laker1

I have a 8 hp Honda long shaft with 6 amp alterator to charge cranking battery.

The long shaft gives you great control while trolling compared to short shaft.

Using a 17 ft Lund. The Honda has an aftermarket tiller extension which works well. The trolling speed can be adjusted to reduce speed minutely to your taste / conditions. I like a trolling engine that starts easilly. 

I realize that this topic " Boat Leaks" is concerned with caulking and sealant .

However I would like to share my experience. We almost lost our boat due to aerator failure. The aerator being plastic developed a small crack which shattered over time (years) underneath the rubber piping. I suspect the pipe was over tightened at the factory and vibration from daily boat use did the rest. We just caught it in time!  You can never fully trust plastic.

Hope you all have a great New Year!

Sharing a memory from this year.

Its late September and Bob Holden and I are fishing in Canadian Esox's Musky Tournament. Bob is an accomplished multi species angler.

Fishing has been poor with rain and fog in the morning and bluebird sky in the afternoon. Its now late in the day and we have only time for one more troll at Forest Island.

We released our lures. I let out a Live Target Sucker and Bob let out a white Jake made by Drifter Tackle. Suddenly my line went skyward followed by Bob's.

We looked up and there was an eagle overhead with our cranks, one on each talon. It was frantic! What to do? We reeled it in to the back of the boat. Bob then put his leather gloves on and I found a paddle. At the boat the eagles wings beat like hammers across the stern. I placed the the blade of the paddle between Bob and that great beak. Upside down the bird began to relax. Bob carefully removed the cranks and released the bird. Released the eagle half swam and half flew to Forest Island. There it rested a bit and then flew up on to the highest tree where it perched in disgust.  We continued our troll.

Wish we had a camera.

jim

Congratulations Aspiring,

You have joined a select group of fishermen!

Your trophies look great but nothing beats your son's smile.

Amazing what a little confidence and determination will do!

There will be more and they will be keep getting bigger.

Again well done.

We did sell it with tears! However I have the metal name decals and they are going up on mahogany in a place of honour!

I also kept the the old Union Jack to fly in the boat's memory. 

Try using a River Run Manta or a Drifter Tackle Hellhound glide bait.

Both have a Great sub surface walk the dog action and are easy to operate with a stiff wire leader. Some guys tweek  their cranks with scent or a small dash of sparkle nail polish.

But the most important thing is confidence! You should expect to get bit and you will! 

I expect that we will soon see a picture of your trophy.

A Supernatural Big Bait either a Headlock or a Mattlock because they both wander left and right like a fleeing baitfish on a troll. Natural finish silver or gold  in walleye or cisco. Simply amazing cranks !

Thanks for the interest.

 You are right. We have also listed it at two wooden boat web sights that service those areas.  Frankly it would cost too much to send it down there on spec.

The Athendune is a boat that spent its life on Lake of the Woods.

My apologies to everyone. Here is a picture of my Dad's pride and joy. I could not post the picture using our IPad

Hope it gets done now from our PC.

 My Dad's Chris Craft. We have just listed it for sale at $25,000. The boat features a mahogany hull, with a six cylinder Chris Craft Model "M" engine. Top speed is 35 mph. Recently upgraded with a 12.volt system and has a new fuel filter . The carb has been rebuilt so it just purrs when running.  The boat is in storage at Anola , Manitoba. Hard to let it go!

Here in Ontario we usually have a rodent problem ; otters , skunks or whatever else seeking a winter home in a closed boat away from the cold. My response has always been to use mothballs and great quanities of Mr. Clean placed inside in a container (s) when one of our boats is stored outside. Inside , I also spread it all over the dock when boats are stored in our boathouse. Varmints do not like the smell of soap! Dryer sheets are sometimes included also.

The fuse advice is great !

I put one into my Lund after I found smoke coming out of my transom.  The accessary wires had rubbed against the internal transom. The dash fuses did not blow as they were intended to.  Instead wire in seeking a common ground burned its way to the sending unit on top of the internal fuel tank. I had turned off the ignition just in time. Now I have a fuse block connecting all my wire with individual fuses just before the battery and the battery itself is only connected with two leads.

If you could Roughrider a little more detail please.

I assume your batteries are in series. So if the first is charged to 90% then the charge automatically flows to the second. Have I got it ?  You don't need four battery leads from the solar panel.

^{Interesting topic.}

^{I would like to contribute after noting that there has been already  a similar concern raised about sound and vibration.}

^{Over time, I have been lowly modifying my boat with this in mind.  I have pool noodles in seat pedestals and have used them to surround my batteries. I have remounted my internal battery charger on a foam rubber base. I intend to remount my rigger and other equipment on to a rubber base.  I have used pipe wrap to partially cover my rigger boom. I note in Florida anglers wrap a cut tennis ball around their rigger line believing that this cuts down on unnecessary vibration/sound. My kicker 's transom is covered with a rubber mat. I have found after exploring with a magnet the odd loose bolt or pop rivet/ piece of wire rolling around on top of the aluminum under my sub floor.  In addition I have tested and tightened a few screws and bolts when I found them loose.}

^{Has it made a difference?  I can only say that while it has been hard to measure ; I feel more confident after doing it.}

My customers have been catching kings on Gambler Rigs in Lake Michigan. We took a couple this year on them too. I run them behind a trash can dodger, spin doctors or plain.

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Hi Gambler.

I am admiring your rigs.  How far back do you run your spin n glows behind gang trolls or dodgers for lakers?

jim

I have been a long time Lowrance owner and advocate. Lowrance lost me the day they talked down to me me telling me that my favourite unit should be thrown in the trash rather than try to repair it. I loved that machine! And spent a lot of money that I did not have just to get that unit. It was so special. So when I retired I went to Humminbird and bought their top of the line. I have had no regrets. Humminbird customer service is just great, they are very understanding and no question is a dumb one. My next sonar for boat number two will be a Humminbird!

I have two observations. I fish Lake of the Woods, Ontario.

In the first one while casting for Musky I saw bass, perch and other little fish jumping all over right out of the water in a weed bed. The reason , a school of Muskies had just moved in shallow from the depths . I saw eight large fish next to my boat just passing through en route to the weeds. A couple of them followed my yellow Mepps spinner and I caught one. All the while little fish were just busting out of the water, so there had to be even more Muskies that I didn't see. Reminded me of a tv show I saw featuring salt water fishing.

There have been other times while using minnows for Walleye that we caught both Pike and Musky when it is apparent that the Walleye feeding had shut down and the school had just moved on. Some of these Esox were quite large too! Lots of fun on six pound test.

About 20 + plus years ago I attended a sold out seminar at our local concert hall in Winnipeg Manitoba. There , Charlie White from British Columbia showed us a film he had taken with a camera secured inside a water tight box next to his down rigger ball. He filmed various fish but concentrated on salmon and their reaction to his spoons. He ran his spoons clean and dipped in various attractants. One of his findings was that oily bilge water from his boat was the best attractant. I was fascinated with this revelation. And the commercial scents available at the time seemed to have no effect. Mr. White produced a VHS tape recording his experiment with his full seminar. The tape was at our local library. I also saw the tape featured on Canadian TV.

Despite all this I do wash my lures in Dawn and I do use scent from time to time. But just the same this still mystifies me!

I agree some pictures would be very helpfull. Now is the time to get organized for open water.

I would respectfully like to add a note of caution about the black box thing. Particularly since you are operating an aluminum boat. My dealer told me that he once saw an aluminum boat where all the rivets under water failed. The owner used a black box! I would investigate the bonding wire instead. I think that you will find that your Lund is already bonded. By the way I have a Lund too. Your issue may not have anything to do with your electrical equipment, but do check it out. Instead you may want to consider boat noise/vibration and what causes it - some boats are just quieter than others when they go thru the water. I am adding rubber using pool noodles or whatever to soak up sound and vibration. There was a recent post just before Christmas in which the writer noted that after setting his riggers upon rubber bases that his catch ratio went up. He reasoned that the rubber base prevented offsetting vibrations being transmitted thru the downrigger line. Something to consider, good luck.

Very nice, well done, good to see you catching skis while snow is falling where I am !

Where have you found Shadzillas for sale?

My boat is out of the water with the bilge and drain plugs left open for air flow with internal hatches propped open. However i also leave a pail of mothballs inside all of our boats to discourage crittters. This seems to work. I notice inside our boathouse that liberal splashes of Mr. Clean spread over areas which attract otters also works well. If I had time to think during closing I would also put a rag soaked in Mr. Clean inside another pail in my boat . I store my boat outside on shore close to an otter family. Think I will address this later this month and add another pail. My system isn't perfect because I still find the odd pine comb from squirrels in spring but thats all, touch wood ! One spring my buddy despite taking the same precautions found a racoon family inside his I O. So I guess no matter what you do , stuff happens !

Hope this helps.

A lot of guys on the Chesapeake use .080 weed eater line. You do have to be careful about winding it onto plastic reels under pressure though.

Could you give us a little more detail about what happens when winding under pressure? I almost bought weed eater line last year. I assume weed eater line binds under pressure but would like to be sure.

Thanks

Jim

I found mounting the DR on rubber, including upper side of securing bolts drastically reduces boat hum/engine noise & vibration from going down the line - steel or other. While my catch frequency went up triple. Also, I use a chartreuse 10" flasher six feet behind the ball, with the silver speckled rubber squid 15" behind the flasher (faster action). Last catch 27 lbs. I also learned how to sharpen hooks (new ones too - triangular as it breaks through mouth cartilage easier than round pointed hooks).

Thank you RSF for your observation.

Come next spring I am going to remount my rigger.

Not sure what kind of rubber I should use. Could you tell me what kind of rubber and where you found it so I can use your example and work from there? Was it just your rigger you remounted or did you add a rubber backing anywhere else to absorb noise/ vibration like an American submarine? I also think cut down pool noodles can contribute. Interesting topic.

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Thank you for your humour Tileman Dan. I appreciate where you are coming from!

For you and everyone else I will explain my interest.

I was hoping that these were the Kachman Automatic Trolling Reels sold by Riviera Tackle and they do wind up to bring the planner board in when your boat turns toward the board. I am unsure if these are the type offered for sale. I have seen this system demonstrated by famed Musky guide, Jim Fleming of Drifter 11 Charters and thought that I could use this when I fish for Lake Trout in the spring and Musky later in the season. Fleming is well known for his charters on Lake Erie and Lake St Clair. He also has been the focus of many tv programs and has been featured in many magazine articles.

Should anyone be interested:

The Riviera web site is rivieratrolling.com

The Drifter 11 web site is Drifter2.com

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