Smokinal

congrats man; thats great! my oldest is graduating high school in a month and then off to college. that graduation seems so far away but im sure it goes by quick.

id start by taking the prop off and checking the splines on the prop and shaft; go from there.

thoughts and prayers for you, your mother and your family.

nice report blue!

welcome bruther!

introduce him to Ned...

well it's definitely worse than my shoulder. just when i think its doing better it starts aching like crazy. i think i'm doing more than i should. i hav a hard time staying still and find myself doing laundry, dishes etc... i gotta slow down. thanks for asking ace, i appreciate everyone's concern.

i hope you get that worked out bill.

this^^^ i scored a huge deal with the sporting goods manager of my local wally world on some clearance strike king stuff. just ask, they want it gone. i also took advantage of some mis tagged weights at dicks last year. i have piles of tungsten.

^^ what a coincidence. sounds very similar to mine. well i hope you recover soon as well.

i agree with all the above; any old voltmeter will work. having said that, the best way to test a battery for state of charge is with a battery hydrometer. around $8 at any auto parts store. youtube some vids on testing battery specific gravity. very easy. wear safety glasses.

i like tying direct. i find snaps/swivels catch too much grass. i also like my plastics to appear as natural as possible. i do use a snap on my crankbait rod but not on anything else. once you make up your mind that you are going to tie direct, you realize it only takes a second to retie and you lose a whole 3 inches of your line.

^^^ i've gotten useless in eustis

sounds to me like a piece of debris in the bowl. does that carb have the little orifice in the bottom of the bowl where the jet screws into? take a straightened out paperclip and jam it through the jet a few times. i had an old johnson with same exact symptoms and thats what my issue was. keep us posted.

well surgery went great; all as expected. good i had it done as the dr said the tendon was worse than the mri showed. one armed bandit for a couple few months now. thank you all for the kind words. much appreciated.

ya, sure!

Absolutely brother!

Well keep us posted and welcome to the site. Good to see another Mainer here. Great place. (the site and the state)

Ya, it was my first time throwing it as well. I will say I don't think you will win any tourneys on them as they really do seem to draw bites from smaller fish. But they keep the stick warm when the bite slows down, that's for sure.

So I went out one last time before my surgery on Tuesday. Gonna be a couple few months before I can move my arm again. We had a heavy front move through last night and I was a little worried going into today as it was scheduled to clear off around 10. Air was 55 in the morning and cleared to mid 70's; water at 58-59. The bite started out slow in the main lake so we went up into some skinny water with pads that we were pretty sure we could get some bites. Sure enough we caught some in there and the bite wasn't too bad. Most were on a GP Rage CutR. Well the bite slowed as it cleared off so we went back out main lake and it was shut down. We threw everything until I remembered I had bought the Shroomz heads and TRD's. I threw a 1/10 oz jighead with a PBJ TRD on it and instantly started catching fish. After 5 or 6 I asked my buddy if he wanted one and, of course, he said "nope, I'll stick with my jig". Well after another 4-5 I just got him out the same thing I was throwing and handed it to him. He tied it on and started catching fish as well. I ended up with 29 and him close to 20. I don't know what it is about this thing but shakeys didn't work, drop shot didn't either. If you are not throwing one of these little turds when the bite is tough, you are shorting yourself.

I keep a ziplock bag with baking soda in it and wash my hands after I launch and before I touch a plastic. I don't worry about it with hardbaits but I'm a little anal about my plastics...

...I shouldn't ask but what's next? Last year I had to have about 3/8" cut off the end of my clavicle. This year, I am tearing my tricep tendon off the elbow. This Tuesday, 19th, I go in for a 2 hr surgery where they will complete tearing the tendon off the bone, drill a hole through the end of my bone in the elbow, cut back the beat up end of tendon, slide the new clean end through the drilled hole, then tie a knot in it on the other side of the hole. lol, sounds like something I would rig up to fix my kids brake cable on his bike. I half expect to find the incision closed with duct tape. I've done some research and this is a common method of reattaching it although it sounds a little sketchy to me. Oh well, it is what it is. Kinda bummed about losing the summer of fishing but it's gotta be done at some point. Might as well be now. I'm going out this Sunday for one last hoorah!

Lund, if I could keep hitting the "like" button, I would. I saw this a while ago (not here) and meant to put it up but never got around to it. That says it all. And I'm not saying the Pats cheating is ok because everyone else does it; but it seems like everyone is busting theirs b***s (no pun intended) about it but no one realizes that every single team has a huge cheating record as well. What's that glass house saying again???.....

Chatterbaits produce significantly more thump and vibration than a spinnerbait. And you said your swim jig, which has even less thump, gave great results. That tells me they wanted a milder bait that day. May not be the same way tomorrow, but that day the vibration was a turn off.

I would launch with a buddy and have more rope than you would need; launch, tie it off and cut off the extra.