MickD

Get a casting practice plug and go into the back yard and go through the reel setup until you find a solution. I know that it is easy to get too much oil in the bearings, and that can slow the reel down for a while. If this is the problem it will work its way out after a number of casts. Or you can carefully blow the excess, if there is any, out with air. But I've never had to do that. The reason the trailer question was asked is that a big trailer can give a lot of air resistance, so expect that to cut your distance. If all else fails, go to a spinning rig. I prefer spinning to casting for swim jigs. Just seems easier to get long distance reliably , and I like the ergonomics of spin for a lift and fall presentation. Many times with a spin jig the fish will prefer the slower fall of the smaller sizes, and I cannot reliably cast them with a BC outfit, especially upwind. Try it, you might like it.

Agree with Sam and Smokinal. When I go through my rods with different stuff on each one a second time I'll switch colors or sizes, etc. Especially with spinnerbaits fish seem to tune in to little details, and get them wrong and you'll get nothing, or you'll get hits but no hookups. I think when that happens it indicates they are slapping the lure with the head but not biting. But it also indicates they are interested if you find the right details for them.

Whether you use a trailer or not depends on how big you want the spinnerbait to look. At times fish don't want a "bigger" lure; at times they do. If you decide the lure needs some more bulk, then put on a trailer. I personally like 3-4 inch grubs. Lots of action. Very effective on pike, less so on bass. Regarding stinger hooks, I don't use them unless I'm getting "thumps" but no fish. I think when your offering is interesting but not quite right the fish will bump it with their heads or strike short. I usually try a different color skirt or blades, but if this persists, I'll add a stinger hook.

It's not about how much line you can put onto a reel. If you have enough to make the casts you want, you're OK. When has a bass taken you into the backing? Or more than a few yards on a run? The advantage of lower pound test braid (or any other line) is in how they cast and how manageable they are on the reel. While 30 Power Pro can be cast pretty well on a spinning outfit, 10 or 15 will be significantly better. It is up to you whether you want to leave it on and deal with some sacrifice, or replace it with lower test line and get the advantages of it. 30 works great on baitcasting outfits. Don't just scrap it; you will find a good use for it someday-it lasts forever in dark storage.

Sorry to report that kits don't include tools, and I don't know of a "group of tools" for sale. I think you'll have to figure out what you need and buy them separately. I think the Mudhole catalog covers what you need pretty well, but if not, a call to them will probably get you some really good help.

I disagree with those who say kits won't cut it. The kits will make a rod that looks just like the rods you see at any big box store and all the Mudhole kits have decent blanks. I think it is wise to start with a kit that doesn't cost an arm and a leg to determine if rod building is for you before making a big investment that may be wasted. Mudhole has dozens of kits that will make a very good rod. You can even get camo, that's sort of special. Many use the aero style reel seat that is the current darling of many custom rod builders. I suggest you get a Mudhole print catalog, read all the building info at the front of the catalog, and if still interested, choose a kit and build it. Expect your first build to be something less than expert, but it will fish just fine. Your skill will increase with every build. Your most likely significant problem will occur if you don't mix your epoxy properly, so go to the Flex Coat videos (search for flex coat epoxy mix video) and see how they do it.

Regarding slow cranks, Norman DBN's fished V E R Y slowly, with a lot of stops, work quite well on spring cold water smallmouths. Not a great search tactic, but if you know the fish are there, try it.

Firetiger works well in MI and in Ontario north of MI for walleyes, pike, and smallmouths. Not as good for largemouths. I've always thought firetiger was a sort of perch imitation pattern.

A tube, in my opinion, doesn't look much like a craw, especially in the context of discussing realistic finishes. Many times pike and bass will nail a tube on the fall many feet up from the bottom where a craw would likely not be found. Working one along the bottom most likely gives the motion stimulus of a craw, but really, even there it doesn't LOOK much like a craw. My point on the walleye is only that color is vitally important at times. There are times when walleyes will just not touch another color than the one they are favoring that day/hour. Bass can see color, and are selective based on color much of the time. Interestingly, on a local lake the largemouth bass will readily take white spinnerbaits but a bite on a white tube or worm is rare. A few miles away is a lake where the bass readily take white worms. On the first lake greens and goby colored plastics are good. AND, there are no gobies in the lake. There appears to be a lot more going on in that tiny brain than we can figure out.

If anyone thinks that color is not important they have not fished for walleyes on the St. Clair and Detroit Rivers. I don't think realistic finishes are important. Here's my theory on what makes fish strike: Fish are primitive, and they don't look at something and think "That looks good, I'd like to eat that." What fish do is just hang out, or in some instances move around stalking, or waiting actively in ambush, but they just react to a few stimuli that mesh with what the fish's brain subconsciously is looking for at the time. The stimuli consist of color, and/or movement (the RIGHT movement), and/or shape, and/or sound, and/or "interest/curiosity." What natural food does a tube look like? Some stimulus, or combintation of stimuli, of the type they are at the moment programmed for, will get them to strike. "Active" fish, whatever that means, are easier to induce into striking than non-active fish. The big question is: What stimuli are they looking for right now? All of us have seen this change in an instant. All the fish that were going nuts for our offerings for the last half hour all of a sudden turn off. I have no magic here, nor do the pros some of the time. I just use past history and other environmental observations to try to find fish, then try a number of colors and presentations until I start to get results.

Theoretically, 6 " more length will help, but as others, I think there may be more to the problem than rod length. Yes, XF action should help. If you are not using braid, try 10-15 # Power Pro with a good quallity 10-15 flouro leader, 3-5 feet (double uni or Alberto knots -PROPERLY tied - don't cut corners, and high quality "sticky sharp" hooks. I assume you're using at least 3/0 hook sizes-I don't think smaller will work as well as 3/0 or 4/0 regardless of jig weight. There is another string of posts titled something like "What's your favorite finnesse outfit," read that.

Should have said medium power, fast action.

Home designed and built 7 foot St. Croix SC V with 10 # Power Pro, 10-15 # flouro leader, Shimano Stradic 4000 FI.

Most of the terms being used are subjective. Soft, stiff, stiffer, etc. What is stiff? Stiffer than what? H action? H means heavy? Heavy describes power, not action. Fast and slow describe action. Limber? How limber is limber? Even the different manufacturers don't agree on what, for example, is a medium power rod. I don't see what the difference between 50 and 20 braid will be since without leaders both have essentially zero stretch and if you want them to, both are strong enough to break most freshwater rods.

I use a 7.1 for lipless cranks, have no trouble getting the speeds I want with them. However, for fat cranks, like Deep Baby N's, they sometimes work the best when hardly moving, even stopping now and then, and for them a lower ratio makes it easier for me. Also, for slow rolling spinnerbaits I find that the lower ratio works better for me. I know, just reel slower, but for some reason, I struggle with that.

Fish doen't break rods. Fishermen do. If you want to soften up the rig a little, put on a leader. About 6 feet of flouro will stretch a little, mono a little more. With any setup you should tailor your max drag setting to the rod capability. Often you'll want it lighter than the max based on your fishing technique, lure style, etc. I seldom have my drag set to the max the rod will handle.

I still use a few factory rods for special stuff that I've not built for. One of my favorite rods is a factory rod I stripped and rebuilt with new handle/grip and guides. I just didn't like the grip, and hated the dull grey guide rings. Now it is one of my favorites because the blank is very much like the St Croix SCV 7 foot medium fast. One of the best. And the grip and guides are what I like.

Olive wooly buggers and grizzly barred streamers.

I've not had this happen in such deep water. Under the conditions you describe I would think that matching the hatch very carefully would be the ticket. A couple things are obvious, the fish are plentiful and aggressively feeding, the prey is very plentiful which means it's probably a school of all one species. What species would the school likely be? Try to identify the species and match it as perfectly as you can for the same size, same color, neutral buoyancy, then vary the action to find out what triggers them. I would think soft plastic minnows, flukes or similar. Or neutral buoyancy hard jerks. I'll bet if you can match the hatch the lure will be struck on the fall pretty regularly. I expect on any given lake there would only be a couple prey species that would be there in the numbers you describe, most likely one of the shads?

Most devices have their owners manuals available on line. Go to the brand's website, find customer service, and you should find a link to manuals. If not there , go to the model number of the product on the website and often manuals are there.

None of us can reliably call it from the photo, although it does appear to me that if you say the little guys are bubbles, then you are not doing the process correctly. Before putting the epoxy onto the blank you should see no bubbles in it. Any formed from the application can be broken by gently blowing on them or flashing it with a lighter (do NOT apply heat enough to heat the epoxy-I've done it and it sometimes makes the humps like I see in the photo. If you have stickups from the ends of threads, cut them off carefully with a very sharp tool. If the epoxy is NOT totally covering the threads put another thin coat on. If the epoxy IS covering the threads you can sand off the epoxy, but don't get into the threads as they will fray and you'll have to do it all over again. Pro Kote takes overnight or more curing so you may not be able to make your time constraints. It has to be pretty hard before sanding. If you don't like the drama of figuring out when Pro Kote is cured, then use Flex Coat next time. Watch the video on the link below. http://www.flexcoat.com/learning-center/instructional-videos/mixing-and-applying-epoxy-glues/

I don't think keeping your original selection on hand should be that troublesome, and you'll be in good shape for any reasonable size of lure. Just put your 1/0's with the 4/0's and the 2/0's with the 5/0's , will take no more room. While I MIGHT make your suggested selection work, I know there will come the time when I'll wish I had another size.

Abu Garcia has some very nice reels in that price range, as do Daiwa and Shimano. One advantage of the major brands is that more people service them and parts are more readily available. I'm not disparaging the quality of the other reels, just presenting another point to consider. When you exceed about $150 the return on the additional money spent becomes less and less the more you spend. IMHO

I recommend weaning the children off the spincast as soon as they develop good skill with it. Then is the time to put a decent spinning reel/rod into their hands while they are still not very rigid toward change. They will take to it a lot faster than most people think, and they are then in a good position to progress toward real expertise and fishing flexibility. They will then have an outfit "just like Dad's."

You have a lot of suggestions on pound test. I'll just say that the lighter it is the better it will cast. I use a lot of 15 , never go to 20 on spinning any more. I don't see why you need to underfill with high quality braid properly loaded onto the reel. If anything it is less sensitve to looping off the spool than mono. Follow your reel's instruction sheet. As to quality, I've had trouble with non-name brand braids and now use only Suffix and Power Pro (+ a little Nanofil for light work) and they are very good and consistent.