therivermonster

I was in my local BPS today to look the boat over again and pick up a few jigs. I remembered this post, so I decided to give the show boat prop a few good yanks. That Merc prop had a 32nd or so longitudinal play along the shaft as well. Must be normal.

Yep. I ordered mine this last Saturday, but the rep said that Tracker was out as far as the end of July or August at this point. Others have reported that some dealers won't even quote a time frame now because the info provided isn't proving to be any good. Who knows. I was told that if I ordered a boat I would get one, so that's all I'm betting on.

After looking the boat over a number of times at our local Bass Pro and researching the boat online, I put a deposit down this last Saturday. The Tracker rep was very informative about the process, but it sounds like I'll have to wait until at least August before my boat gets built. I suppose I'll have plenty of time to prepare for it. I also mentioned my concerns to the rep about quality being sacrificed for quantity, but he assured me that every boat is being meticulously built just as all Tracker boats have been. I hope this is true. Fingers crossed!

Both rods are very nice. It's nice that St. Croix is made in the US, but the Dobyn's rod is at least as light and as sensitive as the Croix, and the finish on the Dobyn's is nicer. The guides on the Dobyn's are also nicer. I like my Avid a lot, but my next rod will be another Dobyn's. I also found that medium power Croix is about comparable to the medium heavy Dobyn's rod. @fisher-o-men, I like em long and strong. There is no pun intended there.

I just posted the stuff below for another member with the same concerns. The pics below are of an Avid X caster, but I own a 7' ML Avid X as well and the guides are identical. **From a previous post** Here are some details of a couple of my setups regarding how the FG knot fits "micro vs standard" guides. In the two examples that I show below, we'll look at the guides on my 7' MF Avid X casting rod next to my Dobyn's 733c with standard guides. The Dobyn's is spooled with Power Pro slick 30lb braid to Sunline Sniper 12lb FC while the Avid X is spooled with 30lb Suffix 832 with a Sunline Sniper 7lb leader. The tip guide on the left is the Avid with the right being the Dobyn's. You can see that the FG knot doesn't take up much room in the micro guide of the Avid. The knot travels in and out of the micro guides of this rod just fine and really isn't much larger than the diameter of the mainline or leader. I measured the ID of the standard tip guide on the Dobyn's, and it showed 3.39mm. I'm not sure if this is correct, but it may be close. The calipers wouldn't fit into the micro guide, so no luck there. Micro guides come in different diameters with some getting really tiny from what I have heard, so take all of this with a grain of salt. From my experience, if you want to run a leader on your Avid X, you shouldn't have a problem if you're tying a good FG knot and probably other joining knots. I had these same concerns, so I'm happy to help. Let me know if there is any other way I can help.

Apologies for taking so long to get back. Here are some details of a couple of my setups regarding how the FG knot fits "micro vs standard" guides. In the two examples that I show below, we'll look at the guides on my 7' MF Avid X casting rod next to my Dobyn's 733c with standard guides. The Dobyn's is spooled with Power Pro slick 30lb braid to Sunline Sniper 12lb FC while the Avid X is spooled with 30lb Suffix 832 with a Sunline Sniper 7lb leader. The tip guide on the left is the Avid with the right being the Dobyn's. You can see that the FG knot doesn't take up much room in the micro guide of the Avid. The knot travels in and out of the micro guides of this rod just fine and really isn't much larger than the diameter of the mainline or leader. I measured the ID of the standard tip guide on the Dobyn's, and it showed 3.39mm. I'm not sure if this is correct, but it may be close. The calipers wouldn't fit into the micro guide, so no luck there. Micro guides come in different diameters with some getting really tiny from what I have heard, so take all of this with a grain of salt. From my experience, if you want to run a leader on your Avid X, you shouldn't have a problem if you're tying a good FG knot and probably other joining knots. I hope this helps and happy fishing. Temps are coming up!!

For what it's worth, I run two Avid X rods and both work just fine with leaders when tied with the FG knot, but that's the only knot I use for leaders so I can't comment on any others. I also try to keep my FG knots nice a slim and make sure you trim the tag end of your mono, floro, etc very close to your half hitches so it doesn't hang in the guides. I would say the only thing to stay away from is leaders from 2 - 6 feet long. I've found with micro guides that either a very short leader (one that doesn't enter the guides), or a leader that goes all the way to the reel is best. If your leader knot is between your tip guide and your reel it is easier to hang on the cast due to having less momentum compared to being further back in the reel where it has more time to speed up when casting. When it all boils down to it, it's not going to be a problem most of the time, so I try not to overthink it. I can send some pics of the knot in the guides if you want.

Hi Austin, I responded to your response in my thread just a bit ago. I have had good success in a number of lakes not to far from Tacoma. All it takes is the time to get out fishing. Are you just getting started fishing in the area?

I haven't fished any lakes near Enumclaw, but I have been scuba diving in Lake Tapps. We saw a ton of large mouth just hanging out. They would come right up to us. The is my PB caught this last Friday evening on black buzz bait. She put up a great fight. I don't have a scale, so I don't know the weight. :/ Who says WA doesn't have any decent sized bass?!!

Hello friends, I live in the Tacoma area and would like to meet up with some fellow bass anglers to snag some fish. If you want to meet up to do a bit of fishing, drop me a PM or reply to the thread. Take care, -Blane

Hi benjy, Ideally you'll want to put as few holes in your boat as possible, however there are techniques that work better than others when you do have to make holes. I would suggest researching kayak rigging options. You'll find the techniques and hardware necessary to get the job done by looking that stuff up. Take care, -Blane

I use a separate small gel cell battery. Using the same battery can cause interference with your graph as far as I understand.

I was able to get out early this past weekend for a a few hours of fishing on my usual lake again. It was nice a dark when I got started. I'm not sure how yall night fisherman do it when it's dark. How do you see where you're throwing? Anyhow, I promised pictures of the little table once it was finished, so here it is in all of its orange glory. I started the morning off using a buzz bait which caught one 8 incher, and had a few more hits. From there it was on to the poppers which took one fish, then the X Rap. The morning bite had gone much slower than I had expected. I had ordered some Keitech stuff from Tackle Warehouse a couple weeks back, but had yet to try any of it, so I figured with the bite slow anyhow, I might as well try it out. I used one of their weedless jig heads with a 4" Swing Impact swim bait. You can see the jig head and the bait on the table above. Once it was rigged up, I gave it a quick little throw off the boat to see what all the fuss was about with the action of this bait. Well, I guess the fuss is warranted because this first cast which wasn't even meant to catch a fish was slammed on the drop by a nice little LM. After this it was fish after fish on this rig. I also rigged up one of the Keitech Easy Shiners which did catch fish, but not nearly as many as the Swing Impact. Two things are for sure. These Keitech swim baits do catch fish, and they are fragile. I think the most fish I was able to catch on one of the 4" Swing Impacts was four of five. I've ordered some Mend It glue to patch them back up once they get torn up. We'll see how it works. At any rate, it was a good day of fishing with lots of fish around. Alright friends. Until next time...

The mods might move this thread before you get the chance to read this, but check out the Electronics section of the forum for more info than you have time to read. There is a ton of great info on side imaging and sonar in general in that section, but you will probably read and hear that time on the water with your unit is going to be the most effective way to get to know what you are looking at. Have fun!

I took the Bass Raider out this past Saturday with my brother for an early morning trip. The top water action was awesome. We ended up fishing from 6:00 AM till 4:00 PM. The Raider ready for action. I used to fish a tone as a kid. My family owns a little cabin on this lake so I spent a lot of time exploring and fishing out here growing up, but I haven't been fishing for many years until recently. I have also never targeted bass specifically, so this has been quite an adventure. The Bass Raider is making it a lot of fun as well. I started the morning out throwing a black buzz bait. I had never caught a fish on that bait, or the pole or reel that I was using. I had recently read about loosening the drag on your reel to help the reel last longer, so I did that after using the reel the last time (Curado). Well, I had forgot to tighten it up this morning. The morning was quiet and beautiful. My brother was throwing a Rap, and I was tossing my buzz to docks and other cover on the shore. I gave my buzz a nice toss up next to rotting dock. Nothing. The spot looked it should be holding a fish seeing as it was on a bit of a point, so I tossed the lure again. Something was different this time; I couldn't get that buzz bait back to the surface. "Snagged", I thought. Darn. Then my pole began to shake a bit like it would if a fish were on, but it felt soft. I started reeling in a quickly as I could, but I wasn't pulling any line. I looked down at the spool on the Curado and it was going the wrong direction. Quickly I set the drag, then bam. The tip of the rod bent and the fight was on. I ended up pulling a nice 4 pounder which is my PB. He got the main hook as well as the trailer. A little later I switched to a Hula Popper which is a lure I've never used. I killed on that bait, and it was a blast. I pulled this little guy which was my next biggest for the day. It was a great day of fishing. We'll be headed out early this coming Saturday for some clear, deep lake smallie action. Take care, everyone.