mriversinco

Wow, very nice job!

Agree with above. You can always adjust the 7 color deeper but it's hard to make a full core go shallower without doing something that could damage the line.

Thanks frank!

pm sent......

Hi Ron, I've had similar problems with my crestliner. I think they're hard to center because of them being aluminum and floating so high. Mine moves like crazy in the back end area while I'm trying to crank it up. I made some guides out of pvc for it and easily broke them about the 2nd time out. The boat floats high but is still pretty heavy when it moves. I actually put a fiberglass marker post up on mine like what I use to mark my driveway during the winter. I know if the boat is 2" from that "flag" then it's centered, plus it gives if the boat moves or is brought in crooked. If you go with the guides I would say the roller looks beefier and that's what you'd need for a rigid guide.

Great fish Mark!

Nice job Mike.

I'd personally say the 300 of 45 is a given. The other i would shorten it up to 250 or 200 of the 32 pound.

the first thing I would think about adding is some long leadcore lines and a dipsey on each side. For the dipsey start with braid and get used to it before you add wire. I'd also start with lead before going to copper. It'll get you used to those long lines without the pain of copper. You'll need a dipsy rod (stiffer) and any reel that has a decent drag. For lead core you'll need a reel that's a little bigger than most downrigger reels but you can use the rigger rods. You'll then need planer boards for the lead and dipseys for the other. You'll also need some rod holders on the side of your boat. Fairly upright for the lead and prefer horizontal for the dipsey. That's a good start to think about....

Way to go Mark!

I've always thought the being able to rack fish at speed was the transducer as much as the fish finder.

Well, it's been a LONG time coming but finally got our first trip in. Talking to people in the morning and it wasn't looking promising but we still went out of Holland about 4pm. The first few hours were an absolute nothing, but then we started picking fish up here or there. They're really spread out and all over the place. Ended up 5 for 9 or so. Went through a school of coho and lost 3 of 4 during one stretch. 2 pretty big kings, 2 coho and a laker. Can't believe how spread out everything was. Had the laker on a 5 color mixed veggies and lost a nice steelie on a FF on a rigger at 110. Isn't that backwards??? Oh yeh, fished from 100' to a little over 210' and didn't pick up fish until heading back in from 210. One other thing, looks like my 6 year old son is finally old enough to put the rod in the holder and bring in small salmon by himself. Here's what worked: big king on RV flounder pounder on low diver set at 1 and 240 feet out. big king on 10" mountain dew, glow spinnie with glo-nad fly. Coho on moonshine carbon full core. Coho on stinger nbk pulling the lure back in through after being release on a rigger. Laker on 5 color mixed veggies slim. Seemed that all the fish hit either on turns or on purposeful speed changes. Anywhere from 2.0 to 3.0 Good luck out there.

TopDawg, if you want to sell them to me for the price of the new motors I'm all in

When I bought the boat, it came with 2 older cannon mag 10's. They have the auto stop so they can't be too old but I was wondering if anyone has broken one of these apart? This year one of them can barely pull the 10 pound ball up (not to mention trying a 12lb balll) and the other is noticeably getting slower. Is it possible to clean the brushes and stuff of the motor? I see the motors run about $200 and seem to be hard to find so I sure would rather try to clean them up. Thanks for the help.

I have a question about a lowrance lms-350a. The ff came with the boat I bought and works very well. It'll mark fish even when I'm up on plane buzzing out at 35mph, and I really would like to continue using it instead of "upgrading". The problem is that the plastic front screen is getting so sun damaged and pitted that it's difficult to read very well without shading it and getting close. I know it's been out of production forever but wondering if anyone has one laying around that doesn't work that I could get the screen from, or if anyone knows where to get a screen? Thanks Mike

I can't afford the nice roller rods so I went with Okuma Classic Pro dipsey rods and put twillit tips on them. So far the eyes haven't grooved and it's been 2 year so of pretty heavy use. You can find those rods for 25 to 29 on the right sales at times. Oh, and they're 9' rods since I have to get around my out and downs and I run 10' braids behind the wire rods. By far the hottest setup in the boat last year.

Nice job Mike!

Great job, thanks for the report.

Way to go Bob.

Nice job in the tough conditions Mike.

I missed getting in too, if you ever fill in Bob and need some crew let me know.

Dipseys 30 pound floro coppers and lead 20 pound floro but I think I'm going to up it to 30 pound this year. I also run a free slider every time that's a 20 pound mono.

If it keeps raining, I gotta believe that'll help the launch problem.

Wow, very nice boat!

Wow, pricey. Lets see, I'm putting something as expensive as my fishhawk on my line and not the 150 pound rigger wire? I think I'll pass for now.