MickD

You may be talking about tongue weight of 100. Certainly not the weight of the trailer + boat. Sounds like a small car nevertheless. What you need to do is to know the total weight of the trailer + boat/motor/everything inside it and compare that with the towing spec of your car. If you are not sure of it, even after consulting the manual, ask your dealer. I don't know where you live, but that might make a difference in whether you can get aggressive or have to be conservative. As the difference between level towing in moderate temps vs hilly/mountainous towing in high temps. Your dealer can help. Or a shop that does hitches. You have not given anywhere near enough info for us to really help.

There is no problem with running any braid through any modern guide. Other than possibly noise.

Flukes have been mentioned. They are great on river smallies. Fish them weightless, let them float down a little , then jerk, wait, repeat. It's not unusual to see the wake from an attacking fish. White has been recommended, a good clear water choice. Bubble gum and Tennessee shad are good, too. Use a size 3/0 EWG worm hook, hook through nose then up through body with the hook just sticking out the back. Get it in there evenly so the action will be good without going too far sideways or spinning. Wacky rig Senkos or equivalent are hard to beat, too. If I wanted to limit my carry to just a few I think it would be Senko/Fluke/small in-line spinner.

Look at the lure weight recommendations on the rods and get the one that best matches the lures you will use most of the time. If the rod is too powerful for the lures you want to cast it will feel like a broomstick and will make casting without a backlash much harder. I expect for your first you will be better served by a medium power. The lure weight recommendation is the most accurate indicator of the power of factory rods, and as a beginner, you want your best chance of success. That will come by best matching the lure weight recommendation. By matching the lure weight to the rod will make the rod load properly on the cast. If in doubt, go lower rather than higher in the interest of better casting.

I would include fiberglass cloth in any repair scenario. I repaired our swimming pool steps with glass cloth and epoxy probably 30 years ago. It has discolored, but still does not leak. The glass cloth will give whatever bondo or resin you use a lot more strength.

Leader material is stiffer than line which helps to keep blade bait hooks from tangling.

I use mono and FC leader material, not "line", for leaders, and have spools of it on board to replace a break-off. Which is rare, but even in the situation where I've cut off a number of times and the leader gets too short, I need replacement. And I have spools of various pound tests of leader material. Not line.

My favorite rod for snapping off bottom and swimming small swimbaits is a 7 foot medium light moderate/fast action rod. If you get too heavy a power the lift and drop in snapping just isn't easy to get right. you want the rod to flex some when you apply the action and its recovery on the drop helps keep the drop from being a fully slack line drop.. The mod fast action casts well and helps keep me connected to the fish. I don't think X-fast is the right action for this, if what you are asking about is what I do.

As above + whites, naturals, not dark. Think ghost.

For me no reel is worth $500, but it depends on an individual's financial situation and their priorities. Is it a great reel? I'm sure it is. Is it worth $500? I don't know, is it to you? Tatulas are pretty darned good.

In the video I don't see any lack of bend in the rod until the fish was gone, so rod technique, in my opinion, was not a problem. Could be lack of a good hook set. One thing that will work even if you are not using a heavy power rod, when finessed fishing, is to give a little slack when you feel the bite, then sharply SNAP the rod up. When the slack is taken up, the hook most often will be set without having to cross their eyes. Then you must, of course, keep a bend in the rod which prevents slack which would give the fish opportunity to throw the lure. This happened so fast that I think the hook was never set. But when it started sliding on the surface, it could be that the line tension dropped enough for the hook to come out. We have all landed fish where immediately on landing the fish we noticed that the hook had not really penetrated past the barb and dropped out. Looks like the fish hit on a long cast, braid will help. Not sure what you were using.

Vapparowhead, based on the bass in your picture, I think you should just keep on doing what you're doing, whatever it is. "Never change a winning game." Sorry, Vaparothead

Rapala DT, don't be reluctant to stop them now and then. Greens up here in the north.

I think you nailed the difference, which is consistent with the thinking that darker is better in stained water. Watermelon works fine, especially with red flecks, in the usually clear water of Saginaw Bay.

If you discard it burn it or cut it into small segments so that birds don't get tangled in it.

does the diameter at the grip interface get larger?

Most of the time I fish with AR on so that when a fish hits hard/fast the drag can handle it rather than my being too slow to respond by back-reeling. Back-reeling can get tricky. If you let up too much you can get slack line. I have, when not using it, had the handle of the spin reel quickly in reverse painfully whacking my hand. There are times when I leave it off and back-reel. I like the choice. I will often turn it off just to let out a little line when I've reeled up too far. Note that many new reels are coming with full time AR, no switch. So if you like the switch, buy carefully.

I may be missing something; what is the difference between a size 16 and 17 casting trigger seat? It's only the hole for the blank, isn't it? Then bigger than 17, what are the differences? On cast I've never used anything but a 16, but I haven't designed for reels bigger than line counters or really large diameter blanks, either.

I saw your pics on storing baits with rubber bands. You simply need more lures. Come on, A-Jay!

Thanks. The damage is, in my opinion, only cosmetic. If I wanted to react to it at all, I would simply use Winn tape and recover the grip and butt knob. Or only the grip, with black. I don't see what is in front of the seat, but to me it doesn't matter. I would not disturb the seat. That is getting into major work with little value. To take off the grip and butt knob, first use braid fishing line between gloved hands and cut the existing EVA off, including carefully removing the winding checks. Try not to damage the area between them. You don't have to have it perfectly clean, but you need to provide surfaces to which you can solidly glue new components. The problem is that the blank has taper, so when you load the new parts from the rear, you have to have an inside diameter that will clear the butt. It will then be sloppy on the blank near the seat. What you need to do is 1. Get a replacement grip the same length as that which is on the rod now. (same for butt knob). Ream it to clear the butt diameter. 2. With masking tape build at least two , probably three, arbors on which to glue the new grip. Build them to be the same diameter as the ID of the grip, or slightly below to allow an easy slip fit over them. One should be at the reel seat, one at the end of the grip, and one in the middle. What you are doing is providing a cylindrical surface on which to glue the new grip. 3. Get some epoxy adhesive, (best is 10 minute paste designed for rod making, like U40 or Flex Coat) not wrap epoxy, and totally encapsulate the tape arbors, be generous with the adhesive. Slide the new grip onto the rod. If any epoxy comes out at the reel seat, carefully try to pick it off with a knife or other precision instrument. Then use 90 % alcohol on a paper towel to wipe off what might remain. Wipe, let the alcohol evaporate, then wipe again with a clean one wet with alcohol. Keep at it until there is no evidence of epoxy. Let that set. If you want to use winding checks for appearance, it won't fit as well as the original since it has to be loaded from the rear over the larger butt diameter. But, it will look ok if you carefully center it on the blank and use epoxy adhesive to attach it to the grip. The butt knob winding check has to be slipped onto the blank now. The butt knob should be drilled to allow an easy slip fit to the butt. The taper is not an issue now in the last couple inches of the blank. Glue the butt knob on and carefully apply a little epoxy to its end to capture the winding check. Do the same cleanup routine as you did for the grip to seat joint. Getbitoutdoors.com will have all the parts you want. You will need to order winding checks that just clear the butt diameter of the blank. Good luck. I'd try the tape first to see whether I liked it before going through all this.

I think you're right. Which if true would lead one to believe that all the schemes of rod-building that try to get the line through the guides with a minimum of direction changes don't add much either. If the big change of direction going through the first guide (the one on the reel) doesn't seem to be a problem then the gentle changes out on the rod are inconsequential. This doesn't mean that spiral wraps don't make sense. They do for eliminating the torque in the hand. But as far as which spiral system is better on the cast, it really doesn't matter. They all work fine.

I think if your FG is getting hung up you may need to do two things. First, make sure you are trimming the leader end really close to braid, then tie a few more half hitches to finish the knot. The half hitches won't make the knot any bigger and may finish the end so it doesn't get hung up. Worth a try. But the best solution is to keep the knot out of the reel, and I don't think you need leaders that are longer than the rod length. I never use one longer than 5 feet and have not seen anything that has made me think it was too short. I think that leader invisibility is much more important than leader length. How far away from the lure do fish look? Not very far, in my opinion.

Can you post a picture of it? I think I know what you're dealing with, but a pic would help.

What determines the size for me is its pound test. Don't buy unless you know its strength. I should mention that I have not often used a snap swivel. Snaps, yes, snap swivels no.