billmac

Hi everyone, This isn't official yet, but you might be interested in this: https://www.facebook.com/ClarksonUniversity/ I am the faculty advisor for Clarkson's bass club, and this young man is one of our past club presidents.

Yeah, it bothers me.

This may sound crazy, but what I'd like are stories, especially if you get someone older who's been tournament fishing a long time, like Hank Parker or Roland Martin. I like tips and instruction, but there's no lack of that here or elsewhere. I'd like to hear about experiences.

My selfies come out clear enough, but I have to remember to smile. It looks like I'm recording a hostage video.

I like to keep moving, so I cover a lot of water. I also bring a lot of enthusiasm with me. I don't always catch fish, but I always expect to, right down to the last cast. I've often come home wishing I'd caught fish, but I never come home wishing I hadn't gone fishing.

My guess is that the vehicle went fully into the water and flipped over.

So I got a new trim motor / pump in my '88 Mercury I6. Is there a handy process for bleeding out the air? It moves up, shakily, but not really down. I have repeatedly opened the fill tube and topped up the fluid, so maybe that's all I need. But it appears to be a slow process. If you saw my other posts you know that my manual release valve is frozen, so I can't use that as part of the process. Thanks.

Keith, It's a 1988 Mercury I6, 115HP. I tried an impact driver and that's what broke the screw initially. I've tried an easy-out. I've tried rapping it. No dice so far. If I thought it was only being held in by pressure, I would just drill through it, release the pressure, and put in a new one. But I'm a little afraid it is seized up in there. I thought removing the trim motor would release the pressure but the screw still won't turn. My two piston rods are still fully retracted, so something is still under pressure. I haven't found anyone in my area willing to work on the motor. Too old.

Hi Tom, I sent you a PM (DM?). Thanks, Bill

I think it's as Tom said, since it was trimmed down, it's under a lot of pressure.

So I managed to painstakingly raise the motor all the way and put the blocking lever (or whatever it is called) in place. I had naively supposed I would be able to remove the trim motor without removing the entire assembly, but that doesn't appear to be the case. One screw is accessible but the other is not. I tried tapping and turning the manual release screw but the screwdriver just dug into the screw.

Thanks. I have managed to use a jack to raise the motor a little. I will keep trying to raise it, but it's coming up very hard and I'm afraid of breaking something.

Hi Tom, The screw didn't back out at all. No movement whatsoever.

I tried an extractor bit. Wouldn't budge. I was afraid to force it too much, because if it falls apart, I'll have to replace the whole unit.

No, I think it is aluminum. True, but I have bypassed the relays and it didn't help.

Unfortunately I can't get at the trim motor, since the outboard is tilted down. If I could release the motor from the trim system I could tilt it by hand, but I can't quite figure out how to do that.

I don't think it's the solenoids. I bypassed the solenoids and jumpered 12V on the far side of each. No difference.

So I'm finally breaking out my boat (busy summer) and I need install a lower unit. Unfortunately I stored the boat trimmed down. I didn't know I wasn't supposed to do this. It won't come up. I get a solenoid click in both directions, but that's all. Battery and terminals are fine. I tried to loosen the manual release valve, but it wouldn't budge, until half the screw snapped off. Is it possible to carefully release the pressure by loosening the fill cap until I'm able to tilt it up manually?

This is just a question out of curiosity. Are the largemouth still thriving in the St. Lawrence? When BASS came to NY in '78, they uncovered a largemouth fishery that the locals didn't really know existed, and for a time it was considered one of the best largemouth fisheries in the country. I know the St. Lawrence is all about smallmouth now, due to the gobies and zebra mussels. Are the largemouth still there? Obviously I know there are still largemouth to be caught in the St. Lawrence, but I'm wondering if that fishery is just as strong, or have the conditions that allowed the smallmouth to thrive done damage to the largemouth fishery? Or are they just ignored now?

I haven't caught big smallies on the Ned, and they are pretty prone to snagging. But I'll never forget tying one on first time and accidently dropping it in the water about a foot in front of me from shore and instantly pulling out a smallmouth.

https://www.dec.ny.gov/press/125657.html

I've shared this elsewhere, but I really appreciate the fact that there's no fishing snobbery here. You can have two guys asking for a $300 reel recommendation and a $30 reel recommendation, and they will both be taken seriously. Bank fishermen are treated the same as those fishing out of a $100K rig. How often have we had serious discussions about Megabass jerkbaits and baits in the $1.00 bin at Walmart?

The top two anglers had 4 limits each averaging over 5lbs apiece. With smallmouth. It also looks like every single angler caught a limit every day. This might not make for good tourney drama, but it is pretty well unparalleled as a fishery.

Mine wasn't really broken. I just had to push down harder.

I've got to work on my selfie technique. I look like I'm miserable.