bassnleo

Check the shear pin, a little bend it in may cause the vibration.

Exactly what I was thinking. I would rig that thing up on a drop shot and throw it at Lake Erie smallies...

The prop is the correct size, all the other problems everyone mentioned to look for was done prior to me asking this question. My motor is out of warranty. The prop spins smoothly and no wobble, it's just plain loud. I'm gonna call Kipawa......

I recently purchased a Kipawa prop for my Minn Kota 40AT. The first time I used it on the water I noticed it was LOUD, so loud I immediately took it off and put the factory prop back on. I was fishing really shallow water and I know it would have spooked fish. For anyone who has one, did you notice it being louder? I checked it over and over, it was on correctly, it spun evenly when out of the water. Is this normal or did I get a bad one?

I pre-fished for 3 hours yesterday, had 8 bites in 3 hours, didn't sore mouth em all.. I will post a detailed report after the tournament. Some of you may be a little suprised, I know I was after prefishing.

I'm just kicking strep throat and a sinus infection. My 1 year old daughter has had a stomach bug for about 5 days now, nothing stays in her, poor thing...... Get well muddy!

I have a 7' MH E-glass crankbait rod that is a Gander Mountain brand rod, if memory serves me correcty I only paid like $55. It's a nice rod and my primary one for deep cranking and heavier cranks.

One of my most productive clear water, cloudy and windy conditions, spinnerbait color is a completely chartruese bait with chartruese double willow blades. I make long casts and burn it over tops of weeds. Smallmouth especially like it... The other situations where I use painted blades, dirty flowing water in local rivers, I call this bait my Halloween special, it's got a firetiger skirt and tandem blades both flourescent orange. Next, give this a try. In the Spring when fishing around cover with a spinnerbait try a tandem bladed bait with a red colorado blade. I've found this to be a good trigger when the fish are seeing alot of spinnerbaits.

In the original post I stated the water visibility was 1-2 feet. Level is normal for this time of year and stable.

A little "test" with results to follow in a few days. Lake temp is currently 40-45 degrees with warmest water being found in small coves in the Northern end of the lake. The lake is a generally shallow (but quite large) with a maxium depth in the Northern end of about 14 feet deep, Southern end hits 20 or so in some areas. The temp in the Southern basin is lower than North. Two weeks ago and before this nasty cold period, main lake water temp was 49 degrees, backs of coves were 55-58 degrees. Alot of fish were being caught shallow, less than 2 feet of water, mostly where warmest water was found. The lake has no significant drop off or ledges, it is mostly sloping banks, flats, gradual declines toward deeper water. Cover is bascially wood in most areas of the Northern end, stumps, submerged logs etc... Coves have some small weed growth and some lily pad growth (when warm enough to grow them). Water visibility is about 1-2 feet in most areas. Lake contains both smallmouth and largemouth. You have not been back to fish since the cold front and you have a tournament there this weekend. It's Thursday, weather is predicted to be sunny for all upcoming days including tournament day, highs in upper 50's to lower 60's, lows in mid to upper 30's. The challenge: How do you attack this senerio? A tough one indeed............. I will be facing these exact conditions this weekend and will report my results and how they compare to responses to this thread. I have a definate game plan and I'm curious to see if anyone else will come up with a successful one.

Purdy slow on the creek I fished. I haven't fished for stockies for 5 years, decided to go this year and take a work partner out who wanted to go and is very novice. We went with 8 guys total, only caught 10 fish. The stream we fished was stocked in the first week of March, there has been flooding conditions since then, plus the water was very cold, all of which IMHO made for tough conditions. Had alot of fun anyway, comraderie is king for me when it comes to stockies anymore.

Being in Law Enforcement, I too have mixed emotions much like Muddy's. I was a sportsman / hunter long before my career began. I often ask myself if I had to choose, what would my choice be? I support the Second Amendment but where do we as a society draw the line? I definately do not want to face an armed nut job sporting an AR-15 or any gun for that matter. Leaves me quite speechless at times :-/

If you do a search of those 2 lines here you will find a multitude of info. IMHO it all comes down to personal preference.........

I've also witnessed a boat zing right on off a trailer at a steep ramp. 17 foot aluminum rig w/ 70 hp jet outboard lying on the ramp was not a pretty sight. Needless to say this guy did not have the glide strips on his trailer the next time I saw him.

I currently own 2 AT's, great, rugged, reliable motor.

I'll second what KU said, I definately have to try on my glasses before I buy them. I've recieved some as gifts before and they never fit. As far as the kind I use, I have 3 pairs of Bolle' Piraja's. I settled on these years ago due to them fitting my face better than any other glasses I tried on. They are durable, have all the UV protection, and all around good glasses. They retail at $80-$100 but I have seen them on ebay for $50

In my humble opinion I would suggest that you FIRST join a local youth club. Check your state's federation, find a club near you that has a youth club and join. Since you are 16 you will only get a year or 2 in the youth club then you will have to move to the adult side. Once you get a few years under your belt fishing tournaments then maybe try a weekend series event as a co-angler. Tournament fishing is just like anything else, start at the grass roots level and work yourself up.

How big, LOL! Whelp, lets put it this way......An 18 foot ProCraft and a 16 foot Tracker Grizzley. On occasion they don't even hold it all!

The local marine shop that I deal with carries them. I have heard of others here buying them elsewhere, I'm sure if you look on Bass Pro, Cabelas, or West Marine one of those sites should have them. If you cannot find them let me know, I'll check the names on mine and do a search and see if I cam find them.

I have the Quantum one you mentioned, I love it and will be buying a second one this year. This rod was made to handle braids well, the parabolic action cushions the shock of the hook set and has nice action when fighting a fish, good backbone for getting a fish clear of cover. I have not used this rod in really heavy vegetation like you have in FL but it has performed flawlessly in vegetation around wood in this area.

First, the length of time your battery will hold enough of a charge to run your tm will vary on how much you use the tm. I have owned 2 tm's that were 55 lb thrust, I found that one battery usually lasted all day but I did also have occasions on windy days where I used up my battery. What I actually did then was installed a second battery and wired them parallel, I never killed the batteries after that. As for the wiring coming with the motor, usually you will only get a few feet of wire. Your best bet is to run the wires from your battery to a recepticle, add a plug to the wires off the motor, plug it in and go. As aready mentioned, a higher reserve amp battery will last you longer. Lastly, I would definately put a 40 or 50 amp breaker on the positive wire. I have 50 amp breakers that will trip when they get too hot, they cool in a short period of time and reset. This will save you from burning up the motor should you have a day where your using it for long periods of time on high.

Yes, gobie style baits will work on inland lakes with no gobie populations. My best technique is to rig them on a jig head and fish them along the bottom, it really resembles a darter or sculpin, or any small bait fish for that matter. I have also found that a larger gobie like Micro Munch Tackle's d.s. gobie works a little better than a smaller one like a Poor Boys, the smaller ones are more suited for a drop shot application. Another trick, I do use plain single tail grubs alot. Try that on a drop shot, great change up for smallies in clear water.

This is kind of a sore subject for me... I regularly deal with people on welfare. Some of these people truly need it and use it as it is intended. Alot plainly abuse it. It sickens me when I walk into a reciepients house or apartment (knowing that too is being funded) and see big screen TV's, large stereo systems, numerous game systems, cabinets chocked full of food, more than most of us working stiffs have. No B.S., my wife and I are both professionally employed and don't have near the crap that these people do who sit around all day on their behinds and DO NOTHING. Just recently I was in a grocery store and watched a man, woman, and their child ring up a grocery bill of over $200 then hand the cashier thier access card. You got it, I just paid for their groceries. That in itself wouldn't bother me but I knew this couple, the guy makes and sells meth, she does nothing, the kid is exposed to it daily. Not 1 month later me were knocking down their door executing a search warrant. The amount of stuff this place had was just plain stupid. Nice furniture, appliances, tons of food, etc...all funded by us. That's my issue with it. As for someone saying that most of the welfare recipients are using drugs, in this area that's probably a fairly accurate statement. I like the drug test idea. Something needs tightened up...

I'm really at a loss for words in trying to describe how the cold front has affected things around here. April 1 I was fishing in a t-shirt and caught 30 bass from less than 2 feet of water. The main lake I was fishing was about 49 degrees, the backs of the Northern coves and bays was 55-58 degrees. Now we have 6-8 inches of snow, temps haven't gone above 33 degrees since April 4, night time lows have been in the low to mid 20's. 10 day forecast is also not looking good, the highest temp I saw is 47, most days it's forecasted to be in the upper 30's to low 40's, lows around 30. Snow, snow and rain, almost every day is forecasted. I have a club tournament on April 15 on the body of water I fished April 1. There is talk of the event being cancelled, not so much because the fishing will be slow, but because this lake is shallow and severly affected by weather. A 15-20 mph wind turns this place into a frothing mess, combine that with low temps and wind chill, makes for a potentially dangerous day on the water. Should the event be held, my plans are to go to the areas where I previously caught fish then back out to deeper water and fish any cover or structure I can find. This lake really lacks defined structure and drop offs basically don't exist, everything is a gradual fall. The lake does have alot of visible deeper wood, and also alot of not visible deeper wood. I will most likely downsize my baits and fish really slow around deeper wood cover. A small jig, jighead worm, small crank, small worm or lizard on a carolina rig are my stragety. I'm tyring to mentally prepare myself for bites being few and far between. That's probably the hardest aspect for me since I can usually boat 20-40 keepers a day on this lake in the Spring. The first 2 events I fished there last Spring resulted in over 75 keepers boated in back to back events / days, first and second place finishes respectively. Will this Winter ever end

Mann's Baby 1 minus cranked across current, try to deflect it off of rocks.