stinger

Don't fool yourself. Those fish are vary much active at different times of the day. Run both spoons and flies until you see what they are interested in. That will vary as the day moves on. Also don't be afraid to drop down deeper. Another 10', 20', 30' will make a big difference.

I ran into Dave two weeks ago in Johnson City. He is still making lures and said that he will be at the Watkins Glen show.

Sorry, I can't help you with a launch report. I do have a link of a rotating, live real-time campus view from Cornell University. It is helpful to see what the south end of the lake is like. On clear days you can see some boats on the lake but really helpful to see the mud lines in the spring and other weather conditions. https://sha.cornell.edu/about/facilities/live-campus-view/

This will sound like I'm belly aching because I am. Like the rest of you I'm a Gen I owner and also had nothing but problems right out of the box. Darrell was great to work with in trying to work the bugs out. Multiple phone calls and component replacements to keep me up and runnin'. I bought the Starter kit that had the speed/temp/depth probe and one depth/temp probe. The system never worked good enough for me to consider buying anymore probes . He had to replace the receiver, charger and the speed/depth/temp probe at one time or another. I was down to the one depth/temp probe by early spring this past season and contacted Darrell again to see if he had any Gen I probes available. He said that he wanted to get all the Gen I units out of the market ( I can now see why) and that I could buy a Gen II system for 35% off (that would be about $600.00 for the starter set). Nice offer but no thanks. I don't have another $ 600.00 and hours and hours of jerking around to throw at the Smart Troll until a more reliable Gen III comes out. PS: ditto, same as Fat Trout

I put this post in the classified section but thought that it may get a different set of eyes here. "I'm looking for one or two first generation (1) Smart Troll probes that aren't getting used anymore. I have the black one. Any of the other colors would work."

Amazon has all the lower unit gear oils you would want and you'll have it in a couple days. Rather than spending all the time and money running around central New York you could be fishing

I have the first generation Smart Troll and it works with intermittent success. It is now obsolete and I'm looking for any info on how the Smart Troll II is working. My unit leaves a lot to be desired. As far as how I hooked the probes to a downrigger I clip it on the main cable just above the ball clincher. I've run them on dipsey's and leadcore also. On the dip I clip it through the eye of the swivel from the wire and the leadcore I have a small inline swivel on the fluorocarbon leader about 10' down from the leadcore and about another 20' of leader to the lure. I hook the probe through the eye of the fluro leader.

I put at least 150' of flea line on over my normal mono. Two things. The fish are generally going to be hanging down 90' to 120'. You'll want to add a few extra feet for the blow back on both the rigger balls and the flea line at those depths. Sent from my motorola edge plus 5G UW (2022) using Lake Ontario United mobile app