PhishLI

You're not alone. The most talented, multi-discipline machinist I've ever come across was in the same boat. He was also a master fixture designer and could conceive and fabricate them too. But get him out of the shop and his mind turned off it seems. Having to assemble a barbeque would turn his brain to goo. Hands shaking and sweat dripping. It was mystifying. And there lies the problem. Two local shops close to me have good reps according the normies, but I've had a clear line of sight to their practices. Your prized reel gets tossed naked other than a tag into a large box with many others. Shots of WD-40 sprayed in before they closed them up. Never.

Another benefit is that you won't end up spinning-out in your head over the slightest squeak or noise.

If you've been taking things apart and putting them back together since you were able to grasp a screwdriver, then a bait caster is a dumb-simple thing to work on. If your knees start knocking when your wife asks you to assemble an IKEA desk, then working on a reel probably isn't for you. If you're somewhere in between, there are plenty of YT reel maintenance and breakdown vids that will help to familiarize you with the process.

Here's just one. Fish Arrow Heavy Poop Stick Bait | Tackle Warehouse I use the 3.6"

I'm generally a 7'3"-7'6" type. However, I picked up a Tatula Elite 6'9" HF specifically for certain spots where I'd be wading out and fishing under low, overhanging tree branches. It's listed as a skipping rod, so it has some tip. More like a MHF tip but it gets into a heavy backbone. I thought it would be just for this situation, but I can't put it down. It's more versatile across its rating than I thought it would be, and I'm not losing much distance when casting compact, heavier baits. Also, I'm often fishing from an un-decked Jon boat, so with my feet being over a foot below the waterline when I'm standing it's the perfect length for skipping.

OK. A priest, a rabbi, and a mullah walk into a nudie bar...

There are other things that matter when you're fishing a heavy-wire hook on a low-stretch setup. Try to avoid keeping your rod tip low and pointed directly at the bait once you've reeled out the slack after a cast. You don't want your line coming out in a straight-line from your reel to the bait. A slight bit of give is available when stroking or dragging a jig by keeping your rod at an angle to the line or generally keeping the tip higher as you work the bait back. Also, if you notice that you're tightly gripping your rig, take a chance and relax your grip a little. That'll also impart just a little "give" into the system. The first part of a hit you'll feel is when they suck it in where the metal bangs through their lips or on the back of their mouths, and then a split second later when their tongue grips the bait against the roof of their mouth. That's right when you want to set the hook, when you feel that pressure and the fish's weight. You should be successful swinging on them but there's always the chance that they might be in the process of ejecting the bait where they won't catch the hook's point at all, and ain't nothing you can do about that. I was never really a blown-hookset-machine, but it happened enough for me to try to figure out why. I initially thought about what I was doing in total then adjusted my approach when fishing chatterbaits on a MHF or a Fast rod and straight braid. My miss-rate diminished greatly. This translated directly not only to heavy wire baits but somewhat lighter single hooks too when fished on stouter, fast rods.

This?

This comes down to putting in time over a long period of time and recognizing what's happening when it happens. It's easy to jump to conclusions based on random successes or failures, but over time you'll find there are real nuances you'll need to pay attention to. Having the flexibility and willingness to get out at different times also helps to build your data base. What was true today isn't often what'll be true tomorrow, especially in a place like Ronk. It's more dynamic with regard to bait movement than any other place around here. Shock survey data shows that the biggest bass on the island live there, but the impossibly dense grass fields give them so many places to hide. Finding hot bite windows where they're roaming on grass line edges or feeding up is the key, and that happens almost exclusively during darkness.

He fishes the NPFL.

Ronkonkoma is the Rubik's cube of lakes here. Very difficult to crack and seemingly only streaky when you do. Just thousands of square feet of monolithic, tightly packed, tall, thick grass which until this year's high water came right up to the surface. It's been low for the previous 4 years. Snag it with a crank or anything else and you'll uproot a plant 15 feet long from the sandy bottom and it'll feel like you're winding in a wet, velcro, beach towel. Because the water only came up this year, you'll find hard bottom from the old weed edge up to the tree-brush line all along the shore. Your best bet is fishing low light in these zones as bait fish push up right against the shoreline. LM, SM, and large schools of Walleye and Crappie come in to smash them. Find a hot zone like where the feeder creek from Lily Pond meets the big lake and you can hit the jackpot. That zone heading back to Victory ramp always has activity at night or very early morning. Once the sun's back up everything buries back into the grass. Punching those weed edges closest to the shore is a good strategy during early morning sessions. There are others too. You just need to be there at the right time as schooling predators are constantly pushing the bait all around. This leads to either random catches or unreal jackpots. I've had my sickest day of fishing ever there, but also my worst arse kickings.

Get some of this Mend-It Softbait Glue | Tackle Warehouse, and after you get home fix them almost endlessly. You wouldn't believe how many times I've salvaged baits over and over again.

Straight from the horse's mouth.

Meh in comparison to the Owner CPS. I swap them off of VMC Drop Dead hooks for the Owner's.

Just a suggestion. Order a pack of Owner CPS (L) too. I swap out the stock medium CPSs every time if the plastic will accommodate the large. The larges rarely core-out the plastic after a bite where the mediums will more often. Owner CPS Centering Pin Spring | Tackle Warehouse

Thought for sure our every other weekend john boat trip would be cancelled yet again because my brother had to work a double, but he found his 3rd wind and toughed it out for as long as he could. Within an hour and a half, he must've nodded out about 10 times only to be woken by his own snoring or by me tapping him on the shoulder. In between snoozes he bagged a good one on the Legal Dope Tiny Tum and mine came on a Berkely Grass Pig within minutes afterward. I couldn't row through the slop and topped out weeds by myself any longer while he slept, so we called it a win and split.

Except the Daiwa CC and CA 80s are built by Doyo. MagTrax brakes too.

It can be on reels without a fast pitch level wind, especially 4 strand braid. I use 30lb Daiwa J8 on my most used reels without worry of dig in as it doesn't happen when fishing baits sometimes up to an ounce in very weedy water.

If the bearing is calling for lube, then no. Magseal isn't a miracle, and it isn't critical for the proper operation of the reel. It will get expressed out of a bearing like any other lubricant. In fact, I've seen it migrate out of the relatively slow-moving outer crank bearing and weep into the IAR bearing causing it to slip. My advice: Just use it until it needs service then have it serviced locally with conventional lube, even if it sees occasional unintentional salt water. Forget using Daiwa for a JDM reel too. They'll bop you on the head for $ and take forever to turn it around as your JDM reel won't be considered eligible for the executive service plan as you didn't pay the up-front premium from a US retailer.

Magseal is nothing more than a magnetic fluid/oil used in certain bearings in the reel. Do you fish the salt? If you don't, there's no reason not to replace it with standard oil or grease when the time comes to service the reel. I have and it works just fine.

Pretty much. Unless you're fishing ultra clear deep water for pressured smallmouth you shouldn't worry about it at all. In my opinion largemouth don't care and I have good evidence that they don't. My local waters are very shallow with depths no greater than 4 feet or so within a long cast and are pretty much topped out with weeds in every direction. Using these places as an example is pretty meaningless. However, I can give a very good example of why I don't think largemouth care much about line. I've been fishing one particular lake with my son in law for the past 8 years. It's the only place he goes to. We call it bass paradise. It has everything. Grassy shallows, ledges, points, steep drop offs into very deep water right off the bank in some places and off long flats in others and several large coves with Lily pads, reeds, eel grass, and occasional milfoil. It has a creek channel feeding out to the salt which allows for an Alewife/River Herring population. The water is very clear as no chemical pesticides are allowed by law and the surrounding town residents comply, so algae is nonexistent there. When I first started going with him, he considered himself a finesse fisherman and used nothing but clear 6lb mono. He caught fish, but so did I when using straight 30lb or 50lb braid. The difference was that I could fish zones he couldn't, and he'd break off with better fish a bit too much while I never did. 2 years in I pressured him to a MH baitcasting rig with straight braid and he was finally able to fish the zones I could. I also got him into fishing jigs. As a consequence, he caught way bigger fish regularly while rarely missing a hookset, and never breaks off unless a monstrous Pickeral gets on. Not much one can do about that. However, wood and brush piles aren't a factor here besides a scant few laydowns, and are the only places where I might tie on a heavy fluoro or mono leader but rarely do. Location followed by bait selection/profile is the biggest factor in bagging better largemouth, IMO. Not the line type. If you learn to fish a semi-slack line, the no-stretch feedback you get from straight braid or braid to a short leader is fantastic. I've never had a bass swallow a bait using braid mainline, just the rare and unfortunate tongue hooking, so hooksets are positive and typically on the roof of the mouth or lip.

But you can if you use these: I routinely fish them through this:

Just a suggestion. When the new one comes in, and even if the box looks fine, quickly go out and cast something several times at the rod's stated weight limit. The box might've still gotten flexed which could've damaged the blank. It took my brother 5 times once to get an undamaged rod. They kept shipping the replacements in those absurd boxes over and over again.

Just buy and use these religiously and they'll stay nice forever. The Rod Glove Casting Reel Glove | Tackle Warehouse

From where? Was it in a rod tube or one of those triangular boxes taped together?