desmobob

I have last year's Striker, a non-Vivid version in 5" and I love the thing. I use it with my float tubes and kick boat. Two of my favorite places to fish aren't on the popular chart cards, so I value the mapping ability of the Striker. I have an older Echomap 93SV in my boat and even though it has maps loaded, I use the mapping feature all the time.

After a great day of fishing yesterday with a favorite BFS outfit including my Daiwa PXL Type R, the reel started getting a little noisy when casting and needing frequent adjustments. (fish photo from yesterday) The southern end of Lake Champlain where I usually bass fish has heavily clay-silted water and bearings can sometimes get dirty. I decided to flush and lube the spool bearings on a few reels I've been using a lot. It turns out one of them on the PXL was bad, or had a chunk of something in it that wouldn't flush out. I have a good selection of spare bearings so I replaced it. I have a handy little bearing flushing tool I got from an R/C store. I use brake cleaner to flush them out, then White Lightning bearing lube or Finish Line ceramic lube to lube them back up. When I took the side over off the PXL, I must have set it down on a rag that was damp with brake cleaner. The paint wrinkled! ? I just e-mailed Daiwa to see how much a replacement would be...

Great reading... thanks!

I'll add another that I tried a couple of years ago and really enjoyed... a cucumber Bloody Mary. Just a regular Bloody Mary but made with cucumber vodka and with a cucumber spear instead of a celery stick. I tried one at an outdoor restaurant on a nice summer day and have mixed up a pitcher of them for several summer get-togethers since then. It initially sounded strange to me but those flavors go together perfectly... like peanut butter and jelly. But I still think a gin and tonic with lime is the best summer drink there is.

Manhattan!

When I was young, I practically lived in the water all summer. I had YMCA Bronze Star and Advanced Open Water SCUBA certifications and was snorkeling when I wasn't SCUBA diving. It is very easy to think to myself, "I'm a strong swimmer." But the fact is, I'm 60 years old now and can't remember the last time I swam more than ten yards! I think nearly everyone overestimates their swimming ability. And most have probably never tried swimming with clothes on or in water that wasn't a comfortable temperature. I'm happy to report that after a lifetime of only wearing a PFD in a canoe or kayak, I'm finding it not at all inconvenient to wear one in my bass boat and while fishing! After a couple of trips, it becomes second nature to put it on (and to attach my outboard's kill switch lanyard to my belt loop).

Every time I've ever thought I was experiencing a drag failure, it was braid slipping around the spool...

BFS fun with the good stuff today... Daiwa PXL Type R and Major Craft Volkey 682L BFS Series rod. We had torrential rains on Monday. I parked myself at the outlet of a big culvert that a huge marsh empties into the lake through. I got seven big bass, green and brown! Every one of them felt like I had the bottom when I set the hook. ? They hit a T-rigged 3" Pit Boss or T-rigged 4" Kalins grub behind a 1/8 oz. weight.

I have suffered endlessly from the trouble little rodents cause. I keep some of those little green cube-shaped rodent bait blocks in my boat all year and really load it up with poison bait when it's covered up for the winter. A five cent mouse can do thousands in damage... ?

I bought a Bass Pro threaded pedestal (3/4") and it fit my 2014 Tracker Pro170. If you e-mail or call Tracker with the serial number of your boat, they can tell you for sure what parts were used.

I can say that the safety videos and posts have had an effect on me. Coupled with the boating safety course I just completed, it added up to enough motivation to change my habits. I started wearing my PFD and using my kill switch lanyard religiously. Thanks A-Jay and Glenn.

I'd get a top-of-the-line reel with DC cast control. I have more than enough reels but kind of have an itch to try one with DC...

Absolutely. I believe it is false economy, or at least a gamble, to try to save money by buying these cheap reels.

So far, none of the reels have been a throw-away. In fact, the GH100 is the only one that's been giving me any trouble at all. I just came inside from lawn-casting the new KastKing Zephyr and it's seems very promising. I did make the investment in a couple of quality BFS baitcasters (and I do have a king's ransom in high-quality casting, spinning and fly reels). Playing around with the cheap ones is just a little facet of the fishing hobby for me. Kind of like my small collection of automatic fly reels, except I use the cheap BFS reels often enough that I can probably justify their cost... I know plenty of guys who spend a whole lot more on cigarettes, a few beers at the bar on the way home from work, lottery tickets, etc. I don't think my little vice is too harmful! ?

In the context of their relative cost, it's a matter of expecting little and sometimes getting a lot. Sadness and humor... When dealing with these reels, I find no sadness but need to maintain a sense of humor! "Whaddya expect for sixty bucks?" ?

I broke the top six inches off one of my two 6' UL Panfish Series spinning rods yesterday while putting it into the rod locker. ? I guess this might be an opportunity to order and try a Premier...

Thanks. I'll take a more careful look at those parts. This little reel might be my most capable at throwing very light baits. The line-behind-the-spool issue does sound very annoying but it usually only happens in conjunction with a backlash, so I can sort of say it's my own fault when it happens. (For instance, like when my lure hit the top of the trolling motor on a roll cast yesterday... world class rat's nest.)

I have a couple of really nice BFS type reels but I have a lot of fun messing around with cheap Chinese BFS offerings like the Tsurinoya XF50 and Spirit Fox, KastKing Zephyr (just got it), and Fishband GH100 Brilliance. They share the deck with my Daiwa PX Type R and Alphas SV105 and have landed some big fish. The GH100 has been one of my favorite cheap BFS reels but it's not without its issues. One is the spool rim to frame fit, which allows the 4lb. test mono I use to sometimes get behind the spool. The other issue is some kind of internal hang-up with the position of the pinion gear, I think. Every so often, the reel starts clattering or grinding on retrieve. Hitting the spool release and re-engaging it doesn't clear it, but manually turning the spool with my finger will. It doesn't happen a lot but it's annoying, and a reminder of why these kind of reels cost around sixty bucks rather than three hundred or more. I had the reel completely apart to carefully clean and lube it and check it for worn or broken parts. Any idea where to start tweaking things?

He'll probably be OK! When I was fishing this afternoon, I came up on a log that was right at the outside edge of the weedline. I had a shallow crank bait on and couldn't throw past the log to get a retrieve by it due to the weeds, so I threw the bait right next to the exposed top of the log and let it sit, then gave it a little twitch. It disappeared in a swirl and I set the hook. It turned out to be a big White Crappie. It had the front treble in its mouth the rear treble was stuck in its eye. Sometimes it happens...

This is why I asked... I had also read about the aviation industry not using soldered connections. That says a lot. I bought an expensive crimp tool last year for making up some ham radio stuff. I had the right jaws for the tool and connectors to do the trolling motor plug, so that's what I used. It was a royal PITA installing the new Motorguide. It was impossible to get to the nuts/washers under the mount and I had to cut out a bit of aluminum below the deck so I could get my arm under the bow to get the old mount off and bolt on the new one. In hindsight, I really think I might have been able to just clamp the new Motorguide into the MinnKota mount that was already on the boat! Doh! I got out and fished for about six hours to try it out. All is good. The momentary foot switch is on the opposite side of the foot pedal than the one that was on my MinnKota. The switch is also much longer so I think it will allow me to fish barefoot, which I couldn't do with the MinnKota as the length of my size 16 feet had the ball of my bare foot past the small foot switch. The switch was under the top of my arch so I wasn't able to depress it without shoes or at least sandals on. My only complaint is that the foot control requires a lot more effort to operate than the MinnKota pedal did. That may be because it's brand new or the cable tension might be a little too tight. I'll check it out.

THUMP! Oh, what a feeling! I bet you'll be throwing nothing but a jig for at least a week.

My Weller is 100W/140W but I also prefer to use a propane torch for large gauge wire soldering. I just wanted to double-check with any experienced folks to be sure there wasn't some weird reason not to solder the connection. The connections will be individually and jointly covered with heat shrink tubing and treated with Corrosion-X. Thanks

The MinnKota Edge 45lb. trolling motor that came on my Tracker Pro170 is failing after almost seven years of good service. I had initially thought I would want to replace it right away but I didn't really have any complaints with it, other than sometimes wishing there were more than just five different speed settings on it. I have a new Motorguide X3 Digital 55lb. 12V motor arriving today. I found one in stock through WalMart's website, strangely enough, and it included next day FedEx delivery! The product page just said "Free Delivery" so the next-day thing was a nice surprise. I had e-mailed Bass Pro to find out which power plug would fit the receptacle already in my boat but haven't heard from them. Since the motor is arriving today, I'd like to install it right away and use the old plug. I noticed the new plugs have crimp-on connectors on the pigtails. If I'm unable to find those in the only hardware store in my rural town, would soldering be acceptable? I had always though soldering was the preferred way to connect wiring but have read that the good crimp-on connectors are sometimes preferred. I have a Weller gun that's big enough and can do a good job. Thanks for any advice, Bob

Most all of the budget options work well and you don't know what you're missing until you try a higher-end product. Then, it can sometimes be hard to go back...

I guess that might be a tendency of a lot of the Chinese BFS reels. I fished my Fishband GH100 (Aldebaran knock-off) almost around the clock yesterday and the line (4lb. hybrid) went behind the spool about a half-dozen times.