Rookie Fisherman

Nice report. What water temps were you recording?

40-43

You can also put a little more angle on the single keel. Just make a new hole and slide the rear of the keel over a little bit. This will help it to pull better.

It was cold! but sunny! Fished 4pm to sunset.

Went 15 for 20. Biggest 8 pounds. All Browns.

43 degree water, 8-12 feet. 2.0-2.2 mph

Bomber pearl at 125-150' of the boards took the most shots followed by Sutton #44 silver w/orange tape 5' down 20' back in the wash. Smithwick fire tiger, A/C Shiner Black/Silver & Stinger Alewife all took a hit or two.

It was a good first outing, couple tangles but no real issues.

I had a couple of coldwater reels and i was completely disappointed. The drag was sticky and never worked right. I contacted Okuma and they upgraded me to the catalinas ( I paid the difference ). So here i am with 200 dollar top of the line Okumas and guess what? They suck....same sticky drag. Not what you would expect out of a "top of the line"reel. In the end i sent them to Tuna Toms. Just got them back today and they dont even feel like the same reels. Extremely smooth...Tuna Toms did an outstanding job. I very well may send all of my reels to him next fall for an overhaul. Tight lines and keep thinking spring!

Sent from my VS980 4G using Lake Ontario United mobile app

I have some Okuma's both Convectors and Magdas. The Magdas I use primarily for BT in the spring. Recently I was looking to upgrade these, 4 total.

So I started doing some research on the Coldwaters. Read a bunch of poor reviews and the general problem was "sticky drag" as mentioned above.

Most said when you adjusted the drag you had to pull several feet of line for the drag to adjust to the new setting.

Okuma is aware of this problem and has supposedly corrected the issue. The ones being shipped now should be good to go.  

So with that in mind I ordered 4 of these (203's). Received them last week, so the first thing I did was play with the drags.

They seem just fine.....the real test will come this spring.

All that being said I do like the overall look & feel of this reel. If the drags hold up its a nice piece of equipment for the money.

I have one that will be available in about a week or two.

2012 Bunk Painted Black. 3500 lb single axle. Apprx 2700 pound carry capacity. 

I had an aluminum boat on it 19'1" L.O.A. with a 8'6" beam.

Paint has some chips in it (especially the cross members) from a road trip through Canada 2 summers ago.

I am selling it because I have a new trailer being built. With 2 motors, tank full of fuel and all my gear I am over capacity.

Other than that its good to go.

Open to an offer. I'll see if I can find a photo......Hadn't planned on listing it for sale until I get it back from the trailer manufacture as they have my boat and old trailer.

I am located in Saratoga NY. I will be in the Oswego area for 10 days in April and could bring it with me then if you are interested.

You can PM if you like

Thanks

Rod

I have one of these as well. I contacted Fish Hawk with this same question. Here is their response...

"The X4D does not display surface speed. We use the same transducer for the regular X4, we leave the wheel in place because we want everything that is mounted to the boat permanently to be forward and backward compatible, so service and upgrades down the road can be done without drilling new holes in the boat"

One would assume it has all the features of the X4 plus the addition of depth at the probe.....their advertising needs to state that it does not have surface speed.  

Here is some photos of the Panther one installed. I think its actually the same as one of the Stearns models.

Simple install. Works well. Motors can be lifted up & down idependently as there are ball joints on each end. 

Also has quick disconnects on each end. I added a Troll Master Pro 2.....the two together really work well for trolling.

Planned on fishing Oswego/Mexico are this weekend but the wave forecast not so good for Sunday.

Thought I might try Henderson as there will be some wind/wave protection.

Never fished that area.....any advice/info would be great.

can you put "it comes standart with a mercury" as a con also

I'm not going to bite

I put a 150 4 stroke EFI on it...so far about 50 hours on it with out a hick up. Also put a PRO-Kicker 9.9 with a pro-troll 2. So far very happy with that set up as well. 

Ill give you my 2 cents.......I own the very boat you mention Targa V18 (2012).... I'll give you a little background first 

I spent 10+ years working in the Marine industry at the retail level. Worked as both as sales rep and a Store manager.

Was resposible for boat sales, ordering from manufactures etc etc. I always had a Aluminum boat as my demo as I liked to fish.

In addition I have owned several different aluminum boats over the years. Smokercraft , Crestliner, Sylvan, Starcraft, Grumman, 2 Trackers  and maybe 1 or 2 more I cant remember.

I did have one with a leaking hull brand new from the factory....it was a Smoker....they took care of it with no trouble. 

All other boats no significant issues.

As for Tracker hull issues. I also read some of the horror stories on line when I was researching for my current boat. 

I looked at it like this. Bass Pro shops is a marketing & retail powerhouse. Tracker far and away sells more aluminum boats than anybody in the industry. (This doesnt make them the best just the biggest). They sell more in some months then many other manufactures do in a year. With all of these sales they have a greater exposure so you are more likely to hear and read about problems. With the amount of boats they sell each year the odds of having one with hull troubles probably isnt that much greater than from another manufacture.

As for the new Targa, the good and the bad

The Bad

On the way home from the dealer I blew a tire....had no spare of course. Tracker paid for 2 new radials to be installed at a local tire shop (trailer did not come with radials from the factory)

Not long after I got it home I noticed a defect in the paint. I took it to a local body shop and the local Tracker Dealer (not where I purchased it though) It was everyones conclusion that there must have been some damage to the paint like a large scrape or something and a repair was attempted instead of repainting the side of the boat. After a little bit of going back and forth with Tracker they agreed to pay for that side to be repainted. They sent the paint, the decals and the check no problem.

My only complaint with the design of the boat so far is the bow area is very tight...but this leaves more room in the back.

The Good

The Beam is 102" widest in its class.

Wide gunnels for mounting DR's (you will need to plate underneath them)

Handles rough water well for a boat its size 

Price. 8-10K less then the Higher end boats with alot of the same features. This is money you can use to outfit the boat.

Boat Comes standard with a 115HP....spend the extra and get the 150.

I would certainely recommend looking at the Lunds, the Crestliners and Alumacrafts

Sorry for the long post....just wanted to give you as much info as I could 

Hope some of this help....Good Luck with the sale of your old boat and the purchase of the new one.