MassYak85

This is was a year to forget for me mostly. A dissapointing spring that didn't yield any big spawning females was followed by my worst summer in memory. No fish over 4lbs until late in the summer where I basically went back to basics and fished a stick worm for a while. Then no more big fish as the summer came to a close in September. Fall was good, I got more comfortable fishing late fall patterns, gained confidence in jerkbaits and tied my PB of 5.4 on a 9 inch slammer. Next year I want to go back to worms and jigs more, and focus on learning deeper structure fishing better.

I've got it on a Dobyns Fury 795 right now, I really like that combo, balances well and the 200 size reel doesn't feel too small with the 20lb line. I'm fishing treble hook baits 1-4oz on it.

Yea if you go straight line no leader I do like the T-wings a lot. I also have a Tatula HD200 and fish 20lb copoly for swimbaits and it BOMBS lures. For me though, I don't feel the little extra distance it might give is worth it usually. But you can find Tatula CT's on sale on Ebay almost any day of the week so usually it's a no brainer to upgrade.

This is more my own curiosity speaking out loud than a criticism....but wouldn't the line guide on a biatcaster freeze up easily? It's not that big and can build up ice quickly. I've had them freeze up OPEN WATER fishing never mind purposefully going out in winter weather with one.

I've got CT's, a CT Type R, and a Fuego CT. IMO The Tatula CT's aren't worth the upgrade over the Fuego. I like the T-wing but that's all you get, and since I use braid to leader a lot the T-wing can be a pain at times. The SV is probably where you see the biggest payback cause of the spool.

It's a good point, I've broken off weights before because of abrasion (well, mostly laziness). Definitely check your line often if you do use it. Sometimes I'll even keep my leader on and have the leader go to the weight, then the usual 2-3ft of line to the worm. Probably too many knots for most folks.

I agree with others that if it's your only reel send it out. What I did was as I got newer reels I started learning to clean mine by tearing apart the old ones. It's not particularly hard but you need the right tools and there's small parts you gotta keep track of.

I liked their Jig heads, not a huge fan of the skirts but they weren't bad quality. I had to stop using them to conform with the lead ban up here though.

I'll split shot rig 5 and 6 inch thin worms like robo worms, works great!

I think @Shimano_1 nailed it. I've towed my dad's 1875 Lund (I think 3000lbs was the estimated tow weight) with my '08 4Runner (V6), no problem on the highway. That said, are you looking to make the Skeeter your future boat or is it just that you'll be towing one occasionally? Long hauls or short trips to the lake? If I was gonna tow one that heavy all the time for long distances I'd probably want a bit more than what my 4runner can do. But if someone needed me to tow theirs in a pinch I'd have no worries that I could do it. I got the 4runner intending to tow, but more thinking forward to an 18ft aluminum than a big heavy glass boat.

Usually I get the green pumpkin ones but that color really stood out to me.

Just kidding, let us know how the Irod handles what you're looking to do.

It's not ideal you'll just have to watch how the baits react to different twitches and adapt accordingly. But when you hook up with one that crankbait rod will play them very well.

Up here in the Northeast I mainly use C-rigs for finding the deep bite in the summer. I'm generally using big worms or lizards. My favorite are the 10" curly tail power worms and the Zoom 6" and 8" lizards. I'm a braid guy and I'm using my jig rod (7'2" HF), not ideal IMO but I can't justify another setup. If I was to pick a dedicated rod I'd go 7'6 or even 7'11. How I'm rigged up though...I'm using 40lb braid mainline to a spro power swivel (70# I believe, they're stupid small for their strength rating). Then from their I've got a 3ft leader of 18lb Maxima Ultragreen to a straight shank worm hook (4/0 roboworm rebarb for thinner worms, 5/0 Gammy for thicker worms). I use a 3/4oz tungsten weight generally but will go down/up to a 1/2 or a 1oz depending on depth and wind conditions. I only have two beads I use, 6 or 8mm glass. A tip I would suggest is to take a bobber stop and put it on after your weight so that it protects the knot on your swivel from the weight slamming into it with the bead. I've never played around with glass vs plastic, brass vs tungsten, clackers, or bead color much to weigh in on that. Don't overlook the finesse C-rigs though like @WRB mentioned. And those Carolina Keepers are good if you don't like messing with a swivel.

I use 1/0 for wide gap finesse hooks when wacky rigging 6" stick baits typically. #1 I would be fine with using for smaller or thinner worms.

Pulled the trigger on my TW cart and hopped over to Hookup Tackle to snag some of those megabass baits half off. Was dissapointed they only have one vision 110 color on sale, so I went ahead and snagged a couple knuckles and vibration x's instead.

Another fishing site posted this on Facebook ?

I hope some of you were able to get out today! Forecast looked bad beginning of the week so I had already made plans. Wish I had waited cause you couldn't ask for better weather this time of year. Also, @Mr. Aquarium, do you have a fly tying vise you use for your jigs that you like? I've been meaning to get one to do some jigs and add wire keepers and such.

I fish almost all braid to leader or straight braid except one reel. The braid I will usually reverse at the end of the season but I'll get a couple seasons out of it usually depending how much I retie. The one reel I have mono on I am replacing several times throughout the season and usually do strip it off at the end of the season just to avoid the bad memory.

Me looking at my Tackle Warehouse cart leading up to the Black Friday sale...

Some pretty tempting deals there honestly. 8 dollar under armour shirts. If that black and gold hoodie was still in stock at 20 bucks I'd probably place an order but yea, 12 dollar shipping isn't wort it for just a shirt.

I like it....only in theory. Like @WRB said, there's no guarantee the bait is positioned in the bass's mouth where the hook is gonna kick into the roof. I don't think it hurts it either but I haven't noticed a poor hookup ratio with a palomar or other knots. I DO have trust issue with the snell knot failing though so I just don't use it.

Not judging... But if you can afford an NRX why not just buy two setups that's would be more suited for each technique? Biggest issue I feel is a frog rod need to be able to drive home massive frog hooks whereas a wacky rod needs to have enough give to be forgiving to smaller finesse Hooks. Casting I don't think would be an issue for most frog rods with some tip since 6inch senkos have a bit of weight to them but the hook styles are just so different between the two techniques. Also line....hard to find a happy medium to do both.

Most reels are gonna have lighter plastic gears in areas that don't need to hold up to high stress, like the level wind. Yea I got the replacement screws already, I just didn't want a repeat with the new ones haha. Thanks for everyone. I'll take a look at that wera precision set.

So I've been cleaning my own reels for the past 4 or 5 years. I own mostly Daiwas and they seem to like to tighten their screws down pretty tight from the factory. I've stripped a few trying to get them out the first time and I'm looking to get a set of screwdrivers that are actually the right size to hopefully avoid this going forward. Right now I'm working on a Tatula CT Type R. Does anyone know the specific size required for the two screws shown below? As you can see I had a hell of a time with one of them lol.