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The Lake Troll series is for smaller water. I would avoid it if it has the line counter on the swivel at the end of the boom. The digital (like on a clicker) line counters by the spool are much nicer.

Cannon and Big Jon are probably the most popular brands followed by Scotty. The Cannon Uni-troll series of manual riggers are a nice rigger to target for entry level. Really rigger brands turns into a Ford/Chevy/Dodge debate as to which is best.

10 lb weights are the lowest I would go with for riggers. You got good advice on the boom length, 4' is a pretty standard Cannon length and my personal preference. The extendable booms are nice, but the fixed length are fine too. For boom length, all you need to ensure is the end of rigger where the cable goes into the water clears your boat/swim platform (and drive). 

Dipsey's were mentioned, They are an easy / cheaper way to get rods out than riggers. It looks like you already have 3 flush mount rod holders per side. You can run dipsey rods out of the two further forward. A drop in multi mount rod holder is nice, but not necessary. When I started, we didn't have rod holders, so we would wedge our rod buts between the seat and engine dog house!

Nice fish, way to go! Thanks for the report.

There is nothing wrong with manual riggers. Advantages are lower cost, higher weight capacity (than some electrics), and better biceps! Make sure the riggers you select have a long enough boom to clear the swim platform. Swivel bases are nice, but not necessary. They can also help with the clearance issue.

Gill-T is awesome at explaining the charts and how he uses them. I know I have gone back to his posts many times to review them.

Regular or Stingray size Stingers always worked best for me. Dreamweaver Super Slim sizes as well. Spoons with orange are popular. Spoons with a white back have been popular lately too, such as DWB.

Nice, I will be up Thursday, keep the good news coming. I hope the weather holds well enough.

I love the DW DWB pattern. I have done well on that one! Keep up the good reports. I 'll be out of Olcott starting late next week. Can't wait and loving the live reports until then.

Talk to Frank at Amish Outfitters, he will help you out.

Thanks Sk8man, that is what I was looking for. The two bolt patterns on the swivel base cover both sets of bolt holes.

Does anyone know what the bolt pattern is for the older square cannon downrigger bases with the lip at the top (i.e. the one used on Unitroll and magnum riggers)? Also, do you know what the bolt pattern is on the older style swivel base as well? I'm looking at upgrading some mounting plates, but the boat is still in storage so I can't take measurements. Thanks. 

The Amish boards pull very hard. They are fine on a Big Jon planer mast, so I think they would work on the Berts too. Plenty of people use them in Erie for walleye, and that is up to 3-4 lines per side. I'd recommend also using the Amish outfitters planer board line with them, it is pretty high test.  

Fished out of Olcott on Friday and Saturday. On Friday we worked 300-400' closer to Wilson. The bite was slow, couple of steelhead on 10 color cores, and a couple kings on flasher / fly's. The big 20+ king came off a rigger at 100', white / white glow spinny, gold/green fly. Picked a coho on a 175 diver on a 3 setting.

Saturday the waves were going pretty good, but so was the bite. We fished deeper in the 375 to 400' range around the 53 west. Couple coho on flasher/flys on 150 3 setting wires. Another big 20+ king on a mag dipsy back 225 and a good mix of smaller kings on the rest of the spread: 75 riggers and 1.5  dipsys at 175. The current going one direction and the wind blowing in another made setting lines challenging at times. Flasher / fly's were hot, the spoon bite was slow. Tried some meat, but couldn't get that to go.

Awesome, thanks to both of you.

Can anyone point me in the direction of the water temperature maps where Lake O is cross sectioned? All I can seem to find are surface and bottom temp maps. I know some people have posted these before, but I can't find them...

Sounds good, I have run two dipsys per side on Erie plenty of times, usually on a 1.5 and 3 setting, but they were the same size dipsy. I was unsure about mixing sizes, but I'll try it now.

Has anyone ever run the mag dipsys and a large (conventional dipsy) on the same side? I was wondering if this can be done. If so, would you set the smaller dipsy on a 3 setting and the mag on a 1.5 setting?

I suggest a snubber, I had the wire pull out of a crimp on the Fish Hawk break away leader when I hit a wave with the ball up causing it to bounce hard. I still had the probe but lost the ball. So good for the 100lb test if the crimp fails. Now I use the Amish downrigger snubber and a the breakaway, but I re-did it with the cannon style crimp ends.

Luhr Jensen snubbers dry rot. Try the Amish Outfitters ones if you want to run snubbers.

On Erie the rubber bands are pretty popular. Another option for attaching them to your tow line is to use the cheap caribeaners (like those people give away for a key chain). You can get bulk packs of these on ebay and they slide down your tow line nicely since they have some mass to them.  

I think Amish Outfitters has light and med rubber bands too. The red colored bands work best.

I think it is more lake specific. I don't recall ever seeing a set of Otter boards on the western & central end of lake Erie, even on charters. I've seen lots of big boards though, even bigger than the Amish ones. Especially in the central basin, the charters will run 4-6 lines per side so you need lots of pull.

Two teens and one screamer mix of spoons and ff150 to 450

So just to make sure I understand this correctly, instead of looking for colder water, like I would have done later in the year. Now I am looking for warmer water? Thanks for the help.

Any advice on fishing out of Olcott this weekend? This is only our second salmon trip, last year we fished the end of July, so I figure things have to be a bit different. It seems pretty quite report wise from that area. We are more interested in having fun catching some fish than targeting a specific species.  Thanks for any help/advice.