PhishLI

Bitter Rivals

Cut bait?

A pal of mine kills 'em on the Bullnose. It's in the Salt series. He has a bunch of colors. He gave me one near the end of last season and I did well with it. It'll wake, or can be cranked down to 2 feet or so. I picked up another. I can't say for sure if the sound tech works, or if he just puts them where the fish are, but he catches consistently with it.

Any chance you'd be willing to post the schematic? Inquiring minds...

Yeah, man. Secret weapon. I have a platoon of them.

Maybe it doesn't actually suck.

Heavy fluoro, or braid? If you're using thick fluoro the T-Wing shines.

Nothing wrong. The kick lever doesn't always land in a tooth of the trip ratchet when you depress the thumb bar. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. Rotating the handle forward will set the lever. It's not play. It's not a problem.

I solved this for myself by using cheap 50 lb braid backing on all of my reels. Just a 4 wrap per side uni to uni connection to the mainline. It reduces the bulk of the connection knot. I use two small squares of Super 33 tape placed on the spool 180 degrees apart after I've cinched the arbor knot for the braid backer. No spool slippage and no bulky arbor or connection knot.

What does the warranty look like? Solid?

IMA Bill Lowen Squarebill Crank Killer shallow water crank. Runs at about 2 ft. Pick a color for your waters. My fav. https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Ima_Bill_Lowen_Squarebill_Crankbait/descpage-IBLSB.html#customer_reviews

Mama always said...

I'm running 20-30 Big Game on 6 swimbait rigs, and 12-15 on a few topwater and light swimbait rigs. It's strong and manageable, and if the spool goes poof it's utterly painless to cut it out and re-spool. One nice thing is that I've yet to backlash off the equivalent of a car payment using it. I've witnessed that with straight braid and braid to leader. The real big baits will shred braid at the knot and expose connection and terminal knots with leaders, but straight Big Game just stretches. Peace of mind.

Not until the point where the 150's spool is completely dumped, and that aint happening with the baits he's throwing on the rod he's talking about. Like I said earlier, their spools are the same width. You'd be correct if the 200 had a wider spool, but it doesn't. If consistent IPT after a long cast is the priority here, the Lew's Super Duty 300 Wide spool is the overall better choice. The 150 and 200 are practically the same reel other than the difference in spool depth and Magforce vs MagZ. The 200 is on the left. The 150 is also available in a 5 spd PG(power gear) model. @Bluebasser86 makes a good point that the 200's the better choice if he wishes to go towards bigger baits down the road. My point was that @Revival would be better off using the 150 when he's throwing the lighter baits he'd mentioned. Personally I have no issues throwing a 1oz glide bait on the 794SB. In the end neither suggestion is wrong, just different.

One more week of below freezing night time temps, mostly 20s. Supposed to be 37 next Tuesday night with 11m mph west winds. If I can find someplace not frozen I'm throwing. This sux.

Clones meet

In order to not waste line tying the Palomar on my spinning reels with 15 lb braid, I switched to the Improved Clinch knot with 8 wraps. No bass has ever broken me off once using this knot.

...and let's not forget its evil twin, the wet fart. OOPs!

I have both reels, and the width of their spool's are the same, but the 200's is deeper. I'm throwing those baits on a Champion 794SB which is similar in length to the SB Jr., but with a slightly longer handle. One of the reasons I'm getting the Irod myself is for it's 17" handle. It'll be better for me on the yak. That said, both rods are 7'8 or so, but because of the longish handles the length from the reel to the tip is just over 6 feet. Even with the leverage gotten because of the longer handles, you're only working with so much here. Given the weight of the baits you'll be throwing combined with the usable length of the rod, you're not going to be making truly monster casts with it. Far yes, but nothing like what you'd get when using a 9 footer. So the 150 will be fine on a rod of this length, even with .017 diameter line. I doubt you'll get far enough down into the spool on a long cast to make the 200 worth getting. I have a Tat 300 also, and have had a Lexa, and it's my opinion that Magforce Z is of little benefit while chucking big baits. It's definitely helpful when throwing wind catching crank baits though, so the 150 opens up options with lighter baits that the 200 won't throw as happily.

If you bump up to a 6 power composite CB rod rated to 1 1/2 oz you'll have the juice to drive the chatter's jig hook home easier, but still have enough delay that you're not yanking the bait out first which happens plenty with a MHF graphite. A 3/8oz bladed jig and a Zako clocks in at over 3/4 oz. I'm not throwing that on my 3 power Dobyn's or 3 power anything else.

Yeah, tell me about it

Budget?

That Beast hook is a mutha to drive through, especially if you hit the bite plate. It's like a monster jig hook. I lost two tanks as I brought them close when using 17lb Siege. The stretch was insane, and both of those fish were only mid 6ers. I've never come close to losing one using 50lb braid once the hook penetrated. I won't use anything less than 20 lb Big Game now. And yes, you need power to drive it home. A heavy fast will get you there most of the time. Anything less and it's sketchy.

Night Fishing: ShellCracker G2 Whopper Plopper 75 Beast Coast Miyagi Black/Blue Project Z Chatterbait Berkley Champ Swimmer Day Fishing: MegaBass Dark Sleeper T-Rigged Chigger Craw 5" Caffeine Shad weightless Shallow Crank bait MegaBass Hazedong Shad 4.2"

This is probably due to gripping the reel tighter than you need to because you aren't quite comfortable yet and less about conditioning. Tightening up everything from one's pucker to one's extremities is common before coordination kicks in. Try softening up a tad by relaxing your core, lower back and neck, or any other parts not associated with the task. Doing this is contagious, and you won't be as tense. This will delay fatigue and shorten the learning curve.