: The state of Missouri closes it's rivers to bass fishing from Feb-May to allow for the best reproduction of the bass population during the spawn. If I catch a bass, I MUST RELEASE IT IMMEDIATELY! No sticking it on a stringer so I can take a picture for a precious Kodak moment later, no putting in the livewell so I can weigh it later. Nope, it has to be released. I suppose I can take a quick picture and/or weigh it at that time but anything beyond that is illegally taking possesion of the fish. If a game warden were to witness my taking possesion I'd be ticketed and instructed to release the fish immediately. If a GW happened upon me and saw the fish stringered or did a livewell inspection the same thing would happen. It appears as though the CA game warden chose to look the other way. Maybe he thought there might be a couple bucks in it for him, maybe the notoriety of this catch might get his name in the papers. Whatever the reason he failed to do his duty. Why does any of this matter? Because had Weakley actually followed CA law that fish never would've been photographed or weighed because it was supposed to be released immediately. He illegally took possesion of that fish for his own gain. With a current record clouded in controversy, why create another one, which could stand for many years, even more controversial. It just seems the CA fishermen are getting real desperate to get this record. As I and others have said, take some lessons on how to handle yourselves when catching a giant bass, learn the CA rules and be prepared. These trophy hunters out there seem to be long on intention but way short on brains.

I manually flip the bail when getting ready to retrieve. I've found it tends to cause a little less in the way of loops. Not that I fish spinning equipment that much other than crappie fishing.

If it's stored outside it could come from rain water that collected in the hull. It could come from the launching process. You could have a leaking fitting in your livewell plumbing. You could have leaking engine mounting bolts. You could have a leaking through-hull fitting at the back of the boat. If the boat is aluminum the hull itself could be leaking. If you have any accesories like a transducer or speedometer mounted to the transom, the screw holes for those may not have been sealed properly and could be leaking.

Without any knowledge of how your boat is wired it's quite possible they're both on the same fuse. BTW, are they on a panel switch you forgot to turn on?

I spend a lot of time on Ebay in the wiggle wart section along with searching the forums for specific original WW colors. If you look around and wait you can occasionally get the good ones for around $8-10 apiece.

You'll have to have decent access to the backside of one side of the livewell. You'll drill a hole at bottom side for the pump with the screen. Then another hole above the water line towards the top for the little aerator head.

Well, on the water stuff is a little difficult to determine till you've left with the boat and put it on the water, I'm talking about glaring problems with the actual finished product. A friend of mine bought one of the Tahoe's and picked it up in Springfield MO at the Tracker complex there. Because he was a rather inexperienced boater, he let the excitement of the day get to him and he failed to refuse delivery like he should have. The boat had pinpoint pops along the gunnel in the fiberglass, an accent pin stripe that was supposed to go from stem to stern that was missing pieces (it appeared they didn't have a full roll of pinstriping at the factory so they pieced it together with scraps. there were foot long blank spots in the pinstriping!!), wrong screws used to hold the accesories together and the worst, the right rear corner of the boat had clearly been crushed and then repaired. The gel color didn't even match right nor was it even. To think BPS would allow this to pass off as a completed, new boat is astonishing. What was worse was the pathetic customer service and repair work that he had to put up with to get it fixed.

Before you sign on the dotted line anywhere, look that thing over with a fine tooth comb. If there is anything not right with the boat don't accept it till it's made right.

I've got a large 96 gallon garbage can that works pretty well for running my 150 in. It's sorta a pain the actually get the OB into it but once in and filled up you can run that motor just like you would at the lake. If it's just for a quick test fire than a set of muffs will do fine.

As stated, both boats are very HP underated but just looking at the two, the Stratos uses it's space wiser than the Nitro. More storage. That along with the better resale value of the Stratos causes me to choose the Stratos.