casts_by_fly

Dry january has never worked for me. My wife is usually traveling, there are football games and parties, and various other stuff going on. Last year my buddy introduced me to an alternative- dry Feb/March. You start at the Super Bowl in mid Feb and you’re dry until St Patrick’s day. Still a month off, but during a better time. And, I can take the 6 week lead up to it to wind down.

I’m a little surprised. The problem isn’t coaching, it’s talent. They just haven’t drafted well to put a team around Allen.

Had my first “oh crap” of the season last night and the second this afternoon. Last night we were going to the local social club which entails a road which is barely wide enough for 2 cars when it’s fully clean. We came around a blind bend and a pickup with plow was coming the other way. I moved over quickly and a couple inches too far. Enough to get both passenger wheels off the edge of the blacktop. Not a problem, right? 4WD and drive it right back up on. Not last night. The snow was so slick that even low lock wasn’t gripping enough to get the front wheel back up. Had to ride it in the gutter like that for 50 yards until I hit a driveway crossing the curb. Then this afternoon I went to blow snow and the blowers (blades?) don’t work. Grip down the handle and nothing. Check the shear pins, check for blockage, nothing. Grip down the handle and notice a lot of play where the cable meets the steel rod that controls the clutch. Manually move the clutch arm? Fires right up. Turns out the cable had stretched just a little too much. Nothing a little adjustment couldn’t fix. Good thing too because shoveling that would have been a pain.

Choproz gives you all the questions to ask yourself. But if this is your first fishing kayak I’m going to say that you probably don’t know the answers yet. Start with the basics and then let it unfold naturally. The 106 has rod holders built in already so you don’t need to add anything just yet. You need some type of tackle holder whether it is a crate, tackle bag, etc. I stuck with a tackle bag for all my time. If you plan to carry 6-8 rods then you’ll probably end up with a crate style. The one thing I do recommend up front is the wilderness systems organizer. Holds pliers, clippers, scissors, and all the small tools that you need to have at hand. And it’s not expensive. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077T3LLQS?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_7&th=1

Growing up, 16lb AN40 was about the only thing that we spooled on any baitcaster. But it’s been discontinued for at least 6 or 8 years now, maybe longer.

We are far enough inland that it will stay as snow but it is right at 31-34 degrees all day today so it is this damp misty fine snow. By the time the temps start to drop the precipitation will be out of the air so the 8” we have is about what we’re going to get here I think. But like you guys, it is going to get cold here to the point of everything freezing so i needed to get it all sorted before it did.

Angus- That’s awesome. What a set you managed to bring home.

Where did you get AN40?

4wd is for getting you out of what 2wd got you into.

We were supposed to get 2” today. Then 1.5”. I just blew 4-6” now that it has just stopped. Good thing I didn’t really have any plans. Also, I’m going fishing tomorrow morning. 30 degrees but zero wind. Fresh snow on the hills. Should at least be pretty.

Hi all The heading sensor is a wonderful piece of equipment. With a Bluetooth based motor (spot lock models) it allows the ability to jog 5’ with a button push while you are locked in a spot. It gives heading info to the motor for advanced course navigation. And if you’re networked to a fish finder it will show you which way the boat it pointing relative to a contour map or waypoint. That last one is super useful when you graph a waypoint and come back to it later with mega live. What I don’t love is the light. It has a bright blue led light on top that flashes once every three seconds when connected. Not a problem normally but if you night fish it is really bright- like enough to screw up your night vision. As any enterprising diy person with strong preferences might do, I put black electrical tape over it last summer to kill the glare. DON’T DO THAT! Turns out, the light is also a button. I had one on my kayak for four years and one on the boat for another. Never knew that. So when I put the tape over it, that pushed down the button. And that’s how you turn it off- press and hold. That’s also how you turn it back on. But for the past 6 months I thought I had a broken heading sensor. Here’s your sign…

At least you guys up north have plenty of experience in it every year. Growing up in Pittsburgh and living in Cleveland for a while taught me winter driving at an early age (16). We had a rear wheel drive truck which made things all the harder. Learning to drive in the snow isn’t about the driving. It’s about avoiding all the pitfalls that will cause you a problem and like you said, you only get that by experience (and lots of playing around in freshly snowed parking lots!!). Here in NJ, we have a lot of people that didn’t grow up in snow and are lacking that experience. Heck, they aren’t good drivers on clear roads. When snow hits here, there are plenty of people that don’t have that inbuilt respect for what can happen. The stupid get stoopider and make worse decisions. I don’t worry about me on the road, I worry about everyone else. And there is a lot of stoopid here. This is our current state of play, all coming down in the past 2 hours. My wife went out before it was this much and even though it’s only 2”, it’s coming down faster than it can get cleared. Good day to heat up the garage and work on tackle.

Yeah, for a single battery charger it just makes sense. Did you get the 100 AH Bluetooth?

On one hand, I agree that some companies do that (planned obsolescence). There is also the slightly more benign "disposable products" where they are designing something at the cheapest initial price to be replaceable but not fixable. In this case there is more to it. The Helix units are great units when it comes to side imaging, mapping, 360, etc. Those functions don't use much bandwidth/processing or power though. Live imaging does. I think Garmin and Lowrance knew that early on so designed their units which take live imaging to take/supply high power from the get go. HBird tried to keep up but tried to keep the Helix lineup in play. That meant they were limited when they designed ML1 to the Helix power and capabilities. If they were to catch up in live imaging, they needed more horsepower than the Helix could supply. So they had to create a new 'entry' level unit that could supply ML2. It had to happen some time and people who bought Helix units in the nearterm before the launch (whenever it occured) were always going to be upset. So rip off the bandaid sooner than later and get the better ML2 on the market sooner.

The heater arrived today. No assemby required other than connecting the hose to the tank and to the heater so off to the garage I went. I threw it on high for 15 minutes and when I came back out the air temp was easily 10-15 degrees warmer. It was enough that I would have been able to work out there in normal clothes and not wearing a jacket. The air temp before heating was 39 per the car which had been sitting in there all night. Of course the boat, the car, and the concrete slab weren't heated up that much so when I shut it off the air was back down to 41 about 30 minutes later when I went back out. Considering I already had a propane tank that was full enough, this seems like a just fine solution for $100. I've got some work to do on the boat so we'll see how it does for an extended period over the next two weeks.

If you were used to having FFS and using it a bit, then I agree that I wouldn't shut the door on it. You could always start with none and see what you miss.

which models are they? I assume they are networked already. If so, maybe just add one as your upgrade? You're not going to get much for them on the secondary market unless it is the current model (which at 5 years it almost certainly isn't). But 5 year old electronics are still pretty good especially if they were higher end models in the first place.

Good luck on the setup! My FF journey was similar to Koz. I started with a 7" and for running 1 thing at a time (no split screeen) and having it reasonably close to you (arms lenth or so) it was pretty good. I got a lot of good imaging from it and learned a lot of things. I also bumped to the 9" when I picked up FFS because the 7" helix wasn't capable of running it. If you think you'll get FFS in the future, then just lay it all out with a 9" now. And if you're going to do that, just go straight to the xplore units. The helix units have an expiry date. They have discontinued most of them and will only have the smaller ones going forward. They are only ML1 compatible (there is a big improvement going to ML2). Updates and fixes (though minor at this point in the lifecycle) are going to stop if they haven't already. Ongoing support will get limited. Heck, it might even be tough to find a brand new Helix 9 MSI G3n/G4n right now. The 7 is fine if you know that's all you will ever want. Great units. But just know that there is no upsize path available. The next step up is the 9" xplore.

The LiTime are the best buy going when it comes to lithium i think. Hard to do better for the price. if you decide you want something like a humminbird piranha 4” I might know where there is one going for quite cheap…

I’ll just leave this right here now that it’s official.

@Bluebasser86 - oh baby! That's a fun one. I thought a small musky on a ned was doing something.

If I am at my desk, with good natural light streaming in, the dogs are outside, I have an illustrated instruction on a 30" monitor in front of me, and the line diameters are just the right combination of stiff and supple, then I can do it. If the phase of the moon is right I can even do it on the first try. For all of that, I fall into king fisher's camp. The alberto takes 1/10th the time and effort and is far easier to get right which is the most important part. I can tie that in the boat if need be (2-3 times a year I have to, usually because of a deep snag that broke at the leader knot). I've never broken a fish at the leader knot, only snags. I tried the double uni but just never got comfortable with it. And the alberto is smaller. This is all spinning tackle, so 10 lb mainline and leader at the top end, then lighter from there.

@Smirak - I could see the smaller organizers for some things. When I was in the kayak and taking some gear but not all they would have been useful. Like you said, take or leave the neko or ned box. Now getting into the boat, that was one of the things where I am moving the other way. That was the appeal of the bigger box in the first place- a one stop shop. @Peacedivision - I meant to say that above, thanks for the reminder. One of the empty inner boxes that I bought before the organizer was sitting on my desk for a couple weeks. My desk has any number of random things going on including hooks and soft plastics/pieces. I don't know what it was touching, but it looked like the plano's of old after not very much time. It still works, but it warped a little and is snug getting in and out of the organizer.

@Smirak - that won’t be me (I’m almost 100% gamakatsu) but helpful for others that use them.

Gim- I’d call it a Texas rigged jig if you want to get technical since I’d class a Texas rigged as having a separate weight (or no weight). But if you’re throwing a 3” plastic on a light jighead (weedless or not) and fishing it like a Ned then I’m just going to call it a Ned.