kingpossible

Sorry for the late reply. I fish Lake Michigan so the fleas aren't as bad as on Ontario - but I've never had a problem with the rigger wire.

I had to buy online. I got Mason MULTISTRAND Leader Wire - 300 ft of 125lb. I went with "bright" wire but they also have a brown colored wire too. The item number is MS-125. I've been running that for a couple years. I change out the ball swivel connection once a year. http://www.masontackle.com/index.php?l=product_detail&p=144

I didn't want to go to heavier balls - so instead I switched the diameter of the wire. I went with a 125 lb wire instead of the standard 150 lb wire that came with the riggers. It helped!

Usually without fulling tearing out the floor and flotation foam, it's not going to be easy to repair or replace the solid rivets. They do sell stronger aluminum pop-rivets for boat hulls that you can install directly. They do require a stronger than normal rivet tool. Drill/cut out the old rivets, coat the new ones liberally with 5200 sealant and set them. Just as an FYI - if it is an older boat its possible the flotation foam could be saturated in areas adding a lot of extra weight to the boat that you don't know about.

Cut off all the dark meat. Trim into 1" lake trout nuggets. Coat in yellow mustard. Let sit 20 minutes. Coat with your favorite breading. Fry. Enjoy.

This could vary a lot depending on target species and the mood of the fish. I'm guessing you are fishing lake trout from the mention of bells. Lake trout fishing with dodgers I've been running leads of 6-15 ft. Spin doctors in the 10-20 ft. Large white paddles 20-25 feet. I'm not sure about cowbells though. I'm sure some wiser people than me will chime in.

I tend to not set the hook because the fish ussually set it themselves well enough. Keep in mind that if the hook is already set, trying to set it again may just rip it out of the fishes mouth. If you are trolling really slow (less than 1 mph) there might be some who say to set the hook.

I'll run leadcore & copper about 20-30 feet back usually. I have a splice of mono before my braid backing. For copper this seems to soften the blow on an initial hard hit putting less stress/shock on your knots. I'll also experiment a bit with leadcore. Shorter cores with mono backing (5 color or shorter) I'll sometimes let back 100-200 feet more before the planer board when I'm targeting fish in the top 25 fow.

I would think 200 ft minimum. I have one with 200 ft and the other with 300 ft. The deepest I usually fish is about 120 ft down, but I've sent stuff down to 175 before with success. It's nice to have it when you need it.

Not sure about the coho fishing on Lake O (I fish Lake Michigan), but I've had good success running free sliders on my rigger lines. Orange works good.

Here's my suggestion: use dipsy divers and see if that helps your catch rate. Also, extend your leads with spoons to 100 ft or so. If the longer lead works, try one rigger with a short lead and see if it also works. Or, look up how to check for stray voltage on the riggers.

I wouldn't install bronze in the aluminum. You won't know anything is wrong until your transducer punches through the floor and you have a 2" hole in the bottom of your boat. Definitely go with the SS.

I've run it in my downrigger holders with the regular rod tip. I just make sure the rod is at 45 degrees to the water. If you are running it out of dipsey holders with the rod near 90 degrees to the back of the boat, I would think it might cause problems.

The bigger fish will occasionally sink a board, but it doesn't happen too often. It is a little work dragging the board back after 200+ feet of line has been peeled off. I used walleye boards and don't set them to release.

Single spoons certainly do change the action of spoons. The weight behind the spoons determines how quickly and how far it flutters back and forth. As said above, single can make them better or worse. To avoid messing with the spoons, try to select a single hook that weighs very similar to the treble your are removing. I've also found that adding a barrel swivel off the split ring helps the landing ratio because the hook can spin as the fish does too - this works with both singles or trebles. Although you can make this very complicated if you want - I will say that my hookup to landing ratio is normally really good no matter whatever hook i'm using. Last year I was at 75% landing ratio and this year I'm at an 78% landing ratio - with most of the fish getting off being jumping steelhead or coho twisting up the line. That's acceptable to me.

Uh oh! It starts with a small collection - and then it grows... too fast if funds are available. I generally like to run almost all the same brand of spoon at the same time - so that means when I hear a certain spoon is working I end up buying 8 to 12 different colors of that brand. Of course I do make it out quite a bit. I made about 35 trips last year.

For an 8" spin doctor you'll typically run the fly about 18 to 26 inches behind (22-24 inches is probably most common). I like to attach the fly to the hole on the "more action" side (the hole across from the fins not right behind them. When I run them off the downriggers, I use a 15 to 20 ft lead past the release. For spoons, I love the Moonshines, but I would suggest picking up a few non-glow finish spoons as well. I'm not sure what other brands the Ontario guys use as I fish Lake Michigan, but did well with the magnum sized Silverstreak Blue Dolphin last year. I also did well with a variety of Dreamweaver Superslim spoon (pretty much anything orange for steelhead) and a variety of greens and yellows for salmon and purple or black down deep (70+).