txchaser

Tastes like chicken!

Except in some edge cases, yep. No fiddling with tension, internal magnets, etc. Just set the dial and go. The Sv's seem to prefer a smooth cast, something like 95% of my backlashes will be in the first 30 feet of flight. For me, the right setting on the dial is where I get a little fluff mid-cast that works itself out by the end of the cast.

I use the Edge boxes to store soft plastics, especially paddletails. I'm a year into the experiment with no problems, and no squid stink either. And I have a 3600 edge where I put chatterbaits with trailers still on. So far the zakos don't seem to have enough salt to cause corrosion or rust on the hooks; keitechs might.

I can't answer your question directly, but I will say the Jackall Archelon has been good to me. Seems made for punching. In particular the hollow body makes a great place to bury a flipping hook securely but without having to get through a bunch of plastic. Has a rattle hole too.

Zillion HD is a standout.

It'll work fine on an ocho. With that said, these rings work far better than the elastic ones that end up cutting the senko in half. I don't use the hook that comes with it, because I don't need the 1/16 extra weight. They are really easy to rig and I haven't used bands since I got them a few years ago. https://www.tacklewarehouse.com/Lake_Fork_Weedless_Wacky_Hook__Weight_System_2pk/descpage-LFWWHWS.html

I've come almost full circle on this, starting with lots of braid/leader use. The way I think about it now is what line gives me the most advantage for a particular presentation. All my bottom contact is flouro, topwater gets mono except where braid gives an advantage like a frog. I do think fish can see the braid on a topwater, so slower presentations I think some fish get scared off. I noticed the fewer rods I had the more likely I was to want to use braid/leader. Even using flouro on a-rigs for the moment, although thats mostly because my a-rig rod is double duty for 2oz swimbaits. I am considering going back to braid/leader for crankbait, since slack line sensitivity doesn't matter there, and being able to downsize or upsize leader quickly may be useful. I still like it a lot for moving bait presentation in weeds, like a swimjig or a chatterbait. Try flouro on your bottom contact rod, or something that gets bit on the fall, and you may notice some bites you were missing before, especially if you fish in the wind.

7.1 for everything but a couple of cranking reels (6.x), frogging (8.x), punching/flipping (8.x) And I'm seriously considering moving the cranking reels to 7.x too, to just have consistency.

My biggest learning is that we over-use shapeners and under-use strops. Unless your edge is actually damaged, stropping gives you better results. Grab one of the kits on amazon with the paddle and two different grit pastes and get to it. Also the youtube videos of japanese-style knife sharpening were really helpful, at least to me. My best knife sharpener: Yeah, it really does come with an instruction manual. I was making knives for a while. You end up needing to reprofile a knife on these to get a perfect edge, which takes forever on many of the new steels. What I end up using more often than not if I'm reparing an edge: https://www.amazon.com/DMT-FWFC-Double-Diafold-Sharpener/dp/B00004WFTW/ref=sr_1_4?crid=2W9CY7GNHVCZ1&keywords=dmt+diamond+knife+sharpener&qid=1664137853&qu=eyJxc2MiOiIzLjgxIiwicXNhIjoiMi44NyIsInFzcCI6IjEuNTkifQ%3D%3D&s=hi&sprefix=dmt+diamond+knife+sharpener%2Ctools%2C94&sr=1-4 Why this instead of the contrapton above? Fast, gets the job done. Sharp enough.

On amazon search for Daiwa Gillion instead of Daiwa Zillion. And if you look at the link you can see what it is from the english writing. Also when you hover over the pic you can see it says zillion on the reel. https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/Daiwa-Gillion-1000HL-Handle-Model/dp/B08NP3F5MV/

Yes. You can shoehorn a 3.3 on to the 3/0 but it's really too small. IMO the 1/0 seems made for the 3.3 and maybe even the 2.8.

I bought a couple of the Axle Hybrids to try out, as I'm a fan of Catchco's Gamechanger Trashmaster Jigs which are similar, I like trying new stuff, and by and large 6th sense design approach fits my local fishing and my fishing style pretty well, so I'll usually give them a shot on new products. The basic design idea on both is that the soft plastic trailer gets rigged like it would on a swimbait hook, so it is more forgiving on the hookset and better in really nasty cover. Sort of in the zone of a slither rig, but better standup of the trailer. Trashmaster: 6th sense: Some observations: 1) 6th sense is a medium diameter hook, where the trashmaster is a very heavy hook. Neither is better, just different situations. 2) I can't tell if the swinging part really adds anything. 3) Diameter of the line tie seems smaller than most other jigs. 4) Vertical instead of horizonal line tie. Anyway, I think is a good jig, it does what it is supposed to, which is not get snagged in nasty brush, but still have a jig presentation. If there's a downside, it is much more expensive than a traditional jig.

If you have other presentations in the 1-4oz range, Irod's a-rig rod is really good. Particularly in the 1-2oz zone, not so much up at 4. If it helps, I see a lot of people using this in shorter range lob casting vs monster overhand. That'll give you a little better result on a H rod. Also the rage swimmers are really heavy vs a grub.

AH dang that's the one I have. QC I guess. Thanks, I wouldn't have otherwise given that brand a shot.

TLDR: Consider throwing it after you find fish that are biting other baits, and see if you can get them to bite the a-rig. Play with depth and steady retrieve vs pulsing etc. Far easier to learn on active fish. Keitech 3.3" make great small a-rig baits. 3.8 feels like a standard size to me. Also grubs were apparently one of the original presentations, so smallish grubs might help, and you might have some laying around. So far my favorite heads for light a-rig are z-man trout eye. I have a preference for eyes on the bait, and a big gold eye fits the bill really well. Hooks aren't too thick. IMO it'd be hard to keep 1/16 heads down more than just subsurface without going reallllly slow. I'm curious to see what others have to say, but there's three places where I throw a-rigs: 1) where I see schools of shad with bass nearby 2) covering water where I'm pretty sure shad-eaters are around (this is probably a non-standard use, but it has produced for me. Usually I need to know the area to do this. 3) past juicy cover, IMO it has some decent draw to it so running down a weedline or past a laydown or weed point isn't nuts. If you need to cut weight, the advice above of dropping the top two jigheads is good advice, don't drop the center bait. On bending the wires out, I had a conversation with one of the a-rig makers (g-funk) and they suggested instead of a sharp bend like a kink, making a longer gentle bend was much better for the rig. I tried to find a pic but no luck. Anyway to get the spread you want don't kink the wire, give it a gentle bend over 3 inches or so.

Zman crosseyez will change where you can fish a chatterbait. The double guard is pretty effective in brush. Blade still gets hung sometimes, but it's a much more versatile bait than one with no guard. I have a big stack of jackhammers and prefer them for open water or sparse weeds, but anything like cover gets one of these. My most-fished cranks are silent or nearly so, and I tend to fish them slow, so I think I'm after less-active fish with cranks, or ones that are really keyed in on something specific like size/color combo. I underfish spinnerbaits, probably because a keitech on a flashy swimmer is almost always tied on and that seems really close to me.

Fishing 6"-10" swimbaits a little bit this year, and it really helped how I see small fish. Mostly that if I'm catching small fish, I'm in the wrong spot, because the big bass will happily eat a small one. When they get big, IMO they get territorial and mean. Lure too big? Nah, if they can fit it in their mouth they will probably try at least once. So little bass mean it is time to go. Might not be too far though, perhaps fish a little deeper, or better cover is nearby. It's probably wrong but I've become convinced that big fish spend very little time shallow, just running up to eat a snack. With a couple of key exceptions. An example from midday this summer, pulled three good sized fish out of a mat that was the beginning of a point. Fish were only in 4 FOW, but they were a tail swish away from 20'. I think the oxygen was better there. Showed themselves on a frog, but I caught them punching.

I don't love just eyeballing how much backing to put on, especially as I'm often changing line diameters, so I bought a line counter. Rapala's is... well, it's plastic junk. Often doesn't work, have had to tear it down completely once, etc. I suppose I should have listened to the reviews, but the other options appeared to be the same. I don't need perfection, but I would like it to last a while and be able to reasonably count anything from 10lb braid to 25lb flouro. Any favorites?

I had to head to a search engine for this. Interesting. Any surprising results when testing your own rods/blanks, or did the curve following pricing pretty well?

I wonder how Paul (Nature of Fishing youtube) is doing. His stuff was great. @Glenn deep-dive podcasts on specifc structure/cover/situations/techniques. Most of the podcasts out there are like talk radio, lots of chatter, not so much content.

I have both. I'm ambivalent about using the zillion or the steez - there hasn't been a single time where I thought to myself 'man I really need to move the steez to this rod'. And many of my rods are sub 4oz. As @iabass8mentioned earlier, tolerances are a little tighter on the steez but the Zillion is so smooth you'll sometimes wonder if it's doing anything. The new gear cut is a winner.

Ok how about a Zillion HD?

Many are concerned about the unavailability of warranty on JDM reels, and I realized I have no idea how common it really is. I've never had one go bad, although I have had a few Tatulas that were geary right out of the box. Other than just sending it back, have you had to use the warranty on your reel?